I marvelled at the temporary nobleman's breathtakingly broad shoulders, each one flatteringly capped in burnished steel.

"Yes," he chortled to me in the House of Reps courtyard at Old Parliament House, laughing till his chainmail rattled, "theres nothing quite like armour to make yourself look buff!"

Monday's Medieval Fest was a part of the celebrations of the 800th anniversary of King John's grudging signing, at Runnymede near London on June 15, 1215, of the Magna Carta.

Did Runnymede teem with folk on the day? Even if it did it was probably out-teemed by Monday's event, which seemed to attract all of holidaying Canberra.

"We had 1000 through the doors by 10.30am [after opening at 10am]!" a happy OPH serf trilled to me early in the morning in a thronged Kings Hall.

All around the walls of that hallowed space the oil-painted statesmen looked on in surprise from their gilt frames. Immediately beneath the gazes of Sir George Reid and Sir Henry Parkes, ordinary (but escapist) Canberrans put on clothes, from a vast supplied-for-the-day wardrobe of costumes for kings, queens, barons, knights, lords, ladies, peasants and serfs. Then, using nifty devices not dreamt of in 1215, their rellos and friends took photos of the giggling fancy-dressed.

Often the costumed elected to have their pictures taken sitting side-by-side on a pair of thrones arranged in front of the hall's dominating statue of King George V. His regal frown suggested he was finding Monday's proceedings vulgar and frivolous. And yet his own kneecap-revealing costume of Garter robes eclipsed in frivolous grandeur anything the escapists were trying on.

There was a variety of medieval sideshows at Monday's event but of course for sheer colour and movement nothing could compete for popularity with the outdoor, courtyard displays of Heavy Combat. The winter sunlight gleamed on the glossy armour of the heavy combat combatants. The warriors roared medieval (but obscenity-free) battle taunts at each other.

Somehow, to see men in armour hacking at one another is to have conjured up expectations of an entertainment like the famous fight (amputations and great gushings of blood) between King Arthur and the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

But no, not with children there. And so when we caught up with combatant Robert Young after a display of heavy combat, though still a little breathless from his battle he still had all his arms and legs and blood. He took off his fabulous helmet so he wouldn't sound muffled while being interviewed.

"What you've just seen today," he panted, "is a display of medieval combat by the Society for Creative Anachronism, also known as SCA."

"The battle you just saw was the King's People versus the People's Champions. I was on the King's side and so of course I had God and the King on my side and that's why we were victorious today."

Yes, some history-conscious people in the audience, well aware that King John is the villain of the Magna Carta scenario (a kind of swaggering, autocratic, 13th century Tony Abbott, trying to trample underfoot the rule-of-law-supporting Gillian Triggses of his time) had actually booed the success of Robert Young's/Lord Rubin's side.

"What you've just seen was some three-on-three combat," Lord Rubin continued.

"What we try to do is recreate the medieval period as accurately as possible, while staying safe, so that we can live to continue doing this another day."

Your columnist wondered (while of course, as someone who lives a life immersed in fantasy, already knowing the answer) what on earth would induce a grown, 21st century Australian to dress and carry on like this?

"It's an amazing feeling," Lord Rubin rejoiced, "to put away all the stresses of your life, to don a suit of armour with your friends, and hit each other!"

"You have complete freedom from all those mundane things, like the need to do your laundry. Your stresses at work, they all vanish as soon as soon as you get the chance to put on your armour. It's a remarkable feeling, the release and the joy you can have by putting on a costume and becoming someone else. I'm a public servant and I tell you, nothing beats getting into a suit of armour and swinging a stick. You get rid of all your Mondayitis blues."

Trying to suppress our envy, we asked him about his gorgeous costume and accoutrements.

"I've been wearing a late-period Crusader helmet which [giving me the weighty item to lift] is made out of solid 14-gauge steel. Armour has to be quite heavy to take out the impact of the weapons."

"But the weapons," Lord Rubin continued, thus giving a further explanation of why Monday's heavy combat  wasn't as grisly as it was in Monty Python And The Holy Grail, "they're wooden or a heavy plastic polymer and they do have dulled edges so that they won't actually cut."

Back in Runnymede-bustling Kings Hall every second child seemed to have been turned into an instant prince or princess by wearing a make-it-yourself cardboard (but jewel-encrusted) crown.

The hall's aforementioned severe-faced oil paintings and sculptures were at last getting into the blood-tingling swing of things and during the session of medieval music and dance, George V's gaitered calves twitched and his bronze toes tapped.