MORRIS-DANCE, or Morrice-dance, a performance for a long time associated with certain festive seasons in England, but now wholly discontinued. The origin of the name is doubtful; and whether the dance was indigenous to England, or was introduced by John of Gaunt from Spain, or was borrowed from the French or Flemings, must be left to conjecture. That, as the name would seem to indicate, it was a development of the morisco-dance or Spanish fandango is not, however, invalidated by the fact that the morisco was for one person only, for, although latterly the morris-dance was represented by various characters, uniformity in this respect was not always observed, and the elements of the dance may have been borrowed from the morisco. There are few references to it earlier than the reign of Henry VII., but it would appear that in the reign of Henry VIII. it was an almost essential part of the principal village festivities. Although allusions to it in poems are very frequent in the 16th and 17th centuries, nothing more than fragmentary descriptions have been handed down to us, so that an accurate knowledge of its characteristic features at even any particular period is impossible. In earlier times it was usually danced by five men and a boy dressed in a girl’s habit, who was called Maid Marian. There were also two musicians; and, at least sometimes, one of the dancers, more gaily and richly dressed than the others, acted as “foreman of the morris.” The garments of the dancers were ornamented with bells tuned to different notes so as to sound in harmony. Robin Hood, Friar Tuck, and Little John were characters extraneous to the original dance, and were introduced when it came to be associated with the May-games. At Betley, in Staffordshire, there is a painted window of the ...