Eighteen of the most favourite new country dances

Paper fan

An engraved sheet folded and mounted on wooden sticks secured with brass and bone hardware to form a fan, probably designed as a portable aide-memoire, includes musical scores for eighteen dances as well as directions for the dance steps — e.g., “The 2nd Lady Lead round the 2d. Gent, the Gent. Do the Same, Lead Down the middle up again Cast off. Pousete” is given for the Duke of Clarence’s Fancy. The decorative border is hand-colored in pink. On the verso is a sheet decorated with a small emblem with musical instruments and notations.

  • Title: Eighteen of the most favourite new country dances [graphic].
  • Publication: [Edinburgh?] : [publisher not identified], [not before 1791]

Catalog RecordĀ 

792.00.00.106 Object Room

Acquired December 2018

One thought on “Eighteen of the most favourite new country dances

  1. This appears to be the fan printed in 1792 and 1793 by John Cock of 21 Wood Street, near Cheapside, in London. Copies are also held by the Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Museum. Sudlow’s Fan Warehouse (at 191 The Strand) made another version of a country dance fan, of which copies survive in the Fitzwilliam Museum. Printed fans of the later 18th century can be identified by the printer’s name and date required by law and usually printed at the very edge of the design so that it was cut off when the fan was mounted on sticks. The Walpole copy has been mounted onto sticks of a different (later) shape than the fan sheet was designed for, as can be seen by the misalignment of the top and bottom darker edging bands.

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