I recently saw a video of an Iberian tradition called ball de bastons. Its a choreographed dance where 2 rows, wielding oak batons, hit them together in time with the music. Wikipedia says it was first recorded in 1150 and is related to Morrris dancing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball_de_bastons
Here's a video of an event:
The first thing this reminded me of was dandia raas, which is another dance where twin sticks hit together in a similar Indian dance/garba. I've gone with my gf to these and they're a lot of fun. It also reminded me of various martial arts traditions where dances are used to practice martial stuff, like some dances in the Philippines.
Does anyone have any experience with ball de bastons? Is there any martial aspect of the tradition?