Annotation:My Lady Winwood's Maggot

Back to My Lady Winwood's Maggot

---

MY LADY WINWOOD'S MAGGOT. AKA and see "Nobody's Jig." English, Country Dance Tune (2/2 time). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AABB. Maud Karpeles notes this tune, which dates to 1726 under this title (although to 1686 as "Nobody's Jigg"), can be used as an alternative accompaniment to the Flamborough Sword Dance. It was first published with the 'Winwood' title in John Young's Third Volume of the Dancing Master [1] (second edition, p. 9) as a longways dance "for as many as will."

Sixteenth and seventeenth century country dance tunes sometimes had the word "maggot" in their titles, perhaps derived from Italian Maggiolatta or Italian May song, but used in England to mean a whim, fancy, plaything, 'trifle'--essentially an 'earworm'. A 'maggot' was also another name for a dram, a small unit of liquid measure. Maggots were latter 17th century longways country dances written generally to triple-time tunes and often dedicated to a personage.

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Barnes (English Country Dance Tunes), 1986. Karpeles & Schofield (A Selection of 100 English Folk Dance Airs), 1951; pp. 18-19. Sharp (Country Dance Tunes), 1909; p. 50.

Recorded sources:

---