[HN Gopher] How did Renaissance fairs begin?
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How did Renaissance fairs begin?
Author : pseudolus
Score : 42 points
Date : 2025-09-27 18:30 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.history.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.history.com)
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| Since 1963. The Byrds attended the first series of renfaires.
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AFlBoxsAkI#ren
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Well-Met-Renaissance-American-Counter...
| IAmBroom wrote:
| If you stretch the "Renaissance" back to the Middle Ages (1300s
| CE), Japan had them in the Renaissance itself.
|
| 1500s samurais popularized a pasttime of reenacting 1300s
| samurais. Except, being Japan, they had actual relics of the
| period in pristine condition.
|
| I know someone in the SCA who portrays a 1500s samurai who
| portrays a 1300s samurai - giving him two periods of costume to
| play with, without "changing persona" at all. Kinda.
| A_D_E_P_T wrote:
| One could make the argument that you're off by about 125 years.
|
| The 1839 Eglinton Tournament, was, in a way, a Renaissance
| Fair. It was a _massive spectacle_ at the time, became
| enduringly famous (or infamous), and helped to kick-off the
| Romantic 19th century fascination with the medieval:
|
| > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eglinton_Tournament
| Mistletoe wrote:
| What interests me is why humans crave this one time in history
| (medieval?). It's old enough to be different than now but not old
| enough to be like caveman times? Lower technology than now but
| not no technology. Do people in other countries that aren't
| western civilization have similar cravings for that era or an era
| like it?
| Tsiklon wrote:
| Renaissance fairs don't really exist in Europe. Most countries
| have their own traditional festivals and customs which date
| back to that time period.
| Swizec wrote:
| > Renaissance fairs don't really exist in Europe.
|
| We have them in Slovenia. In the summer local castles will
| put on a fair for the tourists and kids. Sometimes multiple!
|
| Typically you get a visiting troupe or two from Italy, they
| like to do flag twirling shows. There's always a group of
| folks from Czech who put on an armored fighting competition.
| I've seen jousting tournaments too. And then you have a slew
| of local artisans selling wares roughly inspired by the time
| period. There's often an outdoor play or two, maybe belly
| dancing.
|
| It's all great fun.
| A_D_E_P_T wrote:
| There were at least a dozen this past summer. There was one
| in Zovnek Castle two weeks ago. A couple of weeks before
| that, in Ptuj. Before that, in Celje. Before that, there
| was a Roman-era festival in Ptuj, which was seriously cool.
| And the _best_ medieval-themed festival was in Zuzemberk.
|
| I went to all of them because I have young kids and they
| love that stuff. It's a fun day out. Also gives us an
| excuse to wear all of the arms and armor we've collected,
| lol.
|
| There are lots of these in Austria, too, BTW. There was a
| two-week-long joust fair/festival by Millstatter See in
| early August!
|
| In truth, these festivals are all over Europe. They're just
| not well advertised, so you have to look for them.
|
| The next one in the region, by the way, is the medieval-
| themed Advent festival at the castle in Friesach.
| (Austria.) I'll be there for sure.
| Swizec wrote:
| > In truth, these festivals are all over Europe. They're
| just not well advertised, so you have to look for them.
|
| Considering how crowded they feel, I'd say the
| advertising is plenty sufficient. They're local events
| with limited space.
| A_D_E_P_T wrote:
| That's true of some of them. Some of the other ones --
| usually the ones in out-of-the-way castles (but also,
| surprisingly, both of the events in Ptuj) -- could have
| been twice as busy, and they'd still have plenty of room.
|
| Ah, anyway, it's nice that there's always something to do
| on a Summer's weekend...
| mcv wrote:
| I don't know what a renaissance fair is like exactly, but
| Netherland has several medieval and fantasy themed festivals.
|
| Castle Fest is centered around music (I think it was
| originally organized by the folk band Omnia), but has tons of
| combat and archery demonstrations, a market with clothes and
| weapons (blunt steel and boffer), esoteric stuff and anything
| else that vaguely fits in there.
|
| Elfia, formerly known as the Elf Fantasy Fair is a fantasy-
| themed cosplay festival held twice a year.
|
| Keltfest (10,000 visitors, apparently) is about ancient
| crafts, music, archery, with workshops and demonstrations.
|
| I've also been to a few smaller ones I forgot the names of,
| but these are all pretty big, I think.
| kace91 wrote:
| At least here in Spain we do have medieval markets not tied
| to a specific festivity.
|
| Not sure how much they resemble American ren fairs, but they
| tend to have falconry exhibitions, smiths forging stuff,
| sellers of wooden toys and artisan jewelry..
| cestith wrote:
| At a surface level, that sounds very similar. There's also
| a lot of selling of art, swords, axes, period clothing, and
| such. Oh, and it's the US so there's lots and lots of food.
| rbanffy wrote:
| I wonder if some part of it is because in Europe it's local
| history, while in America it's something imported from an
| idealized past.
| thatguy0900 wrote:
| China at least has the mythologized three kingdoms period and
| wuxia stuff, pretty relatable to arthurian style fables.
| Dynasty warriors is probably the biggest exposure the west has
| had to it off the top of my head
| bill38 wrote:
| Does China have something equivalent to "renaissance fairs" ?
| = re-enactment of things that happened 5 or 6 centuries ago ?
| palmotea wrote:
| > What interests me is why humans crave this one time in
| history (medieval?).
|
| Based on the OP, it sounds like it's nothing special about the
| time period. It sounds like someone put one on as a one time
| event then it became regular event. People think they're fun,
| and it spread.
|
| > It's old enough to be different than now but not old enough
| to be like caveman times?
|
| Ancient Greece/Rome would also fit that bill, but I haven't
| heard of an "Ancient Rome Fair."
| burkaman wrote:
| There's at least one in Europe:
| https://www.augustaraurica.ch/en/roman-festival
|
| Also a British city that does an annual Saturnalia festival:
| https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-merseyside-67680824
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| You've probably heard of Carnival, which served as a sort of
| Roman ren faire for renaissance Italians.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Sadly the illuminati called dibs on having events based on
| that time period.
| triceratops wrote:
| Similarly why do people dress up as pirates and Vikings for
| Halloween? We're talking about gangs of armed robbers who
| engaged in rape, pillage, murder, and slaving.
| kace91 wrote:
| Sounds scary enough. Why are people dressing as non scary
| things though?
| triceratops wrote:
| I didn't think of that, that's fair.
| kragen wrote:
| The humans find narratives about those things very
| interesting, perhaps because listening to them has been a
| crucial survival trait since they evolved storytelling. But
| the question above is why there are Renaissance Faires rather
| than Middle and High Medieval Faires (Viking times) or Early
| Modern Faires (Treasure Island times).
| chrisco255 wrote:
| In my experience, Ren Faires tend to run the whole range of
| early medieval to renaissance times.
|
| In Florida, there is a permanent year round dinner
| entertainment show that includes horseback stunts called
| Medieval Times. In my local Ren Faire, it's really all
| meshed together, if someone wanted to have a viking event
| or attraction it would fit right in and no one would bat an
| eye.
| 5555624 wrote:
| Medieval Times has nine locations in the US and one in
| Canada.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| Didn't realize, was only aware of the FL one. Good to
| know!
| kragen wrote:
| So the answer is that people are unclear on the concept
| of "Renaissance"?
| chrisco255 wrote:
| It's just become a stand-in word to describe this class
| of fairs. In practice, sometimes they are called medieval
| fairs at the event, but there's not a huge distinction.
| No one is going to nitpick at a medieval fair that some
| tech or innovation didn't exist until later and if a ren
| fair features elements of medieval times, it's just not
| going to be called out. Most people mean early
| renaissance anyways, as the fantasy to play up to, when
| knights and swords still played a big role and before
| colonial empires and musketeers really took over.
| jltsiren wrote:
| That depends on the country. In Finland, reenactment events
| tend to be either "ancient" or "medieval". The former focus
| on the Iron Age until around 1200, or prehistoric times
| before Swedish rule and the establishment of Christianity.
| The latter extend until around 1500 or 1600.
|
| Then there is a separate tradition around idealized peasant
| life in the 18th and 19th centuries. But that's not really
| reenactment, as the tradition started with the rise of
| nationalism in the 19th century.
| pixl97 wrote:
| Invention of the printing press caused more late medieval
| and Renaissance data to be captured?
| burkaman wrote:
| They aren't dressing up as actual pirates and vikings,
| they're dressing up as fictional archetypes inspired by stuff
| like Pirates of the Caribbean and How to Train Your Dragon.
|
| Halloween pirates are as different from real pirates as Star
| Wars Stormtroopers are from real-life stormtroopers.
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| Sometimes people like to think about, and even roleplay, some
| pretty dark stuff. Especially on the day set aside for
| exactly this sort of thing.
| leetharris wrote:
| It is similar enough to our modern notions of civilization,
| while being a simpler time.
|
| Also, lots of fantasy stuff is written in medieval-style
| settings, which means lots of fiction meshes well with the
| environment of a medieval renfest.
| jfengel wrote:
| Theoretically it's Renaissance rather than Medieval. And
| English Renaissance at that, which is well after the
| Renaissance was well underway in Italy.
|
| But most RenFests seem to cover a period of about 500 years,
| plus a fair bit of outright fantasy.
|
| At least at my local one, there is a Court playing out a
| fictional version of a real event early in the reign of Henry
| VIII, a period right on the cusp which I would call medieval
| rather than Renaissance. The people involved in that project
| actually have a good understanding of the history and are
| trying for some sort of period accuracy. Everyone else...
|
| Why is that period so fascinating? Pretty clothes, and just
| enough superstitious belief in magic to let you play fantasy
| stories. Plus the actual history really is cool, even if it's
| only obliquely referenced.
| CivBase wrote:
| > Why is that period so fascinating?
|
| My guess is the invention of the printing press. Thanks to
| that, tons of stories and myths have been preserved and
| proliferated with origins in the Renaissance.
|
| We also tend to group a lot of Medieval and Victorian era
| stuff in with the Renaissance, meaning it effectively spans a
| huge era of recorded human history.
| throwup238 wrote:
| The printing press definitely played a huge role.
|
| The earliest equivalents of modern mass market paperbacks
| were fueled by existing legends like King Arthur and the
| Knights of the Roundtable which invented the whole medieval
| romanticism genre. I don't think it's a coincidence that a
| lot of the cosplay gear at renfaires reflects that 12-13th
| century era rather than the changes that amassed versus gun
| powder (although that might just be the ones I've been to).
|
| Sadly not much of that literature survived because it was
| bottom of the market and it's hard for scholars to really
| study.
| navbaker wrote:
| Maryland?
| jfengel wrote:
| Yep. I gather it's one of the better ones. It's certainly
| insanely popular. It practically sells out its entire
| season before it even opens.
|
| And I have never once been aware of the Court. I know about
| it only because I have friends in it. They put a lot of
| effort into that story line.
| navbaker wrote:
| I just started going a few years back and I agree, it is
| really well done. One of my neighbors is the king's main
| guard, so we get all sorts of behind the scenes anecdotes
| at the kids' bus stop in the morning.
| SJC_Hacker wrote:
| > At least at my local one, there is a Court playing out a
| fictional version of a real event early in the reign of Henry
| VIII, a period right on the cusp which I would call medieval
| rather than Renaissance.
|
| Henry VIII was in the early-mid 16th century. Thats's pretty
| darn late to consider medevial. Dates vary considerably but
| most historians consider the medevial era to have ended
| sometimes in the 15th century. Conquest of Constantinpole
| (1453) is a pretty common, albeit arbitrary date.
|
| The Renaissance era, was considered to have begun in Italy
| sometime in the mid 15th century. Of course it took some time
| to spread throughout Europe. But by ~1500 Europe was mostly
| considered to be in the Renaissance. Certainly by 1521 when
| Martin Luther appeared at the Diet of Worms which kicked off
| the Reformation
| rdtsc wrote:
| A lot of fairy tales in the West take place in a "medieval
| mythical time" as I call it: Snow White, Jack and the
| Beanstalk, Rapunzel, Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella etc. Not
| sure how many children are still reading or hearing those these
| days but I think that generates some of the interest. The women
| can still pretend to be Cinderella and men get to pretend to be
| knights or Robin Hood and such.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Yeah. I think this setting goes from like... the fall of
| western Rome to the Early Modern period, haha. (I mean, King
| Arthur stories have been reimagined with Arthur as a Roman or
| somebody filling the vacuum of them leaving Britain, so it
| must bump up against that side).
| LunaSea wrote:
| King Arthur is most likely a story talking about the
| defence of Britain against the Saxon invaders by the
| "native" Britons but told by Anglo Saxons 400-500 years
| later that were themselves living the invasion of Britain
| by the Normans this time.
| tsimionescu wrote:
| I would guess that a large part of it is that it's the oldest
| period of time for which we have significant details, and a
| strong association with the people there as our ancestors (in
| the respective countries where such fairs are prevalent). We
| have much less idea of what ancient Roman or Celtic or Norse or
| Thracian etc day to day life actually looked like, and to the
| extent that we do know, it's much weirder and more foreign.
| crazygringo wrote:
| There's just something appealing about this period of time
| before all the modern technological "evils" seemed to take
| over: capitalism, firearms, factories, etc.
|
| And it's particularly romantic in terms of castles, knights,
| and clothing.
|
| Of course it's not exactly historically accurate. E.g. firearms
| were definitely a thing at the time, but the fairs focus on
| swords, shields, and bows.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| In reality though, feudalism was just one notch above
| pastoral slavery. You had no rights, most people were trapped
| into poverty and bound to a plot of land to work on the rest
| of their lives. The vast majority were not nobility so were
| given breadcrumbs. Wars were brutal and constant, bows were
| as deadly as firearms for a couple centuries, as evidenced by
| the Commanche even into the 1800s (they took more skill to
| train though). Only after capitalism and factories did anyone
| get empowered to improve this situation.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Oh, absolutely. But here everybody gets to cosplay as
| nobility -- knights and princesses and such. Or the "saucy
| wench" in the tavern, or the court jester or whatever. And
| merchants.
|
| It's definitely about the pre-industrial courtly
| romanticism of it, not the reality of an average person at
| the time.
| bluGill wrote:
| Everyone at a fair is a noble, or merchant. Very had very
| different rights, and a much better lifestyle
| (realistically common merchants were probably worse off,
| but we pretend they were better). The peasants were not
| invited to see a joust - some did see it, but only because
| they were servants who's job happen to put them in the
| right spot.
| IAmBroom wrote:
| "Invited to see" is not "allowed to see".
|
| I suspect tournaments were heavily attended by any
| peasants who could get there. Their money, however hard-
| scramble, was just as useful to merchants selling meat
| pies, fried sweetened breads, and beer/wine.
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| first off, as a ren fest veteran, it's easier to just take
| "renaissance" to mean "basically any time between the collapse
| of rome and world war i, also with the possibility of time
| travellers and things that never existed in the first place and
| anachronisms like turkeys in pre-Colombian England" and take
| "Renaissance" with the capital "r" to mean "from the 1300s to
| roughly the discovery of the new world"
|
| Second, I think it's an interesting question to ask if people
| craved this particular past or if they just craved a space
| where everything is vastly different and settled on this period
| because it's pretty firmly embedded in our cultural mythology
| and everyone has an idea, however historically inaccurate, of
| what this time period was like. I think it's less that we built
| it because this is specifically what we want and more that this
| was waiting for us to materialize it. The majority of what
| people get from the ren fest isn't renaissance specific, it's
| just about going to a place that's different enough to be novel
| and exciting but familiar enough to be comfortable. I think
| that if we did a Flintstone Fest where we all dressed as cave
| folk that would be similar enough that you have people who go
| to both. In fact I may be a little biased because I actually
| like to bring a caveman character to our local fest's time
| traveller's weekend. It's fun to turn the conceit on its head
| by walking around acting amazed at how advanced everything is.
| I could also foresee a successful Old West Fest. All time
| periods that are vastly different than now, but with a
| familiarity from being studied, stereotyped and riffed on in
| the common culture. A comfortable elsewhere and elsewhen.
| bluGill wrote:
| I love camping, sleeping in just a tent, cooking on a fire.
| But only for a week here and there, most of the time I'm glad
| to live in my house with HVAC, and cooking in a modern
| kitchen is much easier. However it is fun to do with less -
| intentionally - for a short time once in a while.
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| You know I'd never considered it but a lot of small to
| medium sized music festivals probably scratch the same
| Temporary Autonomous Zone itch as the ren fest. It's just a
| somewhere else to go for a bit where things are different
| because we're all pretty sick of how they are here.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| > Old West Fest
|
| For sure, there are things like Cheyenne Frontier Days though
| not sure that it really goes as far as the cosplaying that is
| seen in ren faires. People do dress in western clothes,
| although they're not necessarily acting out a part. Rodeos
| and western wear though are still fairly common in modern day
| America though.
| ratelimitsteve wrote:
| Have you ever done a ren fest? It's an awful lot like that.
| The paid actors are in character but everyone else is just
| modern folk in a weird, garish misinterpretation of
| pre-1900s fashion. It's kinda fun watching someone in
| Victorian finery try to fit a turkey leg and a beer in one
| hand so they can take a selfie, the anachronism of it is
| cute. It's a bit more audience participation-y than, say,
| colonial williamsburg where the idea is that you're
| separate from the period-appropriate folk and watching, but
| any sort of roleplay from the patrons is optional and
| silly.
| throwup238 wrote:
| _> Second, I think it 's an interesting question to ask if
| people craved this particular past or if they just craved a
| space where everything is vastly different and settled on
| this period because it's pretty firmly embedded in our
| cultural mythology and everyone has an idea, however
| historically inaccurate, of what this time period was like._
|
| I think it's mostly a case of the printing press solidifying
| all that cultural mythology right around the tail end of the
| Renaissance. King Arthur and the Knights of the Roundtable
| was an especially popular theme among early printed fiction
| (think mass market paperbacks of today) which is where I
| think most of this began. The motifs introduced in those
| books have been pervasive since the common people started
| learning how to read and evolved into a lot of different
| cultural features like renfairs.
| cestith wrote:
| I think it's partly because this is what was started and
| caught on.
|
| There are also folk life festivals with traditional art forms
| from before mass production, frontier festivals, colonial
| festivals, Civil War reenactments, Revolutionary War
| reenactments, the Vintage Computer Festivals, conventions for
| antique radio and TV equipment, and all sorts of periods
| people commemorate. This is the one that has been around a
| few decades, caught on in a big way, and spread nationwide.
|
| There are also pumpkin festivals, apple festivals, corn
| festivals, other harvest festivals, May Day festivals, county
| fairs, state fairs, and more despite most of the things
| involved in all of these are anachronistic for most of the
| population. Very few people actually raise prize cattle,
| sheep, and pigs. Very few farm crops. We still celebrate
| these as if we're an agrarian society though.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| I think it's just the huge corpus of fiction that centers
| around that time frame. Our modern culture is directly
| descendent of that. Concepts like master bedroom, inheritance,
| formal titles like sir, King James bible and its older English
| wording, Shakespeare, King Arthur, etc etc. There are massive
| stone works and cathedrals from that timeframe still around
| today in Europe. Many fairy tales and myths and legends were
| created in that time that colored fiction for the next 500-1000
| years into modern day.
| Bratmon wrote:
| Fun fact: During the actual Renaissance, they had "tournaments"
| which were just medieval fairs.
| IAmBroom wrote:
| They also had fairs without tournaments during the actual
| Renaissance.
|
| Ren fair(e): entertainment gathering of the modern age.
|
| Rennaissance fair(e): entertainment gathering, occuring after
| the start of the Renaissance.
| YesBox wrote:
| I had a friend group who participated in these fairs and
| Dagorhir (battle roleplay + foam padded weapons).
|
| I never asked them why they participated. But from observation
| they had great joy in hand crafting costume, weapons, and
| armor, then utilizing their craft to roleplay and battle. Maybe
| there's something to be said about ownership.
|
| I'd also hesitate to guess that the medieval time period was a
| time when most of the technology at the time could be
| understood and actively participated by the average person
| while simultaneously supporting a growing! civilization.
|
| Now the average person undesirably participates in a no or low
| growth job where they have no agency in their day to day.
| A_D_E_P_T wrote:
| The wiki page to the Eglinton Festival notes succinctly:
| "Medieval culture was widely admired [in the 18th and 19th
| centuries] as an antidote to the modern enlightenment and
| industrial age."
|
| This kicked into overdrive in the 20th, with the nascent genre
| of literary fantasy (and, later, video games,) showing people
| alternate worlds that are _potent_ medicine against the
| enlightenment and industrial age -- for they contain little or
| nothing of the more dour aspects of 9th-17th century life.
|
| If anything, it seems to me that most fantasy books and games
| like Dungeons and Dragons only make sense if you imagine they
| take place in the distant post-industrial future. They're _too_
| cozy; there is _far too much_ healing magic and other tech;
| their economies are in many cases post-scarcity...
| mcv wrote:
| Where is the article? I'm getting something about Kevin Kostner's
| The West. Nothing about renaissance fairs.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Loads fine for me.
| burkaman wrote:
| I'm guessing this is a complaint about a full-screen ad that
| history.com is running. I can't confirm because I have like 5
| different layers of ad-blocking that I'm not going to turn
| off to check this, but here's what the page looks like from a
| Finnish server:
| https://pikwy.com/web/68dd4ace6c4fe212122bdfe2
| bill38 wrote:
| It seems that history.com is geo-blocked. You can see it if
| you are in USA, not if you are in Europe or other
| countries.
| burkaman wrote:
| Oh that's crazy, you're right:
| https://support.history.com/hc/en-
| us/articles/4411049949079-...
|
| I wish there was a way for The Internet to eminent domain
| this URL from the History Channel, they clearly don't
| deserve it.
|
| Archive for anyone interested: https://archive.is/2xmAE
| afandian wrote:
| It's broken in the UK. Gives a 302 redirect to
| https://www.history.co.uk/
|
| And VPN via Sweden, redirects to https://www.historytv.se
|
| I don't think they want international visitors.
| neonate wrote:
| https://web.archive.org/web/20250926115407/https://www.histo...
|
| https://archive.ph/2xmAE
| fireflash38 wrote:
| I went down a rabbit hole on Wikipedia about turkeys. Am I
| understanding it correctly in that turkeys went from South
| America to Europe then to North America?
|
| So it's native to the new world, but not native to North America?
|
| Anyway, 1500s is when they came to Europe, so maybe they did
| enjoy a good turkey leg...
| dabluecaboose wrote:
| That is incorrect. Both extant species of turkeys are native to
| North America.
| IAmBroom wrote:
| Also, Wild Turkey(tm) is native to North America. Kentucky,
| USA, specifically.
| Hrun0 wrote:
| > Also, Wild Turkey(tm) is native to North America.
| Kentucky, USA, specifically.
|
| How come Turkeys are called Indians (Hindi) in Turkish
| then?
| IAmBroom wrote:
| It was a joke - Wild Turkey(tm) is a brand of whiskey.
| ricree wrote:
| >So it's native to the new world, but not native to North
| America?
|
| My understanding is that the wild turkey was common throughout
| North America, but was domesticated in Mexico, and modern
| turkey farming uses stock descending from that population.
|
| So the bird itself is native, but most Turkey farms in the US
| or Canada would have been Mexico->Europe->NA.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Turkeys in the northwestern US are not native. They were
| released here (and periodically restocked) in order to be
| hunted.
| IAmBroom wrote:
| Not the point. Cactus are not native to Alaska; polar bears
| are not native to Utah; (some species of) cactus and polar
| bears are native to North America.
| incomingpain wrote:
| Last weekend I went to my local ren faire. What a fantastic time.
| If you havent been to one before, definitely go. At mine, I'd say
| 70% of people are in a costume of some kind. 95% of the costumes
| were period correct or related.
|
| I went in star trek blue. My favourite response a lady tells me
| that I'm violating the temporal prime directive for being in
| uniform. That was hilarious!
|
| Note, I was literally the only person dressed in star trek lol.
| ryoshu wrote:
| The Ren Faire in NY has a time traveller day. Trekies abound.
| cestith wrote:
| Bristol, WI and the TRF in Todd Mission, TX (outside Houston)
| have those days too, or sometimes a weekend. You see a
| handful of Doctors even when it's not one of those. When it
| is, you'll see a lot of Doctors, Starfleet, and others.
| IAmBroom wrote:
| You've recreated a famous Youtube comedy sketch.
| carabiner wrote:
| Are they all just focused on sex, debauchery, lots of drinking
| today? I went to the one near Pasadena around a decade ago, maybe
| related to the OG faire, and there was so much sexual humor in
| the open air (like jokes shouted by storekeepers, and in the play
| being run) where I'd consider it an adult environment. It was a
| little disappointing because I was expecting something like a
| live-action museum, sort of like colonial williamburg in VA, but
| it was more like a party with expensive shit (I think a bottle of
| water was like $7?) being sold and drunk people stumbling. The
| highlight was just talking to a blacksmith who was making nails
| by hand who seemed serious about his craft.
| modeless wrote:
| Is that not authentic?
| tetromino_ wrote:
| I recently went to the New York one. It seemed to mainly be
| about cosplay (showing off your own cosplay, vendors selling
| cosplay-related supplies) and various kids activities. Although
| there certainly was drinking, and a car crash - probably caused
| by the drinking - very soon after the exit from the parking
| lot.
| nameless912 wrote:
| > Are they all just focused on sex, debauchery, lots of
| drinking today?
|
| ...As opposed to the actual medieval period, which was famously
| chaste, calm, and sober?
| IAmBroom wrote:
| Yes, they are primarily based on moneymaking entertainment, as
| you have guessed.
|
| There are more historically-oriented "entertainments", but they
| tend to be both non-profit and not audience-based (everyone
| attending is in costume).
| bbarnett wrote:
| None of these answers are accurate.
|
| What happened is that this county gathering has been happening
| for centuries. Since 1253 in truth. First it was called a
| gathering, then a cobble, and finally in 1582, the Franks took it
| over.
|
| It was highly popularized as a French affair. The whimsical garb,
| the music, all something the stodgy English would have no part
| in. In fact, so stodge were they that it was forced outdoors, as
| none would rent to the Franks for this. Quite rude, in the rainy
| land of the Brits!
|
| Eventually it became Frank-aire, just as other loan words from
| French, like concessionaire or millionaire, and then just Faire.
|
| It's really the world's longest running annual gathering, where
| there's always a redhead in the same maid outfit. 538 years
| running, this year in fact! You can find it in the Guinness Book
| of World Records!
| fsckboy wrote:
| next on history.com, "Whence Weebos?" right after "The Decline of
| Cowboys and Indians"
| hugs wrote:
| "By 1965, it moved to Paramount Ranch in the Santa Monica
| Mountains"
|
| Fun personal fact: Paramount Ranch was also the site of my high
| school's home cross country course (Westlake High School). During
| my high school days, the ranch's center was set up as a western
| town for filming Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. As a kid, you just
| accept all of that as normal, everyday things. "Doesn't everyone
| have Renaissance fairs and TV and movie sets in their town?" It
| took going to college thousands of miles away to realize and
| appreciate how delightfully weird Southern California can be.
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