Mathew Weller was already sweating as he cinched tight more than 100 pounds of plate armor at Petersen Rock Gardens on Saturday.

Doing battle with a rattan sword and shield against older, more experienced men in far lighter armor would be a test, the 17-year-old said, but should prepare him well for future combat.

“When I switch to lighter armor, I’m going to be jumping over people to hit them,” he said.

Saturday would not be that day. Seconds into his first battle, he inadvertently punched a fellow combatant in the groin, then took a killing blow to his own groin.

“Karma,” Weller said. “That’s what it is, karma.”

Saturday was the annual Harvest Tourney for the Shire of Corvaria, Central Oregon’s local chapter of the Society for Creative Anachronism. Dedicated to reliving the period — roughly — between 650 and 1650, the group comes together several times a year to celebrate the culture of the Middle Ages.

At the center of Saturday’s festivities was a hard-fought battle to crown the “Shire Defender,” the pre-eminent swordsman in the greater Central Oregon area.

Olivia Haro — or Lady Olivia Magdalena de Haro, a name she assumes in her role as a 1300s-era resident of Bohemia — said while members of the Shire of Corvaria spend a great deal of time reading to verify the historical accuracy of their SCA identities, they make some concessions to the present day. Well-made modern shoes are a must inside the sword fighting arena. Armored warriors uneasily tipped bottles of water through the bars of their helmets beneath vinyl tents, and at the archery range, a voice from a cassette player counted down the final seconds to the end of a competition.

“We take the best of the Middle Ages,” Haro explained, adding that the lowlights of the era are not entirely ignored. At one recent competition in which participants crafted their own weapon, one draped himself in a collection of plague-infested rats, flinging the rubber rodents at his fellow competitors.

Though SCA reenactors have traditionally kept their focus on European history, some have branched out. Haro said one re-enactor from the Madras area has taken to dressing as a Mayan warrior from the same era, and she’s seen others who assume Japanese and Arabian identities.

“People can be out of different time periods and different places, intermingling, and that’s where it comes to education,” she said. “We all love some aspect of these periods, so that’s where you can learn.”

Ahead of the tournament, the combatants line up before Ekatarina, the reigning princess of Corvaria, to introduce themselves and their consorts. Defending champion of the tournament, Lord Duncan Ottosin — Jimmy Gaylor, when out of costume — smirked and nodded to the woman on his elbow, explaining his regular consort was unavailable for the weekend.

“I don’t know who this lady is, I just found her on the street,” he said.

The princess — Renae Snow of Klamath Falls on any other day — briefly broke character and chuckled, then turned stern.

“Try again,” she said, locking her gaze on the chastened warrior.

As defending champion, Gaylor fought only exhibition battles on Saturday, in order to allow the Shire Defender title to pass on to another combatant. Gaylor said though the tournament is an exercise in acting, the combat is still quite real, describing the ringing sound in his helmet when he took a sword to the head, and rolling back his sleeves to show off the red marks just above his elbow.

“I’ve gotten toughened up enough I’m not bruising anymore,” he said. “I’m still getting hit pretty hard, I’m just not getting them.”