Annotation:Lanquenet
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LANQUENET. AKA and see "Lamb Skinnet." English, Jig. A Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The melody under this title is unique to Charles and Samuel Thompson's 1757 country dance collection. However, the title "Lamb Skinnet" appears to have been fairly contemporary with the "Lanquenet" title, as it appears as "Lamb Skinnet" in R. Baldwin's periodical London Magazine, or The Gentleman's Monthly Intelligencer (London, 1753), and John Johnson's 200 Favourite Country Dances, vol. 7 (London, 1756). As "Lamb Skinnet" the jig has survived in traditional repertoire in England's North Country and the Borders region. The melody has been employed for Scottish Country Dancing, although, as Nigel Gatherer points out, it does not appear in any of the major Scottish collections.
George S. Emmerson, writing in Scotland Through Her Country Dances (1967) remarked that the name may have stemmed from the practice of tying the skin of a dead lamb to a live one in order to have it accepted by the bereaved ewe as a replacement, a theory that has been widely repeated but has no supporting evidence. However, "Lamb Skinnet" has a documented history as the vulgar term for "Lansquenet" [1] (Lanquenet is a variant spelling), the name of a card game, which is itself a corruption of the German Landsknecht, meaning a German mercenary soldier. The game was played by D'Artagnan in Dumas's novel Twenty Years After. Unfortunately, as a game of chance it was found wanting and fell out of favor, for it is susceptible to cheating by card sharps.
Source for notated version:
Printed sources: Thompson (Compleat Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances, vol. 1), 1757; No. 52.
Recorded sources:
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