ZARA Tours announces a new and innovative African adventure which will take place for the first time in February 2010: A group of 12-20 participants will live in the East African savanna like in Stone Age time. There will be an expert Stone Age instruction who will teach many prehistoric skills such as making tools, cloths or Stone Age cooking. Further, the participants will interact with members of local tribes such as the Hadzabe Bushmen who are the only active people of hunter-gatherers in Africa.

The group then has to apply what they have learned in order to solve certain tasks. An example is to bake honey-bread. The group must decide who will collect the honey (from wild beehives together with Bushmen), who will build the oven (using simple Stone Age tools) and who will collect the grains, make the wheat, the dough etc.

This is a really exciting new outdoor adventure for anyone seeking for the complete opposite of modern city life – going “back to the roots”. It is also particularly interesting for groups such as universities or clubs of cultural anthropology, ethnology, African sciences, history, archaeology etc. and for corporate team building.

There is a separate website for this new product with all necessary information, dates of upcoming events, video, photos and the possibility to book: http://www.stone-age-experience.com.

The Old Stone House once again opens its doors to celebrate the holiday season as it presents “A Civil War Christmas.”  Scheduled for Saturday, December 5^th and Sunday, December 6th, this free public program highlights the holiday traditions, music, and culture of the 19^th Century.

The event,  organized by the Stone House and Mercer’s 10^th Pennsylvania Reserve Volunteer Company, will include historical reenactments and activities inside the festive holiday atmosphere of The Old Stone House.

Visit the soldiers at home and in camp.  Meet the wives and children who endured the holiday season without husbands and fathers.  Experience a cozy, relaxing celebration set in the midst of one of the most tumultuous and important eras of American history.

Doors will open at 9:00 am on Saturday, 10:00 am on Sunday, and festivities will continue until 5 pm. There will be interactive displays, free refreshments and tours available all day.  All aspects of the celebration are free to the public; donations to benefit the programs of the Old Stone House and the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves are greatly appreciated.

Scheduled events are listed below; stop by any time to meet reenactors and enjoy the historical holiday decor inside the Stone House.

Saturday, December 5th

9:00 am Open to Public

10:00 am. Soldiers’ Drill

1:00 pm. Soldiers’ Drill

2:00 pm. Kids Militia

3:00 pm. Skirmish

5:00 pm. Closed

Sunday, December 6th

10:00 am. Open to Public

11:00 am. Soldiers’ Drill

1:30 pm. Soldiers’ Drill

2:00 pm. Kids Militia

2:30 pm. Skirmish

5:00 pm.  Closed

Eine Reise in das Leben des 13. Jahrhunderts , unter diesem Motto stand der Besuch im Histotainment Park Adventon.
Ein wirklich stimmiges Bild des Hochmittelalters zeigte an diesem Tag der Verein „Die Reisecen“, sie ermöglichten dem interessierten Besucher einen wirklich Guten Einblick in das Leben dieser Zeit.
Durch eine Modenschau die von Markus Single, der Vorstand des Vereins sehr durchdacht Moderiert wurde , zeigte er dem Publikum die großen und kleinen Unterschiede sowie den alltäglichen Zweck der Gewandung vom einfachen Bauern bis hin zum Ministerialen.
Man hat bei der Darstellung gemerkt, dass dieser Verein mit vollem Einsatz sein Hobby lebt.
Sei es durch Hand genähte Gewänder oder Zelte, wo erst erwähntes durch Schnittmuster aus einschlägiger Literatur recherchiert und selber gefärbt wurde.
Aber auch die Erklärungen auf alle Fragen die vom Publikum gestellt wurden, zeigten dass die Mitglieder gutes Hintergrundwissen über ihr Hobby besitzen.
Ein weiteres Highlight an diesem Tag war die Schußvorführung des voll funktionsfähigen Großkatapult auch „Trebuchet“ genannt.
Diese Art Katapult konnte Steine von 10 kg bis weit über 100 kg mehrere hundert Meter weit schleudern und war eine der gefürchtetsten Waffen des Hoch- und Spätmittelalters.

Der Histotainment Park Adventon mit seinen Siedlern bietet Familien und Interessierten eine wirklich gute Möglichkeit sich experimentelle Archäologie von nahen an zu sehen.
Ob man sich nun in die Frühmittelalterliche Epoche bewegt um das Wikingerhaus zu begutachten, oder dem Köhler im Hochmittelalter bei der Arbeit zu sieht.
Man kann trotz der ganzen Bauphasen und noch offenen Baustellen ganz gut erkennen wo hin dieses große Projekt mal führen soll, zu einer mittelalterlichen Stadt.
Innovativ ist auch das Besucherzeltlager an dem Familien oder Gruppen eine Art „Tagesstützpunkt“ errichten können.
Das Lager besteht aus 3 Zelten, einem Grill, sowie Tischen und Bänken das auch für mehrere Tage gemietet werden kann.
Gruppen mit eigenen Zelten sind nach Absprache gern gesehene Gäste.
Ein Besuch in der Gastwirtschaft „zum Spießbürger“ ist empfehlenswert und lädt zum verweilen im schönen Innenhof mit seinen Marktständen ein.
Ein Besuch in Adventon lohnt sich auf jeden Fall.

Mehr Informationen zu Adventon finden sie unter www.Adventon.de ,und zum Verein Die Reisecen e.V unter www.die-reisecen.de

©Florian Fraunholz / kopist.eu /paxcrucis.de

Today is Veteran’s Day. The day where we honor our soldiers with ceremonies, speeches, and (my favorite) reenactments.

We should never forget how the armed forces have protected us throughout the years. I’m proud of them, and of the great sacrifice many of them made to protect us.

Personally, I was hoping to celebrate the way that Veteran’s Day should always be celebrated: start by dressing up all nice and fancy, shoot some blanks at other reenactors, and then burn Atlanta to the ground. Bring marshmallows and beer for the afterparty.

I would love to come as Teddy Roosevelt. When you’re Teddy Roosevelt, every hill is San Juan Hill. It just never gets old. I’ll bet if, today, you take Teddy Roosevelt, put him in front of a hill, let him think for awhile, and he’ll turn and say to you, “You know, I think I would like to charge up that hill. Excuse me.” I just wish he would quit stealing my bugle.

Unfortunately, nowadays they don’t let you get all that caught up in the reenactment. I asked, but the Atlanta Board of Commerce frowned on the idea. Like they care about historical accuracy.

I checked Google for reenactments. I don’t have any kind of reenactment gear, but I do have a lot of gray clothing. The closest thing I got was a reenactment of the Second Virginia Convention of 1775. Sounded boring.

So instead, I spent the day reenacting many of my finest games on Halo. Now where’s my shotgun?

Soooo, it wasn’t the best idea to start a new blog and then not update it in two months. All I can say is that I’ve been super busy with my life, and haven’t really had time for reenactment stuff. I’m also going through some kind of lack of inspiration. I’ve been doing reenactment for eight years, and at the moment I feel like I’m at dead-end with this hobby. Sometimes it feels as if this hobby takes more than it gives back and leaves you with a bad conscience and a bad spirit.

Different handcrafts should be relaxing and at best even empowering during bad times, but lately I’ve felt those have become a burden. I’m going trough a very hectic period in my life, with studies and work, and I just don’t have time for every nice event and every new piece of clothing. Actually I don’t even have time for my regular chores. Reenactment-wise it doesn’t help that I move in a span of 500 years and occasionally would like to visit some other eras too. I feel like I’m bouncing from one thing to another, unable to concentrate on anything.

However, I’m currently attending an iron age weaving course at the local adult education centre. We are going to make a pair of winingas after a findings from the Kirkkomäki burials in Turku, and some of us are also going to weave an apron after the same findings. It’s a short course, so we don’t have time to really get into details on weaving, but it’s a nice start, and it’s going to be really refreshing to do something from almost a scratch (my weft is self-spinned).

It actually feels nice to think about the future project. I’ll probably have time for the weaving only at the end of this year, so this is going to take almost the whole autumn, but that’s o-kay. One can’t demand too much from herself.

One of my contacts in LiveJournal used a term slow reenactment.  It’s like slow food. Good, healthy, high quality and non artificial. No aiming for high standards, but to have it here and now. I think the concept is brilliant. No need to rush, but when you do something, you do it right. I don’t think that  you need to tan your own leather for your shoes or weave your own fabrics in order to be a good reenactor.  But I do think that with this hobby, quality does matter. You can use months to embroider a pouch, like Elina did, and when it’s finally ready, it truly is wonderful and you can use it for years.

Maybe at some point I’ll get my mojo back. Until then, the sporadic updates will continue.

Soldiers are marching to a temporary historical military village at Suomenlinna seafortress UNESCO World Heritage Site.

This is a CDP theme day post so Click here to view thumbnails for all participants

You want to know about me?

Really?

REALLY?

Fine, you asked for it!

Ok, so I’m 19, I live on the South Coast of England, I am blonde, quite short and I like rasperries, sushi, glowsticks and cats. My life at the moment seems to be split into 4 parts: 3 parts social and 1 part academic (actually, that’s always the proportions I seem to prioritise into) and these are:

University: I’ve just started an art foundation year. It’s not going amazingly at the moment, but I’m hoping once we get to the stage where we can do whatever we want, it’ll improve. And, as I worked out this morning, I’m a quarter of the way through my course already! (It’s only one year long.)

Sailing: My whole family is really into this, and living right next to the sea as we do, it’s a big part of our lives. The local sailing club is where I spend most of my weekends, and most of my summer is spent on a boat of some sort! I’ll admit now though, I’m a bit of a fairweather sailor – come November I’d rather be snuggled up in the clubhouse with a hot chocolate than freezing my wetsuit boots off on the water!

Tudor Reenacting: Ok, a somewhat unusual hobby I know, and again something my whole family does. I’ve been doing it all my life, and it’s very special to me. The people I meet doing it are some of the most amazing and lovely people ever, and it’s such a hoot! My friends all think it’s some kind of weird orgy cult… and actually I guess you could call it that… but it’s A M A Z I N G it really is! For more info visit www.kentwell.co.uk

And last but CERTAINLY not least, my old school friends. Some have gone off to uni this year and others are on gap years, but I am missing them all lots – I loved my school A LOT and I really do miss it – the people, the teachers, the whole atmosphere and collective sense of humour that there seemed to be there. Oh dear how cheesy does that sound! But it’s true anyway, so yuppp!

So, each of these things are equally imporant in my mind (ok ok, maybe I’m lying a little bit: I tend to think that the social side is more important than uni!!!) so I expect that you shall hear a lot more about all of these things in the not-so-distant future. However, for fear of boring you, dear readers, I shall call it a night (I correct myself, a morning) since I am rather tired and am teaching some kids how to sail tomorrow! (Oh help, I hope I won’t drown them)!

Pip pip!

Lucy

Franske Marie, som er en av vennene mine på DeviantART, er stock-fotograf og reenactment-fantast. Hun syr ikke selv, men setter sammen de nydeligste antrekk av klær og tilbehør som hun finner i nærområdet sitt og på nett. Deretter arrangerer hun photo-shoots og publiserer bilder til fri benyttelse for folk som synes at det er morsomt å manipulere bilder i Photoshop. Denne spesielle bildeserien inspirerte meg på flere måter, og jeg har dermed planer om å sy et nytt antrekk i middelalderstil. Om jeg får brukt det er ikke så viktig enda, jeg har stoff liggende fra før av og fikk tak i gråverk kaninskinn til en billig penge. Lærbrynja får komme til sist, når jeg har blitt rik.

Shieldmaiden V by Grinmir-Stock

My eight year old daughter and I took our first tour yesterday of the Sheboygan County Historical Museum.  It is located about 50 minutes north of Milwaukee, Wisconsin right off of Interstate 43.  It was a wonderful experience and I highly recommend it to home schoolers and parents who want their children to experience history with all of their senses. 

During the tour we saw five buildings.  The first building was the museum and gift shop.  The museum portrays local history and artifacts featuring Native American, the circus, dentist and doctor, maritime and so much more.  Our tour guide, Angie, met us here and we started the tour of Judge David Taylor’s Sheboygan home pictured here.  This location was the original site of the house. The museum has such a vast array of artifacts to discuss in each of the buildings.  The most interesting artifact in the house, which I had never seen before, was a chair with a music box built into it which photographers of the time used to let the photographed know how long to sit still for.

We went on to a log cabin built in 1862, during the time of the civil war, which was moved to this site.  It is perhaps one of the best log cabins I have toured.  Angie demonstrated how the German builder of the log cabin treated a fallen tree before using it for one of the logs.  All of our questions were answered.  She was very patient and informative.

Next was the Cheese Factory.  Of course, Wisconsin is the dairy state. The Cheese Factory was moved to this site in one piece in the late 1980s.  We learned how milk was delivered in milk jugs by the local dairy farmers, weighed and paid for.  Then the milk and other ingredients were put into a large rectangular vat and turned to curds and whey.  She said the more liquid or whey that could be removed from the curds the better the cheese.  Different bacteria that is added to the cheese makes the different flavors of cheese such as cheddar, mozzarella, or Colby.  We saw a press that removed even more of the whey.  She also said that we don’t really have to refrigerate cheese.  Back in the 1800s it wasn’t refrigerated. We just think it has to be refrigerated today. 

Then my big surprise!  A collection of butter churns!  These churns were larger churns used to make larger quantities of butter than a dash churn.  There was even one shaped like a big box that would be turned with a crank.  I did some research on this one which I had never seen before. I got this information from dairyantiques.com.

There are no paddles inside this churn.  Cranking made the box tumble corner over corner and in the process the cream was churned into butter.  The earliest churns used a lid that wedged tight with a slight rotation.  This design was also shown in the patent papers.  Later churns, like the one pictured here, utilized the sealing mechanisms found on many barrel butter churns.  We suspect that these lids formed a tighter seal and as the patents ran out they could be used on this churn.  The stenciling on the churn boasts of first place premiums won at state fairs in Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, Illinois, St. Louis and Iowa.  The stenciling also tells of a first place premium and medal from the World’s Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition in New Orleans, a gold medal from the Grand Union Dairy Fair in Milwaukee in 1882 as well as a sweepstakes gold medal awarded in St. Louis in 1883.

The squander bug, the British government’s wartime propaganda campaign cartoon figure has crept back from exile. All this talk of food waste encourages him (or her?) He or she might not be wearing swastikas anymore, more likely pound or dollar signs? (Insert own local currency figures here!)

Maybe we can frighten off the squander bug in his food waste form with a squirt of self-sufficiency from our wartime zoo keeper’s garden!

What could be better than a squirt from a recycled Stirrup Pump, used commonly after the war in zoos and home gardens for watering and bug or weed killing? Their original purpose was for ARP air raid precautions and  firefighting which is what they were issued to zoo keepers and householders for. Swords into ploughshares when used on the veg patch!

Our stirrup pump still works but we no longer pour water through its 70 year old insides. It belongs in our archive collection of wartime objects, along with the charming recycled ‘wartime reenactor’  bear (from the zoo’s lost property section) in his child evacuee’s case of handmade original wartime toys. The puzzle at the bottom of the suitcase is made from an old butter box by a wartime dad for his child. The squander bug doesn’t really belong in here!

Our recycled ‘wartime reenactor’  bear (from the zoo’s lost property section, Paddington style) doesn’t have a name yet. Any suggestions can be emailed to mark.norris@newquayzoo.org.uk in time for our next wartime garden weekend at the zoo, most likely in May 2010.

Wartime recycled handmade toys and a re-enactor bear have got the squander bug surrounded - surrender! Objects from the Newquay Zoo wartime garden archive collection.

Squander bug and original 1939 stirrup pump in Newquay Zoo's wartime zoo keeper's garden ( with lovely dwarf French beans 'safari' variety)

Jeg har dagbok på Live Journal, interiørblog på Blogspot, konto på Deviantart og vedlikeholder bueskytternes blog. Så hva skal jeg med enda en kanal?

Jeg trenger nye lekekamerater. Jeg vet at reenactment er en SMAL interesse, men det må da vel finnes flere i Tromsø som er som meg? Jeg vil finne dere, dere snodige mennesker som vil føle at historien vår er nærmere enn i bøkene. Jeg vil studere, utforske, lage, reise!

Visby

For noen måneder siden var jeg så deprimert over tingenes tilstand at jeg trodde jeg var nødt til å finne opp meg selv helt på nytt. Men turen til Lofoten ble en vekker, og folk jeg møtte fikk meg til å innse at å slippe taket i alt jeg har levd for var helt feil! Interessen for historie farger faktisk det meste av det jeg gjør på en eller annen måte. Til og med jobben min, for hva annet er stil enn historie?

Jeg har skjønt at en blog gir en større kontaktflate enn en vanlig nettside. En annonse på universitetets virtuelle oppslagstavle var fullstendig resultatløs. Så derfor prøver jeg dette, kanskje kan det en dag føre meg dit jeg vil.

Sam had deep blue eyes that I knew I’d have no trouble staring into all night. Judging from his online profile (his favorite books that were listed, and the law school he graduated from), Sam struck me as a smart and well-rounded guy. We’d been trying to meet up for a while, but he’d been on vacation upstate for the last 5 days. I was excited for our date and I chose to sit at a low-lit and hidden corner table so that we could have some privacy. After we ordered cocktails, I asked him about his vacation.

“I didn’t get much rest. I was actually running around all day in armor!” he said. His blue eyes gleamed with passion and I knew I had a comedian on my hands. I laughed and played along with his joke.

“Oh yeah? What were you doing wearing armor?” I whispered trying to sound flirty.

“I make my own armor and I’m pretty proud of that because a lot of people buy theirs. It takes more planning and work to construct it- but it’s more legit that way in my mind. I was fighting against the Kingdom of Aethelmearc!” he said beaming.

He definitely had an odd sense of humor but at least he was trying to amuse me. He was a hot lawyer- and that’s all that mattered- so what if his humor was slightly off? He continued…

“It’s a medieval reenactment battle that takes place upstate a few times a year. You spend the whole day outside, even when it rains, and you only sleep in 20-minute intervals at night in case the enemy attacks. That’s why I’m kind of tired, but I always come back really energized at the same time.” He said all of this very matter-of-factly.

This guy was thrilled about his medieval war achievements…and SERIOUS. It almost hit me as hard as the vodka tonic I had just downed- and I pretty much launched forward to grab the waitress’s arm as she passed by and told her we’d take some tequila shots. Then he asked me what my hobbies were. I told him I liked yoga.

“See…my battles are like what yoga must be like for you. It’s such a great feeling while you’re doing it and afterwards you just feel amazing. I think you’d be perfect for a battle by the way- you seem athletic and focused. You should really look into it!”

I just nodded and leaned my head back to flood my mouth with tequila. Feeling a little happier and woozy after the shot, I decided to have some fun with the situation. The next minutes of our conversation went like this:

Me: That sounds fascinating! You must have a horse too, right?
Knight: No, unfortunately not – we’re mostly on foot at the one I go to.
Me: So if I were to go to one of these battles, what would I be?
Knight: You can be whomever you want!! That’s why it’s so great! People change their
real names and take on new ones. I’m Knight Ferdinand Rothson- there are also
Dukes, Barons, Duchesses- people can take on any identity they want. We also
adopt accents.
Me: Well, I would want to be a princess then- but I’d want to sleep in a castle.
Knight: Yeah- you could be a princess. We don’t have castles per-se, most people sleep
in cots but I’m sure something could be arranged.

He sipped on his drink and told me he knows a lady who in real life is an IT Consultant but makes costumes for the women that attend the battles. He said he’d be glad to put me in touch with her. I was getting bored.

Me: Ok, so let’s get real……..how much sex goes down at these kinda things?

He paused for a few seconds and kind of just blinked at me like I had just asked something extremely inappropriate. He looked offended.

Knight: Well sex is not really the point of going to battles. People are more focused on
what’s going on and on not being attacked.

I was about to say something about how people had lots of sex in medieval times and just didn’t go around telling their neighbors about it…but I stopped myself short. Awesome- so you get to sleep in dirty cots for 5 sexless nights in make-believe land where grown up men and women pretend to stab each other with fake swords. I guess sex in 20-minute intervals would be a big bummer anyway. As we left the bar he told me he had recently quit his job at the law firm to write a book and spend more time at reenactments.

This guy wasn’t just talking out of his a**, these things really exist to my surprise. Watch this:

A German fallschirmjager pops up out of a farm field to take a shot during the WWII Weekend at Eisenhower Farm in Gettysburg, PA.

The year is 1682 and the American civil war is raging throughout the south. Kentucky was a politically neutral state and wanted no part in the war…but the Union and Confederate Armies had different plans. Lincoln wrote in 1861 that…

“I think to lose Kentucky is nearly to lose the whole game.”

And so they fought. On October 8 of 1862, the two armies of the north and south converged in a field outside of the small town of Perryville, 10 miles west of Danville. The Battle of Perryville eventually turned out to be a key and decisive battle during the civil war with a combined total of 38,000 soldiers fighting and over 7,600 losing their lives during the ensuing gun fight.

Each year in October, the Perryville Battlefield holds a civil war reenactment and so The Advocate Messenger’s Clay Jackson and I woke up “early” on saturday morning and headed out to the actual battlefield which sits in the middle of Kentucky’s rolling hills. The air this time of year is very cool and crisp and the cloudless skies made for wonderful lighting as the sun rose over the knobs and trees.

As a history major, I was loving this. I am not a particularly big civil war buff, but it was a period in our nations history that has defined who we as a people are, so it was a really interesting to see hundreds of people dressed from head to toe in authentic civil war era clothing, carrying muskets, and sleeping in triangular white tents, sipping coffee from steel pots and enjoying the cool morning air. These re-enactors take this experience VERY seriously and I tried to capture their devotion to a time period as best I could.

Unfortunately I have other engagements for this afternoon so I will not be able to cover today’s battle but the second part of the battle reenactment is tomorrow and I will be covering that for a while. I can tell you from listening to a few cannons and muskets going off and echoing around the Kentucky countryside that the battle will be a really cool experience. I will get some audio and put a slideshow together sometime sunday night.

Enjoy!

Yes I certainly am starting to get excited about playing Dungeons & Dragons with my 9 yo nephew. I have been reviewing the laughable YouTube videos about it. There is one with John Madden as the Dungeon Master:

and another with an 8-bit reenactment of an actual game session:

Roll 2d10+5 for the hilarity level and drunkenness level.

So I have my character sheet almost all made up and I still have to read through all of the books and “memorize” them. Hopefully my nephew and I can go to the local coin collectors shop and join in the Saturday morning sessions.