ABSTRACT
This chapter takes a step away from the Kölbigk carolers to trace how the memory of medieval dance events continued to circulate in the nineteenth century through the discourse and choreography of the Münchner Schäfflertanz or Munich Barrel-Makers’ Dance. Remembered as a curative guild dance that restored Munich’s economy and spirits after a plague, the Schäfflertanz continues to be reenacted every seven years. Nineteenth-century Schäfflertanz historians generated a discourse around the tradition as they historicized the dance and aligned it with significant early modern events and contemporary concerns around transgressive bodies. Analyzing written and visual accounts of the dance and Schäffler guild activities between 1830 and 1907, this chapter traces how the dance and its story became significant for modern audiences within developing nationalist movements in Germany. Through this analysis, it argues that in the nineteenth century, the Schäfflertanz supported German cultural nationalism by discursively and choreographically invoking Munich’s medieval past while representing the city’s modern civic values of Catholicism, health, industry, and discipline. This dance tradition demonstrates how cultural memory of unruly medieval dancing bodies circulating in the modern period informed conceptions of modernity.
