"Sirtaki (from the Greek - touch) is a dance created in 1964 for the film" The Greek Zorba ". It is not a Greek folk dance, but is a combination of slow and fast versions of hasapiko, an ancient warrior dance. The sirtaki dance, as well as the music for it, composed by the Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, is sometimes called the "Dance of the Zorba".
According to the memoirs of Anthony Quinn, who played the title role in the film, he invented the name of the dance; perhaps by consonance with the name of the existing Cretan dance. "Sirtaki" is a diminutive form of the Greek word "sirtos", which is a common name for several Cretan folk dances. Sirtos is often contrasted with another Cretan dance style - pidichtos, which includes elements with jumps and leaps. Sirtaki contains elements of sirthos in the slow part and pidichtos in the fast one. "(Wikipedia)
According to the memoirs of Anthony Quinn, who played the title role in the film, he invented the name of the dance; perhaps by consonance with the name of the existing Cretan dance. "Sirtaki" is a diminutive form of the Greek word "sirtos", which is a common name for several Cretan folk dances. Sirtos is often contrasted with another Cretan dance style - pidichtos, which includes elements with jumps and leaps. Sirtaki contains elements of sirthos in the slow part and pidichtos in the fast one. "(Wikipedia)