Stephanie- The SCA is a historical recreation and re-creation group that was started at Berkeley in 1966. The span it covers is nominally western Europe from the fall of Rome to 1600, tho' you'll find the occasional persona on either side of that. The society runs on a double structure: there's a regular corporate chain of command, but there's also a feudal chain of command and the two are expected to work together. In order to provide a focus, people are encouraged to develop a "persona" from a particular time & place. The degree of strictness to which absolute authenticity is observed will vary between kingdoms and even individuals; there's an ongoing argument between the "authenticity mavens" and the "fun mavens" . Overall, though, the level of authenticity is far below that of the US Civil War or buckskinner recreationists. Part of this is laxity, but part of it is that we're dealing with a far wider time span with far fewer remaining original artifacts from which to work. I started out as a "fun maven" and still more-or-less consider myself such, but my love for things Welsh has gotten me a lot closer to being authentic. The SCA is now a nearly-worldwide organization; whereabouts are you located? If you're interested, I'll try to get you a contact number for your local group. Hwyl, Lisa Deeds