Note 841 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY (continued 3)
Reading edition
When M. Gaston Paris, Les Origines de la Poésie Lyrique en France au Moyen Age, p. 42, says he has found no dance among the old Romans except the professional dance, he overlooks the fact that this rustic dance in procession about the fields is proof of similar dances for pleasure. It is no professional affair which Vergil has in mind: det motus incompositos et carmina dicat. Surely the dances were not danced by slaves.