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Enjoy this curated selection of theme-related dances for celebrations and holidays, or find a dance associated with a special calendar day, or EVEN your own birthday!
Jul 20
Chess Day
The White Knight
Other Scottish Country Dances for this Day
Today's Musings, History & Folklore
"A chess game is divided into three stages: the first, when you hope you have the advantage, the second when you believe you have an advantage, and the third... when you know you're going to lose!"
~ Savielly Tartakower
This delightful 32-bar reel for three couples in a four-couple set, devised by Iain Boyd (with companion dances The March Hare and The Mad Hatter), is part of a curiouser-and-curiouser trio inspired by the whimsical world of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. It is just the thing for chess players, lovers of chivalric tales, and Alice in Wonderland fans alike! With corner turns, setting to corners, and reels of three, you can imagine translating the knight's signature chess path from the chessboard to the dance floor!
The term White Knight, or knight-errant, comes from medieval chivalric romances, where wandering knights performed brave deeds in the name of a lady, invoking her name before setting off on heroic exploits. Chess itself—this ancient "game of kings," with origins over 1,500 years ago—has inspired storytellers for centuries and remains a favourite symbol in literature, fantasy, and science fiction.
One of its most famous literary appearances is in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, where the entire story unfolds upon a giant chessboard. Alice begins as a humble pawn, advancing one square each time she crosses a brook, while many of the other characters are represented by chess pieces. Along the way she meets the lovable but hopelessly absent-minded White Knight, who rescues her from the Red Knight despite repeatedly tumbling from his horse and proudly describing his wonderfully impractical inventions—including a pudding made with blotting paper, an upside-down container, and anklets to protect his horse from shark bites!
Watch those ankles, Dancers! 🕺 💃 🤍 🖤 🤍 ♟️ ♟️ ♟️ 🐴 🐴 🐴 👑 👑 👑
The White Knight
Chess is one of the most ancient of games, invented in India in the fifth century. July 20th celebrates the day the International Chess Federation (FIDE) was founded in 1924.
The term "white knight", or its synonym "knight-errant" is a figure of medieval chivalric romance literature. The adjective errant (meaning "wandering, roving") indicates how the knight-errant would wander the land in search of adventures to prove his chivalric virtues, either in knightly duels (pas d'armes) or in some other pursuit of courtly love.
The template of the knight-errant are the heroes of the Round Table of the Arthurian cycle such as Gawain, Lancelot and Percival.
A knight-errant typically performed all his deeds in the name of a lady, and invoked her name before performing an exploit.
The White Knight is also a character in Through the Looking Glass, the Lewis Carroll sequel to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
Whereas the first book has the deck of cards as a theme, this book is based on a game of chess, played on a giant chessboard with fields for squares. Most main characters in the story are represented by a chess piece or animals, with Alice herself being a pawn.
The looking-glass world is divided into sections by brooks or streams, with the crossing of each brook usually signifying a notable change in the scene and action of the story: the brooks represent the divisions between squares on the chessboard, and Alice's crossing of them signifies advancing of her piece one square.
Furthermore, since the brook-crossings do not always correspond to the beginning and ends of chapters, most editions of the book visually represent the crossings by breaking the text with several lines of asterisks ( * * * ). The sequence of moves (white and red) is not always followed.
The White Knight saves Alice from his opponent, the Red Knight. He repeatedly falls off his horse and lands on his head, and tells Alice of his inventions, which consists of things such as a pudding with ingredients like blotting paper, an upside down container, and anklets to guard his horse against shark bites.
For more on the chess motif and moves followed on the virtual chessboard represented in Through the Looking Glass, click on the picture of The White Knight, by John Tenniel in 1871.
Click the dance cribs or description below to link to a printable version of the dance!
