Isn't "country" dancing as practiced (and occasionally perfected) today actually a corruption of "contra" dancing and an adaptation by ordinary folks of the more courtly manouevres indulged in by the gentry (aharr yer honner - quick tug o' the forelock)? If this is the case - as I've always been given to understand, then it is the slower, more elegant dances which would be performed by gentlemen wearing swords, which is a whole lot more feasible than trying it with a strip-the -willow.

The livelier versions of the "contra' dances which were done by commoners could have developed their more exaggerated movements simply because they DIDN'T have to worry about three foot long steel bars sticking out behind the men. And the livelier dances are the ones normally performed today by "country" dancers.... certain of whom jump about over swords, if not actually with them.