WALLOON resident Terry Kennedy is a history buff whose passion is recreating instruments and garments from the Viking era.
Mr Kennedy also shoots an old English longbow and it was through his archery group he discovered the Abbey Medieval Festival.
Not content with just going and looking, he decided to actively participate and began making a musical instrument called a lyre which is a type of harp.
“I’d been going to the festival for around seven or eight years, so I knew what it was about,” he said.
“During Covid I had a lot of timber in my mum’s garage and I read an article in a woodworking magazine about a guy here who was making lyres and I thought, wow – I will give that a try.
“I’d been caring for mum and not going out too much really, so I had the time and figured I could make use of the timber because it was too good to throw out.”
He was introduced to a re-enactment group named Jorth Gar that puts on live action displays from the Viking era on Tamborine Mountain.
“I didn’t realise it at the time, but they also went to the medieval festival, so when Covid started to ease off and I had about 12 instruments made, I decided to connect with them,” he said.
“After studying Viking era archaeological finds I decided to dive even deeper and read about a woman who’d written her Master’s thesis on the bits and pieces of instruments that’d been dug up.
“I thought ‘ooh I might try and copy these’ not really having any ideas of my own just wanting to recreate them as they were back then.
“I made the first one and enjoyed it so did some research and found a dozen or so different ones all based on archaeological finds from the Viking area.”
He still wasn’t satisfied and decided there was only so much one can learn through internet searches.
“I spoke to people who are part of various Viking re-enactment groups, hoping they could steer me in the right direction when it comes to accuracy,” he said.
“When I got into it and figured out all the other things they did, I discovered they didn’t have a woodworker in the group and I’m a carpenter by trade.”
Some of the craftsmen imported timber from northern Europe to Australia to make the instruments as authentic as possible.
Importing can be expensive and Mr Kennedy said Australian timber was just as good.
“Besides, I am still learning, and I don’t want to waste expensive timber on something that is not quite right, I still have a lot to learn,” he said.
He has crafted seven medieval lyres and some biscuit tin banjos.
The instruments have been made using historical evidence as a reference.
“I also wanted to be more involved with the medieval festivals I attended and I figured a good way to do that was to make medieval clothing that looked authentic,” he said.
“I have made garments similar to those worn within northern Europe from around 790AD to about 1066AD.
“I source my material from different places and have hand-stitched the whole garment, nothing is machine stitched.
“The first one it took about a week but I am getting quicker and now it takes about three or four days.
“I have around 10 tunics and five lots of pants, and I bought a pair of historically accurate shoes.”
