By Eva Munk

For The Post

LIBUŠćN, Central Bohemia

The first impression is not encouraging: a cardboard sign with the word bitva, or battle, scrawled on it in black magic marker.

Neither is the next: a small valley full of cars, a village of peaked tents, a low cement building — the krčma, or bar — and two rows of portable toilets.

Car stereos blare; cell phones ring.

It's noon. Nothing suggests that in two hours an epic battle will break out.

What had I expected? A scene painted by Breughel?

The Battle at Libušín, the first and largest Gothic battle of the year, always draws a big crowd. Some 200 historical fencing groups from all over the Czech Republic — and from as far as Russia and Switzerland — are meeting here, as they do annually, for a semichoreographed medieval battle.

It's not a re-enactment of history, just an interpretation of it.

The winning side is generally agreed upon in advance, but the survival of individual "knights" is based on their skills alone. As they clash, a hit is considered fatal if the blunt swords in use touch vital areas of the fighters' bodies.

"We have some 1,500 warriors from all over the country," says Václav Janda, the leader of Kyrius, a historical fencing group.

He has been doing this for 15 years. It's easy to see why he goes to the trouble: The battle will draw 5,000 spectators at 100 Kč ($4.30) per head. Many are already seated on the hillside above the battlefield.

Spectators in jeans mingle with knights, yeomen and damsels. More stroll through a fairground on the ridge above, where dozens of crude wooden booths sell everything from millet in cabbage leaves to eggshell-thin chalices of forest glass cased in silver.

"I'm a German nobleman from the beginning of the 15th century — I'm even wearing medieval underwear," says Martin Majerčík, a 23-year-old IT manager, with a wink.

I find the fencing group that invited me, the Okořská Garda.

The Garda is one of some 600 historical fencing groups in the country. Members train for these battles in their spare time, spending their own money on armor, weapons and costumes.

But someone, it seems, has forgotten the aspirin.

"How am I supposed to fight with this headache?" moans Ondřej Panenka, 24, a software coordinator. Like most here, he's been partying for days.

But no alcohol is permitted the morning of the battle, which accounts for a foul mood among many.

Groaning, the combatants get ready for battle, donning quilted jackets and 23 kilograms (50 pounds) worth of armor before marching out.

Panenka's sister, Gábina, is sitting on the hillside, watching the valley floor fill with 1,500 gleaming knights.

A narrator sets the stage for a series of skirmishes with a tale of a quiet village whose inhabitants are kidnapped by evil knights.

Finally, the climax comes, a massive confrontation between the good and the bad. Swords clash, striking arms and armor. Gunpowder sizzles in nearby woods. Bodies fall amid yells.

In the melee, Panenka fights valiantly, but then falls, felled in a wave of hacking steel, a brutal kick to the stomach, his pale hand clamping onto the grass, and he joins the hundreds of corpses littering the field.

"I had three of them hacking away at me, but I finally had to tell them, 'Look, guys, give me a good kick so I can die properly,' " Panenka says later, shaking his head.

Night falls, and cars recede into the darkness. Tents light up, glow like lanterns among the trees.

The Krčma is doing a merry trade. Bodies press close to its large fireplace. Backs are slapped. Hands are clasped. The battle is relived.

It doesn't matter who killed whom: Everyone's a friend here — secure in a shared passion and singing into the wee hours of the morning.