Tournaments were held by the nobility to celebrate the culmination of important political deals or special events, such as a coronation, a wedding of significance, oaths of loyalty, peace negotiations and etc. The aim was to prove agility and combat technique, to display one's skill to others and claim a sizeable prize. Tournaments ranged from classic jousting, where knights and those who could afford equipment faced off against each other on horseback, or massed combat, with rival teams battling it out in the tournament arena. In both cases, the aim was the same – to knock the opponent to the ground, but not to kill or injure him. When defeated, an opponent would usually yield, and while tournaments are usually non-lethal and safety precautions were taken, injuries and even death were not uncommon, but the one commiting the act was highly frowned upon and considered dishonorable.
Initially, the Church strongly condemned tournaments – only in the 14th century did the Church lift the general ban on participation in tournaments and allowed them to be mounted without sanction. However, this obviously didn't stop the nobility, neither the participants at the time from doing tournaments in which many participated.Tournaments also attract large numbers of merchants and varying side events, such as puppet shows, mummer performances and much more. Vast quantities of food and drink are consumed at a tournament, and blacksmiths usually find the most work of all trades, repairing or selling armour and weapons to the tournament participants.
Gambling was also a very prominent thing in tournaments, with noblemen and even commonfolk betting their money on participants with varying odds depending on factors such as their fame, equipment, experience in battle, skill and previous tournament victories.
A tournament may consist of one or more of the following events:
- The jousting lists: Participants charge at one another with lances until one dismounts the other. The participant that knocks his opponent off his horse is declared the winner. There are cases in which knights have jousted for long amounts of time and the winner is declared by the amount of hits they have scored on their opponent if they couldn't dismount each other
- The melee: a number of men engage in combat using swords, maces and axes. Opponents have to be knocked over and made to yield.
- Archery: Archers compete against one another in a contest of accuracy, shooting at static targets at varying distances.
- Axe-throwing: Similar to the archery contest, but with throwable axes
- Horse-racing: Unarmored riders compete in a simple horse race around a track.