Dancing the “Waterloo Waltz”: Commemorations of the Hundred Days – Parallels in British Social Dance and Song
Publication Date
2-13-2018
Document Type
Contribution to a Book
Publication Title
Napoleon's Hundred Days and the Politics of Legitimacy
Editor
Katherine Astbury, Mark Philp
DOI
10.1007/978-3-319-70208-7_11
First Page
209
Last Page
232
Abstract
Collections of country dance tunes and their accompanying steps, which were churned out each year by early nineteenth-century British music publishers, routinely included dances named after contemporary military figures and events. Although previous scholarship has recognized popular songs of the Napoleonic Wars as being important markers of political sentiments amongst wider British society, commemorative dances have not yet been subject to in-depth investigation. This essay explores parallels between commemorative dances and contemporary popular songs in their commentary on the Napoleonic Wars (particularly Waterloo) and considers how such dances contributed to shaping peoples’ responses, evocations, and memories of war.
Keywords
Social Dance, Wider British Society, Napoleonic Wars, Buonaparte, Annual Dance
Department
Music and Dance
Recommended Citation
Erica Buurman and Oskar Cox Jensen. "Dancing the “Waterloo Waltz”: Commemorations of the Hundred Days – Parallels in British Social Dance and Song" Napoleon's Hundred Days and the Politics of Legitimacy (2018): 209-232. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70208-7_11
