Hoxton Square
Hogsdon Square
Hoxton Square or Hogsdon Square is an English Country Dance. It was published by John Young (Playford family) (website) in 1710 in The Dancing Master, Vol. the Second. It was interpreted by Charles Bolton (website) in 1997 and published in Retreads Vol.7. Originally proper this version is an indecent duple minor longways dance. The minor set lasts 32 bars. The tune is in triple time. It is in the key: D Major.
The title is spelled variously: Hodgsdon Square, Hogsdon Square and Hoxton Square.
Note: Each Strain is to be play'd twice over.
The first two Men fall back, the We. do the same, then the first Man turn Right-hands with the 2d Man, the first Wo. do the same, then half Figure Now the Man is on the Wos. Side begins as the first Now the are all in their proper Places; the first Man casts off and goes round into the first Wo. Place, the Wo. following him, then back again, all into their proper Places Clap Hands, then all four take Hands and go clear round with your Faces outward, then turn single, and then Right and Left
The tune was published with the dance. It was performed by the Odd Sundays Garage Band (Judy Linsenberg, Shira Kammen and Patti Cobb). The music is used with permission from the Odd Sundays Garage Band.
The animation plays at 95 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 (no music plays during this slow set). 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 dances of Charles Bolton (including interpretations like this one) are licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license by the CDSS Online Library.
An online description of the dance may be found here.
| A1 | 1-4 | Fall back with neighbor, come forward turning single cloverlear, end facing neighbor |
| 5-6 | Mirror hand turn, M1+W2 right, W1+M2 left, 1s together at start | |
| 7-8 | 1s cross down, 2s cast up half double figure eight | |
| A2 | 1-4 | Fall back with neighbor, come forward turning single cloverlear, end facing neighbor |
| 5-6 | Mirror hand turn, M1+W2 left, W1+M2 right | |
| 7-8 | 1s cross down, 2s cast up half double figure eight | |
| B1 | 1-4 | M1 to partner, honour, he casts left, she follows, he goes around 2s to her place she cuts between to his |
| 5-8 | W2 to partner, honour, she casts left, he follows, she goes around 1s to his place he cuts between to hers | |
| B2 | 1-4 | Clap, then turn right into center so all are back to back and form a circle facing out, circle right half, turn single cloverleaf to progressed places |
| 5-8 | Facing partner four changes of rights and lefts |
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=HoxtonSquare
The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 1997 by Charles Bolton. And is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2021 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license.
This website is copyright © 2021-2025 by George W. Williams V
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.