contra dance

plural contra dances

1. danceA type of folk dance style in which couples dance in two facing lines of indefinite length.

   1 more example

   [T]he Duchess, and the dandies, and the member's wife and all the rest of their tribulations, were happily hidden from the view by the towering bouquets of the gold plateau vases at the head of the room. [...] A contra-dance after supper was felt to be a national duty; but behind those fatal vases a plot had already been concocted by the recondites for rewarding their previous self-denial, not by a quadrille, but a galoppe.

   1836, [Catherine Gore], chapter VIII, in Mrs. Armytage; or, Female Domination. […] In Three Volumes, volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 134

present singular third person contra dances · participle present contra dancing · participle past contra danced · past contra danced

1. To participate in a contra dance.