Finstock morris dancers

jane · Senior Member

RE: Finstock morris dancers

rene oliver · Senior Member

Hi Shane and Jane -

The `Professor` of Morris Dancers - especially the Wychwood area, is Keith Chandler, Finstock (Music Historian and Genealogist). Do either of you know him?

Regards, Irene

Shane Bywaters · Guru

Hi Jane,

Yes, I've too fallen across snippets of Morris Dancing + Finstock + Oliver information before.

Re: The names of one set of Finstock morris dancers were recorded by the field collector Thomas James Carter for the antiquary Percy Manning in 1897 as: Edward Oliver, John Oliver, William Dore, Charles Dore, John Dore, Stephen Dore, Thomas Langford (musician), James Turner (swordbearer) and George Stratford (the squire, or leader, of the team). Three of the team were carpenters. To judge from their ages this team danced around the 1830s"

My thoughts would be the three highlighted in bold are probably Brother, Brother and Brother-in-law, per the following colourful little diagram:

morris

Thanks,
Shane

jane · Senior Member

Edward Oliver and John Oliver are among the names of Finstock morris dancers collected by a researcher in the 1890s but apparently referring back 40 years or more before that. See the first entry at http://england.prm.ox.ac.uk/englishness-morris-dancers-bells.html for details.

Jane