[Gregory J. Liebau]

Hello folks,

Two years ago, I sold virtually all of my reenactment goods to fund a travel opportunity, and have since been without even a single set of clothing suitable to wear to a day event. Lately I've been researching what period I might want to devote some energy and resources to in order to "get back into the game." My quest - which as of yet is inconclusive - has made me reconsider some fundamental aspects of reenactment from a personal perspective, as well as of incorporation into a group mentality. I believe these questions, which are aimed at reenactors, are also valid for collectors. So, if you feel that your collection reflects your interests in particular ways, let us know how that's so!

Some of the questions that have come to mind for like double-edged blades. Some folks like to be unique, and there are still many "impressions" that have seen rarely or even never achieved among the reenactment community. However, having a unique kit to go to prolonged events begs the question - which events to attend? There are some diverse events in the United States where many kits would certainly be welcome, such as Days of Knights or Marching Through Time. However, not all kits lend themselves to many of the more serious, period-specific camping events, such as Crossroads in Time (c. 1300-1500). Or, one could build a harness to match the needs of the locals, such as armored WMA groups.

Another major consideration is how a particular kit is appealing to your personality and tastes. Like choosing a car, reenactment kits are a reflection of one's priorities and aestetic sensibilities. Do you want something that aligns with the history you admire and study the most, or something that allows you to experience life in a new way (such as sword fighting versus archery versus making music, perhaps)? What moves you to consider a particular period and kind of kit most suitable for your personality?

Balancing the differences between creating something new, aesthetic pleasure, historical relevance, and the possibility of joining others at events, can be hard to juggle! As many here are also reenactors or serious collectors of historical reproduction armament, I think that such questions are probably common among our lot. If you have any insight into your previous considerations and possible sacrifices in one arena or the other, please share... Cheers!

-Gregory

[Matthew Amt]

[William P]

well im new to the game of reenacting, so my kit is still being built up from off the shelf stuff i bought in order to have something that isnt civvies to wear and also to ensure i can take part in steel combat

my kit is that of a byzantine infantryman of the 10th century AD, similar rank and function on the field to a roman legionary or macedonian phalangite, with pike, kite shield, and sidearm, armoured in mostly very dense cloth armour such as a kneelength gambeson, probably a helmet if he's in the front rank a very thickly quilting/ compressed felt cap and turban if he is not.

most of my friends try and really bling it out as varangian guardsmen or elites of their cultures such as cataphracts or jarls or knights

however i purposely chose to be a infantryman for a few reasons
one is somewhat a question of cost, a gambeson and simple helmet costa a lot less than a whole heap of lamellar or scale armour or a nice fancy helmet (although, of course doing ANYTHING really well in reenacting will still cost you in either money, or time or both, especially since byzantine stuff isnt as well represented in the various medieval merchants

but mostly its to try and address a noticable wrinkle in the living history side of reenacting in that it feels, wrong somehow to have an entire field full of elites with good, rich armour, with the middle and lower classes being underrepresented,

of course as someone whose primary activity within reenacting is fighting, when i started, and even now, i still devote a decent focus, and effort, to maintaining pieces of kit that allow me to fight safely, this means i have quite a conundrum since the early medieval period was well and truely before the widespread adoption of hard gauntlets, often, gauntlets are one of the most important pieces you buy as a combatant,

as time has gone on i have been trying to pay mre and more attention to the living history side of my period, expanding and refining my out of combat kit, such as clothes, appropriate accessories, and especially a good pair of shoes...



(its always seen as puzzling that the byzantine cataphracts, men so heavily armoured they are nicknamed after cooking kilns, never developed and hand protection for them.... )

but, ive been doing this less than 5 years so i cant offer much experience

[Dan Howard]

I sold most of my collection to help pay for Andrew's Dendra Panoply when it came up for sale about ten years ago.
http://myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=8942

Since then I have been very picky when selecting pieces to collect. I only buy one or two things per year and go to a lot of trouble to ensure that they are as close as possible to the museum examples. I'm not interested in re-enacting; I like to have pieces that can help with researching a particular subject.

[Dan Howard]

[Kuo Xie]

Aesthetics plays a huge part for me. I always had a very specific look that I wanted to achieve with my armor. Love the look of mail so I wanted a hauberk to be the centerpiece of the outfit, but on the other hand the head-to-toe mail of the 1100 – 1200s knight didn’t have enough visual variety for me. Go forward a couple hundred years though, and you still have the mail hauberk, but now it's being supplemented with interesting plate and splinted elements. The late 1300s knight with visored great helm, mail hauberk, splinted limbs, and coat-of-plates or early breastplate, is the image that comes in my head when I hear the word "knight".

For example look at these guys:



Elements of mail, splints, scale and plate have a lot of visual variety and make an appealing combo.

As an aside, can anyone ID a source for the second illustration? I pulled it from another forum a long time ago but was never able to find the original source or any effigy references.

[Sean Flynt]

Seems like the rise of "cosplay" would provide options to use even the most obscure kit. Scouting and education groups are often looking for interesting speakers. A great kit could do some real good in helping people understand history and arms and armour.

I'd love to make one good, complete kit--probably late 15th c. or early 16th c. English infantryman. Mainly just to better understand the period. Makes more sense to me to put all energy, skill and resources into a single perfect kit that can be used to teach than to have a dozen kits that are only kinda-sorta and aren't of much educational value.

[Victor R.]

After a couple of experimental buys of ahistorical and mismatched items with an eye towards looking cool at RenFest, I decided to look to my ancestral roots and focus on a Germanic man-at-arms of the late XVth century - nothing too fine or fancy, but solid and good quality. I have about 90% of a military kit together, but nothing really on the civil side. As I continued to build, my eye was caught by earlier eras as well, which is why I have about 90% of a military kit for a late XIVth impression, also Germanic in its aesthetics. Swords, daggers, polearms (large and small) and armor are virtually all influenced by extant Germanic pieces (at least according to their manufacturers, and that seems to jibe with my own research). That's not to say many of the items I've collected couldn't be found elsewhere in Europe, they just tended to be what was prevalent in the areas of what is now Germany and the former HRE. While not actively having anything done right now, when I'm able to do so, I am planning to put together an early 7th century Frankish kit, or, at the very least, a suite of arms. Like the first two not-quite-complete kits, the Frankish commission-to-be was inspired by a sword that caught my interest and derived from the area of my ancestral homeland. The Frankish commission will be my first that is aimed at a true reproduction of a specific sword - or as close as we can get to it from pictures and written descriptions and measurements. Until I saw this particular piece, I had no real interest in collecting anything pre-Crusades - not that I didn't appreciate what I saw, it just wasn't for me until I this particular piece came to my attention. (Gotta love myArmoury - so many ways to influence the spending of my savings and future income!)

For me, once I decided on the geography, it has always begun with a sword, and built from there. Oddly, I still haven't been to RenFest, and probably won't go anytime soon. It's still a bit warm in Texas in October, or, barring that, rainy (this year, we have warm), and the Texas RenFest seems to be less focused on the living history aspect that interests me, and more on pirates and fantasy themes - even the weekends focused on what might be closer to LH, it's XVIth century English. Then again, I do already have a Knecht and a Soldat...Landsknechts were Germanic and XVIth, weren't they.... Hmmmm......