Summary: Vol. 30 Issue 2

Published: May 2023

Table of contents

• North British go to Ostend
• Bank Holiday Dance Out
• EDITORIAL
• An historic set of swords
• DERT 2023, Rochdale
• Obituary: Geoff Kirk 
• Sightings of sword

Editorial

As I started writing this editorial the theory of Six Degrees of separation struck me. That is the idea that all people are six or fewer social connections away from each other. And this is even more true in the small world of sword dancing. 

As ever at Easter, North British had a trip to Belgium where they: visited a brewery, drank beer, met up with In De Kring, from Dunkirk, and danced a mix of rapper and longsword.

I was sorry to hear of the death of Geoff Kirk. One of the things about Geoff is that he and Andrew Kennedy danced together in Clydeside and between them are responsible for the Elgin Sword dance. The Elgin sword dance is a staple of North British, who were founded by Andrew Kennedy.

North British went to Belgium and Leven Sword stayed home. Dancing in Great Ayton on the coronation bank holiday but not for it. In the photos of Leven, there is Doug Rowling, a long time dancer with North British.

Leven Sword were dancing the Boosbeck dance; it is from Boosbeck, or possibly the nearby Lingdale, that the swords given to Ebor come from. Kevin Holland has done a lot of research without quite getting an answer.

There doesn’t seem to have been lots of monarchical fervour from sword teams, Leven were not celebrating and neither were Maltby Sword Dancers and Barnsley Longsword who both danced rapper at the coronation celebrations as the photos show.

For a magazine about longsword, there is a lot of rapper dancing in this issue. Whatever the rights and wrongs of competitive dancing DERT was a very enjoyable day and an excellent window for rapper.