Annotation:Round the Maypole (1)

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X:1 % T:Round the May-Pole [1] M:6/8 L:1/8 B:Thompson’s Compleat Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances, vol. 3 (London, 1773) Z:Transcribed and edited by Fynn Titford-Mock, 2007 Z:abc’s:AK/Fiddler’s Companion K:Bb B>cB d2f|B>cB d2f|bag fed|cdB AGF| G>cB d2f|B>cB d2b|agf cf=e|f3 F3:| |:f2f f2g|_agf edc|e2e e2f|gfe dcB| BFB dBd|fdf bfe|dcB F>BA|B3 B,3:||

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ROUND THE MAY-POLE [1]. English, Country Dance & Jig (6/8 time). B Flat Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. The melody is unique to Charles and Samuel Thompson’s third country dance collection (London, 1773). Alfred Moffat (Dances of the Olden Time, 1912, p. viii), writes:

Randolph Caldecott's 'Come Lasses and Lads' (1884); maypole dancers sans streamers.

The primitive instinct with dancers, where no figures are provided, is to dance round an object. The object might be a captive, and altar, or other sacred emblem. Perhaps this altar or emblem might be decorated with a trophy taken from the enemy, and we may thus look upon the Maypole with its garlands and streamers as an embodiment of this emblem, and the dance round it as a survival of the primitive usage. The same tradition is also found in children's ring games...