Old Simon the King

Old Simon the King is an English Country Dance. It was published by John Playford (website) in 1679 in A Supplement to The Dancing Master. It was interpreted by Andrew Shaw in 2000 and published in Mr. Kynaston's Famous Dance. It is an improper duple minor longways dance. The minor set lasts 16 bars.

Playford writes:

Honour to the Prsence, then to your we. Lead up all forward and back, that again.
First man being on his wo side lead the 2. wo. side-way, then the 1. wo. with the 2. man lead to the other file at the same time, then all face, the 1. cu. cast off, and 2. cu. fall into the 1. cu. places, then 1 cu. lead downward, and 2. cu. lead to the Presence at the same time, then 1. cu. fall into their own places, and 2. cu. cast off to their own places at the same time, the 1. man back to back with the 2. wo. and 1. wo. and 2. man back to back at the same time, then 1. man give right hand to the 2. wo. and left to his own wo. then 1. wo. give right-hand to the 2. man and right and left with her own, then the Hey through the 2 cu. which brings him on his wo. side again.

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.

The dance contains the following figures: cast, lead, figure eight, double figure eight, hey, circular hey, back to 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=OldSimonTheKing

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The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2000 by Andrew Shaw. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2022 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.