The Loxwood Joust

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Planning

Fantasy Fairs in Europe 2027: Elfia, Castlefest, MPS and the Medieval-Fantasy Circuit

Europe's fantasy fairs for 2027 by date, from Elfia and Castlefest to MPS and Mythodea: what is period at each, what is elves, who they suit, and where the real thing is nearby.

Tom Saxby · 10 min read · 12 Sep 2026

Planning

Medieval Festivals in the UK 2027: The Ones Worth a Weekend, in Date Order

Eight UK festivals with 2027 dates we have checked, January to October: which are free, which are Viking, which is a show, which is fantasy, and how to get to each.

Wren Ashdown · 9 min read · 12 Sep 2026

Festival Guide

How Jousting Actually Works: Rules, Scoring, the Lance, and Where to See a Real Tilt

Tilt versus mêlée, how a joust is scored, what the lance and the armour weigh, which festival jousts are theatre and which are sport, and where to watch one.

Tom Saxby · 10 min read · 12 Sep 2026