Pioneer of the Scottish HMB movement, Dave McNaughton, concerning his way of stirring up the movement in his country.

First we had to learn whether the people of Scotland really wanted to join the National Team of the country. We began to conduct surveys in the social network Facebook. As a result, we held a meeting for all those who were interested in HMB. There we had a public vote. We wanted to find out whether Scotland needed its own national team for historical medieval battle. The event took place on the 8 of September 2013 in the Stirling Castle.

Having gathered the like-minded people for the team, we started to create our HMB organization from scratch. Taking into account that there was no such sport as Historical Medieval Battle in Scotland at the time, we had to develop a certain hierarchy. As a result, we got a Committee with a written code of laws for us to be able to implement our vision of HMB movement in our country. We called it Scottish Knight League.

Then I contacted HMBIA to talk about participation of the National Team of Scotland in the World Championship in HMB “Battle of theNations”-2014. The talks went well, and as a result I was invited to the meeting of captains, held in Liechtenstein. There I presented our National Team. I cooperated with the HMBIA leadership and got any information I needed for our team to comply with all the high standards of the organization.

We conducted our annual elections for all the positions in the Scottish Knight League. After the election, I was appointed Director General of the Committee and captain of the National Team. For me, it meant that I got a lot of responsibilities which were hard to combine.

Being Director General, I had to organize a fundraising campaign, a PR campaign for the League, provide fighters with armor and weapons. I also had to deal with logistics issues, find premises for the headquarters and devote some time to charity.

Being team captain, I had to gather the guys who wanted to become members of the Scottish National Team and provide them with a wrestling, fencing and fitness coach. It was difficult, but I did that! My team went through a series of trainings and participated in the World Championship in HMB “Battle of the Nations”-2014!

Dave McNaughton,
captain of the «Deils Claymores» club,
captain of the National Team of Scotland

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