Abbots Bromley Horn Dance Abbots Bromley Horn Dance The Abbots Bromley Horn Dance is an English folk dance dating back to the Middle Ages. The dance takes place each year in Abbots Bromley, a village in Staffordshire, England. The modern version of the dance involves reindeer antlers, a hobby horse, Maid Marian, and a Fool. There are no recorded references to the horn dance prior to Robert Plot's "Natural History of Staffordshire", written in 1686. However, there is a record of the hobby horse being used in Abbots Bromley as early as 1532, and it is possible that the horn dance component of the
Morris dance dressed as a woman. The largest Molly Dance event is the Whittlesea Straw Bear Festival, established in 1980, held at Whittlesey in Cambridgeshire in January. There is also hoodening from East Kent, Stave dancing from the south-west, and the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance. Another expression of the Morris tradition is Vessel Cupping. This was practised in the East Riding of Yorkshire until the 1920s. It was a form danced by itinerant ploughboys in sets of three or four, about the time of Candlemas. Additionally, there is a specifically Welsh version of this terpsichorean art that is distinct from the Borders