Polka
| Polka | |
|---|---|
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | Early to mid-19th century, Czech Republic |
| Typical instruments | |
| Derivative forms | |
| Subgenres | |
The polka is originally a Czech dance and genre of dance music familiar throughout Europe and the Americas. It originated in the middle of the 19th century in Bohemia, now part of the Czech Republic. Polka remains a popular folk music genre in many European countries, and is performed by folk artists in the Czech Republic, Germany, Austria, Poland, Croatia, Slovenia, Switzerland, and to a lesser extent in Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Hungary, Italy, Ukraine, Romania, Belarus, Russia, and Slovakia. Local varieties of this dance are also found in the Nordic countries, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Latin America and the United States.
The name polka possibly comes from the Czech word "půlka" ("half"), referring to the short half-steps featured in the dance. Czech cultural historian and ethnographer Čeněk Zíbrt, who wrote in detail about the origin of the dance, in his book, Jak se kdy v Čechách tancovalo cites an opinion of František Doucha (1840, Květy, p. 400) that "polka" was supposed to mean "dance in half" ("tanec na polo") i.e. the absence of diacritics, both referring to the half-tempo 2
4 and the half-jump step of the dance. Zíbrt also ironically dismisses the etymology suggested by A. Fähnrich (in Ein etymologisches Taschenbuch, Jiein, 1846) that "polka" comes from the Czech word "pole" ("field"). On the other hand, Zdeněk Nejedlý suggests that the etymology given by Fr. Doucha is nothing but an effort to prove the "true Czech folk" origin of Polka. Instead, he claims that according to Jaroslav Langr ("České krakováčky" in: Čas. Čes. musea, 1835, Sebr. spisy I, 256) in the area of Hradec Králové, the tune Krakoviáky from the collection Slovanské národní písně of František Ladislav Čelakovský became very popular so that it was used to dance (Czech dances) třasák, břitva,, and kvapík, and this way was called "Polka". Nejedlý also writes that Václav Vladivoj Tomek also claims the Hradec Králové roots of a Polka. OED also suggests that the name may have been derived from the Czech polka meaning "Polish woman" (feminine form corresponding to polák, a Pole).
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