Palotás, the dance of Hungarian nobility

There are several types of folklore dances in Hungary which you can admire in folklore night programs when staying in Budapest or in some celebration days in the countryside, for example at Easter in Hollóháza where the Hungarian customs still alive.

The most of these dances are danced by people wearing colourful traditional costumes which were fashionable in the countryside in the 19^th century. However, there is a dance that you can see very rarely in folklore nights and never in villages. It is called “Palotás”.

The Palotás dance was already known in the 15^th century, and it was pretty different from the other fashionable dances in Europe like La Sarabande, Pavane, Allemande and later Menuet. We know very little about the history of Palotás from this era, but it was danced to a faster music and “softer” rythms than the others. And it was danced only by the nobility and in the Hungarian royal court. As sometimes Church men participated in this dance, they could use handkerchief despite touching the ladies’ hands that was forbidden.

In the 17^th century the Palotás was danced only in Transylvania and soon it was forgotten because of the new dances came from Western Europe to Hungary. Mostly the French, Austrian, and German music and dances influenced the Hungarian culture in this period since Hungary became the part of the Holy Roman Empire in 1686.

The Palotás had its heyday again from the end of the 18^th century. At the beginning of the 19^th century the national identity became stronger and the folklore became important again. We can see this tendency in the politics, in the fashion of dresses, in the arts, and in dances as well. This is the period of the famous Hungarian folklore dance called “Csárdás”. However, the Csárdás was the dance of peasants (the name “csárdás” drifts from the word “csárda” that means Hungarian inn and resthouse), while Palotás was the dance of nobility, upper middle class and bourgeois. Its name literary means palace, but in ancient Hungarian language palace had a quite different meaning than nowadays. The palota (palace) was the ornamental saloon or ball saloon in a castle or mansion.

The Palotás remained a group dance as it was at the beginning, and it still showed its hilarious and gallant mood. In the 19^th it became soon the traditional opening dance in the balls. Its choreography was made by the dance master Samu Tóth in 1860. After the Austro-Hungarian Compromise in 1867, dancing Palotás as opening dance became a tradition until the end of ’40 years.

Nowadays you can see Palotás dance mostly on proms of high schools. It is still danced in fashionable Hungarian style costumes from the 19^th century.