or Dancing (Fr. danseur; Teut. dansen), as at present practised, may be defined to be a graceful movement of the body, adjusted by art to the measures or tones of instruments, or of the voice. But according to what some reckon more agreeable to the true genius of the art, dancing is the art of expressing the sentiments of the mind, or the passions, by measured steps or bounds made in cadence, by regulated motions of the figure and by graceful gestures; all performed to the sound of musical instruments or of the voice.

There is no account of the origin of the practice of dancing amongst mankind. It is found to exist amongst all nations whatever, even the most rude and barbarous; and, indeed, however much the assistance of art may be necessary to make any one perfect in the practice, the foundation must certainly lie in the human constitution itself.

As barbarous people are observed to have the strongest passions, so they are also observed to be the most easily affected by sounds, and the most habitually addicted to dancing. Sounds to us the most disagreeable, the drumming of sticks upon an empty cask, or the noise made by blowing into reeds incapable of yielding one musical note tolerable to us, is agreeable music to them. Much more are they affected by the sound of instruments which have anything agreeable in them. M. Gallini informs us that "the spirit of dancing prevails almost beyond imagination among both men and women in most parts of Africa. It is even more than instinct, it is a rage, in some countries of that part of the globe. Upon the Gold Coast especially, the inhabitants are so passionately fond of it; that in the midst of their hardest labour, if they hear a person sing, or any musical instrument played, they cannot refrain from dancing. There are even well attested stories of some negroes flinging themselves at the feet of an European playing on a fiddle, entreating him to desist, unless he had a mind to tire them to death; it being impossible for them to cease dancing while he continued playing."

The same thing is found to take place in America; though, as the inhabitants of that continent are found to be of a more fierce and barbarous nature than the African nations, their dances are still more uncouth and barbarous than those of the negroes. "In Mexico," says Gallini, "they have also their dances and music, but in the most uncouth and barbarous style. For their symphony they have wooden drums, something in form of a kettle-drum, with a kind of pipe or flageolet made of a hollow cane or reed, but very grating to an European ear. It is observed they love everything that makes a noise, how disagreeable soever the sound is. They will also hum over something like a tune when they dance thirty or forty in a circle, stretching out their hands, and laying them on each other's shoulders." They stamp and jump, and use the most antic gestures for several hours, till they are heartily weary. And one or two of the company sometimes step out of the rings to make sport for the rest, by showing feats of activity, throwing their lances up into the air, catching them again, bending backwards and springing forwards with great agility."

The origin of dancing amongst the Greeks was most certainly the same as amongst all other nations; but as they proceeded a certain length in civilization, their dances were by consequence more regular and agreeable than those of the more barbarous nations. They reduced dancing into a kind of regular system; and had dances proper for exciting, by means of the sympathy above mentioned, any passion whatsoever in the minds of the beholders. In this way they are said to have produced effects to us absolutely incredible. At Athens it is stated that the dance of the Eumenides or Furies in the theatre had so expressive a character as to strike the spectators with irresistible terror. Men grown old in the profession of arms trembled; the multitude ran out; women with child miscarried; people imagined they saw in earnest those terrible deities commissioned with the vengeance of heaven to pursue and punish crimes upon earth.

The Greeks had martial dances, which they reckoned useful for keeping up and cherishing the warlike spirit of their youth; but the Romans, though equally warlike with the Greeks, never had anything of the kind. This may probably be owing to the want of that romantic spirit for which the Greeks were so remarkable. Hence there was less excitement, and much more cool deliberate valour, displayed by the Romans. The passions of pride, resentment, obstinacy, and the like, were excited in them, not by the mechanical means of music and dancing, but by the idea early instilled, that their greatest glory was to fight for the republic. It does not, however, appear that the Romans were at all less capable of being affected in this mechanical manner than the Greeks. When dancing was once introduced, it produced the very same effects at Rome as at Athens.

Amongst the Jews, dancing seems to have formed a part of the religious worship on some occasions, as we learn from some passages in the Psalms, though we do not find either salutation or singing positively enjoined by a divine precept. In the Christian churches mentioned in the New Testament, there is no account of dancing being introduced as an act of worship, though it is certain that it was used as such in after-ages. Gallini tells us, that "at Limoges, not long ago, the people used to dance the round in the choir of the church which is under the invocation of their patron saint; and at the end of each psalm, instead of the Gloria Patri, they sang St. Marcel, pray for us, and we shall dance in honour of you." Though dancing would now be looked upon as the highest degree of profanation in a religious assembly, yet it is certain that dancing, considered as an expression of joy, is no more a profanation than singing, or than simple speaking; nor can it be thought in the least degree more absurd that a Christian should dance for joy that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, than that David danced before the ark when it was restored to him after a long absence.

Plato reduces the dances of the ancients to three classes: first, the military dances, which tended to make the body robust, active, and well disposed for all the exercises of war; secondly, the domestic dances, which had for their object an agreeable and innocent relaxation and amusement; thirdly, the mediatorial dances, which were in use in expiations and sacrifices. Of military dances there were two sorts; the gymnopedic dance, or the dance of children; and the enoplium, or armed dance. The Spartans had invented the first as an early excitation of the courage of their children, and in order to lead them on insensibly to the exercise of the armed dance. This children's dance used to be executed in the public place. It was composed of two choirs, the one of grown men, the other of children; whence, being chiefly designed for the latter, it took its name. Both classes of performers were in a state of nudity. The choir of the children regulated their motions by those of the men, and all danced at the same time, singing the poems of Thales, Alcmanon, and Dionysodotus. The enoplium or Pyrrhic was danced by young men armed cap-à-pied, who executed to the sound of the flute all the proper movements either for attack or for defence. It was composed of four parts. The first, called the podism or footing, consisted in a quick shifting motion of the feet, such as was necessary for overtaking a flying enemy, or for getting away from him when an overmatch; the second, the xiphism, a kind of mock fight, in which the dancers imitated all the motions of combatants, aiming a stroke, darting a javelin, or dexterously parrying or avoiding a blow or thrust; the third part, called the komos, consisted in very high leaps or vaultings, which the dancers frequently repeated for the better accustoming themselves occasionally to leap over a ditch, or spring over a wall; the tetraconoe, or the fourth and last part, was a square figure, executed by slow and majestic movements, but it is uncertain whether this was everywhere executed in the same manner.

Of the Greeks, the Spartans were those who most cultivated the Pyrrhic dance. Athenaeus relates, that they had a law by which they were obliged to exercise their children in it from the age of five years. This warlike people constantly retained the custom of accompanying their dances with hymns and songs. The following was sung for the dance called trichoria, said to be instituted by Lycurgus, and which had its name from its being composed of three choirs, one of children, another of young men, and the third of old. The old men opened the dance, saying, "In time past we were valiant." The young men answered, "We are so at present." "We shall be still more so when our time comes," replied the chorus of children. The Spartans never danced except with real arms. In process of time, however, other nations came to use only weapons of wood on such occasions. Nay, it was only so late as the days of Athenaeus, who lived in the second century, that the dancers of the Pyrrhic, instead of arms, carried only flasks, and ivy-bound wands (thysri) or reeds. But even in Aristotle's days they used thysri instead of pikes, and lighted torches instead of javelins and swords. With these torches they executed a dance called the conflagration of the world.

Of the dances for amusement and recreation, some were simply gambols, or sportive exercises, which had no character of imitation, and of which the greater part exist to this day. The others were more complex, agreeable, figured, and were always accompanied with singing. Amongst the first or simples ones was the ascotiamus, which consisted in jumping with one foot only, on bladders filled with air or wine, and rubbed on the outside with oil. The dyopodium was jumped with both feet close. The kybdestesia was what is called in this country the somerset. Of the second kind were that called the wine-press, of which there is a description in Longinus, and the Ionian dances. These last expressed originally nothing but what was decent and modest; but in time their movements came to be so depraved, as to be employed in expressing voluptuousness and obscenity.

Amongst the ancients there were no festivals nor religious assemblies which were not accompanied with songs and dances. It was not held possible to celebrate any mystery, or to be initiated, without the intervention of these two arts. In short, they were looked upon as so essential in these kind of ceremonies, that to express the crime of such as were guilty of revealing the sacred mysteries, they em- ployed the word *kheister*, signifying to be out of the dance. The most ancient of these religious dances is the *Bacchus*, which was not only consecrated to Bacchus, but to all the deities whose festival was celebrated with a kind of enthusiasm. The most grave and majestic was the *hymnomatic*, which was executed to the lyre, and accompanied with the voice. On his return from Crete, Theseus instituted a dance, at which he himself assisted at the head of a numerous and splendid band of youths, round the altar of Apollo. The dance was composed of three parts: the *strophe*, *antistrophe*, and the *stationary*. In the strophe, the movements were from the right to the left; in the antistrophe, from the left to the right; and in the stationary, they danced before the altar; so that the stationary did not mean an absolute pause or rest, but only a more slow or grave movement. Plutarch is persuaded that in this dance there is a profound mystery. He thinks, that by the strophe is indicated the motion of the world from east to west; by the antistrophe, the motion of the planets from the west to the east; and by the stationary, the stability of the earth.

To this dance Theseus gave the name of *geronos*, or the crane, because the figures which characterized it bore a resemblance to those described by cranes in their flight.

**Stage-Dances** are treated of under the head **Ballet**.

**Country-Dance**, commonly so written, and hence seeming to imply a rustic way of dancing borrowed from country people or peasants, is, however, merely a corruption of the French *Contre-danse*, where a number of persons placed opposite each other begin a figure.

**Rope-Dancer (scheunobates)**. See **Acrobates**.

**Dancing-Girls** are commonly met with all over the East. Such are the Almé of Egypt, and the Bayaderes of India. See **Alme**.

**Dancette**, a term applied to the indented or zigzag moulding peculiar to Norman architecture.

**Dandelion**, *Leontodon Taraxacum*. See **Botany**, vol. v., p. 197.

**Dandini**, the name of a family of Florentine painters: Cesare (1595–1658); Vincenzo (1607–1675); and Pietro (1646–1712). Of these the last was a successful imitator of Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese. His principal works are at Florence.

**Dandolo**, Enrico, a celebrated doge of Venice, elected to that office in 1192, in his old age; yet in 1201, though nearly blind, Dandolo joined in the crusade undertaken to restore Alexius to the imperial throne. With his own hands the aged hero planted the standard of St Mark on the ramparts in the first assault of Constantinople in 1203; and was present at the storming of the city in the following year. He had the glory of refusing the imperial crown, which was offered to him by the Latins, although he afterwards accepted the sovereignty of Roumelia. He died at Constantinople in 1205, and was buried in the church of St Sophia.

**Danegelt** (*Dane* and *gelt*, money), an annual tax (originally of one shilling, and afterwards of two) imposed on the Anglo-Saxons for every hide of land throughout the English realm, church-lands excepted, to maintain forces to oppose the Danes, or to furnish tribute to procure peace.