" Tanzt das Spandauer Ballett" > "Dancing the Spandau ballet"

[high wood]

The one problem that I have with the "soldiers dancing around the bullets striking at their feet" explanation is that in all the accounts that I have read, no one ever mentioned dancing around under machine gun fire. Most accounts refer to being scythed down like corn, rows of men at a time. Certainly individual soldiers may have spun round under the impact of machine gun bullets, but they certainly were not dancing. The only example of anyone dancing as bullets were fired at their feet that I have seen were in Hollywood Westerns.

I firmly believe that the term Spandau Ballet was coined by British and American soldiers participating in the guard changing ceremonies at Spandau Prison. As it is soldiers' slang it is unlikely to be recorded in official publications but I would bet (I am not a betting man), that if you asked the question, "What do you understand by the phrase Spandau Ballet other than the band of the same name?" on the Army Rumour Service website, you would hear references to Spandau Prison.

Edited 13 July by high wood
Spelling

[MaureenE]

The impression I get is that in the Great War period you would have to be moneyed and cultured to have ever seen a ballet, or probably even to have heard of ballet. Certainly not something that the average soldier would be aware of. It seems most unlikely to me that this is  a Great War period expression.

Maureen

[green_acorn]

On 12/07/2024 at 15:14, GreyC said:

Hi,

no it doesn´t with reference to my question which was directed at „high wood“ and his suggestion that the term may stem from the way the changing of the guard at Spandau was performed by the British / Russian personnel. Not a suggestion to be found in the linked texts you provided.

Sorry I tried to help.

GreyC

GreyC (and high wood),

I apologise Grey C, as I answered in response to an auto message advising me you had made a post to my question.  It was not apparent to me in your post #8  that your question was to high wood, as in your post you hadn't addressed him, or quoted him.  I therefore, and unfortunately thought you directed it to me.

I would also note from Mr Alphin's CV, that he was a published author, historian and had been an academic at a Rice university, West Point and the US Comd and GS College, Ft Leavenworth, Kansas. So Alphin is not someone who I would generally accuse of ignoring the historiographic process by making things up, or plucking things from thin air as other may. 

But I do appreciate your opinion and that you have tried to help me.  Even though I thought I phrased my question in post one to a specific target audience, some responses have been a bit of tangent for my need and my question, that is what frustrated me.

Noting that Arthur B. Alphin at his webpage discussing the "beaten zone" specifically attributes the phrase to WW1 German machine gunners, I would liike to take you back to my question in post one:  "Have any of our German members, or language speakers, come across the term in German literature?

Regards,

Chris Henderson

 

[AOK4]

18 minutes ago, green_acorn said:

 "Have any of our German members, or language speakers, come across the term in German literature?

 

I have replied already, but you don't seem to want to accept what I and several other users have replied...

[FROGSMILE]

53 minutes ago, green_acorn said:

 "Have any of our German members, or language speakers, come across the term in German literature?

Greg when you’ve dug yourself into a deep hole it’s probably a good idea to stop digging.  GreyC is a German forum member and one of the several from, or associated with that nation, that I specifically sought comment from on your behalf!

As for the subject at hand, I think that there’s a general consensus, based on a number of well explained factors by several contributors, that this ‘Spandau ballet’ construct is unlikely to be either, German, or even related to WW1.

With regards to Colonel Appin, he might well be an expert on small arms matters, but it doesn’t make him infallible when it comes to understanding foreign (to him) cultural matters, nor the nuances of their native languages.

Edited 14 July by FROGSMILE

[GreyC]

2 hours ago, green_acorn said:

I apologise Grey C

Accepted

For me high woods suggestions as to the origin of the phrase in connection to the music group make the most sense, given the place and the date the inscription in Berlin was found and the band founded. I haven´t heard of it in any other way or read of it, not even in the famous book Im Westen nichts Neues - All Quiet on the Western Front - by Erich Maria Remarque who would have found a way to include it surely, had he heard of it himself.

GreyC

Edited 14 July by GreyC