Figure Eight
Bars: 8 for a full, 4 for a half.
In the example the 1s cross down between the 2s, loop around them and come back up, then cross down between the 2s again, and loop around them again, returning to original places.
There is also a half figure of eight, where the active couple crosses between the inactive couple, loops around them and finishes in their partner's place.
Variants
Henry Playford also published dances where the men figure eight through the women (and vice versa): in Juice of Barley, 1689, he describes the movements of a figure of eight across (but does not name it), while in Easter Eve, 1701 he does use the name.
Nathaniel Kynaston published several dances with figure of eights on the side lines (as opposed to through another couple), see Love and a Bottle, 1710 where M1 figures through the men, and W1 through the women. The Canary's, a dance published by John Young in 1726 also has each sex doing a figure eight on its own side.
Kynaston also published dances where the first corners figure eight though the second corners (or vice versa). See Jockey's Jigg, 1711. Cook's Humour, published by Young in 1718 (so perhaps devised by Kynaston also) has the corners doing half figures of eight.
History
Playford uses a figure of eight in his dance What You Please, from 1651:
1. man go in the Figure of 8 about the 2. man and 1. wo. go int the Figure of 8 about the 2. wo.
As far as I can tell, there are no dances native to the US which use the figure of eight — except for the dance Figure of Eight but even this dance does not use the term, it has to spell out the movements of the figure because no one was expected to know it.
As with many other figures, this started reappearing in the 1970s when Contra reimported many English figures which it had lost over the years.
Some dances which (probably) use this figure
- Dances for which I have animations
- Dances in (R)SCDS Books
Note: This list may be incorrect or incomplete.
See Also
This website is copyright © 2021-2026 by George W. Williams V
My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.