Scottish Country Dancing Dictionary

The Crooket Horned Ewie

Scottish Country Dance Instruction

THE CROOKET HORNED EWIE (S8x32) 3C (4C set) David Rutherford RSCDS Book 14

1- 8 1s lead down below 2s, cross and cast down behind 3s to 3rd place opposite sides (2s+3s step up), 2s repeat this Fig (3s+1s step up)
9-16 3s repeat the Fig (1s+2s step up) and all turn partners 2H 1½ times
17-24 1s lead down below 2s, cross and cast down behind 3s, lead up to top, cross and cast to 2nd place own sides (2s step up)
25-32 1s dance down below 3s, cast up to 2nd place and all turn 2H once round

(MINICRIB. Dance crib compiled by Charles Upton, Deeside Caledonian Society, and his successors)


Keith Rose's Crib Diagrams


Dance Instruction Videos

The Crooket Horned Ewie - Scottish Country Dancing Instruction Video

Dance Information

The Crooket Horned Ewie is a Scottish Country Dance published by Rutherford in 1758 and interpreted in RSCDS Book 14 in 1947.

Rutherford spelled the title: "The Crocked Horn'd Ewe".

(Dance information copyright, reproduced here with the kind permission of George Williams)


The title of this dance, The Crooket Horned Ewie, comes from The Crooket Horned Ewie - Song written by John Skinner in c. 1780.

Oh, the yowie wi' the crookit horn
A' that kenned her could hae sworn
That sic a yowie ne'er was born
Here aboot or far awa'

It is thought that the title, The Crooket Horned Ewie, refers to the whisky-still with the crooked, spiral or corkscrew shape of the condenser being compared to a ewe's (female sheep) horn.

In a letter to "The Reel" magazine in 1954, a correspondent, C.F. Craigie, wrote

'The ewie is a vessel to hold the liquor and the crooked horn is the spiral condenser tube on top - the contraption used in the illicit preparation of "Highland Dew" '.

The Crooket Horned Ewie Song - Information Video

Crooket Horned Ewie
Crooket Horned Ewie c. 1894
The Black-Faced Scotch (Heather Sheep) Have Very Large And Spirally Twisted Horns


This page contains both original content, which is copyrighted, and excerpts from Wikipedia and other sources using the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Text from this original Ewie wi' the Crookit Horn article on Wikipedia.
Image from Bennett, Frank P., ed, No restrictions, via Wikimedia Commons.

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