pavane

A musical style characteristic of the 16th and 17th centuries.

[…] if the men should not agree what to play, but one would have a grave Pavane, another a nimbler Galliard, a third some frisking toy or Iigg, and then all of them should be wilful, none yield to his fellow, but every one scrape on his own tune as loud as he could: what a hideous hateful noise may you imagine would such a mess of Musick be?

And he tasted in the language of memory ambered wines, dying fallings of sweet airs, the proud pavan […]

A moderately slow, courtly processional dance in duple time/meter.

Why then be merry; be merry, or I’le be Out of humour, and then who shall dance the Pavan With Ossorio?

The pavane† was quite popular at the time when Tabouret wrote his treatise, and he ventured the opinion that it would never cease to be so. It is not many years since an attempt was made in Paris to revive the dance, but it must be confessed that the modern adaption did not seem to bear any particularly striking resemblance to the original movement.

To dance the pavane.