() is a group of various southern Italian folk dances originating in the regions of

Calabria , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

Campania Campania (, also , , , ) is an administrative Regions of Italy, region of Italy; most of it is in the south-western portion of the Italian peninsula (with the Tyrrhenian Sea to its west), but it also includes the small Phlegraean Islands and the i ...

and

Puglia it, Pugliese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographic ...

. It is characterized by a fast upbeat tempo, usually in time (sometimes or ), accompanied by

tambourine The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though ...

s. It is among the most recognized forms of traditional southern Italian music. The specific dance-name varies with every region, for instance ''Sonu a ballu'' in

, ''

tammurriata () is a group of various southern Italian folk dances originating in the regions of Calabria, Campania and Puglia. It is characterized by a fast upbeat tempo, usually in time (sometimes or ), accompanied by tambourines. It is among the mo ...

'' in

, and ''

pizzica Pizzica () is a popular Italian folk dance, originally from the Salento peninsula in Apulia and later spreading throughout the rest of Apulia and the regions of Calabria and eastern Basilicata. It is part of the larger family of tarantella. Dan ...

'' in

Salento Salento ( Salentino: ''Salentu'', Salentino Griko: ''Σαλέντο'') is a cultural, historical and geographic region at the southern end of the administrative region of Apulia in Southern Italy. It is a sub-peninsula of the Italian Peninsula ...

. Tarantella is popular in

Southern Italy Southern Italy ( it, Sud Italia or ) also known as ''Meridione'' or ''Mezzogiorno'' (), is a macroregion of the Italian Republic consisting of its southern half. The term ''Mezzogiorno'' today refers to regions that are associated with the peop ...

and

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. The term may appear as in a linguistically masculine construction.

History

Apollon Mokritsky Rim Italyanki na Terrase 1846

In the Italian

province of Taranto The province of Taranto ( it, provincia di Taranto; Tarantino: ; Salentino: ), previously known as the province of the Ionian, is a province in the Apulia region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Taranto. It has an area of , and a total popul ...

Apulia it, Pugliese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographic ...

, the bite of a locally common type of

wolf spider Wolf spiders are members of the family Lycosidae (). They are robust and agile hunters with excellent eyesight. They live mostly in solitude, hunt alone, and do not spin webs. Some are opportunistic hunters, pouncing upon prey as they find it or ...

, named "tarantula" after the region, was popularly believed to be highly venomous and to lead to a hysterical condition known as

tarantism Tarantism is a form of hysteric behaviour originating in Southern Italy, popularly believed to result from the bite of the wolf spider ''Lycosa tarantula'' (distinct from the broad class of spiders also called tarantulas). A better candidate ca ...

. This became known as the "tarantella". R. Lowe Thompson proposed that the dance is a survival from a "

Dianic Dianic Wicca, also known as Dianic Witchcraft, and, to some also as "Dianism," "Dianic Feminist Witchcraft," or simply "Feminist Witchcraft"' is a modern pagan, goddess tradition, focused on female experience and empowerment. Leadership is by wo ...

or Dionysiac cult", driven underground. John Compton later proposed that the

Roman Senate The Roman Senate ( la, Senātus Rōmānus) was a governing and advisory assembly in ancient Rome. It was one of the most enduring institutions in Roman history, being established in the first days of the city of Rome (traditionally founded in ...

had suppressed these ancient

Bacchanalian The Bacchanalia were unofficial, privately funded popular Roman festivals of Bacchus, based on various ecstatic elements of the Greek Dionysia. They were almost certainly associated with Rome's native cult of Liber, and probably arrived in Rome ...

rite Rite may refer to: * Ritual, an established ceremonious act * Rite of passage, a ceremonious act associated with social transition Religion * Rite (Christianity), a sacred ritual or liturgical tradition in various Christian denominations * Catho ...

s. In 186 BC the tarantella went underground, reappearing under the guise of emergency therapy for bite victims.

Courtship versus tarantism dances

The stately courtship tarantella danced by a couple or couples, short in duration, is graceful and elegant and features characteristic music. On the other hand, the supposedly curative or symptomatic tarantella was danced solo by a victim of a ''

Lycosa tarantula ''Lycosa tarantula'' is the species originally known as the tarantula, a name that nowadays in English commonly refers to spiders in another family entirely, the Theraphosidae. It now may be better called the tarantula wolf spider, being in the ...

'' spider bite (not to be confused with what is commonly known as a

tarantula Tarantulas comprise a group of large and often hairy spiders of the family Theraphosidae. , 1,040 species have been identified, with 156 genera. The term "tarantula" is usually used to describe members of the family Theraphosidae, although ...

today); it was agitated in character, lasted for hours or even up to days, and featured characteristic music. However, other forms of the dance were and still are dances of couples usually either mimicking courtship or a sword fight. The confusion appears to derive from the fact that the spiders, the condition, its sufferers (''tarantolati''), and the dances all have names similar to the city of Taranto.Toschi, Paolo (1950). Proceedings of the Congress Held in Venice September 7th to 11th, 1949: "A Question about the Tarantella", ''Journal of the International Folk Music Council'', Vol. 2. (1950), p. 19. Translated by N. F. The dance originated in the

region, and spread throughout the

Kingdom of the Two Sicilies The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies ( it, Regno delle Due Sicilie) was a kingdom in Southern Italy from 1816 to 1860. The kingdom was the largest sovereign state by population and size in Italy before Italian unification, comprising Sicily and a ...

. The Neapolitan tarantella is a

courtship dance A courtship display is a set of display behaviors in which an animal, usually a male, attempts to attract a mate; the mate exercises choice, so sexual selection acts on the display. These behaviors often include ritualized movement ("dances"), ...

performed by couples whose "rhythms, melodies, gestures, and accompanying songs are quite distinct" featuring faster more cheerful music. Its origins may further lie in "a fifteenth-century fusion between the Spanish

Fandango Fandango is a lively partner dance originating from Portugal and Spain, usually in triple meter, traditionally accompanied by guitars, castanets, or hand-clapping. Fandango can both be sung and danced. Sung fandango is usually bipartite: it has ...

and the

Moresque Moresque is an obsolete alternative term to "Moorish" in English, and in the arts has some specific meanings. By itself, the word is used to describe the stylized plant-based forms of tendrils and leaves found in ornament and decoration in the ...

''ballo di sfessartia''." The "magico-religious" tarantella is a solo dance performed supposedly to cure through perspiration the delirium and contortions attributed to the bite of a spider at harvest (summer) time. The dance was later applied as a supposed cure for the behavior of neurotic women (''Carnevaletto delle donne'').Ettlinger, Ellen (1965). Review of "La Tarantella Napoletana" by Renato Penna (''Rivista di Etnografia''), ''Man'', Vol. 65. (Sep. – Oct. 1965), p. 176. There are several traditional tarantella groups: ''Cantori di Carpino'', ''Officina Zoé'', ''Uccio Aloisi gruppu'', ''Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino'', ''Selva Cupina'', ''I Tamburellisti di Torrepaduli''. The tarantella is most frequently played with a

mandolin A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...

, a guitar, an

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...

and

tambourines The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though ...

flute The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedless ...

fiddle A fiddle is a bowed string musical instrument, most often a violin. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including classical music. Although in many cases violins and fiddles are essentially synonymous, th ...

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

and

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches ...

are also used. The tarantella is a dance in which the dancer and the drum player constantly try to upstage each other by playing faster or dancing longer than the other, subsequently tiring one person out first.

Tarantism

Tarantism, as a ritual, is supposed to have roots in the ancient myths. Reportedly, victims who had collapsed or were convulsing would begin to dance with appropriate music and be revived as if a tarantula had bitten them. The music used to treat

dancing mania Dancing mania (also known as dancing plague, choreomania, St. John's Dance, tarantism and St. Vitus' Dance) was a social phenomenon that occurred primarily in mainland Europe between the 14th and 17th centuries. It involved groups of people da ...

appears to be similar to that used in the case of tarantism though little is known about either. Justus Hecker (1795–1850), describes in his work ''Epidemics of the Middle Ages'':

A convulsion infuriated the human frame .. Entire communities of people would join hands, dance, leap, scream, and shake for hours .. Music appeared to be the only means of combating the strange epidemic ..lively, shrill tunes, played on trumpets and fifes, excited the dancers; soft, calm harmonies, graduated from fast to slow, high to low, prove efficacious for the cure.

The music used against spider bites featured drums and clarinets, was matched to the pace of the victim, and is only weakly connected to its later depiction in the tarantellas of Chopin,

Liszt Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...

Rossini Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards f ...

, and Heller.Sear, H. G. (1939). "Music and Medicine", p.45, ''Music & Letters'', Vol. 20, No. 1. (Jan., 1939), pp. 43–54. Note that Sear may mistake the Neapolitan and Apulian tarantellas and that those by Romantic composers to which he refers may have been intended as Neapolitan. While most serious proponents speculated as to the direct physical benefits of the dancing rather than the power of the music, a mid-18th century medical textbook gets the prevailing story backwards, describing that tarantulas will be compelled to dance by violin music. It was thought that the ''Lycosa tarantula''

had lent the name "tarantula" to an unrelated family of spiders, having been the species associated with

Taranto Taranto (, also ; ; nap, label= Tarantino, Tarde; Latin: Tarentum; Old Italian: ''Tarento''; Ancient Greek: Τάρᾱς) is a coastal city in Apulia, Southern Italy. It is the capital of the Province of Taranto, serving as an important com ...

, but since ''L. tarantula'' is not inherently deadly, the highly venomous Mediterranean black widow, ''

Latrodectus tredecimguttatus ''Latrodectus tredecimguttatus'', also known as the Mediterranean black widow, or the European black widow, is a species in the genus ''Latrodectus'' of the widow spiders. It is commonly found throughout the Mediterranean region, ranging from ...

'', may have been the species originally associated with Taranto's manual grain harvest.

''Tarantella'' ballet

The Balanchine ballet ''Tarantella'' is set to the '' Grande Tarantelle for Piano and Orchestra'', Op. 67 () by

Louis Moreau Gottschalk Louis Moreau Gottschalk (May 8, 1829 – December 18, 1869) was an American composer and pianist, best known as a virtuoso performer of his own romantic piano works. He spent most of his working career outside the United States. Life and car ...

, reconstructed and orchestrated by

Hershy Kay Hershy Kay (November 17, 1919 – December 2, 1981) was an American composer, arranger, and orchestrator. He is most noteworthy for the orchestrations of several Broadway shows, and for the ballets he arranged for George Balanchine's New York City ...

. The profusion of steps and the quick changes of direction that this brief but explosive

pas de deux In ballet, a pas de deux (French language, French, literally "step of two") is a dance duet in which two dancers, typically a male and a female, perform ballet steps together. The pas de deux is characteristic of classical ballet and can be fo ...

requires typify the ways in which Balanchine expanded the traditional vocabulary of classical dance.

References

Relevant literature

*Inserra, Incoronata. 2017. ''Global Tarantella: Reinventing Southern Italian Folk Music and Dances''. Urbana-Champaign: University of Illinois Press. 226 pages.

External links

Legend of the TarantellaWord of the Day: Tarantula and Tarantella
etymology and folklore
RHYTHM IS THE CUREThe tarantella dance!YouTube_Video:_Draga_Matkovic
,_oldest_practicing_classical_pianist_of_the_world,_plays_her_own_Tarantella_composition_from_1927_on_her_102nd_birthday,_November_4,_2009..html" ;"title="Draga Matkovic">YouTube Video: Draga Matkovic
, oldest practicing classical pianist of the world, plays her own Tarantella composition from 1927 on her 102nd birthday, November 4, 2009.">Draga Matkovic">YouTube Video: Draga Matkovic
, oldest practicing classical pianist of the world, plays her own Tarantella composition from 1927 on her 102nd birthday, November 4, 2009.br>Tarantella's history
{{Authority control Dance forms in classical music Sacred dance Italian folk dances Taranto 17th-century music genres