I'd like to apologize for my exuberance and outburst of writing in this thread. It's extremely rare that a question related to my specialty comes up.

In short:

I've written a considerable amount below. The basic summary is that no, dances of the era were not the precise, complex choreographies of ballet performances and Hollywood. They were primarily intended as social dances, with a decreasing emphasis on displays of individual skill, and had the somewhat the same separation you see today between casual social ballroom dance and modern competitive ballroom dance. Complex, precise performances did take place during the era, but served other purposes, like theatrical productions, ceremonial occasions (eg, the ball in Trollope's Way We Live Now), or the promotion of dance masters and their paid instruction. This difference is a product of different purposes of different dances, as we see today.

---

I am on a train at the moment, and being thus unfortunately deprived of direct checking of my usual sources, I will have to resort to citing from memory at the moment. When I return home, I should be able to revise the post somewhat.

Dance serves a variety of purposes: ceremony, performance, social interaction, and so on. A discussion of dance difficulty, "intensity", and so on requires a differentiation between the purposes of the dances involved.

Hollywood, and modern performances in a particular period, often portray dance in the 18th and 19th centuries as being ceremonial, and often do so with choreographed performances. These styles of performances were not unknown in those time periods. For example, I believe it is either Strathy or Wilson who notes, in the early 19th century, that "skilled" (not the right word, I will replace later) dancers would often replace standard footwork in country dances and quadrilles with their own: Ellis Rogers suggests that by this they were referring to professional dancers dancing in performances, and I tend to agree. Giraudet, in Traite de la Danse, I believe has several references to quadrilles that are primarily intended for performance, and they are, as might be expected, considerably more complicated than dances intended for social occasions: this at a time when quadrilles had become a dance of the middle classes. One might suggest that many partner dances in Gilbert's Round Dancing are for similar purposes, or for promoting the skill of dance masters and thus their services: it seems unlikely for example, given the tendencies of contemporary dance manuals and references to dances, that many social dancers were dancing highly complex, syncopated waltz variations.

Like modern performance and modern ballroom dancing, these dances were choreographed, done with familiar, practiced partners. This is quite distinct from social dancing.

Of course, you are discussing quite a long period of time and a large area. Restricting our view to my specialty (England and America, which to some extent includes France), there were three predominant styles of social dance: country dances, quadrilles, and round dances.

Country dances, popular in England up until the end of the Regency era, were not choreographed, despite the modern depiction of them. While danced by lines of couples, they tended to be improvised by the lead couples in each set, with the dance passing down the line as dancers watched and had the lead couple possibly call the figures (see de Guardiola's discussion of historical progression). Such dances served a few purposes at once: they allowed social conversation between dancers who were not dancing at the moment, social interaction between all the dances, and some displays of dance skill and thus refinement.

Yet while the ideal of these dances was a precise, organized dance of coordinated figures and ballet footwork, the reality appears to have been quite different. For every book Wilson, always the purist, sold of complex diagrams and equations describing how to improvise a complex country dance in one's head, there were numerous little manuals of pre-set, fashionable dances for ladies to memorize and present as their own. These dances tended to be far less complex than modern performances of country dances, or even modern social English Country Dance, where the dances are taught specifically. And they still tended to be chaotic.

While Wilson had his own motivations for disparaging dancers and encouraging more paid instruction, his Danciad decries all manner of chaos and disorder at balls. And this is supported by less biased sources. Dickens, in the mid/late-18th century ball scene of A Christmas Carol, describes a ball where not a single country dance is actually finished, instead each descending into confusion and missteps until the dancers simply gave up and applauded happily. Rules for some subscription balls of the 18th century suggest that couples leading dances be given, in one case, three tries at leading a country dance and having it fall apart before being asked to step aside and let the next in line lead! (I believe this may be in the Bath New Assembly Rooms rules?)

Having a theoretical basis in ballet does not imply precision, either. It is generally considered, for example, that while ideal ballet turnout was usually seen as close to 180°, social dances usually involved turnout of around 90°. With training but without serious, professional practice, footwork was almost certainly sloppy by comparison to ballet, and the footwork tends to be simple both in variety (most country dances involve chassés, balancé-assemblé sequences, and one or two memorized setting steps) and descriptions in social dance manuals relative to actual ballet.

Still, these were dances done primarily by the upper classes. They did have some element of performance to one's peers in them, and dancing was seen, as cecikirk notes, as part of upper class education.

As one note here about modern depictions: modern depictions of country dances are almost entirely inaccurate not just in style but in the way that style represents social views and culture of the eras involved, usually being based in the modern English Country Dance tradition likely started by Cecil Sharp in the 1920s. Actual country dances were not slow, "stately," prudish dances. They were instead energetic and athletic. de Guardiola writes extensively about this and it is a source of considerable annoyance.

The quadrille, on the other hand, with four couples dancing together in a square, is a dance that underwent considerable transition over the 19th century after becoming wildly popular, at least in England, after 1815. In its earlier form as dance of the upper classes, Ellis speculates that it offered considerable advantages over the country dance: figures were fixed and learned, dances were not ridiculously long (a single country dance in the 18th century might last 30 minutes), and yet there was more opportunity for individual performance. At that time, it could be seen as similar to country dances, but less likely to fall apart.

Yet as part of economic transitions throughout the 19th century, and changes in the popularity of dances, the quadrille became increasingly a dance of the middle classes. Footwork, by the middle of the 19th century, was almost entirely missing from instruction manuals, or even decried as pretentious. Dances were largely walked through, something that would have been seen as unacceptable a half century earlier (there is a Mansfield Park reference I need to add here), and the basis in ballet mostly disappeared (I am also skeptical of Ellis' speculation that earlier styles of quadrille persisted amongst the upper classes). Quadrille figures were simplified, and areas meant for individual performance were almost entirely removed. The purpose of the dances became yet more focused on sociality and entertainment than they had been in the past.

In this era, I believe it is either Hillgrove or Dodworth who, while again having their own motivations, spoke of balls where scarcely one set of dancers could be formed that would actually know a quadrille. There are also several other sources that suggested the quadrille fell rather out of style despite continuing to be played.

Round dances, like the waltz, polka, and so on, which became increasingly popular from the 1830s onward, were entirely different. These were partner dances in the modern conception, and were social. They were, even by necessity, less focused on performance than early quadrilles and country dances: with everyone dancing at once, and focused on their partners, there simply isn't the same visibility.

There were certainly variants of these dances that were precise, difficult, and probably intended for performance, as I mention with Gilbert earlier. Yet the vast majority of dance manuals suggest that these were largely not danced. All evidence I have found suggests that the vast majority of dancers were dancing socially, and dancing only the simplest steps or the latest fad (usually poorly). For example, something requiring significant dance skill, like a Highland schottische, finds actual reference only in a handful of dance manuals and an exhibition performance for Victoria. There is even reference to one prestigious military regiment having a tradition of only dancing basic waltzes in one direction, never doing reverse turns! These dances were a time for social interaction, not for ceremony and performance; the idea of such dances being done as part of a larger choreography has no place outside of contemporary performances and Hollywood.

I'll update this further when I return home, and possibly try to make it more concise!