Dance Lessons, Mirrors and Minuets: Martin Engelbrecht's Engraving Das Tantzen / La Danse

Abstract

Martin Engelbrecht’s hand-coloured engraving Das Tantzen / La Danse c. 1730 depicts a dance lesson where the dancing master is teaching five students. The engraving is detailed and accurate in what it portrays: the clothes of the six gentlemen, the room itself with an expensive and luxurious mirror and large glass windows, the dance being taught and the posture of the dancing master and his students. The wealth of detail reveals a great deal about the social mores of the period, and the cultural expectations that surrounded dance teaching. This article, therefore, begins with an overview of the state of print publishing in Augsburg and the place Martin Engelbrecht had in it, who might have been the potential buyers for such a print, and their reasons for purchasing it, before examining the image itself, and the elements that make up the image and their significance: the glass windows and mirrors, the French and German texts in praise of dancing, the clothes worn by the dance master and his students, and finally the dance information depicted in the engraving.