The Highlander's Maggot

The Highlander's Maggot is an English Country Dance. It was published by Playford (John Young) (website) in about 1726 in The Dancing Master, The Third Volume, 2nd ed.. It was interpreted by Andrew Shaw in 2024 and published in The Irish Howle. Originally a Triple Minor this version is a proper Duple Minor dance. The minor set lasts 26 bars.

John Young writes:

Note: The first Strain twice, and the last once over.
The 1st. cu. Figure thro' the 2d. cu. Sett and cast off, then Figure thro' the 3d. cu. and turn in the 2d. cu. place The 2d. cu. do the same The 1st. and 2d. Men Sett to their Partners and change places, the 1st Man turn the 2d. Man with his Left-hand quite round, the 1st. and 2d Wo. do the same at the same time, then Right and Left half round, the 2d. cu. cast off, then the 1st cu. Sett and cast off

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: hand turn (allemande), set, cast, lead, figure eight, rights and lefts (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=TheHighlandersMaggot

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The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2024 by Andrew Shaw. 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.