Re-enactment / historical question

[fortcollinsjerry]

Still, just because the earliest known date is circa 1594 do not mean to say that something like that was not worn, just that there is no record of it.

Mark

and Mark, that is the rub many proto-reenactors think should be the rule. Unfortunately, it is not! The whole point of doing reenacting is you are expected to become a historical archeologist (SP) of sorts. Delving into the written and/or visual arts to have the provanance of everything you wear or own. Otherwise you just wind up looking like a rag bag of different parts and pieces from different times. There is no record of something because it didn't exist then. What do you think all that stuff in museums is all about. Just about everything that has ever been made by humans is in a museum or in a work of art somewhere.

The technological mentality of the era is important as well. You can't possibley be in character with a damascas steel dirk on you hip because that technology did not exist anywhere else other than in North Africa. Modern black smiths and knife makers didn't discover that technology untill late in the 20th cantury.

Using your premis "If they had of had it they would have usd it" simply isn't the best approach and sometimes you will embarass youself showing up in something that couldn't possibley had been in use in the time your living in. Really, we can't advise you what to wear because we don't know "Who" you are going to be and in what era you existed. Finally, for gods sake don't show up with a stainless seel anything.