The medieval jousting is on the way to the Tarago Show on 6 March. Photo: Supplied.
Charging at another human on a horse is somewhat of a forgotten pastime, but that’s all about to change. Taking over the Tarago Show on 6 March this year is Liberty and Rodney Deaman, two locals passionate about medieval horse sports.
The pair will be running a skill and arms demonstration, which involves sword skills, slant skills and spear handling on horseback. They’ll follow the skill and arms demonstration with a mini jousting tournament, in which they’ll compete in a reenactment battle.
“My husband and I have been doing medieval horse sports for about six or seven years now and jousting for about three,” said Liberty Deaman.
“We originally started out with horse archery, which is one of the fastest-growing sports in the world and obviously a combination of horse riding and archery.
“Through that, we met a number of people who were involved in different types of reenactment, and we being horse people sort of followed down the line of what else we could do,” she said.
Having jousted at several fairs across the state, including Orange and Blacktown, this is the first time they’ll perform in front of their local community in Tarago, a place they moved to five years ago and have grown to love.
“It’s a great, small community. Everyone is really friendly with each other, and there’s a lot of great community events available to different people throughout the community, which is really awesome,” said Ms Deaman.
“It’s really horse-focused community as well. We’ve got the Pony Club out there, and we do actually run a branch of the Australian Horse Archery Association, so we have a club out there that meets every month.”
Ms Deaman said that the Tarago community has been “hugely supportive ” of bringing their passion to the local show.
“We actually got a little round of applause and a great big cheer when we agreed to host the joust and the skill and arms at the show,” she said.
“They’re all looking forward to it. I think everyone’s quite interested and excited about it going ahead especially because this year the horse competition component of the Tarago Show won’t be held on the same day.”
While they love medieval horse sports, there are several similar activities one can get involved in, meaning one doesn’t necessarily require a horse to join in the fun. They’ve met many people with different interests in mediaeval activities over the years and can use those connections to help others find their passion.
“At the end of the joust, there will be the opportunity to come and meet us and our horses, so obviously, if anyone has any questions about how they can get involved. Or, if they’d like to look into it themselves, we can tell them where they’re best suited to start looking based on where they live and the level of experience they’ve got already,” said Ms Deaman.
Gates to the Tarago Show will open at 9:00 am on 6 March, running through to 5:00 pm. The skill and arms show will begin at 11:30 am, and the jousting will begin at 2:30 pm.
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