It's your money! Go for it! Just don't be suprised when no one notices, or cares.
Guess you didn't read this part of the post.
Some things are necessary for participation.
Other things are "acceptable" for participation.
Ones level of immersion and ones own expectations apply only to himself until that person attempts to blend into a group of other people that propose to be of the same inclinations. Each one diferent, but all of the same general, vague similarity. What is common and acceptable at one location might be inappropriate at another place with another group.
Some things are unacceptable anywhere.
Some things are acceptable anywhere.
Buy your hemp tent. It will be acceptable anywhere. It does not matter to me what your tent is fasioned from as long as it is not a fabric that interferes with the presentation and "mindset" of the historic site or group you represent and cooperate with. They are the persons that you must accomodate through your purchases and actions.
The chance that I will ever lay eyes on you are slim, and unless I am on the jury comittee of a site you visit, my opinion of your gear is of little influnce. If our paths do cross, I do not know you and will not recognize you (first time I have seen an anonomous post allowed on this board!) and would hope that any judgment I placed on your clothing and equipment would be in relationship to the requirements and guidelines of the site.
I have known many people that became obsessed with equipment beyond the level one could view as "reasonable" or "normal". Most are no longer in this activity because their own mindset and presentation became entangled with their knowledge of the inaccuracies in their equipment.
I have known few people that quit because other people were not good enough to camp with. However, many of the people that quit reenacting stop participating because the feel they are not able to do it right! Their own self imposed standards of historical correctness drives them away.
Now that you have your hemp tent what is the rope you use to pitch the tent made from, how about the pegs? Was the fiber woven in the "traditional" manner or on a modern machine?
Are your clothes hand sewn from hand woven fibers, dyed with natural dyes and stiched with with hand spun thread of linen or silk?
Is all of your leather brain tanned, or tanned only using the processes and chemicals used during your era of focus? Are the stiches sewn using sinew or hand spun thread? Were the holes punched with an awl forged by hand?
Is your very limited stock of cookware appropriate for your area? (It was diferent in diferent places) Was it all hand formed from hand forged sheet metal? Are the bails round or square? Are the ears the proper shape and properly rivited in place?
God help you if you are eating using more than a wooden spoon, your fingers and knife!
And does that knife have the proper pedigree? Has modern machinery ever polluted it? How was the steel made? Are the rivits perfect for your area, along with blade shape and handle material. Is it too big, too small, too thin, too thick? Is it sharpened in the proper manner on a natural stone from a river undamed by the Corps of Engineers?
Now, how about the gun. Is it an origional? If origional is it proper for the persona and era? Has anything been repaired or replaced? Who authenticated it? Even the "experts" get fooled on occasion, and some individuals will not accept the expertise of certain other "experts".
If it is not origional was the barrel hand forged, around a mandrel, using a charcoal fire and period correct anvil and tools? Was it then reamed smooth using a hickory rod with steel inserts backed by wheat chaff? Was the lock forged and filed by hand and inlet into a stock that was never touched by power tools, not even cut down with a chain saw? Was artificial lighting being used while this work was in progress?
What about your speech, grammer, hygiene, hair, beard? Do you keep a proper supply of body lice to use for events? Do you have too many teeth to be alive in the prescribed era?
The list never ends! You just draw a line somewhere. You draw it at your own level of participation ability and tolerance.
Then there is the biggist question of all, does everything "look right"? If everything else is perfect and it just does not come together right you are still going to look "farby". Some folk just have the knack of looking goofey and being clumsy in camp.
Other people can walk through Wally World, spend an evening with needle and thread and show up the next day at a site looking like they just survived Braddock's Defeat!
As for what I do, say or advise, you can take it or leave it. No one is forcing any opinion on you. I am simply typing on a keyboard and have absolutely no control over you life or decision makeing process!
This is a computer forum with 4,000 members. Watch the posts closely and you will find that some of our "experts" actually know very little about muzzleloaders. Some of them, obviously, have never fired a black powder gun.
Some of our reenactors have never visited an historic site while wearing period clothing. Some have never spent the night in a cloth tent, nor slept on the ground among the ferns listening to a bear tear up a stump a few yards away.
Some have read but one book and others have studied minute details about an area, ignoring the general flow of history. Still, they arrempt to clarify points of detail in other areas where their expertise is lacking.
My level of interest, imersion, education or expertise applies only to myself. My level of adiquicy or inadiquicy applies only to myself. If you do not wish to read my posts you are not forced too. My answers are drawn from the limited amount of knowledge and reference material I have. My memory may fail me or my information may be outdated or out of context.
Accept my words, or the words and advice of others on this forum with caution. Some of us may not know whatof we speak. Some of us sound good and know nothing. Some of us seldom speak and conceal great wisdom.
Neither do you have to spend your hard earned coins as I feel they should be spent.
I do not have control over your actions or thought processes, over what you learn, know or do.
And I refuse to take tha blame if you look farby.
:hatsoff:
roperties not present in Cotton canvas. I have my painters tarp already, and am quite happy with it. but the purist in me would surely love to have a "period fabric" over my head at least once.
