Wednesday, January 27, 2010

… Who lives in Drury Lane?

The muffin man was said to live in Drury Lane, and it is of course the home of the Theatre Royal – one of the icons of the West End.



While there had been cockpits and theatres build on the site before 1660, it was the theatre designed by Wren that really began the real history. Unfortunately it succumbed to the first destructive fire on 25th January 1672.

We learn from Pepys' Diary just how popular play-going was for Londoners,  and the new theatre designed by Wren opened in 1674 and could hold the staggering number of 2000 spectators.

The history of the Drury Lane theatre is bound up with two very famous names, David Garrick and Richard Sheridan. Garrick managed the theatre in the eighteenth century and in 1776 he sold his share to Richard Sheridan. As a popular playwright himself Sheridan was successful until 1809 when the theatre succumbed to its second devastating fire.

The tale is well known about Sheridan who sat watching his theatre burn down, drinking a glass of wine. He was famously reported to have said: "A man may surely be allowed to take a glass of wine by his own fireside!”


The theatre that we see today was opened in 1812 – the same year that Wellington defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo. Since then the interior has been extensively remodeled but today’s theatre only seats 205 people more that it did in 1674!

In 1794 the famous comedian Richard Baddeley (a former pastry chef) made a bequest of £100 to the Drury Lane Theatre Company so that they can buy a cake!

It is a Twelfth Night Cake which is purchased every year and the cast members of the current production, still in costume, eat a slice and drink a toast to the memory of one of the theatre's most famous actors.

Seeing as the toast is drunk in wine, maybe it is also a homage to Richard Sheridan who stood and watched his fortune go up in smoke so long ago.

To my knowledge this custom was still being observed in the 1980’s.

The present cast of 'Oliver' should have eaten the slice of cake and raised a glass of wine to the memory of the two Richards on the evening of the 5th January 2010 – Twelfth Night.

Does anyone know if they did?

I am off to Melbourne on business for a week - so no blogging until next Tuesday ...

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Throwing the Hood at Haxey

Well, I’ve been known to throw a handkerchief or too in my time, but unlike Lady de Mowbray I’ve never chucked my hood away!

In all fairness to the Lady, it is actually said that she lost her scarlet hood while out riding toward Westwoodside across the hill that separates it from the village of Haxey, in Lincolnshire. It was blown away by an errant gust of wind, only to be chased down and picked up by a nearby farm worker – who, overcome by the Lady’s beauty or shyness (take your pick), was unable to return it personally to her.

A more self-possessed individual took the hood and handed it back to her –it was said (versions vary here), either by the Lady or the chivalrous one, that ‘He had acted like a lord, while the other had acted like a fool’.

Apparently, Lady de Mowbray was so amused that she donated 13 acres (you can do the maths for square metres if you really must), on condition that the chase for the hood should be re-enacted each year. Over the centuries this has become to be known as “The Haxey Hood”

Like all myths it is difficult to know just how much reliance can be put on the story, however the nobles mentioned in the tale did actually exist, records show a John De Mowbray who was born in 1310 and died in 1361 could have been the husband of the lady, and as Baron Mowbray of Axholme he would have had enough land to give some away – although I note that there appeared to have been little consultation by the lady before handing it over.

Actually it doesn’t matter whether it is true or not – what it does is give a really good excuse for engaging in a highly robust contact sport, probably a fair amount of beer drinking, some cheerful English folk songs and a satisfied sense that it can be done all over again next year.

What more could a village want – well probably to win it next time if you are regulars at the Carpenters Arms!

So what does it entail? The Game is played on 6th January every year unless it falls on a Sunday of course. It starts in the afternoon, when the fool and his twelve Boggans parade up the street to the Haxey Parish Church. The Boggans are the official players in the Game and need to be strong and vigorous young men, as they put themselves up against all comers. It is no surprise that they are often recruited from the local football team.

Chief among the Boggans is the King, who carries his roll of thirteen willows bound with thirteen withy bands. Traditionally the Boggans should be wearing red coats, but even those that don’t still keep the traditionally red somewhere about them in memory of the Lady’s Hood.

The Fool – representing the one that was too shy to hand the hood back – leads the procession and has the right to kiss any lady he chooses throughout the ceremony. Now that certainly is out of character if you ask me; or perhaps he has gained courage over the centuries.



He too wears red about him in honour of the hood, blackens his face with soot and carries a whip filled with bran to lay about those who come too near – how that helps with the kissing bit confuses me.

Before the game begins in earnest the fool mounts a platform and makes a speech before he reminds all combatants of the rules of the game:

Hoose agen Hoose
Toon agen toon
If tho’ meet a man knock ‘im doon
But don’t ‘Ut ‘im!

Strangely, while he’s making these pronouncements a small fire doused with damp straw creates a cloud of smoke which pours around him, known as Smoking the Fool. This appears to be the remnant of a more sinister activity where the Fool was hung from a tree over a smoking fire and then allowed to drop into well wetted straw. Occupational Health and Safety are probably having a fit!!

Now the game begins, and the hood is thrown up. As far as I can tell the aim of the game is to seize the hood and carry it over the boundary to their village while everyone else attempts to stop them.

I got all excited the first time this happened – but I gather they were just preliminaries it is when the ‘Sway’ is thrown into the arena that the fun really begins. A ring of Boggans surround the area while either the Fool or some other unsuspecting notable throws the leather hood high into the air. The ring of Boggans break up and that’s the last we see of any sense of order.

Every able bodied man or woman is encouraged to take part in this mass of heaving humanity, even bystanders have been caught up in the general melee. The goal is to get the Sway to the village pub and while it cannot be kicked it can be pushed, pulled or dragged in the general direction. Movement is not rapid.

In fact it can take hours and in the meantime there is no safety for hedges, animals or stray stone walls. Eventually the Sway arrives at one of the pubs and the landlord takes charge of it and the party begins!! The winning pub hosts the Hood until the same time next year when it all begins again.

What a way to spend Epiphany! And if you want to see what it’s all about watch this and listen to the songs that they are singing – that should please ‘Show of Hands’ – in some places we do still hark back to our Roots and celebrate our English Heritage with Gusto.

Monday, January 25, 2010

The History of English Folk Tradition

The history of the English Folk Tradition lies with the history of the agricultural and labouring classes of our past.  At one time they were an integral part of the calendar year, and many of them echoed even further back to the ancient pagan traditions so vitally bound up with the continual round of sowing, planting and harvesting.

Surprisingly, in a country which developed and introduced the Industrial Revolution these traditions and customs have been incredibly tenacious - up until recently.  With what appears to be deliberation, the government with the assistance of the main stream media, have attempted to denigrate all that England stood for and to destroy all semblence of our true culture.

But, if we are to move forward then we must understand where we have come from - and I don't mean the disgraceful revisionist history being taught in the schools and universities at the moment.  Revisionist history whose only aim appears to be to destroy our pride in our people, our culture and our nation.  People without pride become the louts on the streets and people deprived of their history become displaced and displeased.

My aim is to re-introduce the people of England to some of the cultural practices that they may not have been aware of - and as our traditions are seasonal - so this blog will reflect that as well.

But I wonder how many of the old ways are now left; it will be interesting to see!

So let's start in January - perhaps you were not aware that it is unlucky to give credit on the 1st of January or to cause someone to be in your debt by lending them something!

After the Christmas season the darkness of winter descends again.  And the customs of the land reflect the short days and the long winter evenings, but the winter solstice has now passed and the next cycle of ploughing and planted is not that far off. 

In our pagan past there would have been gods and goddesses to be propitiated to ensure a successful harvest; the remnants of these customs survive in the mummers plays and the midwinter sword dances.

Huddled around the fire at night, the English would spend their time passing on the tales of the heros, or playing Nine Men's Morris and that perennial pub favourite 'Shuffleboard'.

In England today you might still be able to catch the Mummers Plays and Sword Dancing in Durham, Northumberland (I'm a traditionalist).  In Yorkshire the principle teams that I once knew were at  North Skelton; Handworth; and Lingdale - and the midwinter sword dances had a symbolism which still echoes with us.


Danced around midwinter they symbolised the death of the old year and the promise of the year to come.  The Yorkshire dancers used the traditional long, flexible steel swords, while the less ambitious chose the long wooden swords.  After a number of sequences portraying the coming of the new and the going of the old years; the swords were secretly intertwined (dancers movements hidden by the closeness of the dancing circle) and then on cue; one dancer would hold the interlocked sword knut triumphantly aloft to admiring applause.

Do not be dismayed by the sneering putdowns by the so-called modernists, or the dismissal of our traditions by the pseudo-intellectuals.  Those that patronisingly laugh at the colourful costumes of the Morris Dancers - or who throw their hands up in horror denouncing as 'racist' the five century old tradition of 'blacking up' by our dancers are also the ones who would gaze in awe and admiration at the Swiss Guards in the Vatican City!


They have little love for, and certainly limited knowledge of who we are and where we have come from. They deserve our pity not our anger.  Let us trust that we will educate them in the ways of the English so that they can learn to love the place of their birth and the customs of their people.

Alas, like George Orwell I am not optimistic - and if we cannot, then like him I am content to despise them as they despise us!