Pickle Herring [one of the characters] stamps with his foot, and the Fool rises on his knees again.” A little more parleying, and “Then the Dancers, putting their swords round the Fool’s neck again,” the Fool proceeds to make further absurd bequests. The same kind of thing is repeated, with scraps of song and dialogue between the placing of swords about the Fool and the threats that he is to die. This action, taken in connection with the title of the piece, “The Plow Boys or Morris Dancers,” establishes it as a Teutonic tradition—a Lincolnshire variant of the combination of the sword-dance with the “Fool Plough” festival which was peculiar to the northern counties—as the following passage from Grimm will show:—
“Frigg, the daughter of Fiörgynn, as consort of the highest god, takes rank above all other goddesses: she knows the fates of men, is consulted by Odinn, administers oaths, handmaids fulfil her hest, she presides over marriages, and her aid is implored by the childless; hence hionagras is also called Friggjargras. We may remember those maidens yet unmarried being yoked to the plough of the goddess whose commands they had too long defied. In some parts of Northern England, in Yorkshire, especially Hallamshire, popular customs show remnants of the worship of Frieg. In the neighbourhood of Dent, at certain seasons of the year, especially autumn, the country folk hold a procession and perform old dances, one called the giant’s dance: the leading giant they name Woden, and his wife Frigga, the principal action of the play consisting in two swords being swung and clashed together about the neck of a boy without hurting him.”[1]
In this case, perhaps, the importance of the action of the piece is so clear that it need not be insisted upon. But in all folk-drama it is the same. What is of first consequence is the action and the characters represented; the
- ↑ Communicated by J. M. Kemble, from the mouth of “an old Yorkshireman”. I account for the sword by the ancient use of that weapon at weddings.
