{"id":2035,"date":"2025-01-07T17:51:03","date_gmt":"2025-01-07T16:51:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.histoiredebal.com\/?p=2035"},"modified":"2025-02-16T13:36:47","modified_gmt":"2025-02-16T12:36:47","slug":"la-tempete-contredanse-star-du-xixe-siecle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.histoiredebal.com\/en\/2025\/01\/07\/la-tempete-contredanse-star-du-xixe-siecle\/","title":{"rendered":"La Temp\u00eate, a hit throughout 19th century"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

La Temp\u00eate<\/em> is a staple of 19th-century ballroom re-enactments. I’m sure you’ve already danced it here or there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s a dance that’s accessible to everyone: all you need is the ability to walk and to know your left and right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What’s more, there’s no limit to the number of dancers: you can always add an extra line of four dancers. The only constraint is the size of the venue!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In short, La Temp\u00eate<\/em> is known to everyone\u2026 or is it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this article, we’ll look beyond the easy animation dance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We’ll look at the origins of the dance and its gradual spread throughout the world (yes, yes!) throughout the 19th century. We’ll also look at the variations proposed by dancing masters. Finally, we’ll look at what the dance has become as it moves into the traditional repertoire.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"George
George Cruikshank, Moulinet. Elegancies of Quadrille Dancing<\/em>, Apr 11th 1817.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Being a French native speaker, I write in English as good as I can. Please let me know if you spot any error. thank you!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The name and origins of La Temp\u00eate<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For once, I’m not going to venture into the realms of choreographic creation. It’s not laziness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I wrote this article in 2020, getting to the source material was as easy as taking the Ring to Mordor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So it seems that the dance is indeed French in origin, as its name suggests. This idea is repeated in (among others) Hillgrove, 1857:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201dThis dance was lately introduced into Paris, and is now in high repute in the <\/em>soir\u00e9es dansantes and the fashionable circles in England, and may be truly represented as general favorite, as it only requires an intimate knowledge of the figures to make it both agreeable and suitable for all ages\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nThomas Hillgrove, The Scholar\u2019s Companion & Ballroom Vade-Mecum<\/em>, Turnbull & Co, New York, 1857.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Hillgrove then draws a political metaphor on dancing:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cWhen the figure is properly performed the dance is particularly social, cheerful and amusing, and combines the excitement of the country dance with the grace and elegance of the quadrille; while, at the same time, it symbolically illustrates the singular vicissitudes of the social condition of the land which gave its birth – or at least celebrity – the top going down and the bottom going up.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nIbidem<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

This references the French revolutions of 1789, 1830 and 1848.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many English-speaking sources mention that La Temp\u00eate<\/em> comes from France. Yet, not any French nor French-speaking source supports the thesis that the dance was fashionable in Paris in the 1850s. Or even in the next decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We must conclude that La Temp\u00eate<\/em> had fall to oblivion in France for a while in the mid-19th century. On the opposite, the dance will enjoy a long, rich life in the English-speaking world: Great-Britain, USA, and event Australia!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everywhere, the name stays La Temp\u00eate<\/em> in French. That is an important note. Indeed, there exists another dance, The Tempest<\/em>, that is completely different from La Temp\u00eate<\/em>, even if they are both dance in the same period. More information about The Tempest<\/em> on Capering and Kickery<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

La Temp\u00eate<\/em> is an extraordinary success. It is found in over 50 dance treatises between 1802 and 1917! And be sure that I haven’t found them all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those are many, many variations to explore<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The formation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Before reading the figures, a few words about the unusual formation for La Temp\u00eate<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In La Temp\u00eate<\/em>, dancers forms lines of two couples side by side. Those lines faces each other, in small set of 8 dancers. All those set form a large column, like a double longways<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Instructions
Formation for La Temp\u00eate<\/em> (well, La Tampete<\/em>), in Whale 1851.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The progression is a classic duple minor set. After each repeat of the dance, the lines progress one place forward. When a line reaches the end of the longways, it stay inactive during one repeat. During that repeat, the couples inside the line must turn, as a couple, to face the column. Dancers should not turn individually, as it is important that the Leader stay on the Left, and the Follower on the Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interestingly, from 1851, Whale indicates that all the sets start the dance at the same time<\/strong>. So there is no “snowball” progression. Be careful though, not to generalise that remark to all country dance, or event for all versions of La Temp\u00eate<\/em>. Elliott, circa 1854, still recommends the snowball progression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

La Temp\u00eate<\/em>: quadrille or country dance?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The idea that La Temp\u00eate<\/em> is a hybrid between the quadrille and the country dance (in longways) is one that often crops up in the sources. In addition to the excerpt from Hillgrove given above, see what Routledge said in 1868:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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 \u201cIt unites the cheerfulness of the quadrille with the sociability of the country dance; and when its lively figures are correctly performed, it is both amusing and animated.\u201d<\/p>\nGeorge Routledge (\u00e9d.), The Ball-Room Companion<\/em>, George Routledge & Sons, Londres, 1868.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The filiation between La Temp\u00eate<\/em> and the country dance seem obvious. It is a (double) longways, with a duple minor set progression. The only peculiarity it the formation. The figures (hands across, circles…) are also very common in the country dances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had more trouble conceiving a link between La Temp\u00eate<\/em> and the quadrille. As I read more sources, two explanations appeared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reilley 1870 says:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cAs now danced, it is usually commenced in the form of a number of quadrilles, each of which separates into lines, facing each other, the sides forming on the leads; as in this diagram.\u201d<\/p>\nE. B. Reilley, The Amateur\u2019s Vademecum, A practical Treatise on the Art of Dancing<\/em>, J. Nicholas, Philadelphie, 1870.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

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\"Diagram
Position des dansuers pour la Temp\u00eate, selon E. B. Reilley, The Amateur’s Vademecum<\/em>, J. Nicholas, Philadelphie, 1870.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Indeed, you can visualise a quadrille<\/strong>, with the partners of the side couples facing each other and lined up on the heads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You’ll notice that couples 3 and 4 will be separated from the second repeat. What’s more, the head couples are reversed: lady on the left and gentleman on the right. This does not change the way the dance works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carpenter 1879 proposed another solution. He described various \u2018Figures for plain quadrille<\/em>\u2019, often danced instead of the 3rd or 4th figure. One of these is a version of La Temp\u00eate<\/em> which begins with a large round dance. At the end of the large circle, the men in the leading couples let go of the lady in front of them and continue straight ahead. In this way, two lines facing each other are formed: couples 1 and 4, opposite couples 3 and 2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carpenter doesn’t give a diagram, so I’ll do it myself:<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"la
From the square position to “flat quadrille” or double longways<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Notice that all dancers get to keep their partners and will progress with them, unlike in the previous proposal. Also, the couples are correctly place (with Gentlemen on the Left).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aussi, les positions sont invers\u00e9es entre cavaliers et dames par rapport \u00e0 la version pr\u00e9c\u00e9dente.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In short, country dance or quadrille, it’s all a question of point of view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Is La Temp\u00eate<\/em> a Mescolanze ?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In the 1820s and 1830s, a type of dance called \u2018mescolanze\u2019 appeared in Britain. G.M.S. Chivers, a dance teacher, claimed to have invented it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It interests us because it is a kind of country dance in which four dancers face four others, exactly as in La Temp\u00eate<\/em>. Could La Temp\u00eate<\/em> be a survivor of the genre?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a matter of debate among dance historians. It is certain that La Temp\u00eate<\/em> existed as early as 1802, i.e. before Chivers’ publications. But it could be that he was the promoter of a pre-existing dance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mescolanze or not, La Temp\u00eate<\/em> is the only \u20184 on 4\u2019 dance to have had lasting success in the nineteenth century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Variations on La Temp\u00eate<\/em><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

You probably know that version of La Temp\u00eate<\/em> (Hillgrove, 1857):<\/p>\n\n\n\n