Pillage, Plunder and Party – A look at Tamborine Mountain’s Viking Culture Day, and the people behind it

A look at Tamborine Mountain’s Viking Culture Day, and the people behind it

By Kyle Hitchmough

If you stepped foot into the Tamborine Mountain State School Markets on Sunday the 11^th, you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d stepped right back in time. Traders peddled their handmade wares of pottery and hides, arrows flew through the air and struck their targets true, and the clash of steel on steel rang out as armoured warriors duelled for honour and glory. The annual Viking Culture Day takes place on the mountain, a festival of historical costumes, goods and entertainment that makes for one exciting day out for all those who attended.

The Viking Culture Day is an event organised by Jörth Gar, a ‘living history society’ of historical reenactors who pride themselves on their portrayals of Viking mercenaries and civilians alike. A crowd flocked to the fighting arena to see simulated duels between opposing armies of fierce faux-Nords wielding very authentic weapons and armour. Handmade pottery was on sale alongside impressive textile creations, and the blacksmiths’ stall had all kinds of metalworks and weaponry set out for the public to examine, and even a legitimate blacksmith peddled his wares. Across the way, an archery range offered arrows at generous prices to line up and take your shot at stuffed, fuzzy beasts.

I chatted with Luke Payne, the leader or “jarl” of Jörth Gar credited for the success of Viking Culture Day. Luke has been in the re-enactment community for 20 years and running Jörth Gar for 14 of those. He walked me through the history of Jörth Gar, and how they brought Viking culture to Tamborine Mountain.“Originally, we just wanted to have a day for Jörth Gar just to display to the public what we actually did as a club,” he told me. “It started when I thought ‘Well, let’s just demonstrate our skills and abilities and what we’re actually doing.’ And then we decided the best way to do it would be to put on a day for the public and make it donation based… That was 13 years ago, so we did it quite early in our career as a group. We’ve grown a lot, and over time, friends from other groups have said “Can we come along?” and we’ve grown it from there. I’ve always kept it modest and small, so it’s easy to manage— And people like it like that, just walking around, there’s no pressure, especially for other groups who come to just relax and fight.”

It feels like a true Viking village from old Norway and planted right in the middle of Tamborine Mountain. Jörth Gar’s tents line the perimeter of the area. Luke laughed: “This year the wind was hectic—we nearly got blown away last night, and with the fire bans as well—we weren’t able to cook with fire and we weren’t actually able to light our fire for warmth. It was a freezing night last night, so we huddled like penguins for warmth!”

I had a chance to speak with James the blacksmith—although among his cohort he’s known as “Jakob”, the Russian version of his given name—who told me he had been part of the re-enacting scene for over a decade, and blacksmithing for 7 years.

Impressed by his expertise, I asked him what drew him to a trade like this. “Every person has something in them that’s creative. You stop somebody’s creativity and essentially watch them die. It’s really quite interesting from a psychological perspective. But that’s the one thing about re-enactment—what we do here is not just re-enactment, it’s living history.”

Just like Jakob, there’s a host of interesting characters to see and talk to around the Culture Day, merchants and warriors alike. I even spied a few children in period-appropriate dress, scurrying about to assist the adults in their tasks, fetching tools and gathering spent arrows. My attention was caught by a heavenly smell, which I followed to a man in red, toiling behind an impressive collection of pots and pans with all sorts of mouth-watering food within. When he had a spare moment, he was gracious enough to grant me a short interview, which proved to be more than enlightening about the inner workings of a group like Jörth Gar.

Who are you, and what do you do?

“My name’s Marco, and I’m the head chef for the Jörth Gar group. I do a feast for everyone. Last night I cooked up half a venison on a spit—Made some cabbage salad, whole bunch of honey glazed vegetables, and I made an oat spiced cake for dessert. All authentic ingredients used.”

How long have you been doing this?

“I’ve been part of this group for 13 years, and I’ve taken over cooking in the last two. I used to be one of the warriors—I retired from that and took up the cooking.”

What got you started?

“I was always interested in the old times… more of a cooking aspect because I used to be a chef. Learning how to cook on open fires was pretty good and using traditional equipment. One day I was driving past a festival and I decided to stop in. I saw this group and the rest is history.”

What do you love about doing this?

“The people. They’re such a great bunch of people. We sit around, we drink, we tell a lot of stories to each other… It’s definitely the people. It has to be.”

What do you think an event like this brings to the community here?

“Well, we’re hoping to bring more tourism in. We only run this once a year, but we try to bring a lot of visitors to the mountain. The more visitors we can draw up here, the more we can bring into [the festival].

Before I headed home, I asked Jarl Luke why it was our town that he and his group chose to grace us with their fantastic festival every year.

“Obviously, it brings people to the area. We do always choose points where there’s already a lot of tourism going on: for example, you’ve got the markets going on at the same time as this, you’ve got the Gallery Walk. We’re definitely bringing people into the area. A lot of people come up here every year with their families and just love watching the shows as a family day out… So, you can just give five bucks and your whole family can come in the gate and they can go and do archery, the kids are occupied. It’s just one of those things that I think is good entertainment and a good day out.”

Learn more Jörth Gar on their website: http://jorthgar.com.

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