Roger of Coverly - Thompson
Roger of Coverly - Thompson is an English Country Dance. It was published by Thompson in about 1770 in Thompson's Compleat Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances, Vol II, London. It was interpreted by George Williams in 2024. It is a proper 4 Couple Longways dance. In this dance the couples are permuted by: 2341. The minor set lasts 84 bars.
See the Regency Dance site's description of the evolution of this dance.
Thompson writes:
The 1st. Man goes down & foot it to the Bottom Wo: the Wo: does the same with the Bottom Man the Man foot it round the Bottom Wo: the Wo: round the Bottom Man turn the Bottom Wo: the Wo: turn the Bottom Man so on till you come up to the top then cross over and turn till you come to the Bottom
Playford describes a dance with this name and tune, but with a very different figure.
Like Wilson's dance of 1808, this one begins with a series of criss-cross figures. Here M1 begins first rather than W1, and the bottom couples don't join in the fun. Also it looks as if the 1s interact with every couple, not just the bottom one: so on till you come up to the top
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 dances of George Williams (including interpretations like this one) are licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: CC BY-NC-SA license.
| A1 | 1-4 | M1 go down to W4 and set to her and returns |
| A2 | 1-4 | W1 go down to M4 and set to her and returns |
| A3 | 1-4 | M1 loop W4 and return |
| A4 | 1-4 | W1 loop M4 and return |
| A5 | 1-4 | M1 two hand turn W4 and return |
| A6 | 1-4 | W1 two hand turn counter-clockwise M3 and return |
| A7 | 1-4 | M1 go down to W3 and set to her and return |
| A8 | 1-4 | W1 go down to M3 and set to her and return |
| A9 | 1-4 | M1 loop W3 and return |
| A10 | 1-4 | W1 loop M3 and return |
| A11 | 1-4 | M1 two hand turn W3 and return |
| A12 | 1-4 | W1 two hand turn M3 counter-clockwise and return |
| A13 | 1-4 | M1 go down to W2 and set to her and returns |
| A14 | 1-4 | W1 go down to M2 and set to her and returns |
| A15 | 1-4 | M1 loop W2 and return |
| A16 | 1-4 | W1 loop M2 and return |
| A17 | 1-4 | M1 two hand turn W2 and return |
| A18 | 1-4 | W1 two hand turn M2 counter-clockwise and return |
| B1 | 1-4 | 1s cross by right, go below, as 2s move up, 1s right turn half |
| B2 | 1-4 | 1s cross by left, go below, as 3s move up, 1s left turn half |
| B3 | 1-4 | 1s cross by right, go below, as 4s move up, 1s right turn half |
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=RogerOfCoverly-Thompson
The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is copyright © 2024 by George Williams. And is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. 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
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.