BALET, or BALETTO, a kind of dramatic poem, representing some fabulous action or subject divided into several entries; wherein several pers... Ballet

Ballet is more particularly used for a kind of comic dance, consisting of a series of several airs of different kinds of movements, which together represent some subject or action. They are performed chiefly by masks representing fawns, tritons, nymphs, shepherds, and the like; and consist of three parts, the entry, figure, and the retreat. The word is of Greek origin, formed from βαλλειν, jaceere, to cast, throw, or toss; whence also in writers of the middle age, we find ballatones for saltations, dances; and ballare, for saltare, to dance.

the English poetry. See Ballad.