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belly dance

noun, verb — 2 senses

belly dance

noun

Etymology Calque of French danse du ventre, equivalent to belly + dance. First attested in English in 1889, in an article about that year's Exposition Universelle in Paris in the November 22 edition of the Yorkshire Factory Times: "A café in the Rue du Caire attracted 2,000 spectators daily to see the ‘belly dance’, and realised a total of 400,000 francs." Early sources also used the French term danse du ventre as-is.

1

A form of dance originating in the Middle East and characterized by movements of the torso.

Synonyms
oriental dance

belly dance

verb

Etymology Calque of French danse du ventre, equivalent to belly + dance. First attested in English in 1889, in an article about that year's Exposition Universelle in Paris in the November 22 edition of the Yorkshire Factory Times: "A café in the Rue du Caire attracted 2,000 spectators daily to see the ‘belly dance’, and realised a total of 400,000 francs." Early sources also used the French term danse du ventre as-is.

1

To perform a belly dance.

Derived terms
belly dancer, belly dancing

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.