Anglo-Saxon life

May 27, 2008 11:36 PM

Regia Anglorum, an English re-enactment society, maintains a wealth of information about life in medieval England using the virtual village of Wichamstow and its surroundings. They have in-depth articles on many of the crafts and trades that the villagers would have undertaken, and about the places they would live and work. (A full listing is here.) They are perhaps unique, however, in building a medieval village and estate with which to demonstrate medieval craftsmanship.
posted by Upton O'Good (6 comments total)

Bloody Saxons, come over here, nicking our jobs with their superior ironwork, horrible smell of roast boar...place is a midden! Still, at least it's not the Jutes.
Excellent post Upton. Thanks!
posted by Abiezer at 3:17 AM on May 28, 2008 [1 favorite]

In a similar vein, Castell Henllys is an iron-age fort in Pembrokeshire that was originally bought by an iron-age re-enactor so he could recreate the fort as it was. That task was harder than he thought it would be, as the buildings in the fort (and all forts) were constantly being rebuilt and rearranged. But the round houses they have reconstructed are very cool. It's now owned by the National Park Authority.
posted by Helga-woo at 4:30 AM on May 28, 2008

This is really neat; thank you for sharing!
posted by headspace at 5:04 AM on May 28, 2008

Here in the US there's Connor Prairie, which does something similar for US rural life in the 1800's.

I'd imagine that more historic effort went into the Regia site simply because there's fewer records of daily peasant life than there are records of daily life for farmers etc in the 1800's.

I always did like recreations like these.
posted by sotonohito at 6:53 AM on May 28, 2008

Conner Prairie is awesome. I went there a few times in grade school. I grew up in the less impressive Connersville, which was named after William Conner's brother, John. No not that John Connor.
posted by sciurus at 7:32 AM on May 28, 2008

Viking re-enactors are toughest nerds I know. Last time I talked with some, they had tested if their shoe-making method was correct and other equipment robust by marching 100km with them.
posted by Free word order! at 12:08 PM on May 28, 2008