Tantivy: The New Hunt Dance

• Era: late 1890s-1900 England/France

"Tantivy: The New Hunt Dance," was invented by English dancing master R. M. Crompton, later to become the first president of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing and a part of the early 20th-century movement to keep ballroom dance out of the hands of the "wrong" people, which primarily meant American, and especially African-American, influences.  That was all in the future in the 1890s, however, when this dance first appeared.  It may have first been published in Crompton's own book, Theory and Practice of Modern Dancing (London, c1891).  Unfortunately, I do not have a copy of Crompton's work.  The dance, however, can be found in at least three other works of the late 19th century, attributed in each case to Crompton.

I first noticed Tantivy in T. Leggett Byrne's Terpsichore: Her Votaries and Fashions, published in London in 1899 (but with a preface dated to Dublin in 1898) and made available online by Chris Brady here.  A second source is Saxon's Everybody's Guide to Ball-Room Dancing, written by Crompton's contemporary William Lamb and published in London circa 1898-1900 (it is listed in The English Catalogue of Books for those years, which was published in 1901).  The description of the dance in these two sources is word-for-word identical.  Finally, Tantivy was included in the massive French tome Traité de la Danse,  published in Paris in 1900 as volume II of an immense work on dance by Eugène Giraudet that went through dozens of editions in the late 19th century.  Giraudet dates the dance to October, 1896.  While Crompton was certainly known to American dance teachers (Philadelphia dance teacher and writer Albert Newman claimed in the early 1910s to have received dances directly from him), I have not so far found this particular dance in any American source.

The word tantivy is associated with hunting in England, with an implication of going full-speed or headlong, as discussed by Michael Quinion at World Wide Words, and the dance does require a certain enthusiastic commitment to perform successfully!

It is not clear to me whether there was a specific piece of music to which this dance was originally set, but Leggett Byrne states that the music is in 6/8 time.  In practice, it works well to lively late-19th century polka, march, or two-step music.  The tempo must be fairly brisk for the turns to work smoothly.

The dance sequence is a total of sixteen bars (eight bars repeated with alternate feet leading).  The first part is identical to the first part of the simpler sequence "Tres Chic," credited to William Lamb and described in my earlier post here.  It also bears a strong resemblance in pattern to the older heel-and-toe or Bohemian polka.  The steps given below are for the gentleman; the lady uses opposite feet.

The Sequence
(start side by side, her left hand resting on his shoulder, his right arm around her waist.)

1b   Hop on right foot and point left lightly forward; hop right again and tuck the left foot raised behind the right (rhythm 1-2)
1b   Chassé forward (slide-close-slide; left-right-left; rhythm 1&2)
2b   Repeat the above, opposite feet (1-2, 1&2)

(face partner, join hands into regular ballroom position)

2b   Two slow, gliding schottische-style step-hops, free foot tucked behind ("ankles crossed"), making a full turn: slide-hop (1-2), slide-hop (1-2)
1b   Two galops along line of dance (slide-close-slide-close, left-right-left-right, 1&2&)
1b   A final gliding step-hop making a half turn (1-2)

(dancers open up to face forward, gentleman on the right with the lady's right hand in his left)

The entire sequence is then repeated on opposite feet from opposite sides; the lady must move in strongly to take ballroom position (elbows toward line of dance) on the fifth bar to begin the turning.  Note that the transition between the first eight bars and the second is "slide-hop, hop/point;" the two consecutive hops while breaking out of ballroom position to face forward are the most difficult part of the dance to perform gracefully, along with the matching transition from the end of the sixteen bars back to the beginning of the dance again.  Strong ankles and good balance are a must!

Giraudet notes that the dance has un effet charmant and adds a minor variation in style, claiming that at the beginning, the man's left hand should be placed on his hip and the woman's right hand should hold her gown.  He also suggests that in the repetition of the dance the man actually puts his left arm around the lady in a reverse ballroom hold, but this is directly contradicted by the other sources and awkward besides.

Special thanks to Barbara Pugliese for locating her copy of Lamb's book to confirm my years-old notes on the dance.

Comments

[Marilee J. Layman]

Is this TAN ti vee or tan TIV ee?

[Susan de Guardiola]

It's "tan TIV ee" according to various online dictionaries.