dance

plural dances · alternative obsolete daunce

1. countableuncountableA sequence of rhythmic steps or movements usually performed to music, for pleasure or as a form of social interaction.

   I do a dance when she plays the drums!

   2 more examples

   He does the Gangnam Style dance with his friends in school.

   "I ought to arise and go forth with timbrels and with dances; but, do you know, I am not inclined to revels? There has been a little—just a very little bit too much festivity so far …. Not that I don't adore dinners and gossip and dances; not that I do not love to pervade bright and glittering places.[…]"

   1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter II, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC

2. countableuncountableA social gathering where dancing is the main activity.

   The dance we had in August 2008 is one of the greatest moments of my life!

   2 more examples

   "I ought to arise and go forth with timbrels and with dances; but, do you know, I am not inclined to revels? There has been a little—just a very little bit too much festivity so far …. Not that I don't adore dinners and gossip and dances; not that I do not love to pervade bright and glittering places.[…]"

   1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter II, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC

   But, he continued, "the experience of the Peking Municipal Communist Youth League shows that, as long as dance parties are organized and supervised well by the work units concerned and these units organize their own sentries, as long as the people attending these dances are given a little coaching in advance on what is meant by normal socializing and recreation, and as long as these dances are organized, led and guided properly, there will be no incidents."

   1985 April 29, Daniel Southerl, quoting Deng Liqun, “Saturday Night Fever in Peking”, in The Washington Post, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 27 Aug 2023

3. uncountableThe art, profession, and study of dancing.
4. abbreviationellipsisuncountableEllipsis of electronic dance music.
5. countableuncountableA piece of music with a particular dance rhythm.

   They stayed together during three dances, went out on to the terrace, explored wherever they were permitted to explore, paid two visits to the buffet, and enjoyed themselves much in the same way as if they had been school-children surreptitiously breaking loose from an assembly of grown-ups.

   1909 September 9, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], “A Court Ball”, in The Squire’s Daughter, London: Methuen & Co. […], →OCLC, page 9

6. countablefigurativelyuncountableA battle of wits, especially one commonly fought between two rivals.

   So how much longer are we gonna do this dance?

7. countabledatedfigurativelyuncountableAny strenuous or difficult movement, action, or task.

   He that would watch the king's hares must not drag himself along as if he was a lazybones with soles of lead to his boots, or like a fly on a tar-brush, for when the hares began to scamper about on the hill-sides it was quite another dance than lying at home and catching fleas with mittens on.

   1886, Peter Christen Asbjø￵rnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 170

8. countableuncountableagricultureA repetitive movement used in communication between worker honey bees.

   It was seen that the readiness to dance and intensity of the dance are clearly increased when the temperature in the hive remained between 28-36° C.

   1961 November, W. Wittekindt, “An Understanding of Dancing Behaviour”, in G. H. Cale, editor, The American Bee Journal, volume 101, number 11, Hamilton, page 434

present singular third person dances · participle present dancing · participle past danced · past danced · alternative obsolete daunce

1. intransitiveTo move with rhythmic steps or movements, especially in time to music.

   I danced with her all night long.

   2 more examples

   These drum beats are making me dance!

   “Well,” I answered, at first with uncertainty, then with inspiration, “he would do splendidly to lead your cotillon, if you think of having one.” ¶ “So you do not dance, Mr. Crocker?” ¶ I was somewhat set back by her perspicuity.

   1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter IV, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC

   Synonyms: throw shapes

2. figurativelyintransitiveTo leap or move lightly and rapidly.

   His eyes danced with pleasure as he spoke. She accused her political opponent of dancing around the issue instead of confronting it.

   3 more examples

   And woods along the banks are waving high, / Whose shadows in the glassy waters dance,

   1812–1818, George Gordon [Lord] Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, canto 2, verse 54

   Sweet visions of you / Will dance through my head / Tonight while I lie / Awake in my bed

   1975, Ecstasy, Passion & Pain, “One Beautiful Day”

   A common and beautiful side-effect of high solar activity is the Aurora Borealis - the northern lights that dance across Arctic skies.

   2023 November 15, Prof. Jim Wild, “This train was delayed because of bad weather in space”, in RAIL, number 996, page 30

3. transitiveTo perform the steps to.

   Have you ever danced the tango?

4. transitiveTo cause to dance, or move nimbly or merrily about.

   Thy grandsire loved thee well; / Many a time he danced thee on his knee.

   c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]

   1 more example

   Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead, By pavèd fountain, or by rushy brook, or in the beachèd margent of the sea, To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind, But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport.

   c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]

5. euphemisticfigurativelyTo make love or have sex.

   You make me feel like dancing.

6. agricultureTo make a repetitive movement in order to communicate to other worker honey bees.

   It was seen that the readiness to dance and intensity of the dance are clearly increased when the temperature in the hive remained between 28-36° C.

   1961 November, W. Wittekindt, “An Understanding of Dancing Behaviour”, in G. H. Cale, editor, The American Bee Journal, volume 101, number 11, Hamilton, page 434

7. euphemisticfigurativelyTo kick and convulse from the effects of being hanged.

   Simon had seen other men executed at Berkeley, both in the castle and outside in the village. They were usually strung up like rats, left to dance, their death throes sometimes seeming to last forever.

   2001, Paul Doherty, The Hangman's Hymn (Canterbury Tales Mysteries, Book 5)

   5 more examples

   If that veil can be maintained, if the workers can be kept from knowing the perfidy of officials, the criminality of capitalism, the murderous vengeance that is planned by the plutocratic powers of America, then Charles Moyer, William D. Haywood, and George Pettibone will dance on empty air, while the ghouls of capitalism rejoice because they have landed another blow upon the body of resisting labor.

   1907, Literary Digest, volume 34, page 364

   Beneath the shoulder blades of the limp form lying there lay the heart that had hated him, that had beat high at the thought of seeing him kick at the end of a hangman's rope, that had exulted in the prospect of him dancing a death dance on air.

   1926, Walter Noble Burns, The Saga of Billy the Kid, page 250

   'Hats off!' the shout went up, not out of respect for those about to die, but for a better view of their death dance. The hangman, who was as drunk as anyone else, uncoiled the rope's free end from each prisoner in turn and threw it up to an assistant balanced precariously on the beam above. Each was tightly fastened, leaving very little slack. When the moment came, the carts would be driven out from under the prisoners, leaving them dancing the Tyburn jig, their legs paddling helplessly in the air.

   2010 January 12, Sara Starbuck, Dread Pirate Fleur and the Hangman's Noose, page 342

   Not only will you be whipped, but Jack Ketch will be displeased. He knows how to attach the rope just so...a man's neck can be snaped in an instant and he feels pain for a moment only. Or, at Ketch's pleasure, the man swings in the air, his legs dance in an ungainly manner, his face turns red, his tongue turns purple and protrudes - a poor devil once bit off the tip and spit it out, and he chocked(sic) to death.

   2019 November 7, Carter J. Gregory, The Hangman's Psalm: The Girl at the Gallows

   Initially, all hanging deaths were by the short rope. The victims strangled as they performed a twitching death dance. Over time there was a move to a longer rope. The extra drop meant the victim's neck snapped, causing a more humane death. For a long time adter the long rope was introduced, stories circulated around Aberdeen of executioners slipping in the short rope for criminals convicted of particularly heinous crimes, especially for crimes against children. No quick end for these devils. A slow dancing death, courtesy of the short rope, brouht in by canny executioners.

   2022 November 30, John Gardiner, A Hitchhiker's Triptych

plural dances

1. governmentA normally horizontal stripe called a fess that has been modified to zig-zag across the center of a coat of arms from dexter to sinister.

   Or, a dance gules, in chief 3 lions' faces sable.

   1922, Miscellanea Genealogica Et Heraldica, page 189

   2 more examples

   The fact appears to have been that Simon de Montacute bore two coats; the one, Argent, three fusils, which it is most probable was a corruption of a fess dancette, or a dance, Gules; and the other, Azure, a griffin segreant[…]

   1828, Sir Nicholas Harris Nicolas, Walter (of Exeter), The Siege of Carlaverock in the XXVIII Edward I. A. D. MCCC, page 243

   It is as follows - being headed by a shield of arms in colours - gold with a dance gules between three croslets fitchy gules.

   1902, The Ancestor: A Quarterly Review of County and Family History, Heraldry and Antiquities ..., page 85

plural Dances

1. A surname.