Miss Mary Douglas ~ RSCDS

Lady Mary Douglas Miss Mary Douglas ~ RSCDS

Miss Mary Douglas ~ RSCDS is a Scottish Country Dance. It was devised by Thomas Wilson in 1816 and published in A Companion to the Ball Room, London. It was interpreted by RSCDS in 1935 and published in RSCDS Book 10. It is J8×48 3C/4C, a proper Triple Minor dance. J48.

In his A Companion to the Ball Room, 1816, Thomas Wilson published Lady Mary Douglas:, wherein he writes:

SINGLE FIGURE Tune played straight thro and Da Capo
Whole figure at top lead down the middle up again turn your partner & lead outsides

OR THUS Cross over 2 Cu: cross up 1 Cu: towards the top and half figure round the top Cu: & the double triangle

DOUBLE FIGURE Tune played twice thro and Da Capo
Hey on your own sides chain figure 6 round lead down the middle up again lead thro the top Cu: whole figure round the bottom Cu: turn corners whole figure contrary corners

The music consists of 2 eight bar strains. The RSCDS has chosen the DOUBLE FIGURE which means the music should be played ABBABB (I think). " " indicates a strain.

Wilson defines his figures in his An Analysis of Country Dancing.

The animation plays at 120 counts per minute normally, but the first time through the set the dance will often be slowed down so people can learn the moves more readily. Men are drawn as rectangles, women as ellipses. Each couple is drawn in its own color, however the border of each dancer indicates what role they currently play so the border color may change each time through the minor set.

An online description of the dance may be found here.

The dance contains the following figures: hand turn (allemande), cast, lead, hey, parallel hey, rights and lefts, down the middle and back (and probably others).

If you find what you believe to be a mistake in this animation, please leave a comment on youtube explaining what you believe to be wrong. If I agree with you I shall do my best to fix it.

If you wish to link to this animation please see my comments on the perils of youtube. You may freely link to this page, of course, and that should have no problems, but use one of my redirects when linking to the youtube video itself:
https://www.upadouble.info/redirect.php?id=MissMaryDouglas-RSCDS

< Prev Top Next >

The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 1935 by RSCDS. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2024 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

This website is copyright © 2021,2022,2023,2024 by George W. Williams V
Creative Commons License My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.