ABSTRACT
Eighteenth-Century courtesy and conduct writers addressed dancing in the same breath as music. In 1722 John Essex suggested that the knowledge of few if any of the arts and sciences were so necessary or advantageous as dancing, especially under the tutelage of a good dance-master, both as a diversion and as an essential exercise. John Playford’s The English Dancing Master: or, Plaine and Easie Rules for the Dancing of Country Dances, first published in 1651, was easily the best-known dance collection of its time. The concerns that informed Playford’s particular apology for social dancing had their tap-roots anchored in the politics of morality, especially in the relation of moral virtue to human sexuality. Literary and visual representations of galumphing dancers, usually men, were common throughout the century and are worth examining for more than their intended humor.
