A Treatise on the Art of Dancing Part 1

A Treatise on the Art of Dancing.

by Giovanni-Andrea Gallini.

Of the ANTIENT Dance.

In most of the nations among the antients, dancing was not only much practised, but const.i.tuted not even an inconsiderable part of their religious rites and ceremonies. The accounts we have of the sacred dances, of the Jews especially, as well as of other nations, evidently attest it.

The Greeks, who probably took their first ideas of this art, as they did of most others, from Egypt, where it was in great esteem and practice, carried it up to a very high pitch. They were in general, in their bodies, extremely well conformed, and disposed for this exercise. Many of them piqued themselves on rivalling, in excellence of execution, the most celebrated masters of the art. That majestic air, so natural to them, while they preserved their liberty, the delicacy of their taste, and the cultivated agility of their limbs, all qualified them for making an agreeable figure in this kind of entertainment.

Nothing could be more graceful than the motion of their arms.

They did not so much regard the nimbleness and capering with the legs and feet, on which we lay so great a stress. Att.i.tude, grace, expression, were their princ.i.p.al object. They executed scarce any thing in dancing, without special regard to that expression which may be termed the life and soul of it.

Their steps and motions were all distinct, clear, and neat; proceeding from a strength so suppled, as to give their joints all the requisite flexibility and obedience to command.

They did not so much affect the moderately comic, or half serious, as they did the great, the pompous, or heroic stile of dance. They spared for no pains nor cost, towards the perfection of their dances. The figures were exquisite. The least number of the figurers were forty or fifty. Their dresses were magnificent and in taste. Their decorations were sublime. A competent skill in the theatrical, or actor's art, and a great one in that of dancing, was necessary for being admitted into the number of figurers. In short, every thing was in the highest order, and very fit to prove the mistake of those who imagine that the dances are, in operas for example, no more than a kind of necessary expletive of the intervals of the acts, for the repose of the singers.

The Greeks considered dancing in another point of light; all their festivals and games, which were in greater number than in other countries, were intermixed and heightened with dances peculiarly composed in honor of their deities. From before their altars, and from their places of worship, they were soon introduced upon their theatres, to which they were undoubtedly a prior invention. The strophe, antistrophe, and epode, were nothing but certain measures performed by a chorus of dancers, in harmony with the voice; certain movements in dancing correspondent to the subject, which were all along considered as a const.i.tutive part of the performance. The dancing even governed the measure of the stanzas; as the signification of the words strophe and antistrophe, plainly imports, they might be properly called danced himns. The truth is, that tragedy and comedy, made also originally to be sung, but which, in process of time, upon truer principles of nature, came to be acted and declaimed, were but super-inductions to the choruses, of which, in tragedy especially, the tragic-writers, could not well get rid, as being part of the religious ceremony.

This solves, in a great measure, the seeming absurdity of their interference with the subject of the drama: being deemed so indispensable a part of the performance, that the scene itself was hardly more so: consequently, there was no secret supposed to be more violated by speaking before them, than before the inanimate scene itself. But what was at least excusable, on this footing, in the antients, would be an unpardonable absurdity in the moderns.

Athenaeus, who has left us an account of many of the antient dances, as the _Mactrismus_, a dance entirely for the female s.e.x, the _Molossic_, the Persian _Sicinnis_, &c. observes, that in the earliest ages of antiquity, dancing was esteemed an exercise, not only not inconsistent with decency and gravity, but practised by persons of the greatest worth and honor.

Socrates himself, learnt the art, when he was already advanced in years.

Cautious as I am of using a false argument, I should say, that the making dances a part of their religious ceremonies, was a mark of their attributing even a degree of sanct.i.ty to them; but that I am aware there were many things that found a place in their festivals and games, which, among those heathens, were so far from having any thing of sacred in them, that they did not even show a respect for common decency or morality.

But as to dancing, it may be presumed, that that exercise was considered as having nothing intrinsically in it, contrary to purity of manners or chast.i.ty, since it made a considerable part of the worship paid to the presiding G.o.ddess of that virtue, Diana, in the festivals consecrated to her. Her altar was held in the highest veneration by the antients. Temples of the greatest magnificence were erected in honor of this G.o.ddess. Who does not know the great Diana of Ephesus? The a.s.semblies in her temples were solemn, and at stated periods. None were admitted but virgins of the most spotless character. They executed dances before the altar, in honor of the deity, with a most graceful decency; invoking her continual inspiration of pure thoughts, and her protection of their chast.i.ty. Those of them, who distinguished themselves above the rest, by superior graces of performance, received rewards not only from the priestess of Diana, but from their own parents. Nor were the young men but curiously inquisitive, as to who particularly excelled on these occasions. Distinction in these dances was a great incentive to love, and produced many happy unions.

Such of these virgins as married, retained, in quality of wives, such a veneration for this sort of worship, that they formed an a.s.sembly of matrons, who on set days, performed much the same devotion, imploring, in concert, of the G.o.ddess, a continuance of her gifts, and of that spirit of purity, the fittest to make them edifying examples of conjugal love and maternal tenderness.

Innocent amus.e.m.e.nts having been ever reputed allowable, and even necessary expedients for relaxing both mind and body from the fatigue of serious or robust occupations, Diana had her temples, especially in countries proper for hunting, where the parents used to resort with their children, and encouraged them to partake of the diversions in which dancing had a princ.i.p.al share.

The antients have left us an unaccountable description of the Baccha.n.a.lians, whose deportment forms a striking contrast to the decent regularity observed in the worship of Diana. The Baccha.n.a.lians strolled the country, and, in the course of that vagabond scheme, erected temporary huts, their residence being always short wherever they came. In their intoxication they seemed to defy all decency and order; affecting noise, and a kind of tumultuous, boisterous joy, in which there could never be any true pleasure or harmony. They were, in the licentiousness of their manners, a nuisance to society; which they scandalized and disturbed by their riots, their mad frolics, and even by their quarrels. Their heads and waists were bound with ivy, and in their hands they brandished a thirsus, or kind of lance, garnished with vine-leaves. When by any foulness of weather they were driven into their huts, they pa.s.sed their time in a kind of noisy merriment, of shoutings and dithirambic catches, accompanied by timpanums, by cymbals, by sistrums, and other instruments, in which noise was more consulted than music, and corresponded to the sort of time they kept to them, in the frantic agitations of their Bacchic enthusiasm. The Corybantes were called so from their disorderly dancing as they went along.

The Pirrhic dance differs not much from Plato's military dance.

The invention of it is most generally attributed to Pirrhus, son of Achilles; at least this opinion is countenanced by Lucian, in his treatise upon dancing; though it is most probably derived from the Memphitic dance of Egypt. The manner of it was to dance armed to the sound of instruments. Xenophon takes notice of these dances in armour, especially among the Thracians, who were so warlike a people. In their dance to music, they exhibited the imitation of a battle. They executed various evolutions; they seemed to wound each other mortally, some falling down as if they had received their death-wound; while those who had given the blow sung to the song of triumph, called _Sitalia_, and then withdrew, leaving the rest to take up their seeming dead comrade, and to make preparations for his mock-funeral, in the pantomime stile of dance. He has also described the dance of the Magnesians, in which they represented their tilling the ground, in an att.i.tude, and in readiness for defence, against expected moroders. They put themselves in a posture of protecting their plough, with other motions expressive of their resolution and courage, all adapted to the sound of the flute. The moroders arrive, prevail, and bind the husbandmen to their plough, and this terminates the dance. Sometimes the dance varies, and the husbandmen prevailing, bind the moroders.

The same author mentions also the Mysians who danced in armour, and used a particular sort of _peltae_ or targets, on which they received the blows. In short, these armed dances had different names bestowed upon them, according to the countries in which they were used.

The Egyptians and Greeks were extravagantly expensive in their public festivals, of which, dancing always const.i.tuted a considerable part.

The Romans, among whom the more coa.r.s.e and licentious dances derived from the Hetruscans, had at first prevailed, came at length to adopt the improvements of taste, and consequently of decency and regularity; the festivals, of which dancing was to compose the princ.i.p.al entertainment, were adapted to the season of the year.

Every autumn, for example, it was a constant custom, for those who could afford the expence, to build a magnificent saloon in the midst of a delightful garden. This ball-room was decorated in the most brilliant manner: At one end of the ball-room stood a statue of Pomona, surrounded with a great number of baskets made in the neatest manner, and full of all the finest fruits that the season produced. These, with the statue, were placed under a canopy hung round with cl.u.s.ters of real grapes and vine-leaves, so artfully disposed as to appear of the natural growth. These served to refresh both the eye and mouth. The performers of the ball went up to this part of the saloon, in couples, processionally, to avoid confusion. Each youth took care to help his partner to what she liked best, and then returned, in the same regular manner, to the other end of the room, when they served what remained to the rest of the spectators. After which the ball immediately began.

I was shown, by an Italian painter, a curious picture in his possession, of the antients celebrating one of this kind of festivals. The att.i.tudes into which the figures were put, and which appeared to have been drawn for the conclusion of the ball, were beautiful beyond imagination.

In winter there were b.a.l.l.s in the city of Rome; for which the appropriated apartments were commodious; and where the illuminations were so great, that notwithstanding the usual rigor of that season, the room was sufficiently warm.

Round the room there were tables and stands, on which was placed the desert; and there were generally twelve persons chosen to distribute the refreshments, and do the honors of the ball. The whole was conducted with the utmost decency and regularity, while Rome preserved her respect for virtue and innocence of manners.

By the best accounts procurable, their serious dances were properly interspersed and inlivened with comic movements. Their first steps were solemn and majestic, and, by couples they turned under each other's arms; and when the whole thus turned together, they could not but afford a pleasing sight. After which they resumed the serious again, and so proceeded alternately till they concluded the dance.

In the spring, the country became naturally the scene of their dances. The best companies resorted, especially to such villages as were noted for the most pure and salubrious springs of water.

If the weather was mild, they danced upon an open green; if not, they formed a large covered pavilion, in the middle of which they placed the statue of Flora, ornamented with flowers, round which they performed their dances. First the youth, then those of riper years; and lastly, those of a more advanced age. After each of these divisions had danced separately, they all joined and formed one great circle. The most distinguished for excellence in the performing these dances, had for reward the privilege of taking a flower, with great solemnity, from the statue of the G.o.ddess. This was esteemed so high an honor, that it is scarce imaginable how great an emulation this inspired; as this privilege was to be obtained by the impartial determination of the best judges.

Summer was however the season in which the pleasure of dancing was carried to the highest pitch. For the scene of it, they chose a shady and delightful part of a wood, where the sunshine could not incommode them, and where care was taken to clear the ground underfoot, for their performance. A young lady of the most eminence for rank and beauty was chosen to personate the G.o.ddess Ceres. Her dress was of an exquisite taste, ornamented with tufts of gold, in imitation of wheat-sheaves: while her head was decked with a kind of crown composed of spangles, representing the ears of ripe corn, and perhaps, for the greater simplicity, of the natural grain itself. Those who danced round her, all wore wreaths of the choicest flowers, and were dressed in white, with their hair flowing loose, in the stile of wood-nimphs. On this occasion, there was always a great croud of spectators; and the joy that appeared in each parent's eye, when their daughters were applauded, made no small part of the entertainment. As garlands, and wreaths of flowers composed the princ.i.p.al ornament of the persons who performed in this dance, such a respect was had for it by the people in general, that they abstained from gathering any flowers, till after this festival was over.

I have myself seen a drawing of this rural dance, in which I counted no less than sixty performers.

The celebrated Pilades is mentioned to have been the great improver of this dance. He excluded from it all jumping or capering, for fear of violating or of disfiguring the graceful regularity of the whole, which he considered as the most essential towards preserving a pleasing effect.

Not less than two months were the usual time of preparation for this dance, to which there was always a confluence of persons from all the neighbouring parts. But none were allowed the liberty of dancing, except persons of the first rank and distinction in the country; the whole being regulated by some person acting in quality of _choragus_, or director of the dance.

The reign of Augustus Caesar was undoubtedly the epoch, of the establishment in Rome, of the art of dancing in its greatest splendor. Cahusac, an ingenious French author, in his historical treatise of this art, a.s.signs to that emperor a deep political design in giving it so great an encouragement as he undoubtedly did; that of diverting the Romans from serious thoughts on the loss of their liberty; especially in fomenting a dissention among them, about so frivolous an object as the compet.i.tion between those two celebrated dancers, Pilades and Bathillus.

That something of this sort might be the design of that emperor, is not to be doubted; but Cahusac, over-heated, perhaps, by his subject, exagerates the importance of it beyond the bounds of cool reason. So much however is true, that those two dancers were extremely eminent in their art, and may be esteemed the founders of that theatrical dancing, or pantomime execution, for which it is not sufficient to be only a good dancer, but there is also required the being a good actor; in both which lights, these two artists were allowed to excel, Pilades in the serious or tragic dance, Bathillus in the comic.

These also founded a kind of academies of dancing, which produced several eminent artists, but none that ever equalled themselves in performance or reputation. What history records of them, and of their powers, as well as of that theatrical pantomime dance, of which they were the introductors, in Rome, would exceed belief, if it was not attested by such a number of authors as leave no room to think it an imposition.

But as to dancing itself, either considered in a religious, or in only an amusive light, it may be p.r.o.nounced to have been among the Romans, as old as Rome itself, and like that rude in its beginnings, but to have received gradual improvement, as fast as the other arts and sciences gained ground.

Processional dances were also much in vogue among that people.

They had especially an anniversary ceremony or procession, called, from its pre-eminence, singly, POMPA, or the Pomp.

It was celebrated, in commemoration of a victory obtained over the Latians, the news of which was said to have been brought by Castor and Pollux, in person. This festival, was, at first, consecrated to Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva. But it was afterwards made more general, and celebrated in honor of all the G.o.ds. This procession was in the month of September. It began at the temple of _Jupiter Capitolinus_, proceeded to the _Forum Romanum_, from thence to the _Velabrum_, and afterwards to the _Grand Circus_.

You have in Onuphrius Panvinius, the order of this procession at large, of which the directors were the chief magistrates of the city: the sons of the n.o.bility leading the van. Those of the Equestrian order, whose fathers were worth a hundred and fifty thousand sesterces, followed on horseback. It would be here foreign from my purpose to give the whole description of this procession, and of those who composed it. It is sufficient to observe, that processional dancing const.i.tuted a considerable part of it. The Pirrhic dance, executed to a martial air, called the _Proceleumaticus_, employed the men of arms. These were followed by persons who danced and leaped, in the manner of Satirs, some of them in the dress ascribed to _Silenus_, attended by performers on instruments adapted to that character of dance. These made the comic part of the procession, and the persons representing Satirs, took care to divert the people by leaps, by a display of agility, and by odd uncouth att.i.tudes, such as were in the character they had a.s.sumed. There were also in another part of the procession twelve _Salii_, or priests of Mars, so called from their making sacred dances in honor of that G.o.d, the most considerable part of their worship; these were headed by their master or _Praesul_, the leader of the dance, a term afterwards a.s.sumed by the Christian Prelates. There were also the _Salian_ virgins, besides another division of the _Salii_ called _Agonenses_ or _Collini_.

Nor is the processional dancing any thing surprizing; concerning that among the heathens, and even among the Hebrews, they were greatly in use. Who does not know that David's dancing before the arch was but in consequence of its being one of the religious ceremonies on that occasion?

The heathens used especially to form dances before their altars, and round the statues of their G.o.ds. The _Salii_, or priests of Mars, whose dances were so framed as to give an idea of military exercise and activity, threw into their performance steps so expressive and majestic, as not only to defend their motions and gestures from any idea of levity and burlesque, which it is so natural for the moderns to a.s.sociate with that of dancing, but even to inspire the beholders with respect and a religious awe.

The priests chosen for this function, were always persons of the n.o.blest aspect, suitable to the dignity of the sacerdotal ministry. And so little needs that dignity of the heathen ministry be thought to be wounded or violated by the act of dancing, in religious worship, that dances were actually in use among the primitive Christians, in their religious a.s.semblies.

There was a place in their churches, especially allotted for these consecrated dances, upon solemn festivals, which even gave the name of _choir_ to those parts of the church now only appropriated to the reading of the divine service, and to singing. In Spain, it long remained an established custom for Christians to a.s.semble in the church-porches, where, in honor of G.o.d, they sang sacred himns, and to the tunes of them, performed dances, that were extremely pleasing, for the decent and beautiful simplicity of the execution. All which I mention purely to salve that inconsistence, of the levity of dancing with the gravity of divine worship. An inconsistence of which the antients had no idea; since, on that occasion, they almost constantly joined dancing to singing.

They are both natural expressions of joy and festivity; and as such they thought neither of them improper in an address of gratulation to the deity, whom they supposed rather pleased at such innocent oblations of the heart, exulting in his manifold bounties and blessings.

From before the altar, among the heathens, the admission of dances upon the theatre, was rather an extension of their power to entertain, than a total change of their destination; since the theatres themselves were dedicated to the worship _of the heathen deities_, of which their making a part was one of the princ.i.p.al objections of the primitive Christians to the theatres themselves. However, it was from the theatres that dancing received its great and capital improvement.

As an exercise, the virtue of dancing was well known to the antients, for its keeping up the strength and agility of the human body. There is a remark which I submit to the consideration of the reader, that it is not impossible but that the antient Romans, who were, generally speaking, low in stature, and yet were eminently strong, owed that advantage to their cultivation of bodily exercise. This kept their limbs supple, and rendered their const.i.tution stout and hardy. Now, very laborious exercises would rather wear out the machine than they would invigorate it, if there was not a due relaxation, which should not, however, be too abrupt a transition from the most fatiguing exercises to a state of absolute rest. Whereas that dancing, of which they were so fond, afforded them, not only a pleasing employ of vacant hours, but, withall, in its keeping up the pliability of their limbs, made them find more ease in the application of themselves to more athletic, or to more violent exercises, either of war or of the chace: while all together bred that firmness of their muscles, that robust compactness and vigor of body, which enabled them to atchieve that military valor, to which they owed all their conquests and their glory.

Certain it is then, that among the Romans, even in the most martial days of that republic, the art of dancing was taught, as one of the points of accomplishment necessary to the education of youth; and was even practised among the exercises of the Circus. I need not observe, that there were also various abuses of dancing, which they very justly accounted dishonorable to those who practised them, whether in public or private. These, in the degenerate days of Rome, grew to an enormous excess. But I presume no one will judge of an art by the abuse that may be made of it.

Of

DANCING

In General.