Tournament Society

Because of the rising cost and logistical difficulties involved in sponsoring a tournament, during the early and mid 14th century groups of knights in the Bavarian region of Germany banded themselves into small groups for the purposes of sponsoring and participating in tournaments. Barber and Barker (1989) put forth a theory that it was because of these societies that the tournament was more common in Germany than in France or England, and the tournament companies were responsible for their proliferation.

For one of these societies, the tournament was to act as an annual assembly, whose members wore the same livery and held a court at the same tournament, to which they were to bring their wives and daughters in order to ‘bring honor to the society,’ during which they were to conduct their annual business. All members are to attend, or were fined. A council of four was named to oversee the membership, and members were to help one another in times of war. They founded a chapel in Freising. All members were to own war-horses if they were able. Some German societies elected a king to oversee their members. According to Barker and Barber, "...the society was intended to offer a suitable atmosphere in which chivalric culture could flourish." We have definite records of societies in existence from 1387 to the 1430s, but it is likely that they existed both before and after this.

Within the SCA, the Tournament Societies and the Monarchical knightly orders (the Garter and Star, for example) proved the direct inspiration for the formation of the tournament companies, groups of knights, men-at-arms, and ladies dedicated to particular aspects of the tournament experience.

Unfortunately, very little research has been done on the historical tournament societies; presumably some of their documentation lies buried in the German records, to be found by an enterprising scholar.