Re-enactment group size and what you try to do with it (And we need more members)
My group has had a little problem over the last year - two members have gotten a real job in England, another emigrated with his girlfriend, a couple of possible Polish fill-ins have gone back to Poland, and one of our older members hasn't been seen for a couple of years because of pressure of work and other things.
This means that we end up with 3 - 6 people at each event.
When you are attempting to portray anything like a small travelling group or any decent amount of living history, this presents several problems:
1) More roles to be filled than there are people.
2) Set up and take down of the camp, with 4 tents, fire shelter etc, takes ages.
3) Everyone is run ragged and unable to have a proper break because it is just them covering one area of interaction.
For point 1, if you are trying to show combat, you really need one knight plus a man at arms and a cheaper spearman or two. Certainly more than 2 guys. If you try to do anything like a Lords travelling circus, I mean household, you have the lord, perhaps his lady, plus the marshalsea, cook, secretary, carters, grooms etc. Definitely more than 6 people, and even more if you plan on being quite posh, because then you'll have gentlemen attendants. Few groups manage to portray the social side of things very well, and naturally I think it would be great to do so.
Of course all this doesn't matter so much if you are trying to be what much of Scottish re-enactment unfortunately seems to be, which is sitting about saying "here's a sword, here's a spear" and "look at the different food people at then."
There's probably a sweet spot to be had between the extremes of carefully choreographed presentations of life such as you find at Kentwell, and the lower end of the re-enactment spectrum, but to make them work we need more people.
Problem 2 is one that really wears you down over a season. If it is taking you 1.5 hrs to get everything down at the end of the weekend because there are only 6 of you, and this means you get home even later, then it puts you off doing things. Whereas if we had a couple of extra pairs of hands things would go a lot faster. And if they stay in plastic, it helps having them around the camp making it look more occupied and important. The effect on Saturday at Lanark with an extra 4 people in the encampment was quite noticeable, and it was possible to draw the public into chatting rather than lecture them all the time.
Point 3 - from Kentwell I reckon the ideal numbers for a station or display in a busy location or time is 3, especially if you are doing proper LH. So one person can be working, another explaining, and the third tidying up/ off to the toilet/ running errands/ resting from working the bellows for 10 minutes to get the metal to melt. At a less busy event, you can get by with 2, but having just one person such as happens with the alchemy means I get very tired and miss what else is going on around me.
So we need more people. Not too many more, ideally about 10 to 12 per event, which means we need 2 to 3 times that many on the books. With 12 people per event, we can setup and take down much quicker, cover all major roles, and do living history with a bit more depth, for example, although the food our cook makes is good, I'm getting a bit bored of the same recipes, but that is because he's mostly working on his own. With two cooks we can do better more varied food, and hopefully split it by social level as well. Also with 12 people we might have a chance of fielding 3 or 4 fighters as well, which always helps given the battle orientation of re-enactment here. Certainly the circa 1300 battle at Lanark this year was apparently a bit small and silly, which is a shame given the events origins.
Some groups manage to get to the size of having 20 or 30 people at an event, which would be nice, but is hard to do in Scotland what with our population restrictions, and also groups that size tend to be a little more impersonal.
Finally, based upon what I've seen at Fort George and Lanark, I think there has been some improvement amongst proper re-enactment groups over the last 5 or 6 years. Still dodgy pottery and chairs, some not quite right clothing, but basically the groups with an interest in accuracy are progressing.
This still leaves the usual suspects, you know who they are, and there was a rumour that a certain group had been approached regarding Bannockburn 1314. That could be a big fun event, if they get the right organiser (hint - nobody who regards tartan and kilts as authentic for 1314 should be allowed anywhere near the job) and inveigle some funds from the gvt etc, if could be big. But then they also need to sort the site out and weather proof it somewhat and improve the visitors centre. The politics though would be complex, seeing as Salmond is likely to want an independence referendum that year for symbolic reasons. And I was involved with the stramash with Siol na Gael in 2007, which was amusing and a little disheartening as well. More details can be communicated in the pub or elsewhere.
This means that we end up with 3 - 6 people at each event.
When you are attempting to portray anything like a small travelling group or any decent amount of living history, this presents several problems:
1) More roles to be filled than there are people.
2) Set up and take down of the camp, with 4 tents, fire shelter etc, takes ages.
3) Everyone is run ragged and unable to have a proper break because it is just them covering one area of interaction.
For point 1, if you are trying to show combat, you really need one knight plus a man at arms and a cheaper spearman or two. Certainly more than 2 guys. If you try to do anything like a Lords travelling circus, I mean household, you have the lord, perhaps his lady, plus the marshalsea, cook, secretary, carters, grooms etc. Definitely more than 6 people, and even more if you plan on being quite posh, because then you'll have gentlemen attendants. Few groups manage to portray the social side of things very well, and naturally I think it would be great to do so.
Of course all this doesn't matter so much if you are trying to be what much of Scottish re-enactment unfortunately seems to be, which is sitting about saying "here's a sword, here's a spear" and "look at the different food people at then."
There's probably a sweet spot to be had between the extremes of carefully choreographed presentations of life such as you find at Kentwell, and the lower end of the re-enactment spectrum, but to make them work we need more people.
Problem 2 is one that really wears you down over a season. If it is taking you 1.5 hrs to get everything down at the end of the weekend because there are only 6 of you, and this means you get home even later, then it puts you off doing things. Whereas if we had a couple of extra pairs of hands things would go a lot faster. And if they stay in plastic, it helps having them around the camp making it look more occupied and important. The effect on Saturday at Lanark with an extra 4 people in the encampment was quite noticeable, and it was possible to draw the public into chatting rather than lecture them all the time.
Point 3 - from Kentwell I reckon the ideal numbers for a station or display in a busy location or time is 3, especially if you are doing proper LH. So one person can be working, another explaining, and the third tidying up/ off to the toilet/ running errands/ resting from working the bellows for 10 minutes to get the metal to melt. At a less busy event, you can get by with 2, but having just one person such as happens with the alchemy means I get very tired and miss what else is going on around me.
So we need more people. Not too many more, ideally about 10 to 12 per event, which means we need 2 to 3 times that many on the books. With 12 people per event, we can setup and take down much quicker, cover all major roles, and do living history with a bit more depth, for example, although the food our cook makes is good, I'm getting a bit bored of the same recipes, but that is because he's mostly working on his own. With two cooks we can do better more varied food, and hopefully split it by social level as well. Also with 12 people we might have a chance of fielding 3 or 4 fighters as well, which always helps given the battle orientation of re-enactment here. Certainly the circa 1300 battle at Lanark this year was apparently a bit small and silly, which is a shame given the events origins.
Some groups manage to get to the size of having 20 or 30 people at an event, which would be nice, but is hard to do in Scotland what with our population restrictions, and also groups that size tend to be a little more impersonal.
Finally, based upon what I've seen at Fort George and Lanark, I think there has been some improvement amongst proper re-enactment groups over the last 5 or 6 years. Still dodgy pottery and chairs, some not quite right clothing, but basically the groups with an interest in accuracy are progressing.
This still leaves the usual suspects, you know who they are, and there was a rumour that a certain group had been approached regarding Bannockburn 1314. That could be a big fun event, if they get the right organiser (hint - nobody who regards tartan and kilts as authentic for 1314 should be allowed anywhere near the job) and inveigle some funds from the gvt etc, if could be big. But then they also need to sort the site out and weather proof it somewhat and improve the visitors centre. The politics though would be complex, seeing as Salmond is likely to want an independence referendum that year for symbolic reasons. And I was involved with the stramash with Siol na Gael in 2007, which was amusing and a little disheartening as well. More details can be communicated in the pub or elsewhere.