Medieval festivals in Europe

April 2026

• Stéphane D · CC BY-SA 2.0

  Featured

  Living History & Museums Castle Events

  Guédelon Castle (living medieval construction site)

  Treigny, France

  Guédelon is a 13th-century castle being built from scratch in a Burgundy forest quarry using only the tools, materials and techniques of the 1230s, open to visitors from spring to autumn since the first stone was laid in 1997. Around forty masons, carpenters, blacksmiths, tilers, rope-makers and carters work in front of the public, and the site draws roughly 300,000 visitors a season.

  On now until 1 Nov

  Family

October 2026

• Al Bundy at da.wikipedia · CC BY 3.0

  Jousting & Tournaments Living History & Museums

  Middelaldercentret (The Medieval Centre), Nykøbing Falster

  Nykøbing Falster, Denmark

  Middelaldercentret is an experimental living-history museum on the Guldborgsund opposite Nykøbing Falster, where a reconstructed Danish market town of around the year 1400, Sundkøbing, is populated by costumed staff who stay in character all day. Its season runs from early May to late September with daily trebuchet firing, jousting and craft demonstrations, plus an autumn-holiday week in October and a Christmas market.

  On now until 16 Oct

  Family

November 2026

• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Munich Medieval Christmas Market at Wittelsbacherplatz

  Munich, Germany

  The Mittelalterlicher Weihnachtsmarkt am Wittelsbacherplatz, billed by the city as the Münchner Adventsspektakel, has filled the square north of Odeonsplatz with costumed traders, historical crafts, medieval music and staged sword fights every Advent since 2005. The 2026 market runs 20 November – 23 December, daily 11:00–21:00, closed on Totensonntag (22 November); entry is free.

  20 Nov–23 Dec 2026

  Free Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Siegburg Medieval Christmas Market

  Siegburg, Germany

  The Mittelalterlicher Markt zu Siegburg turns the market square below the Michaelsberg abbey into a medieval town market for the whole of Advent, with costumed traders, working craftspeople, jesters and musicians and a night watchman's call every evening; the 2026 market runs 20 November – 22 December. Held since 1991, it is free to enter, and the organiser has already published the 2027 dates, 19 November – 22 December.

  20 Nov–22 Dec 2026

  Free Family
• Maasaak · CC BY-SA 4.0

  Medieval Christmas

  Tallinn Christmas Market

  Tallinn, Estonia

  Tallinn's Christmas market fills the Raekoja plats, the Town Hall Square of the Hanseatic old town, around a single spruce from 20 November 2026 to 6 January 2027, daily 10:00–20:00, in what the organisers count as its 25th edition. It is not a medieval-themed market — the traders sell modern Estonian crafts and food in ordinary dress — but the square is, and the city's claim that the Brotherhood of Blackheads raised the first public Christmas tree here in 1441 is why it belongs on this site, with the historians' caveat attached.

  20 Nov–6 Jan 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Lübeck Historical Christmas Market on the Marienkirchhof

  Lübeck, Germany

  The Historischer Weihnachtsmarkt on the Marienkirchhof, the churchyard between St Mary's and the Rathaus in Lübeck's UNESCO-listed old town, is the medieval-styled one of the Hanseatic city's eleven Christmas markets: craftspeople showing forgotten trades, coppersmiths, silversmiths and pewter casters, walk-acts and musicians in historical dress under candles and a canopy of red paper stars. The 2026 market runs 23 November – 23 December and is free to enter.

  23 Nov–23 Dec 2026

  Free Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Pforzheim Medieval Christmas Market

  Pforzheim, Germany

  Pforzheim's Mittelaltermarkt im Blumenhof runs for more than five weeks each winter, from the Monday before Advent to 30 December, with costumed traders and craftspeople, a wooden-tub bathhouse, axe throwing, a hand-cranked chain carousel and a stage of medieval bands beside the town's Stadtmuseum; the 2026 market runs 23 November – 30 December and is free to enter. The 2025 edition was the thirteenth, and the market is one of the few in Germany open between Christmas and New Year.

  23 Nov–30 Dec 2026

  Free Family
• Featured

  Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Esslingen Medieval Market & Christmas Market

  Esslingen am Neckar, Germany

  Esslingen am Neckar's combined medieval market and Christmas market fills the half-timbered old town from the last week of November until just before Christmas. Around 200 stalls and roughly 500 programme slots of jugglers, fire artists, craft demonstrations and music make it the largest event of its kind in southern Germany.

  24 Nov–22 Dec 2026

  Free Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Dresden Medieval Christmas Market in the Stallhof

  Dresden, Germany

  The Mittelalter-Weihnacht im Stallhof fills the 16th-century tournament yard of Dresden's Residenzschloss with more than fifty costumed traders and craftspeople working with late-medieval tools, musicians and a bathhouse from the Wednesday before Advent to 23 December; the 2026 market runs 25 November – 23 December. It reopens as the Dresdner Rauhnächte between Christmas and Epiphany, one of the very few medieval markets in Europe that is open in early January.

  25 Nov–23 Dec 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Durlach Medieval Christmas Market

  Durlach, Germany

  The Mittelalterlicher Weihnachtsmarkt Durlach fills the Schlossplatz in front of the Karlsburg, the former palace of the margraves of Baden-Durlach, with costumed traders, craftspeople, jesters and the knights of the Badische Schwertspieler from the Wednesday before Advent to the fourth Sunday of Advent; the 2025 market ran 26 November – 21 December and the 2026 edition is expected on 25 November – 20 December. Started in 2002 as a fundraiser for the victims of that year's Elbe flood, it has been run by the Durlach clubs' association since 2008.

  Expected Nov–Dec 2026

  Family
• Medieval Christmas

  Nürnberger Christkindlesmarkt

  Nuremberg, Germany

  Nuremberg's Christkindlesmarkt fills the Hauptmarkt and the Rathausplatz from the Friday before the first Advent to Christmas Eve with 168 red-and-white wooden stalls and about 180 traders, opened each year by the Christkind's prologue from the gallery of the Frauenkirche and drawing around two million people; the 2026 market runs 27 November to 24 December. It is not a medieval market: the square is 14th-century and the Frauenkirche was Charles IV's imperial court chapel, but the market itself is first documented in 1678 — a date the market's own historians revised from 1628 — and t...

  27 Nov–24 Dec 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Middelaldercentret Christmas Market

  Nykøbing Falster, Denmark

  Alletiders Julemarked opens the Middelaldercentret's reconstructed town of around 1400 for one weekend each year, the Saturday and Sunday of the first Advent weekend, with stalls of local crafts and food set among the museum's medieval houses; the 2026 market is on 28–29 November, 10:00–16:00. Admission was DKK 59 for adults and DKK 29 for children in 2025.

  28–29 Nov 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Ronneburg Castle Historical Christmas Market

  Ronneburg, Germany

  On the first three Advent weekends the 13th-century hilltop castle of Ronneburg, east of Frankfurt between the Wetterau and the Vogelsberg, opens its halls and towers for a historical Christmas market: stalls in the castle rooms, a medieval market with jesters, musicians, taverns and craftspeople outside the walls, and a living nativity play. The 2026 market runs on 28–29 November, 5–6 and 12–13 December, Saturdays 11:00–20:00 and Sundays 11:00–18:00; admission is €10 for adults, €7 for children and €7 for anyone in full historical costume.

  28 Nov–13 Dec 2026

  Family

December 2026

• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Medeltida Jul – Medieval Yule in Visby

  Visby, Sweden

  Medeltida Jul is the winter offshoot of Visby's Medieval Week: three days on the first weekend of December when the roofless S:t Nicolai church ruin fills with a medieval Christmas market of craft stalls, warming fires and music, opened by a torchlight procession from the Österport gate. The 2026 edition runs 4–6 December; the market is free and the concerts, workshops and walks are ticketed.

  4–6 Dec 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Advent at Křivoklát Castle

  Křivoklát, Czechia

  Advent na hradě Křivoklát opens the royal Gothic castle of the Bohemian kings in the wooded valley of the Berounka on the second and third Advent weekends for a craft fair with historical entertainment — jugglers, stilt-walking angels, a rope-walker, a nativity play with carols, children's workshops — and free-flow access to the castle interiors with their Advent crib; the 2026 dates are 5–6 and 12–13 December. In 2024 admission was CZK 160 including the fair, the programme and the interiors.

  5–13 Dec 2026

  Family
• Featured

  Medieval Markets & Fairs Medieval Christmas

  Ribeauvillé Medieval Christmas Market

  Ribeauvillé, France

  On the first two weekends of December the whole Grand'Rue of Ribeauvillé, a walled wine town under three ruined castles of the lords of Ribeaupierre, becomes a medieval Christmas market: costumed beggars, peasants, dancers and jugglers work the street, the Three Kings arrive with camels, wild boar turns on spits and cervoise is poured from barrels. The 2026 market is on 5–6 and 12–13 December, Saturdays 10:00–19:00 and Sundays 10:00–18:00, and entry is free.

  5–13 Dec 2026

  Family
• Medieval Markets & Fairs Living History & Museums +1

  Midwinter Fair Archeon

  Alphen aan den Rijn, Netherlands

  The Midwinter Fair fills Archeon, the open-air archaeological museum park in Alphen aan den Rijn, with a two-day winter fantasy market, folk and pagan bands and fire-lit winter rituals on a December weekend. The backbone is the park's reconstructed medieval town and Roman quarter and the craft stalls; the fantasy is in the costumes, the folklore acts and the Yule theme of celebrating the return of the light.

  12–13 Dec 2026

  Family

January 2027

• Viking & Norse Historic City Celebrations

  Scalloway Fire Festival

  Scalloway, Scotland

  Scalloway's Viking fire festival opens Shetland's fire-festival season on the second Friday of January: a Guizer Jarl and a squad of men, women and children in Norse dress lead the torchlit procession through the village to the boating club slipway at Port Arthur, where the galley is set alight and cast adrift on the sea before a fireworks display and a night of hall performances. The next edition is Friday 8 January 2027.

  8 Jan 2027

  Family
• Mike Pennington · CC BY-SA 2.0

  Featured

  Music, Feasts & Theatre Viking & Norse +1

  Up Helly Aa (Lerwick)

  Lerwick, Scotland

  Up Helly Aa is Lerwick's Viking-themed fire festival, held on the last Tuesday of January: about a thousand torch-bearing guizers led by the Guizer Jarl's squad in Norse dress march through the town and burn a full-size replica longship, then tour a dozen halls performing skits until morning. It grew out of 19th-century tar-barrelling, with the first torch procession in 1881 and the first galley burning in 1889; the next edition is Tuesday 26 January 2027.

  26 Jan 2027

  Family

February 2027

• Featured

  Reenactment & Battles Living History & Museums +1

  JORVIK Viking Festival

  York, England

  The JORVIK Viking Festival takes over York for a week every February half-term with a Viking encampment and traders' market in the city centre, a march of hundreds of warriors, talks, crafts, a best-beard contest and a ticketed finale battle with pyrotechnics. Founded in 1985 by the team behind the JORVIK Viking Centre, it is the largest Viking festival in Europe and draws around 40,000 people.

  8–14 Feb 2027

  Family

March 2027

• Music, Feasts & Theatre Fantasy Fairs & Spectacles

  Trolls & Légendes

  Mons, Belgium

  Trolls & Légendes is Belgium's fantasy festival, held every two years over the Easter weekend at Lotto Mons Expo: three days of folk and fantasy-metal concerts, a book and comics fair with international authors, a craft market, role-playing and board games, exhibitions, films and cosplay, run by volunteers and drawing close to 25,000 visitors. It is an indoor festival in exhibition halls rather than a fair on a field; its medieval side is the craft market, the folk music and the costumes, not camps or tournaments.

  Expected Mar 2027

  Family

April 2027

• Medieval Markets & Fairs Jousting & Tournaments +1

  Setmana Medieval de Montblanc

  Montblanc, Spain

  Montblanc's Setmana Medieval de la Llegenda de Sant Jordi turns the walled Catalan town into a medieval fair over the two weekends around Saint George's Day (23 April), with a free daily market and camp, parades, a night-time dragon show projected on the 14th-century walls and an open-air staging of the Saint George legend, which local tradition sets in Montblanc. Founded in 1987 and declared a festival of national tourist interest, it reached its 39th edition in April 2026.

  Expected Apr 2027

  Family

May 2027

• CesisCastle · CC BY-SA 4.0

  Medieval Markets & Fairs Living History & Museums +1

  Cēsis Castle Medieval Days (formerly Cēsis Medieval Festival)

  Cēsis, Latvia

  Cēsis Castle, the Livonian Order's mightiest fortress and Latvia's best-preserved castle ruin, runs a costumed 'medieval season' from May to September with craft days in the castle garden, a Hanseatic market during the July city festival and period-dressed castle folk on summer weekends. A standalone annual Cēsis Medieval Festival, the successor of the Baltic Medieval Festival first held here in 2001, could not be verified as still running in 2026, so this listing is marked unverified.

  Expected May–Sep 2027

  Family
• Living History & Museums Historic City Celebrations

  Medieval Mdina Festival

  Mdina, Malta

  The Medieval Mdina Festival brings re-enactors, falconers, flag-throwers and musicians into the walled streets of Malta's old capital for a spring weekend. Organised by the Mdina Local Council, it recreates life between about 1200 and 1500 with battles, parades, crafts and street scenes inside the bastions.

  Expected May 2027

  Family