Vapor' dance, done with clouds of steam instead of fabric veils." The Hebrew word chuwl, meaning to twist or whirl (in a circular or spiral manner), is used in Judges 21:21-23, Judges 11.34, and I Samuel 18.6-7. In these instances it refers to a type of erotic dance done during biblical ceremonies, and performed by women. Most notably, in Canaan before 900 BC, a small piece of cloth worn around the hips (ḥagor), would have been all that was worn. Richard Strauss Strauss's operatic adaptation of the play also features the Dance of the Seven Veils. The dance remains unnamed except in the acting notes, but Salome's sexual fascination with John seems to motivate the request—though Herod is portrayed as pleased. The music for the dance comes from near the climax of the opera. The visual content of that scene (about seven minutes long with standard tempi) has varied greatly depending on the aesthetic notions of the stage director, choreographer, and soprano, and on the choreographic skills and body shape of that singer. Strauss himself stipulated that the dance should be "thoroughly decent, as if it were being done on a prayer mat." Nevertheless, many productions made the dance explicitly erotic. In a 1907 production in New York the dancer "spared the audience nothing in active and suggestive detail", to such an extent that some ladies in the audience "covered their eyes with their programs." Ernst Krause argues that Strauss's version of the dance "established the modern musical formula for the portrayal of ecstatic sensual desire and brought it to perfection." In Derek B Scott's view, "The eroticism of the 'Dance of the Seven Veils' is encoded in the sensual richness (timbral and textual) of a huge orchestra, the quasi-Oriental embellishment of melody (intimations of 'exotic' sensuality), and the devices of crescendo and quickening pace (suggestive of growing excitement)." Later versions The Wilde play and the Strauss opera led to the phenomenon of "Salomania", in which various performers put on acts inspired by Salome's erotic dance. Several of these were criticised for being salacious and close to stripping, leading to "insistent vogue for women doing glamorous and exotic 'oriental' dances in striptease". In 1906 Maude Allan's production "Vision of Salomé" opened in Vienna. Based loosely on Wilde's play, her version of the Dance of the Seven Veils became famous (and to some notorious) and she was billed as "The Salomé