- Rough music
Rough music is a form of English
folklore , and refers to an 18th and 19th century practice in which a humiliatingpunishment is inflicted upon one or more people who have violated the standards of the rest of the community.Rough music is noisy, masked demonstrations usually held at the home of the wrongdoer, involving the banging of
frying pan s,saucepan s,kettle s, the rattling of bones andcleaver s, the ringing of bells, hooting, blowing bull's horns, and utilizing any other kitchen or barn utensil with the intention of creating a cacophonous noise to the discomfort and lingering embarrassment of the subject.cite book | last = Cox | first = Christoph | title = Audio Culture | publisher = Continuum | location = London | year = 2004 | isbn = 0826416144 |pages=47-48] During a rough music performance, the victim may be ridden upon a pole or donkey, and his crimes may be the subject of mime, theatrical performances, recitatives, along with a litany of obscenities and insults. The participants were generally young men temporarily bestowed with the power of rule over the everyday affairs of the community.Issues of sexuality, reproduction and domestic hierarchy most often formed the pretexts for rough music.
Equivalents include the German "
haberfeld-treiben ", Italian "scampanate " and French "charivari ". Instances of rough music in theUnited States were known as "shivaree s".References
External links
* [http://www.notbored.org/rough-music.html Notbored.org]
* Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge (1884), chapters 36, 39. ISBN: 0004245350
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