My Background in Living History

What is My Background in Living History?

At the time of writing this paper, I will have been a historical reenactor for over four years and in three different Living History Groups: Pax Romana (1st Century Roman Britain), Companie of Knights Bachelor (1195 Holy Land), and Sengoku No Bushido (16th century Japan). I first joined Companie of Knights Bachelor, then also joined Pax Romana, and then created Sengoku No Bushido in August, 2016.

I had always loved history as a youngster, and up until I was about nine years old I assumed that the only way one could learn about history was through textbooks, history class and the like. However, when I was about ten years of age, my parents told me about a festival in Caboolture called the Abbey Medieval Festival. I thought this would just be another outing where my parents said it ‘would be fun’, and I kept thinking to myself that they were overreacting when they said I would love it. They eventually were able to convince me to come along, and I saw something that would change the way I saw and learned history forever. It was like going back in time! The festival was filled with individuals wearing old clothes with old names, living casually in their own contexts, all in the 21st century! I truly was in utter bewilderment and wonder!

Before this, I had of course been to museums and I found them to be great to visit and having all sorts of interesting artefacts for me to see and videos to watch. But this festival was something else altogether; these artefacts were not rusted, worn, torn, or barely preserved… they looked like they had been made a few months ago at most, and were being worn and used! I could even smell them! I stayed in a military encampment almost the entire day, trying on armour and holding spears, pretending I was one of my Saxon or other medieval ancestors. I became known as the funny blond haired kid that wore armour and walked up and down the tents, helping to promote a group that I was not even a part of! Some of these reenactors still recognise me as that kid today! 

This experience truly was remarkable and, now that I look back on it, there was so much more going on than I could ever have imagined at the time. It was after that first visit to the festival that I decided I would become one of those crazy guys wearing old clothes and bashing each other with weapons for fun.

Of course being a historical re-enactor turned out to be made of more than just running around in old stuff and ‘being on display’, but this was what made the hobby so captivating! It wasn’t LARP (Live Action Roleplay), it wasn’t cosplay, it wasn’t even SCA (Society of Creative Anachronism) or HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts), while all these are forms of Living History…it was one of the deepest and richest forms of Living History: Historical re-enactment.

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