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Rensaissance Faire Days
"🎶 Fill mine cup, pour some ale in it
Take a sip, tip the wench
Julius, get the carriage!
Ride to London, Amsterdam, Paris and Vatican City
Quoth the Bard, "All the world’s a stage,"
Thus, our entrance be evermore witty!"
~ Uptowne Funk with medieval lyrics, Bardcore cover of Bruno Mars' Uptown Funk
Good morrow, kind sirs and gentle ladies! Do you know “a hawk from a handsaw”?
Shakespeare’s Hamlet did — or at least claimed to — and such a turn of phrase seems quite at home among the many traditional and historic gatherings, festivals and theatrical faires held all over the world, offering a bit of time-travelling entertainment inspired by the Medieval, Renaissance, Victorian and other periods of history.
With its rich, dominant purple, the Faire Family tartan was designed as the official tartan of the Faire Family Online Group. Medieval and Renaissance Faire regulars often form a remarkably close and supportive community — a faire family — and the tartan was created as a way of showing pride in being a “Rennie.”
Costumes, music, re-enactments of period plays and sports, dancing, feasting, artisans, demonstrations and all manner of amusements come together to create highly anticipated events for re-enactors and visitors alike.
One spectacular early precedent for the historically themed faire was Scotland’s Eglinton Tournament of 1839. Held at Eglinton Castle in North Ayrshire in late August, it attempted to recreate a grand medieval tournament, complete with knights, jousting, pageantry and revelry — and attracted an astonishing crowd said to number around 100,000 spectators!
Many faires today are set during the reign of Elizabeth I or Henry VIII, although historical accuracy is not always allowed to stand in the way of a good time. Vikings may wander in from several centuries earlier, pirates from several centuries later, and assorted knights, nobles, peasants, rogues and fantastical creatures may happily mingle together.
And regardless of the century represented, there always seem to be plenty of kilts to be found!
And a word about all that purple! In Tudor England, sumptuary laws regulated who might wear certain colours, fabrics, furs and finery according to rank and station. Purple, long associated with royalty, was particularly restricted — so appearing splendidly arrayed in purple without the proper rank could be considerably more daring than a modern fashion statement.
Be not faint of heart, tartan wearers! Don the royal purple, defy the sumptuary laws, and make merry in this tartan of many colours! 💜 💙 💚 🤍 ❤️ 💛 👑 ⌛ 🏹
'Tis the season for creative anachronism!
In 1957 in the United States, "A Christmas Masque of Traditional Revels" was held in in New York City, and the following year another in Washington, D.C.. In the next decade, along with a revival and interest in early folk music, the modern Renaissance festival was created.
Such public entertainments, especially popular in the United States, include stages or performance areas set up for scheduled shows, such as plays in Shakespearean or commedia dell'arte tradition, as well as anachronistic audience participation comedy routines.
Other performances include dancers, magicians, musicians, jugglers, and singers. Between the stages, the streets ("lanes") are lined with stores ("shoppes") and stalls where independent vendors sell medieval and Renaissance-themed handcrafts, clothing, books, and artworks.
The original Renaissance Pleasure Faire of Southern California (RPFS) was held in the Spring 1966 at the Paramount Ranch located in Agoura, California, focusing on the practices of old English springtime markets and "Maying" customs. And in 1967, a Fall Renaissance fair, with a harvest festival theme, was held first at what is now China Camp State Park in San Rafael, California, and, in 1971, at the Black Point Forest in Novato, California.
Both fairs developed into local traditions and began a movement that spread across the country.
In recent years, American-style Renaissance fairs have made inroads in other countries such as Germany, Canada, and Australia.
The Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) is an international living history group with the aim of studying and recreating mainly Medieval European cultures and their histories before the 17th century. A quip often used within the SCA describes it as a group devoted to the Middle Ages "as they ought to have been", choosing to "selectively recreate the culture, choosing elements of the culture that interest and attract us".
For more on this society and a list of faires throughout the world, click the re-enactors!