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weapons, NOT fantasy kit! We have loads of information on the weapons used and the combat is ten times better because the hand-weapons are shorter and the shields smaller. Longer hand-weapons and big shields make life much more hazardous and it's too difficult to open up a shield wall when you can't hit guys in the head, which is how it really would have been done.
Living Archaeology v Living History
There is a greater interest developing in the archaeology and even more so in the sociology of the periods we cover., which is what we are really re-enacting anyway. I think to define what we do in such terms makes you take a different approach to it! Well it has made a difference to me at anyway.
In my own group, Mogh Roith, we are taking a step back and looking at our roots, our name, and our logo. Our name, taken from a Pre-Christian tale and newly adopted symbol from an Iron Age artefact (the Petrie crown), we feel it only right that we delve into that era properly. (Mogh Roith, being a Munster name for the Sun God and his symbol being 'a wheel that was rowed across the sky'. The Petrie Crown features disks or wheels, on them the image interpreted as a ship being pulled across the sky by sea birds with the Sun God (Solar symbol) within it's hull.)
Individual projects seem also to be coming to the fore. Some of my fellow group members have been working on stone carving and have even taken on the bigger task of building a 'Long-house' in their back garden. I am personally researching the building of a replica round house to be hopefully based on an actual post hole layout to be built at my place sometime next year.
Re-enactors are also actually starting to work directly with archaeology students and vice a versa. This February a Living Archaeology project was run by and for the Re-enactors that were working in the National Heritage park Wexford over the summer (Team SMELT), with some UCD Archaeology Society Students, This proved very interesting. More details in the next issue.
New Group on the Scene
A new group on the scene 'Clairséach Óir - War of Independence Re-
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enactors', bring us new and daring periods to cover. The group has been set-up to cover the home rule crisis, Easter Rising, war of independence and Irish civil war, with such groups as; The Irish Volunteers, Irish National Volunteers, Fianna Eireann, Cumann na mBan, The Irish Citizen Army, The Hibernian Rifles, The Ulster Volunteer Force, The Royal Irish Constabulary, The British Armed Forces, The R.I.C. Auxiliary Corps, The Black & Tans and The Irish Free State Army (and a few others) being portrayed. They will cover from 1903 up to and including the year 1923. (See Directory for Details.)
I'd love to know what other people have planned. Do people have grand plans or are they happy to stick with what they've got? Will the rest of us simply sit on our 'Viking' laurels or will we actually try to crack this re-enactment thing wide open?
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