Baslow, DerbyshireGlover's History, Gazetteer, and Directory of the County of Derby, 1829Transcriptions by Rosemary Lockie, © Copyright 2001, 2012 Materials collected by Stephen Glover in the early 19th century towards a History and Directory of Derbyshire were published in 1829 in 3 volumes. The Directory - “accurately taken during the years 1827, '8, and '9, by Stephen Glover” - was published first, when according to its introduction, the remaining material was “still in the press”. Its subsequent publication resulted in two volumes. Volume I contains a History of the county as a whole; and Volume II describes individual Towns and Villages. The first part of this extract contains material from the county History, the second part is from the Directory. Extract from The Peakland Year: August, by Julie Bunting, Long ago the villages of Baslow, Curbar and Froggatt celebrated their annual feasts on the first Sunday in August. Baslow customs included a unique ceremony called Kit Dressing - a kit being a milk pail - as described in Glover's History and Gazetteer of the County of Derby: ‘A beautiful garland and a large pink-coloured flag with emblems, were also carried in the procession. Twigs of willow were bent over the tops of the kits, and entwined with ribbons and flowers; and many fanciful ornaments of muslin and silk, mingled with trinkets of silver and gold composed the garlands, which were also formed upon a frame-work of willow twigs, interwoven together. The maidens of the village, attired in their best carried the kits on their heads, attended by the young men... the procession was attended by the Baslow band, and the decorations of the kits surpassed in beauty and taste any that had ever before been seen’. The ceremony seems to have been partly a thanksgiving and partly an invocation for a coming good year in the dairy, for this short rhyme was displayed on one of the dressed pails: ‘The farmer, the plough-boy, the fleece and the flail, Success to the milk-maid who carries the pail’. Baslow was thronged with visitors for the day and the evening was spent in dancing and merrymaking at the Wheat Sheaf Inn. DIRECTORY
Notes
Transcribed by Rosemary Lockie in August 2001 & June 2012. |
|||||||||||||||