A 19th-century square dance, which was a variant of the Quadrille with an elaborate final figure (‘Grand Chain’). Even more than the quadrille, the music used for the dance was almost invariably derived from popular songs and stage works. The Lancers flourished alongside the quadrille in the last quarter of the 19th century and even outlived the latter into the early 20th century.
The name ‘Lancers’ was derived from the Quadrille des lanciers, which was introduced in Dublin in 1817 by the dancing-master John Duval. It consisted of the following five figures: ‘La Dorset’ (music by Spagnoletti); ‘Lodoïska’ (music by Rodolphe Kreutzer); ‘La Native’ (‘If the heart of a man’ from The Beggar's Opera); ‘Les Graces’ (‘Pretty Maiden’ from Storace's The Haunted Tower); and ‘Les Lanciers’ (music by Janiewicz). The Quadrille des lanciers achieved international popularity during the 1850s after being introduced to Paris by the dancing-master Laborde, but had virtually died out by 1870 except in England where it achieved new life with new sets of music as the Lancers. The five figures of the Quadrille des lanciers were known in France as ‘Les Tiroirs’, ‘Les Lignes’, ‘Les Moulinets’, ‘Les Visites’ and ‘Les Lanciers’, and in Germany (where the whole dance was alternatively known as ‘Quadrille à la Cour’) as ‘La Dorset’, ‘La Victoire’, ‘Les Moulinets’, ‘Les Visites’ and ‘Les Lanciers’ or ‘Finale à la Cour’.
J.S. Richardson: The Social Dances of the Nineteenth Century in England (London, 1960)
S.J. Cohen, ed.: International Encyclopedia of Dance (New York, 1998)
ANDREW LAMB