An actress playing the role of Mary Queen of Scots at a Scottish fair in 2003.

Living history is an activity that incorporates historical tools, activities and dress into an interactive presentation that seeks to give observers and participants a sense of stepping back in time. Although it does not necessarily seek to reenact a specific event in history, living history is similar to, and sometimes incorporates, historical reenactment. "Reenactment" redirects here For the 1968 Romanian film see The Reenactment. Living history is an educational medium used by museums, historic sites, heritage interpreters, schools and historical reenactment groups to educate the public in particular areas of history, such as clothing styles, pastimes and handicrafts, or to simply convey a sense of the everyday life of a certain period in history. A historic site is an official location where pieces of political military or social History have been preserved Heritage interpretation is the communication of information about or the explanation of the nature importance and purpose of historical natural or cultural resources objects

Activities

Activities may be confined to wearing period dress and perhaps explaining relevant historical information, either in role (also called first-person interpretation) or out of character (also called third-person interpretation). In Character is an Acting term referring to an Actor playing the part of a character either in a format setting (e Museum theatre is the use of Theatre and theatrical techniques by a Museum for educational and informative purposes Out of character (sometimes abbreviated to OOC) is a phrase used in entertainment and Role-playing to differentiate between a person playing a character Museum theatre is the use of Theatre and theatrical techniques by a Museum for educational and informative purposes While many museums allow their staff to move in and out of character to better answer visitor questions, some encourage their staff to stay in role at all times.

Living history portrayal often involves demonstrating everyday activities such as cooking, cleaning, medical care, or particular skills and handicrafts. Handicraft, also known as craftwork or simply Craft, is a type of work where useful and decorative devices are made completely by hand or using only simple tools Depending on the historical period portrayed, these might include spinning, sewing, loom weaving, tablet weaving, inkle weaving or tapestry weaving, cloth dyeing, basket weaving, rope making, leather-working, shoemaking, metalworking, glassblowing, woodworking or other crafts. The categorization of Time into discrete named blocks is called Periodization. Spinning is an ancient textile art in which plant, animal or synthetic Fibers are twisted together to form Yarn (or thread Sewing or stitching is the fastening of Cloth, Leather, Furs Bark, or other flexible materials using needle and A loom is a Machine or device for Weaving thread or Yarn into Textiles Looms can range from very small hand-held frames to large free-standing This article describes textile weaving For other senses of this word see Weaving (disambiguation. Tablet Weaving (often card weaving in the United States is a Weaving technique where tablets also called 'cards' are used to create the shed the Inkle weaving is a type of warp-faced Weaving where the shed is created by manually raising or lowering the warp yarns some of which are held in place Tapestry is a form of Textile art. It is woven by hand on a vertical Loom. A textile is a flexible material comprised of a network of natural or artificial Fibres often referred to as thread or Yarn. Dyeing is the process of imparting Colours to a textile material in loose fibre Yarn, Cloth or garment form by treatment with a Dye. Basket weaving (also basketry, basket making, or basketmaking) is the process of Weaving unspun Vegetable Fibers into A rope is a length of Fibers twisted or Braided together to improve strength for pulling and Connecting. Leather crafting is the practice of making Leather into craft objects or works of art using shaping techniques coloring techniques or both Metalworking is craft and practice of working with Metals to create individual parts assemblies or large scale structures Glassblowing is a glassforming technique that involves inflating the molten glass into a bubble or parison with the aid of the blowpipe or blow tube Woodworking is the process of building making or carving something using Wood. Considerable research is often applied to identifying authentic techniques and often recreating replica tools and equipment.

Presentation

A viking encampment.

Historical reenactment groups often attempt to organize such displays in an encampment or display area at an event, and have a separate area for combat reenactment activities. Description The term "camp" comes from the Latin word campus, meaning field Combat reenactment is a side of Historical reenactment which aims to depict historical forms of Combat. While some such exhibits may be conducted in character as a representation of typical everyday life, others are specifically organized to inform the public and so might include an emphasis on handicrafts or other day-to-day activities, which are convenient to stage and interesting to watch, and may be explained out of character. During the 1990s, reenactment groups, primarily American Civil War groups, began to show interest in this style of interpretation and began using it at their reenactments. Causes of the war See also Origins of the American Civil War, Timeline of events leading to the American Civil War The coexistence of a slave-owning South

Living history in education

Living history may also be used to describe a method of teaching history whereby students try their hand at such activities and experience some aspects of period lifestyle guided by historical interpreters, albeit sometimes with less stringent standards of authenticity.

Photographs of living history exhibits are increasingly used in historical textbooks to illustrate aspects of daily life^[1]. Living history requires thorough research on the part of the museum staff, volunteers and interpreters.

Notable living history museums

• Colonial Williamsburg in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States
• Conner Prairie in Fishers, Indiana, United States
• Frontier Culture Museum of Virginia in Staunton, Virginia, United States
• Heritage Park Historical Village in Calgary, Alberta, Canada
• Jorvik Viking Centre in York, England
• Old Salem in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, United States
• The Old Town, Aarhus, Denmark
• Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Massachusetts, United States
• Skansen open air museum in Stockholm, Sweden
• Sovereign Hill in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia

See also

• American Civil War reenactment
• Buckskinning ("Rendezvous")
• Combat reenactment
• The Company of Chivalry, UK-based 14th century reenactment group
• Experimental archaeology
• Living History Australia
• Nova Roma
• Open air museum
• Society for Creative Anachronism

References

External links

• Living History at the Open Directory Project
• Museum Village, Monroe, New York
• Widoeghe a Dutch language historical reenactment web site
• Frontier Culture Museum, Staunton, VA
• Jersey County Victorian Festival in Jerseyville, Illinois
• Legio V Alaudae Roman history reenactment group in Tennessee
• Comitatus (UK) ( Late & Post-Roman Romano-British and Germanic Living history and experimental re-enactment, 306-866AD)
• Society for Creative Anachronism
• Buckinghams Retinue (Wars of the Roses and early Tudor re-enactment and living history group, based in the UK)
• Hungerford Household (Medieval and Tudor living history group, UK based)
• Kentwell Hall (Tudor living history site in UK)
• WEOROD Early Medieval Historical Re-Enactment and Living History Society in Hampshire, UK
• Company of Chivalry’ Medieval Re-Enactment and Living History in 1370
• Nazareth Village. Recreation of 1st century Nazareth, living history and open air museum , in Nazareth, Israel. The Open Directory Project ( ODP) also known as dmoz (from directory Monroe may refer to two municipalities in Orange County New York in the United States Monroe (town New York Monroe (village Dutch ( is a West Germanic language spoken by around 24 million people 22 million of which are from the Netherlands, Belgium and Suriname "Reenactment" redirects here For the 1968 Romanian film see The Reenactment. For the small town of the same name in New South Wales, Australia, see Jerseyville New South Wales. The History of the city of Rome spans 2800 years of the existence of a city that grew from a small Italian village in the 9th century BC into the center Tennessee ( is a state located in the Southern United States. Late Antiquity (c 300-600 is a Periodization used by historians to describe the transitional centuries from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages, in Romano-British culture is that of the Romanized Britons under the Roman Empire and later the Western Roman Empire, and of those exposed to Roman culture in the years The Germanic peoples are a historical group of Indo-European -speaking peoples originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Germanic Wildlife Hampshire has wildlife typical of the island of Great Britain