The Origins of Cotillion
Ana Shore and Mel Videto
This Saturday, November 29th, is the annual Cotillion. The theme of this year’s dance is “A Winter’s Evening in Paris”. The Cotillion is an event thrown for Cortland and Homer High School’s junior and senior girls, who are all permitted to bring a date with them. The tradition of cotillions has been around for a long time, it originated in France in the 1700s. Originally, it consisted of four couples dancing in the formation of a square. This is similar to square dancing in the U.S. where the directions are called out loud by a caller. The name cotillon, which is French for "petticoat", reflected the use of the women’s petticoats by the men in the dance. Cotillions were often used to present a young woman, or some other prominent figure, to society for the first time. By the 1800s, the cotillion had evolved to include many complex dance figures with more couples. The tradition of the cotillion was introduced to Britain around 1763 and from Britain it came to America around 1772. However, the tradition really caught in the western hemisphere with its reintroduction into American culture through a costume ball hosted in New York in 1854. The costume ball was a German Cotillion with the theme of Louis XV and was hosted by Mr. William Colford Schermerhorn. This was where the roots of the cotillion were planted in the U.S. and the dance started to become more widely practiced. In Britain, the tradition of cotillion widely disappeared, except for French or historical contexts. Although the Cotillion that our community practices today has strayed from many aspects of its French roots, it’s still a fun filled night.
“Cotillion.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. 22nd October
2014. Web. 28th November 2014 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cotillion>.
