New Hampshire Renaissance Faire Earns A Rousing ‘Huzzah!’
Did you know that there is a renaissance faire held on dedicated grounds in Kingston, NH? Did you know it has been going on for almost 10 years now?
If you did, you were well ahead of me, and I have been going to New England ren faires for more than a decade. Based on the attendance figures from this year’s New Hampshire Renaissance Faire, held the past two weekends in May, I was one of the few fans of the genre that didn’t know about it. According to a post on the official Facebook group for the faire, the attendance over the two weekends was about 4,800 — the equivalent of a decent local comic book or anime convention. That is quite a bit less than the bigger, more commercial King Richard’s Faire in Carver, Mass., which had attendance of more than 150,000 over its eight weekends in 2013, according to the website for Renaissance Magazine.
That smaller size has distinct advantages, however. One is the ability of the NHRF to donate much of its earnings to charity. While it has a dedicated site to operate in, it has no permanent structures to have to maintain. The faire’s program for this year notes that in its nine years it has given $31,000 to local charities. This year it picked The NH Food Bank, and the Rockingham Country Nutrition & Meals on Wheels program. Both organizations also had booths at the faire to accept further donations.
Another benefit of the small size is the faire’s ability to offer free water to anyone on the grounds. At every performance stage (the 35 acre site had four, with comfortable backed benches) there was a large sports team water jug with cups available for anyone who was getting parched to use for free.
For a smaller faire, the entertainment was even more exciting than the bigger competition. In addition to belly dancers, dancing fairies, wandering minstrels of all stripes, and pirate groups like B.O.N.E.S. (Brethren Order of the North East Sea) and the ever-popular New England Brethren of Pirates, there were fighters and jousters that went at each other … well, full tilt. The top image is of one of the jousters — a woman under that helmet, huzzah! — from a group of various New England-based members of the modern International Jousting Association. And while King Richard’s Faire performer put on a heck of a show, watching real jousters barrel at each other on horseback across the rail in a list, splinter lances and take body-numbing hits, was a true spectacle.
The melee side of the ancient tournament wasn’t forgotten either. The Neville Companye, a Maine-based group of War of the Roses reenactors, staged foot combat demonstrations — except they were more like weaponized hockey fights than a mere “demonstration.” As you can see from the photo to the right, these are really armored fighters going at it with real weapons. Company member Brian Caton told me that on Saturday they had a handful of injuries and near misses, including Brian himself getting a sword point through his eye slits (luckily not causing any damage to anything but his armor).
The majority of the fields are ringed with vendor tents, offering all sorts of ren faire goods at prices that seem more reasonable than those at bigger faires. For example, no vendor was selling soda or water for more than $1. All of that adds up to a fun, family friendly faire, where prices are low enough to take all the kids, and yet there is still more than enough violent combat and comely, cleavage-enabled lasses to satisfy the most jaded ren faire dad.
Stay tuned in the next couple of days for a gallery of photos from the New Hampshire Renaissance Faire!
