Living History Events in Denmark 2024

This is my 2024 watch list of living history events. More will be added along the way.

Review of Ridley Scott’s “Napoleon” 2023

I had high hopes for the “Napoleon” movie. There has in my mind been a lack of historical epics (not necessarily historical movies), the “Epic” genre seems to have faded a bit into the background.

It is understandable with the current climate of war in Europe again that it could not be glorifying Napoleon to any big extent but I was hoping for a character study into the complex character of Napoleon. However this movie is not a character study, instead it seems more like a parody on Napoleon and a likely commentary on present-day dictators and that power corrupts.

The movie had the “short” run time of 2 hours and 37 minutes and it is clear that compressing Napoleon’s entire life into that would be impossible. Even if cutting it down to the Siege of Toulon (1793) to Waterloo (1815) would mean a mere 7 minutes screen time per year if his life, so the movie would need a focus. In this case it is the romance between Napoleon and his first wife Josephine.

The underlying narrative of the movie is therefore that Josephine was Napoleon’s muse and source of inspiration. After the divorce his decision-making and luck went down hill dooming him to exile. That is an interesting take but ultimately did not work for me. The movie is rife with historical inaccuracies but that is the least of the issues with the movie. The movie never dares to present a balanced view on Napoleon and cannot be said to be close to an accurate biopic.

Battle of Copenhagen 1801 – A Sails of Glory battle

If you have not used the Sails of Glory system for multiplayer games, I highly recommend it. It is a system that has simultaneous turns so it cuts down the amount of downtime and admin making it easy for each player to take control of a single ship as part of a larger age of sails battle.

On April 1st (almost anniversary), we ran a Battle of Copenhagen 1801 scenario using a modified advanced Sails of Glory rules set.

The main idea was to have the two battle lines run by an automa/NPC and the players commanding one ship each trying to influence the battle. The British commanded the frigates as they arrived randomly after being swept away by the currents around the Middle Ground and the Danish commanded the ships kept in reserve which for the battle was actually allowed to sortie out of port.

Each turn considered to be 5 minutes of “real time” in game and every 6 turns players would draw special event cards to affect the battle and NPC control and hidden events and reefs were controlled by a game master.

The terrain is custom built and the main battle line are not SoL minis. I am still working on a post on the scenario rules but I wanted you to enjoy the pictures.

The Battle of Copenhagen 1801 is almost the true definition of a paradox:

• It was fought by the insistence of Czar Paul of Russia, but he was dead by the time it took place
• It was a sea battle to avoid having to commit the Danish navy
• It is generally considered a victory both Danes and Brits

In this post you can find rules and a scenario for the Battle of Copenhagen sprinkled with a bit of What-ifs to keep it interesting. The rule set is a modified Sails of Glory set with rules for NPC battle line while the players each take command of a smaller ship to try to turn the tide of battle.

Small Board Games with Historical Themes

Each year more than 6000 new board game titles are published, of which is an overwhelming amount of new games. With so many new games a number of these deals with history or have historical themes.

Sometimes these are slapped on or reskins of other games with generic themes, at other times there are history lessons to be learned form them. In this post, I take a look at a number of small and cheap board games and their ability to teach history.

Book Recommendations

During both lockdowns I have been reading lots of books especially historical fiction and alternative history so I would like to propose a couple of books for people needing to social distance for a while longer.

#WeWalkforLivingHistory – an Initiative to Support Culture

2020 will be a year to be remembered as a very special year, especially so for the living history communities. While we love getting out and live history on fairs, events and at museums, 2020 had very little of that.
In Spring during the lockdown with cultural institutions and museums bleeding, a spirit of solidarity and desire to help grew. As Denmark was not in a severe enough lockdown to force curfews, living history enthusiasts and reenactors took to the streets near their homes to remind people that museums and culture would need them to come back as soon as it was safe to do so.

It all started in the UK but it soon spread and was spearheaded by Thit Birk Petersen in Denmark by creating a Facebook group and using the existing living history groups to reach out.

Take a walk in your historical outfit – support living history. We live in crazy times and we can not meet and make living interpretation. Many museums and freelancers are bleeding and are affected by the Corona-pandemic. I would like to make awareness of this and therefore I invite you to walk with me – at a distance, where you are at, in your historical costume. So put on a historical suit of your choice and take a walk around your neighbourhood – talk to who ever you meet and give them a history lesson or two 😉 If you have contact to local media – good, but if not, take a picture and use the #wewalkforlivinghistory

Thit Birk Petersen in Gå en tur i dit historiske kostume – støt kulturen the Danish Facebook group

In 2021 with a second round of lockdown. We are back in the streets blaffling people and making them smile. This is a fun way of reminding people of the events, museums and culture and a good way of engaging people who may not have a knowledge of living history or history in general.

Spring 2020, Copenhagen. Advertising living history

So if you meet someone who looks a couple of centuries out of place, come say hello. We love to chat about history, our hobby and spread the word to ensure the living history events in 2021 or whenever they are allowed to continue will be successful and reach as many people as possible. We are not just people who like to dress up for the sake of it.

Pictures are taken from walks in Copenhagen, Spring 2020 and Winter 2021. But this is happening all over Denmark and hopefully the rest of the world as well. If not, please feel inspired and dress up for a walk. Support culture, make people smile and get to wear your historical outfits, what is not to like?

One of the really fun things are the mixing of living history communities in a way we have rarely seen as most events keep to a certain time period. But for instance in January vikings, Medieval, American Civil War and WWII were represented so even if you are a seasoned reenactor there is an opportunity to learn about other parts of history.

All pictures are copyrighted by Bo Herbst and used with permission.

Romanian National Military Museum and Romanian WWII tanks

Romania is generally a very overlooked nation when it comes to military history at least in Western Europe. But there is a major military museum with a very interesting collection to be found in Bucharest. It is known has the  Muzeul Militar Naţional “Regele Ferdinand I” after its’ founder Ferdinand I as early as 1923.

May 4th Living History Events

The weekend of May 4th saw the 74th anniversary of the liberation of Denmark. As such it was marked by a number of events around Denmark and WW2Tommies had a busy weekend attending a number of events.

Living History Events in Denmark 2019

2019 is a meager year when it comes to big living history events in Denmark but here is my watch list for this year.

The Bastion of the Vilnius Defensive Wall

If you are going to Vilnius and is interested in brick fortifications consider a visit to the Bastion of the Vilnius Defensive Wall.