THE COMPLETE SYSTEM OF ENGLISH COUNTRY DANCING, Containing all the Figures ever used in English Country Dancing

A beautifully unsophisticated example of this very scarce English dancing manual found here in the publisher’s original paper covered boards with printed spine label. Printed on high quality wove paper, the text and plates are in excellent condition, many leaves unopened.

Publisher’s binding of brown paper over boards, chipping to the paper covering and cracking along paper covering outer hinges. Binding entirely sound. Collates in line with OCLC 35049803, date taken from frontispiece: [3] vi-xxvii [1] pp339 [1] Plates comprise: foldout frontispiece ‘Plan and Construction of a Country Dance’ opposite the title page; folding ‘Explanation’ and 4 further leaves of plates follow; then ‘Dance Figures’ (opposite p151): seven in total which is one more than called for in some of the standard descriptions, but matches Harvard’s copy. Ownership signature of ‘F Lloyd’ to the lower pastedown.

Originally published in 1808 and expanded in 1811, this edition borrows extensively from earlier editions, containing as with earlier editions, the figures for English country dances as explained through innumerable tables, diagrams and text. Performed as a series of figures danced by a column of men facing a column of women, the English country dance existed as a vernacular equivalent to the imported dances like the Waltz and the Quadrille.