festival plea for support

Apr 28 2011 by George Topp, Hamilton Advertiser

SOUTH Lanarkshire is once again playing host to the country’s largest history festival, which returns to Lanark later this year.

Scotland’s Festival of History 2011 will attract thousands of visitors to the county over the weekend of August 20-21.

Last year’s unique event brought an economic boost of more than £274,000 to the local economy, and now the event organisers, Lanark Medieval Society, are hoping county businesses can help them build on the festival’s success.

Supported by the country’s national events agency EventScotland, South Lanarkshire Council, and Advertiser publishers Scottish & Universal Newspapers, the festival has so far managed to run without any commercial backing or sponsorship.

But, faced with increasing costs, the small team of local volunteers who run the festival are now having to seek sponsorship to ensure that what is believed to be the county’s largest visitor event can continue to flourish.

What began 10 years ago as a small one day event has now grown to be the country’s national history festival, and one of Britain’s top re-enactment shows, regularly attracting participants from more than 12 countries, and visitors from around the world.

Scotland’s Festival of History takes visitors on a unique walk through more than 2000 years of history, from the Celts and Romans to the two Great Wars, thanks to about 500 costumed specialist re-enactors from across Europe.

Over the weekend a massive camp of more than 100 colourful historic tents acts like a time warp, where visitors can watch battle re-enactments, living history displays, historic and modern craft demonstrations, music and song from across the centuries and much more.

Organised by a small locally-based team of eight volunteers, with support from the Rotary Club of Lanark, the organising team have been praised by Scottish Ministers as being “pre-eminent in their field,” while First Minister Alex Salmond, and Paul Bush, chief operating officer of EventScotland, have also been full of praise for the event and its value to Scotland, both economically and as an important visitor attraction.

But, faced with the ever-increasing costs involved in staging such a major event, festival organisers are now hoping to attract support or sponsorship to ensure its future.

“Increasing festival costs means we now need to look for outside support or sponsorship from businesses interested in being actively involved in supporting the county’s largest visitor show, and one that brings large benefits to the area,” said organiser Kenny Ellis.

“Studies last year by EKOS and GDR for South Lanarkshire and EventScotland showed that the festival was directly worth £100,000 to the local economy, and also resulted in more than £174,000-worth of national and international media publicity, in print, TV and radio, for South Lanarkshire,” he added.

The event also works with a range of charities, including Help for Heroes, the Armed Forces Veterans Association and PoppyScotland. Charities taking part last year raised more than £1000.

“We will welcome anyone interested in helping such a colourful and unique event, irrespective of whether they simply want to play a role in organising and helping run the festival, maybe have ideas on how to improve the event, or simply becoming involved as a sponsor,” said Mr Ellis.

“Ideally we would love to attract a headline sponsor, but there are also opportunities for sponsorship of individual attractions, from children’s activities to hands-on historical activities, to some of the battle re-enactments or historic musicians and singers. Financial backing to help with admission tickets or programmes is also required, as is sponsorship of the two-day international Lanark Silver Arrow longbow archery tournament,” he added.

Those interested in assisting and keeping this important event thriving and developing even further should contact Mr Ellis at 01555 666736, mobile 07963 128365 or through scotlandsfestivalofhistory@hotmail.co.uk. Information on the festival, including TV documentary footage of past events, can be found at www.scotlandsfestivalofhistory.co.uk

FOOLING ABOUT: giant jesters at the history festival.

ON TARGET: a Napoleonic soldier straight from the set of the hugely popular TV series Sharpe’s War. There will be more colourful action like this at Auhust’s big event.

NORSE ACTION: the Viking warriors are another popular draw when the country’s largest history festival comes to Lanarkshire.