Seventeen villagers of Lincolnshire have been fined for ‘rantanning’ […] the ‘rough music’ of kettle and pan, in which the rustic moralist conveys his sense of outraged propriety.

Apart from making presentments in the Church courts, villagers had many informal ways of expressing their disapproval of the way a married couple comported themselves: by playing ‘rough music’ under their window, for example […]

The most common form of punishment was ‘rough music’, or charivari, as it was known in southern Europe, where the villagers made a rumpus outside the house of the guilty person until he or she appeared and surrendered to the crowd, who would then subject him or her to public shame or even violent punishment.

People suspected of adultery, whoredom, or the like could expect to be awakened in their beds by their peers, making ‘rough music’ outside by clanging pots and pans.

Rough music

Meaning

Noun