A Weekend at the Geschichtspark Bärnau-Tachow
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Categories: Medieval, Modern

A Weekend at the Geschichtspark Bärnau-Tachow

Eleven people in late medieval clothing standing in front of a wattle-and-daub building
A group photo from the workshop at the Geschichtspark, July 2019, by Martin

In July 2019 I attended a living history weekend at the Geschichtspark Bärnau-Tachow in Bavaria on the old Goldene Straße from Prague to Nürnberg. It was organized by Roland ‘Dimicator’ Warzecha and his group in northern Germany.


Three small houses: one of wattle and daub with a plank upper storey, one of logs, one of planks set vertically in a frame
Three of the houses based on 13th century sources at the Geschichtspark Bärnau-Tachow, by Sean Manning

One of the goals of the Geschichtspark is to represent a full range of possibilities and trades and building types in a small space they can afford to maintain. So in their 13th century section they have three main types of buildings: the wattle-and-daub-between-posts which everyone knows, but also log cabins (which I had heard were a Finnish invention imported to New Sweden on the Delaware River, but Vitruvius 2.1.4 talks about them in Colchis) and a system of vertical boards side by side in frames. The last does not seem very good to me, although cutting mortise-and-tenon joints in the edges of the planks helps keep the drafts down and neighbouring boards in contact, but they are exploring the possibilities allowed by the archaeological record and the skills of their staff and volunteers. They are laying the foundations for their first stone building, a replica of one of the fortified halting points on the Goldene Straße just a few hundred metres from the original route.

A man in a quilted jacket with a narrow waist and a sword and buckler resting on his shoulders, and a woman in a foot-length dress hitched up into a belt holding the same weapons

Fencing in a bright summer sun alternating with rainshowers is sweaty work, so it was good to be wearing the appropriate clothing: wool hosen, a blue buckram pourpoint stuffed with two pounds of cotton over a linen shirt, and a straw hat. Full coverage and a wide hat keeps the sun off your skin and keeps sweat from evaporating too quickly, while the linen and wool wick it away from your skin and create a microclimate around your body. As a result, I noticed something that an ancient writer also noticed when he described the tough outdoor life of the Persians of old (Xenophon, Cyropaedia, 8.8.11):

Again, this also was a native custom of theirs, neither to eat nor drink while on a march, nor yet to be seen doing any of the necessary consequences of eating or drinking.

If you are physically active and wear linen and wool outdoors, you may not need to drink as much as you do in cotton shorts and a t-shirt, and you definitely don’t need to pee as often as you do sitting at a desk in an air-conditioned office and drinking a glass an hour. You sweat the water out.

Two men in linen shirts and strraw hats playing a touch game
Practiceing snaking pushing movements at the cross with bare hands can teach mechanics better than trying the same with heavy, insensitive weapons. Photo by Georg, July 2019.

I don’t think many of my gentle readers are interested in historical fencing but I should say something about the workshop anyway. The group consisted of twelve people including a non-fencing husband. The two-day course covered pages 3-7 of Forgeng’s latest edition of Royal Armouries MS. I.33 (prima custodia called under arm against Halbschilt) plus a variant where the scholar in Halbschilt does not respond soon enough and the priest can wind or strike between the hands. Limiting the amount of material is necessary because I.33 is an advanced manual, for people who are already good fencers but whose decision tree is not yet the most efficient (the manuscript has almost nothing on body mechanics, footwork, the blows, and other fundamentals, just page after page of the best thing to do when the swords cross in a certain way so it is a difficult source to interpret).

Two sword and buckler fencers, one in the middle of a step
Enough talk, let’s have some action! Photo by Martin, July 2019

Quite a few martial arts have a principle which is called controlling the centre or “take the weapon, break the man”: before you strike, you position yourself so that they cannot strike you with their main weapon in a single tempo (movement). Fiore’s preferred strategy was to lure his partner into a delivering a committed attack and take the center by parrying it, while Roland and Cornelius take inspiration from 17th century Italian fencing and try to occupy the centre as they come into measure, adopting extended guards with the weight on the back foot and the point forward and making many tiny movements of their wrists and hands to get control when the swords cross. They are so good at this that it is probably not a good idea to cooperate, counter-bind, and try your own tiny pushing movements at the end of your arms. They will almost certainly win, whereas if you make the fight about something else that suits your nature and your training, you might find that there you have the advantage. So I am reading Fiore again searching for hints on how he handled people who took this approach, and trying out some of Roland and Cornelius’ tricks for getting into measure to strike without stepping before your companion thinks you are there or get control of a bind without closing in. Every fencer needs to be prepared for this approach to a fight, and see where it fits into their own art.

People in linen shirts seated at a wooden table with earthenware, stoneware, and wooden vessels
Mittagessen in the 13th century inn. Photo by Georg, July 2019.
Several people sitting at a candelit table in a wattle-and-daub building
The traditional feast at the Geschichtspark: roast pork, coleslaw, bread and beer from a restaurant in town. Photo by Georg, July 2019.

My thanks to the staff in Bärnau, and especially to Dr. Julia ‘Walpurgis’ Gräf who is a staffer, fencer, and helped me figure out the Bavarian train system. Deutsche Bahn managed to sell the same seat to two people, but that is another story. Thanks to Martin and Georg for photos, and for everyone who put up with my physical and neurological limitations. The site has regular tours, gatherings to repair buildings or start building their stone fortified hostel, and demonstrations of trades such as dying.

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5 thoughts on “A Weekend at the Geschichtspark Bärnau-Tachow

  1. woodcrafter1372 says:

    SO Jealous! Well done my friend.

  2. woodcrafter1372 says:

    Try guard strikes on someone who is winding and by setting their blade aside, close to pommel strike or throw.

    1. Sean Manning says:

      Thanks Dan. Do they still do that annual fencing event for people from different groups at a campsite in the southern BC interior? That is closer to you guys. I don’t know if there is some SCA person with a farm in the interior with his own hillfort like Steve Muhlberger had in Northern Ontario.

      I.33 does have the “close in and envelop their arms” plays, and Fiore talks about how posta longa is full of deception and tastes the other guards and avoids cuts and delivers its own. He just does not give a lot of details, you were supposed to already have a clue 🙁

  3. gamingballistic says:

    When I got a chance to train with Roland a few years ago in Minnesota, I asked him about coming to grapples, and his comment was (essentially) he hates grappling and so his goal is to kill the other guy before it ever comes to that. So there’s definitely something to be said about “if the other man is playing for distance, take the opportunity to close to grips.” On the other hand, if he’s also studied his grappling…

    1. Sean Manning says:

      And there are other strategies like “strike and fly out” (backing out of measure after a single strike rather than coming around for another attack from another angle) or taking the hands. Apparently one of the key skills in combat sports is analysing the best technique and strategy of the 1-4 people you expect to face at the finals. And once you are competent at one martial art, you can learn others with other strategies and systems of movement- but that is way over my pay grade, right now I just want to become competent at a first art and that will take a few years.

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