the Pipe and Tabor compendium

the Pipe and Tabor compendium

essays on the three-hole pipe

England: history of the pipe and tabor

the 17th century

In the 17th century neither terminology nor spelling were fixed. So a pipe and tabor player could be, for example,
a minstrel, a musician, a drummer, a pyper, taber and pipe or a fidler.
instruments
1604 poem 1604
16051605 Spain 16201620 Praetorius, Germany  
16361636 Mersenne, France
16501650 Kircher, Rome, Italy
1650-17001650-1700 book illustration England 16861686 book illustration London, England    
 

1641

“… A gang of women, to the music of pipe and tabour, levelled the fences round a recent enclosure and feasted
on cakes and ale to celebrate the act before they were caught and sent to jail by an angry magistrate….”

‘Rural Economy in Yorkshire in 1641, being the farming and account books of Henry Best’, ed. C. B. Robinson,
in 'The Great Rebellion. The King's War, 1641-1647 by Wedgwood, C. V. 2001

1683 fidler killed, trial account:

“it appeared the said Persons were in Maskerade, and that Sutton was a Fidler , who refusing to play
before them so long as they required him, they drew their Swords, and one of them Killed Him.”

Proceedings of the Old Bailey, 12th December,  t16831212-11


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