Now! Then! 2024! - Yorkshire On This Day

Excerpt

All the parties before mentioned did fetch William Hodshon from his own house and did carry him upon a stang to the church, and about the church, and the mab [slut] dance before him, and so carried him into the church and about the font and set him in his stall with the piper playing before him all that time. And it was done the Sunday before named in the time of divine service. And Robert Taler, a churchwarden, did not only go himself but lent a stang to carry the said Hodshon on, and being asked why he did so, he answered in great derision that he would do the like again.

Comment

Comment

REED’s endnote quotes the OED on riding the stang:

In some places in Scotland and the north of England, one who has in certain ways incurred the indignation of his or her fellow-villagers is compelled to ‘ride the stang’ (either personally, in effigy, or by proxy), accompanied by a jeering crowd and sometimes ‘rough music’. There is also a New Year’s day custom by which every one met by the mob has either to ‘ride the stang’ or pay a forfeit.

How had he annoyed them? “Mab” is presumably the OED’s “A slattern; a promiscuous woman,” so perhaps he had whoring, or was believed to be homosexual.

The letterpress accompanying Walker’s image apparently reads as follows:

This ancient provincial custom is still occasionally observed in some parts of Yorkshire, though by no means so frequently as it was formerly. It is no doubt intended to expose and ridicule any violent quarrel between man and wife, and more particularly in instances where the pusillanimous husband has suffered himself to be beaten by his virago of a partner. A case of this description is here represented, and a party of boys, assuming the office of public censors, are riding the stang. This is a pole, supported on the shoulders of two or more of the lads, across which one of them is mounted, beating an old kettle or pan with a stick. He at the same time repeats a speech, or what they term a nominy, which, for the sake of detailing the whole ceremony, is here subjoined:

With a ran, tan, tan,
On my old tin can,
Mrs. ____ and her good man.
She bang’d him, she bang’d him,
For spending a penny when he stood in need.
She up with a three-footed stool;
She struck him so hard, and she cut so deep,
Till the blood run down like a new stuck sheep!

(Brand 1849)

The tradition was popular in the 18th- and 19th-century United States, and the Coen brothers even run Homer Stokes out of town on a rail in O Brother, Where Art Thou?:

Cosmo Brown (Donald O’Connor) suffers the same fate at 1:15 in the extraordinary Make ‘Em Laugh sequence in Singing in the Rain:

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Original

Officium domini contra Robertum Buttrie et Johannem Brunten for carrying William Hodshon into the Church of Apleton vpon a bar or stange, as we were informed and doe beleeue

Quo die comparuerunt dicti personaliter Brunten et Hodeson Quibus et fassi sunt obec<.> vnde dominus assigauit eis ad peragendum declaracionem provt in superdicto et ad certificandum

Officium domini contra Willelmum Steward a piper for playing vpon his pipes before them

Quo die comparuit dictus Steward Cui dominus iniunxit ad peragendum declaracionem

Officium domini contra Thomam Wright Ward who was the agent in the premisses aforesaid & caused the same to be done

Quo die comparuit dictus ward Cui dominus iniunxit ad peragendum declaracionem °Et postea 8 Martij 1637 absolutus dictus ward absolutus fuit et dismissus./°

Officium domini contra Willelmum Iohnson ⸢dimissus⸣ Robertum Taler gard’. ⸢dimissus⸣ Johannem Taler ⸢dimissus⸣ Willelmum Taler ⸢dimissus⸣ (Willelmum Hodshon) Robertum Eden ⸢dimissus⸣ et Radulphum Stockdale et Thomam Ward all these for being in the action aforesaid in prophaneing the Church as hereafter is specified, vpon Sunday the xxth of September 1635 °Excommunicatus Stockdale Emanauit|

Quo die comparuerunt dicti Willelmus Iohannes Robertus Tailer Iohannes Tailer et Robertus Eden et negauit obieccionem esse verum in vim Iuramentorum suorum prius prestatorum tactis &c. unde dominus eos dimisit

Officium domini contra Robertum Morton ⸢dimissus⸣ Willelmum Steward Robertum Steward ⸢dimissus⸣ Iohannem Brunton Willelmum Rowntre Richardum Rowlles et willelmum Atkinson ⸢dimissus⸣for the like at the same tyme

Quo die comparuerunt dicti Morton et Robert Steward et in vim iuramentorum suorum tactis sanctis negauerunt presentamentum esse verum vnde dominus eos petentes dimisit deinde comparuit dictus Ronetree ⸢Atkinson⸣ similiter fidem fecit tactis &c. vnde dimittitur deinde comparuit dictus Ronetree et fassus est that he did helpe to carry the saide halgsoe to the Church style & noe further vnde dominus inuxit ei

Officium domini contra Iohannem Rimde ⸢dimissus⸣ Thomam Bratton ⸢dimissus⸣ Iennetam Hodgson Iacobum Tendale ‸⸢Tinmouth⸣ seruum Roberti Eden for the same offence All the parties before mencioned did fetch william hodshone from his owne house & did carrye him vpon a stang to the Church and about the Church & the Mab dance before him & soe carryed him into the Church & about the ffonte & set him in his stall with the piper playing before him all that tyme. & it was done the Sunday before named in the tyme of diuine seruise And Robert Taler a Churchwarden did not onely goe himselfe but lent a stang to carry the said hodshon on, & being asked why he did soe he answered in great derision that he would doe the like againe, if it were to doe

Quo die comparuerunt dicti Ricardus Bratton et Tinmouth et dominus iniunxit eis ad peragendum declarcionem provt in superdicto Et sententauit ad certificandum °Et postea 25 Octobris 1637 coram Magistro Calverley comparuerunt dictus Rymde pro se et dictus Britton et obtul<.> se promptum facere fidem that neither of them were presente at the said disorder, vnde dominus Rymde et Britton absoluit et dimisit/ Et postea 5 videlicet die Aprilis 1637 apud Eboracum coram venerabili Magistro Timotio Caluerley comparuit dictus Tinmouth et fidem fecit that he was not consenting to the said disorder, neither came then in holy Chappell, but only light on that company in his goeing sonne he left them vnde dominus eum absoluit et dimisit/°

570 words.

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• Appleton Wiske (1) ·
• Bagpipes (2) ·
• Charivari (2) ·
• Coen brothers (1) ·
• Consistory court (1) ·
• Domestic violence (7) ·
• Donald O’Connor (1) ·
• Ecclesiastical court (2) ·
• Embarrassment (1) ·
• Gene Kelly (1) ·
• Homosexuality (3) ·
• Humiliation (2) ·
• Make ‘Em Laugh (1) ·
• Neile/Neale, Richard (1562-1640) (2), churchman, bishop successively of six English dioceses, including the Archdiocese of York (1631 until his death); involved in the last burning at the stake for heresy in England, that of the Arian Edward Wightman in 1612 ·
• North Riding of Yorkshire (51) ·
• Northallerton (6) ·
• Physical comedy (1) ·
• Poetry (70) ·
• Profanity (6) ·
• Prostitution (15) ·
• Riding a rail (1) ·
• Singin’ in the Rain (1) ·
• Song (20) ·

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