antedating of "cancan"

[George Thompson]

This is a nice little scrap.  The OED has 1848 as the first appearance of "cancan"  in English.  This is from 1842, and from an American source at that.

The following is not quite the whole of the original, but is a good deal more than is absolutely necessary for philological purposes.  However, the story is intereting for a number of other reasons, so here it all is.


1842:   MORALS OF THE WALL STREET PRESS. -- We find the following exquisite bit of morality in the "New York American" of last evening, conducted by Charles King. . . : --
        THE GAIETIES AND MORALS OF THE COURT OF FRANCE are thus described by a Paris correspondent.
        The occasion was a fancy dress ball, given by the Duke of Orleans, at the Pavillon Mersan, that portion of the palace of the Tuilleries occupied by the Heir apparent.  We pass over the first part, which, while the King and Queen were present, was orderly. . . .  The tables were abandoned to resume the dance: and now the Paris letter speaks: --
        "The dance was recommenced and with fury.  The Princess, Messrs Joinville and d'Aumale, with Mesdames Liardiere, and Hochet, danced the cancan, a sort of cachuca, danced outside the gates of Paris, not without grace, but very free in its attitudes.  At first, this caused some scandal, or some appearance of it; little by little, however, people became bolder, and the quadrille was enlarged.  The spectators pressed round, and finally, to accomodate those behind, the men in front of the circle sat down on the floor.  The freedom of the dance becoming licentious, the whirling trails of the ladies brushing the faces of the gentlemen, all but extended on the floor, and their indiscrete hands seized, in some instances, that upon which Henry VIII of England founded an order of knighthood.  Some ladies considered this quite funny; others, in indignation, quitted the experiment.  Among the dancers were the Queen of Spain, Mrs. T., wearing the diamonds that belonged to the church of T!
oledo, and Madame Casaiora: There were, moreover, two young Spanish girls, who spoke of a dance sometimes practiced in their country, and which terminates by the gentlemen raising his partner on his hands.  This seemed difficult, but it was tried -- at first with little success -- afterwards with better; but the attempt led to indescribable confusion: the feet slipped from the hands -- the hands from the feet, &c. &c.
                *               *               *               *
        ["]But, it is asked, where were the husbands all this time? -- eating and drinking, or talking with the Duke of Orleans.  Be it so, but they were certainly very imprudent husbands.  ***["]
        The "New York American" and the King clique were among the first in Wall street, that raised the hue and cry about the "immorality of the New York Herald," because we published innocent and graceful descriptions of balls and soirees, &c.  We now confidently appeal to the public -- to the whole American public -- if there ever appeared any article in the Herald, from the first day of its existence up to this time, that could approach, in the remotest degree, the freedom, the immorality, the indecency, the licentiousness of this astounding and extraordinary article.  No one in New York -- no one can -- ever dare to impeach our private morals -- the blamelessness of our private life -- the honesty and integrity of all our private relations -- but in order to deceive the public, and to gratify malignity of rivals, the outcry was raised against the morality of the herald, by such miserable beings as King & Co.  ***
        NY Herald, March 19, 1842, p. 2, col. 1

The library here has as much of the American as is available on microfilm, having both the Library of Congress and the NYPL files, but 1842 is not included in either, or I would have cited this from it.

The editor of the Herald was James Gordon Bennett.  Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much.  I don't know much about his private life, but the vulgarity of his newspaper was astonishing.  However, I will no doubt keep plowing through it, and may well find the first American actual cancan dancing, if I do.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998.