Morris and Mummers

The Dorsetarian

Fossil Folklore
Sea Dragons, Fairy Loaves& Serpents of StoneFables & Fossils of Lyme Regis by Dr. Karl P.N. Shuker Dr. Karl Shuker and life-size megalodon jaws,Lyme Fossil Shop, Lyme Regis In July 2010, I visited Lyme Regis on Dorset’s south coast, a relatively small town but one that is to fossil enthusiasts what Hay-on-Wye on the Welsh-English border is to book love...

Skulls in Folklore
Skulls by Sabine Baring-Gould. In medieval churches, castles, and mansions where there is a parapet rising from the wall and obscuring a portion of the roof, this parapet is supported at intervals by corbels, that usually represent heads of either men or beasts, very frequently grotesque. These corbels are not of any great structural importance, though they add to architectural decoration. T...

Ghosts and Hauntings
Ghosts and Things that go Bump in the Night by David Kingston. The word Ghost is described in the Oxford dictionary as, "a person's spirit appearing after his or her death." But then what about the reports of horses galloping down the lanes on a dark night and other such apparitions? Why do certain countries, houses and places appear to have more than there fair share of Ghosts?Great Britai...

Maids, Moors, and Monsters
Maids, Moors, and Monsters The Folklore of Morris by Richard Freeman. Few people who have seen Morris men dancing on a village green or in a pub garden realise the complexity and antiquity of the dance they are witnessing. The pleasant spectacle has a history that stretches back thousands of years and is peopled by grotesque and sometimes disturbing characters. Morris is a dance o...

Eric Frank Russell
Eric Frank Russell by Mark North. English Science Fiction writer and Forteanist Eric Frank Russell was born on 6th January 1905, Sandhurst, Surrey into a military family. He served with the RAF during World War II and worked briefly as an engineer before taking up writing full-time. Russell wrote numerous science fiction novels and over a hundred short stories from the late 1930's to the mid-1...

Daisy Wheels
Daisy Wheels and a Ritual Landscape in Dorset. by Ric Kemp In the summer of 2009 I went for a walk across a 10 kilometres long prehistoric landscape feature called the Dorset Cursus, probably a ritual processional walk-way constructed earlier than Stonehenge, containing a solar alignment, or a noted position on the horizon where the sun sets or rises at a point in the seasonal cycle of the...

John Symonds Udal
John Symonds Udal - A Dorset Folklorist by Mark North. To Dorset people of old, customs, superstitions and traditions were inextricably interwoven with nature, countryside and social history. This formula produced a wealth of folklore in this county and the first person to make an intense study of the subject was John Symonds Udal. A sportsman, antiquarian, collector, essayist and a miscel...

Christmas in Dorsetshire
Christmas in Dorsetshire by John Symonds Udal Imbued with the utilitarian spirit of our time, one is apt to overlook those strong feelings of genuine pleasure and innocent merriment with which our ancestors were wont to greet Christmas as it came upon them in its annual round. For many years now the ancient glories that used to attend the celebration of the great season of Christma...

Halloween
The Feast of the Dying Sun The Customs and Traditions of Halloween By Robert Newland. Hallowe'en, otherwise known as All Hallows Eve, a time for fun and games, dressing up and ghost stories. Traditionally it was believed that malevolent spirits, witches and fairies were abroad on this night. (see also Walpurgisnacht - The Springtime Halloween)Yet contrary to popular belief Hallowe...

Black Dogs - Part 1
Spectre Dogs by Robert Chambers. Neither Brand in his Popular Antiquities, nor Sir Walter Scott in his Witchcraft and Demonology, mentions spectre-dogs as a peculiar class of apparitions, yet they seem to occupy a distinct branch of English mythology. They are supposed to exist in one form or another in almost every county, and few kinds of superstition have more strongly influenced the c...

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Morris & Mummers

We have gathered some website links for further investigation. These links go to Dark Dorset recommended sites for further investigation.

Morris Dancers of England DVDs

The Morris Dancers of England, is an exciting range of DVDs, produced by Newland Media. Each DVD illustrates the variety of traditional English Morris Dancing by different performing Morris groups throughtout England.

Babylon Morris

Founded in 1995, Babylon are a border morris dance team, based in the small Dorset village of Corscombe.

Bourne River Morris

Bourne River Morris Men dance in the Cotswold tradition. They practice in Winton on Thurdays from 8pm, and new dancers are very welcome

Dorset Buttons

The Ladies Morris Side was formed in 1978 and is based in Wareham in Dorset. They dance in the Northwest tradition and wear the wooden clogs that were everyday footwear at the time the dances were first performed. The team name originates from the hand made buttons that were widely made in Dorset until the invention of the button-making machine in the 1860’s.

Dorset Knobs Mummers

a small group based in East Dorset and West Hampshire, interested in Mumming
and other folk customs.

Frome Valley Morris

Frome Valley Morris are primarily a performance dance team who practise English Morris dancing - yes, the handkie and stick type, uniquely derived from the UK. We also perform two longsword dances and a Dorset mumming play which was enacted near Weymouth.

Hobos Morris

Hobos Morris 'Ladies'! Border dance side based in Poole, Dorset. Practise on Tuesday evenings from approximately the beginning of October to the end of March

Quayside Cloggies

Based in Poole, Dorset, Quayside Cloggies are a ladies clog-morris dance side who dance in the Northwest Tradition and take their dances mainly from Cheshire and Lancashire.

Steps in Time

Steps In Time are a junior folk dance side. We meet every Friday in Sutton Waldron, near Shaftesbury, Dorset.

Uplyme Morris

First formed in 1989, the Uplyme Morris group website, includes photographs, information about the performances and tour dates.

Wessex Morris Men

One of Dorset's Morris group websites, including photographs, information about the performances and tour dates.