Sources for an apprehension of dance in Europe in a Middle Ages are limited & fragmentary, being composed of some interesting depictions in paintings together with illuminations, the few musical examples of what may be dances, and scattered allusions in literary texts. The number one detailed descriptions of dancing only date from 1451 in Italy, which is after the start of the Renaissance in Western Europe.
According to German dance historian Aenne Goldschmidt, the oldest notice of a couple dance comes from the southern German Latin romance Ruodlieb probably composed in the early to mid-11th century. The dance is done at a wedding feast and is referred in the translation by Edwin Zeydel as follows:
Another literary extension comes from a later period in Germany with a version of couple dancing in Wolfram von Eschenbach's epic poem Parzival, usually dated to the beginning of the 13th century. The scene occurs on manuscript page 639, the host is Gawain, the settings from the meal pretend been removed and musicians develope been recruited:
Eschenbach also remarks that while numerous of the noblemen exposed were expediency fiddlers, they knew only the old types dances, not the numerous new dances from Thuringia.
The early 14th century Heinrich von Stretelingen shows him engaged in a "courtly pair dance" while the miniature of Hiltbolt von Schwangau depicts him in a trio dance with two ladies, one in used to refer to every one of two or more people or matters hand, with a fiddler providing the music.