Minstrels and maidens flocked to Bourne Hall Museum this weekend to help transport thousands of visitors back to the Middle Ages.

More than 4,000 visitors watched jousting and foot wrestling and were able to take part in a medieval battle armed with inflatable swords.

Others were able to try their hand at medieval dancing and brass rubbing, or buy crafts from one of the many stalls.

Jeremy Harte, curator at Bourne Hall Museum, said: "It was a great festival atmosphere. People enormously enjoyed hitting each other with inflatable swords in the battle re-enactments. It was enjoyable mayhem. We had some absolutely brilliant bear dancing. We also had cockfighting where people dressed up as chickens and fought. They were terribly brutal in the Middle Ages but we had to explain we were not going to be that realistic.We had archery in the park on Saturday and that was the first time we have been able to do that. We are currently the only indoor medieval festival in the South East. We had a lot of families, more this year than ever previously."

The Herald of Spring Festival is organised by the Epsom and Ewell Borough Council and a band of volunteers and has been part of the borough’s calendar since the 1970’s.