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"Merlin and Nimue", Edward Burne-Jones, 1861
Days of Camelot
Aug 25
Other Scottish Country Dances for this Day
Today's Musings, History & Folklore
“The best thing for being sad," replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, "is to learn something. That's the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”
~ T.H. White, The Once and Future King, 1958
Wise words from a wizard during the season of Arthurian festivals and fairs! Why not heed this advice and add an Arthurian jig to your repertoire? Just beware of getting tangled in the metaphorical thorn bush — the tricky "helix" figure that ends this dance! In Scotland’s Borders region, the village of Drumelzier holds a modest thorn tree marking the supposed grave of Merlin, the legendary wizard of Arthurian tales. While Merlin is often portrayed as the wise sorcerer guiding Arthur’s rise to power, in Drumelzier, he is remembered as a wild and tormented prophet, linked to the Scottish figure Lailoken. According to the 12th-century Life of St. Kentigern, Merlin went mad after a fierce battle, wandering the woods until his foretold death by drowning in the River Tweed. The thorn tree at the meeting of the Pausayl Burn and the Tweed stands as a memorial to this tragic figure, blending the Arthurian legend of Merlin’s entrapment in a hawthorn bush by the enchantress Morgana Le Fay with local Scottish folklore. Though the original tree was lost in the 1920s, a plaque still marks the site where the mystical meets the historical! ⚔️ 🪄 🧙 👑
Merlin's Thorn
The Festival du Roi (Arthur), a music festival held in Bréal-sous-Montfort, France over 2 days, near the Paimpoint forest, said to be the enchanted Brocéliande forest of Arthurian legends, the haunt of King Arthur, Merlin, and Viviane the fairy, also known as variously as Nimue, Vivien, Elaine, Ninianne, Nivian, Nyneve, or Evienne, and the Lady of the Lake.
Nimue is the beautiful young woman responsible for Merlin's downfall, although in some legends, Morgan Le Fay, a sorceress is responsible, plotting the downfall of King Arthur as well. These female characters have been conflated in the various retellings.
In some versions of the legend, Nimue traded her love for lessons in sorcery. Although Merlin foresees his own death, he is so smitten with Nimue that he is helpless to avert his own tragic end.
Merlin's downfall and imprisonment is recounted differently in various versions of the narrative; the enchanted prison is variously described as a cave, a large rock, an invisible tower, or a hawtorn tree, where his voice is still sometimes heard.
The legendary Brocéliande, is often identified as the real-life Paimpont forest in Brittany, France. But other purported sites of Merlin's burial include Drumelzier in Tweeddale, Scotland and Carmarthen on Ynys Enlli off the coast of Wales.
The place in Drumelzier where Merlin is said to be buried is marked modestly by a thorn tree, near where a burn joins onto the River Tweed. The town has placed a plaque at the bottom of the tree acknowledging “the wizard Merlin’s grave”, and where it also states that the present tree is not the original one, which was swept away in a flood sometime in the late 1920s.
For more on the Merlin and Lady of the Lake, click the famous painting of "The Beguiling of Merlin" showing Nimue, The Lady of the Lake, holding the infatuated Merlin trapped in a hawthorn bush and reading from a book of spells, (1872–1877) by Edward Burne-Jones.
And for a video of the dance performed by the Waikanae SCD Club, 2014, see below.
Click the dance cribs or description below to link to a printable version of the dance!
