My Dance Card Is Full: How Victorian-Era Etiquette Spawned a Phrase
duncan1890/iStock via Getty Images During the Victorian era, well-to-do families delighted in hosting extravagant balls, which were attended by other well-to-do families in the area. While these occasions were highly anticipated opportunities for young ladies to mingle with all the eligible bachelors, letting loose on the dance floor was not loose in any way. For one, the dances themselves were extremely specific—waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other numbers whose steps and formations had been practiced before. And thanks to dance cards, the process of choosing whom to dance with was rathe...
Source: mentalfloss.com