Annotation:Buffoon (2) (The)
BUFFOON [2], THE. English, Morris Dance Tune (4/4 time). G Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. A related tune to the Adderbury version, collected in the village of Ilmington, Warwickshire, England. In an article entitled "Dance Traces Surviving in The Ritual of Freemasonry" (published in Archaeology Ireland, Spring 2010) Alan Nowell mentions the curious comic aspects of the Buffoon morris dance, with its ritualized aggression, presented in comic fashion.
This repeated kicking chorus (found in a Wyresdale hopping dance, Northumberland) may have had a separate history. It occurs in the Ilmington Buffoon Cotswold Morris Dance and it seems to be related to Pimponpet which is listed as one of Gargantua’s Games by Rabelais (c.1494-1553). In Randle Cotgraves' English/French Dictionary published 1611 it is described as “A kind of game wherein three hit each other on the bumme with one of their feet”. In 1653, Thomas Urquhart, translator of Rabelais, seems to have been familiar with Pimponpet and translates it as Bumdockdousse