Sometimes you wake up in the morning and see something you know is going to make the rest of your day. Here is a video of Polish and Danish people wearing armor and battering each other with all manner of antique weapons:
Watch dudes in suits of armor battle with swords in the Medieval Combat World Championship
Denis Doyle/Getty Images
This, as you can see, is no joke, despite what we’re pretty sure is Lord of the Rings music. These are the Poland and Denmark teams in the Medieval Combat World Championship, held over this past long weekend in Malbork, a 13th century Polish city with a badass Teutonic castle.
It’s ... uh ... this is a really good sport. It is very readily appreciated. This promo video from last year in Spain will get you hyped as hell for it. As the (very funky) announcer puts it, “for those of you who are wondering about the rules here now, there aren’t that many.” The objective is to knock the dudes on the other team down. As the announcer puts it, you can do pretty much anything except football tackling, foot-stomping and hitting folks behind the knee, in the throat or the spine.
Of course, even if limbs aren’t severed, there are injuries. This is from that 2014 video:
It’s cleaned-up medieval warfare. It’s great. And Poland won on their home field in front of a great (and well-dressed) crowd!
(If you’re curious, you can see photos of the USA team, who only won a couple medals, here.)
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