Catching of Fleas

Catching of Fleas is an English Country Dance. It was published by John Playford (website) in 1670 in The Dancing Master, 4th ed.. It was interpreted by Cecil Sharp (website) in 1912 and published in The Country Dance Book (Part 3). It is a proper Duple Minor dance. It is a USA dance. The minor set lasts 144 bars. It is in the key: F Major.

This dance has three small duple minor dances inside it, punctuated by the usual "Up a double"/"Siding"/"Arming". When specifying how many times these subdances should repeat Playford writes "These Changes to the last", which usually means "when everyone is back where they started" but that takes too long.

Playford writes:

Lead up all forward and back That again First cu. meet and take right hands, then go over and slip into the 2. place, change places again Do thus to the last.
Sides all That again First cu. cross over between the second cu. cross over again between them, cast off all four and come to your places The rest doing the like Change
Arms all That again First Cu. fall down into the 2. place on the outside, back again to your places, take both hands, slip down between them, turn S. This Change to the last

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.

Up a double
 
A1-4Up a Double, and back
5-8That again
Part 1 repeats 5 times
 
B1-41s fall back, come forward, take hands and change by the right
5-81s slip down and change places as 2s move up outside
Siding
 
1-4Right Siding
5-8Left Siding
Part 2 repeats 5 times
 
B1-21s cross down as 2s move up
3-41s change
5-82s followed by 1s cast down back to places
Arming
 
A11-4Right Arming
A21-4Left Arming
Part 3 repeats 5 times
 
B1-41s cast below 2s and lead up to places
5-61s slip down inside as 2s move up outside
7-81s turn single down

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=CatchingOfFleas

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The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2021 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

This website is copyright © 2021-2025 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.