Exhibit:

Balls and Dancing in Jane Austen's World

Preview of images

Assemblies, balls, and dancing are central to the plots and themes of many of Jane Austen’s novels.  Similarly, these events were central to sociability during the Georgian and Regency Eras, as they provided a socially acceptable setting for men and women to meet and begin forming relationships.  Knowledge of these aspects of society help readers to better understand Austen’s writing.  This exhibit displays various aspects of balls and dancing during the Regency Era, including assembly rooms, music, dancing styles, dress code, and overall ballroom culture and etiquette to provide historical context for the works of Jane Austen. 

Images in this Exhibit

Assemblies and Assembly Rooms

This image is Thomas Rowlandson’s “A Dancing Master’s Ball (Assembly Room at Bath).”  This image is dated June 26, 1790, and is one of Rowlandson’s many illustrations showcasing the Bath Upper Assembly Rooms.  The Bath Assembly Rooms were designed by John Wood the Younger in 1771 and were restored in 1963.

As chronicled in the second edition of the Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, Austen and her family spent a significant amount of time visiting and residing in Bath.  Austen herself lived in Bath from 1801-1805 and visited the Upper Rooms in 1801.  She took enough of a liking to...
Dancing Styles

This image from Thomas Wilson’s Analysis of Country Dancing instruction manual shows the five positions of dancing that were utilized in Regency Era Assembly Rooms.  These positions were used in a variety of different dances that were popular at the time including minuets, country dance, cotillions, and Waltzes.  These dances occurred at both the public assemblies and private balls. 

Allison Thompson discusses specific dances that were done at the Bath Assembly Rooms in her paper, “The Rules of Assembly: Dancing at Bath and Other Spas in the Eighteenth Century.”  She...
Ball Dress and Appropriate Attire

Dress codes at public balls were outlined in the “Rules of Assembly” which would have been posted on the wall at the assembly rooms.  These guidelines provided rules for the kind of behavior that was to be expected at gatherings.  Most notably, the Rules of Assembly almost always included points about appropriate attire.  Some of these points listed in Allison Thompson’s “The Rules of Assembly: Dancing at Bath and Other Spas in the Eighteenth Century” include the exclusion of boots and half boots and the requirement of a lady to wear court dress if she wished to dance minuets.  

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Music and Professional Musicians

This image is Isaac Robert Cruikshank and George Cruikshank’s “Tom, Jerry, and Logic Making the Most of an Evening at Vauxhall.”  This piece depicts a formal event at the Vauxhall Gardens in London and showcases the orchestra in the center of the illustration. Separate spaces for live musicians, such as the one shown in the image, were common during the Regency Era and were also present in the ballrooms at the public assembly rooms like the Bath Assembly Rooms and Almack’s.  Music for each dance was chosen by the lady leading the set. 

While professional musicians were common at...
General Etiquette and Ballroom Culture

Along with providing the dress code for assemblies, the Rules of Assembly also outlined the rules for overall behavior at assembly rooms.  Public balls were highly formal.  The attached image is Thomas Rowlandson’s 1813 piece simply titled “The Ball Room.”  This image shows a group of assembly guests at an assembly room in Scarborough dancing a longways dance, which was surrounded by etiquette and formality.  In sets like these, the most important lady (in sense of rank or bridal status) at the assembly would lead the first dance by dancing at the top of the set.  At some other balls,...