I think whippet had a perfectly reasonable point. What makes some of us most uneasy about Morris is the explanation that it is a fertility rite of pre-industrial, even pre-Christian, origin, not just rugby and drinking by other means. These same people then practice it in such a way as to beat any sense of ritual or magic out of the dance and its special sennse of occasion.

I seem to remember an article in an EFDSS publication that gave strong evidence that the origin of Morris was in German courtly dances.

People say what ever they like without any need for evidence and they can dance likewise.

But some bits of folk dance/song/lore do go back a long way and affect some of us emotionally in ways that pop, classical and Morris at the end of the pier on a sunny day do not.

Is 'Hal an tow' a Victorian creation or something much older? That Fire ceromony with barrels of burning tar? Northwest Morris in tiny pennine towns is that also Victorian or does it have a deeper heritage? It strikes a strange chord with me.