Farb (reenactment)
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Farb is a derogatory term used in the hobby of historical reenacting for participants who exhibit less commitment to historical authenticity.
In addition, the term farb has since been repurposed for other uses, but mainly as a general derogatory term similar to the use of many modern profane terms.
Farb used as a noun ("The farb over there is talking on his cell phone.")
Farb (or Farby) used as an adjective ("You're wearing jockey shorts underneath that cavalry uniform? That's so farb.")
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[edit] Description
[edit] Origin
- Farb was created by mixing two words to describe something that is fake or looks inauthentic, fake (F) and Garb (arb). It was first used in the 1960's to describe the uniforms and tactics of the first budding reenactment groups. It has also been described as a contraction of "Far be it from authentic, or Far be it for me."
In the late 70's historian and author Jonathan Gawne attempted to get to the bottom of where this term came from. He traced it to a group of American Civil War reenactors for the mid - central east coast. According to them, the term had developed in Civil War reenactments as a term among friends who were deeply into authenticity. Supposedly, the source claimed, he knew the actual event that started it. A group of quite authentic reenactors were walking down a tentline and one spotted a bright blue plastic cooler in the period encampment. He wanted to point out how dumb that looked, but did not want to upset anyone. He knew his friends spoke some German and so used the word Farb (German for "color") to draw attention to the out of place color in an otherwise nice encampment. The usage spread as a funny way of pointing out errors in impressions, or major gaffs like wearing digital watches. At the time of this study not one individual questioned, from a number of different reenactment groups and time periods, had an alternate explanation for it. "Fake Garb" and "far be it from me" were unknown in the groups that were interviewed.
It remains to seen if any pre-1976 publications contain an explanation.
[edit] Meaning
- Farb is the amount of inaccuracy observed in a historical impression. It is considerably scrutinized in the wearing of reproduction uniforms more so than original examples. The more inaccurate an outfit is, the higher the "Farb Factor" is. For example, the farb factor is used frequently in reproduction German World War II uniforms, as they are more difficult to reproduce and have fewer existing original articles to compare against, as opposed to the U.S. World War II uniforms. Additionally, someone who is a farb is said to be farby.
[edit] In Reenacting
[edit] Elimination
Many reenactment groups try to reduce the amount of "farb" in their group by placing strict limits including:
- From where the uniform can be bought
- Who manufactured the uniform
- Amount of detail in the uniform (# stitches per CM on German uniform, etc...)
- Letting the public place vendor reviews on who to buy from and who is a "Farb"
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Wargames: Inside the World of 20th Century Reenactors (Smithsonian Books, Washington, 2004). ISBN 1-58834-128-3
