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War dance   /wɔr dæns/   Listen
War dance

noun
1.
A ceremonial dance performed before a battle or after a victory.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"War dance" Quotes from Famous Books



... residents of the Thousand Islands besides the Copleys had now arrived, and the gaiety of the season was at its height. There was one very large hotel at Alexandria Bay, and it was planned to use its ballroom for a "big war dance," to quote Helen. It was to be a costume dance, and everybody that appeared on the floor must be dressed in ...
— Ruth Fielding on the St. Lawrence - The Queer Old Man of the Thousand Islands • Alice B. Emerson

... sublime ceremony of hair-cutting, they cautiously approach the Yaks, performing a sort of war dance, ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens

... turned over to the Warm Spring captors to guard, along with the other captives. They were all taken down the little branch a few hundred yards and securely bound and tied to a stunted juniper tree. During the night the Warm Springs indulged in a war dance, each lucky warrior flourishing the scalp he had taken. Along past midnight all the captives excepting Johnny were securely bound to the juniper with green rawhide, a mass of sage brush collected and the captives roasted alive. Johnny told me that every moment he expected to be served in the same ...
— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson

... &c 909; war cry, war whoop. chest-beating, chest-thumping; saber rattling. V. defy, dare, beard; brave &c (courage) 861; bid defiance to; set at defiance, set at naught; hurl defiance at; dance the war dance, beat the war drums; snap the fingers at, laugh to scorn; disobey &c 742. show fight, show one's teeth, show a bold front; bluster, look big, stand akimbo, beat one's chest; double the fist, shake the fist; threaten &c 909. challenge, call out; throw down ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... looked quickly in the direction of the house. Just then a figure appeared, stared at the approaching girls and began waving his hat wildly, at the same time doing a sort of war dance. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Junior Year at High School - Or, Fast Friends in the Sororities • Jessie Graham Flower

... was called out on deck at this juncture and the boys, once he was out of the room, joined in a war dance round the swinging ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton

... upon the platform. A block of buildings just opposite the station was on fire, and was evidently doomed; yet Flagstaff's citizens, whose forms, relieved against the lurid glow, looked like Comanche Indians in a war dance, fought the flames with stubborn fury. The sight of a successful conflagration always thrills me, partly with horror, partly with delight. Three hundred feet away, two buildings formed an ever-increasing ...
— John L. Stoddard's Lectures, Vol. 10 (of 10) - Southern California; Grand Canon of the Colorado River; Yellowstone National Park • John L. Stoddard

... Bangs. He found himself on his back one day with a small army of youngsters executing a war dance round him. He got roughly used, poor fellow, and at last changed his tune from threats to whines, and eventually, with the aid of a few parting kicks, was permitted to depart in peace. And he never tried on bullying with us again, except ...
— Parkhurst Boys - And Other Stories of School Life • Talbot Baines Reed

... expressed with felicitous charm—infallible. A judgment that has nothing to do with justice. The critic and the judge seems to think that in those distant lands all joy is a yell and a war dance, all pathos is a howl and a ghastly grin of filed teeth, and that the solution of all problems is found in the barrel of a revolver or on the point of an assegai. And yet it is not so. But the erring magistrate may plead in excuse the misleading ...
— Notes on My Books • Joseph Conrad

... tiny flames leaped up the painted band joined in a wild war dance about the stakes, flourishing their weapons and whooping as if they were real Indians. Some of their postures and steps were exact imitations of the poses and steps taken by savages ...
— Frank Merriwell at Yale • Burt L. Standish

... from the crowd, and the air was filled with the gleam of metal as they waved their tomahawks. Excited men began to beat the war drums, and others began to dance the war dance. But Timmendiquas said no more. He knew when ...
— The Riflemen of the Ohio - A Story of the Early Days along "The Beautiful River" • Joseph A. Altsheler

... was suddenly cut short as the first notes of a rousing march came ringing into the earphones. Every note was true and distinct as before, with practically no interference, and when the last note had died away the boys rose and as though actuated by one impulse, executed an impromptu war dance. ...
— The Radio Boys' First Wireless - Or Winning the Ferberton Prize • Allen Chapman

... pioneers of the new colony. They landed, and liked the look of the place, but they were timid by reason of the tales they had heard of Maori ferocity. Now at this time the Ngapuhis were at war with the Arawas, and the latter were getting up a war dance, which the settlers were just in time to see. Five or six hundred men stood in four long rows, stamping in time to a chant of their leader. It was night, a fire lit up their quivering limbs and their rolling eyes; they joined in a chorus, and when they came to particular ...
— History of Australia and New Zealand - From 1606 to 1890 • Alexander Sutherland

... through materials separate from his body, and so he constructed drums and cymbals and gongs; and by means of these, too, he communicated his needs and stimulated himself to rage and excitement—and his enemy to fear—in war dance and battle rush. And in doing this he was imitating nature, whose noises, exciting and terrifying, he had long known: the clap of thunder, the whistle of the wind, the roar of the waves, the crackling of burning wood, the crash of fallen ...
— The Principles Of Aesthetics • Dewitt H. Parker

... demanded that some entertainment should be provided in front of it, and this enabled Mr. Levinski to introduce to the public Professor Wollabollacolla and Princess Collabollawolla, the famous exponents of the Bongo-Bongo, that fascinating Central African war dance, which was soon to be the rage of society. But though, as a result, the takings of the Box Office surpassed all Mr. Levinski's previous records, our friend Prosper Vane received no practical acknowledgment of his services. He had to be content with the hand and heart of the lady who played ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne

... dancing a war dance in honour of their chief. We shall have an opportunity of witnessing ...
— Hendricks the Hunter - The Border Farm, a Tale of Zululand • W.H.G. Kingston

... of peace. His embassy. His adventure with the worshippers of the volcano. With those of the storm, on the Andes. Falls in with the savage armies. Character and speech of Zamor, their chief. Capture of Rocha and his companions. Sacrifice of the latter. Death song of Azonto. War dance. March of the savage armies down the mountains to Peru. Incan army meets them. Battle joins. Peruvians terrified by an eclipse of the sun, and routed. They fly to Cusco. Grief of Oella, supposing the darkness to be occasioned by the death of Rocha. Sun appears. Peruvians from the ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow

... of the war dance. They forgot to give thanks for the sweet waters of the maple, and for the planting season. Neither did they remember to praise the Great Spirit, in song and dance, for the juicy strawberries, and the waving green corn, as once ...
— Stories the Iroquois Tell Their Children • Mabel Powers

... fire could not be had, exercise must serve its purpose. Hastily pouring some powder into his hand he dampened it and blacked his face. "Victory, men, victory!" he shouted, taking off his hat and beginning to leap and dance. "Come on! We'll have a war dance and then a feast, as soon as the meat arrives that I have sent for. Dance! you ...
— Alice of Old Vincennes • Maurice Thompson

... that she just let out a little gasping "Oh!" and leaned her forehead against his coat. Then she felt his wet arms round her, his wet body pressed to hers, and in a second he was dancing with her a sort of silent, ecstatic war dance. Suddenly he stopped, went down on his knees, pressing his face to her waist, and whispering: "What a brute, what a brute! Making her wet! Poor ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... Japs won a victory John Byrnes would shift his pins, and then he would execute a war dance of delight, and the other firemen would hear him yell: "Go it, you blamed little, sawed-off, huckleberry-eyed, monkey-faced hot tamales! Eat 'em up, you little sleight-o'-hand, bow-legged bull terriers—give ...
— The Trimmed Lamp • O. Henry

... the lower Mohawk valley, took the belt from him, Red Head, a chief of the Onondagas, made reply, telling him that from every castle warriors would follow him to the north. A war dance followed, and a large body of the Six Nations were ...
— The War Chief of the Six Nations - A Chronicle of Joseph Brant - Volume 16 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • Louis Aubrey Wood

... believed himself that he was the only man on earth that could land this contract. When Jared says if he don't get this chance he's gonna quit his job right then and there and the boss can look elsewhere for the estimate figures, I almost fell off the couch, and Alex does a war dance. ...
— Alex the Great • H. C. Witwer

... wandered in pursuit of game to the sources of the Tyne found the heaths round Keeldar Castle peopled by a race scarcely less savage than the Indians of California, and heard with surprise the half naked women chaunting a wild measure, while the men with brandished dirks danced a war dance. [37] ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 1 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... of rice, honey, sugar, flour, and oil; and although very simple as a confectionery, they were very palatable. We remained with the Chief about an hour, and before we went away he requested our company in the evening, promising to treat us with a Dyak war dance. We took our leave for the present, and amused ourselves with strolling about the town. I will take this opportunity of making known some information I have at this and at different times obtained relative ...
— Borneo and the Indian Archipelago - with drawings of costume and scenery • Frank S. Marryat

... of reviving in the group a lively sense of the past. It is a method of reinstating the excitements and the sentiments which inspired an earlier collective action. The savage war dance is a dramatic representation of battle and as such serves to rouse and reawaken the warlike spirit. This is one way in which ceremonial becomes a means of control. By reviving the memories of an earlier war, it mobilizes the warriors for a ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park

... made, the men began a war dance. Some were dressed in masks of horses, and others wore ...
— The Later Cave-Men • Katharine Elizabeth Dopp

... came on the scene of action, fierce red men of the forest, and their language was decidedly Jabberwocky. The little girl was quite frightened at the fierce brandishing of tomahawks. Then they had a war dance. And oh, then came the marvel of all! Four beautiful Shetland ponies with the daintiest carriage and six lads in livery. There sat General Tom Thumb, the curiosity of the time, the smallest dwarf known. He was not much bigger ...
— A Little Girl in Old New York • Amanda Millie Douglas

... at him in amazement not unmixed with alarm. They could see no reason for his strange behavior and were at a complete loss what to make of it. They watched their comrade execute a war dance around the entrance to the cave for some moments and finally disappear within, uttering one last ...
— The Go Ahead Boys and the Treasure Cave • Ross Kay

... chiefs sat in respectful silence and the young braves arose eager for the war dance when Big Smoke ...
— The Perils of Pauline • Charles Goddard

... a face at the indignant shopman by putting his fingers in his mouth to widen it, and pulling down his eyes. Hokar never smiled, but showed no disposition to move. Bart, angered at this blocking up the doorway, and by Tray's war dance, jumped the counter. He aimed a blow at the guttersnipe's head, but missed it and fell full length. The next moment Tray was dancing on his body with his tongue out derisively. Then Hokar gave a weird smile. "Kalee!" he said to ...
— The Opal Serpent • Fergus Hume



Words linked to "War dance" :   ceremonial dance, ritual dancing, ritual dance



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