CHAPTER III.
The origin of the Indian Drama—Aryan Mythology—Clown and Columbine—Origin of the Chinese Drama—Inception of the Japanese Drama—The Siamese Drama—Dramatic performances of the South Sea Islanders, Peruvians, Aztecs, Zulus, and Fijis—The Egyptian Drama.
Of the Indian Drama we learn that the union of music, song, dance, and Pantomime took place centuries ago B.C., at the festivals of the native gods, to which was afterwards added dialogue, and long before the advent, out of which it grew, of the native drama itself.
The progenitors of the Indo-European race, the Aryans—in Sanscrit meaning Agriculturists—who crossed the Indus from Amoo, where they dwelt near the Oxus, some two thousand years before Christ, were the original ancestors and people of India.
The Aryan race (Hindus and Persians only speak of themselves as Aryans) laid the foundation of the Grecian and Roman Mythology, the dark and more sombre legends of the Scandinavian and the Teuton; and all derived from the various names grouped round the Sun god, which in the lighter themes the Aryans associated with the rising and the setting of the sun, in all its heavenly glory, and with the sombre legends the coming of the winter, and marking the difference between lightness and darkness.
In India the origin of dramatic entertainments has been attributed to the sage Bharata (meaning an actor), who received, it is said, a communication from the god Brahma to introduce them, as the latter had received his knowledge of them from the Vedas. Bharata was also said to be the "Father of dramatic criticism." Pantomimic scenes derived from the heathen Mythology of Vishnu—a collection of poems and hymns on the Aryan religion—are even now in India occasionally enacted by the Jatras of the Bengalis and the Rasas of the provinces in the west, and, just as their forefathers did ages and ages ago. An episode from the history of the god Vishnu, in relation to his marriage with Laxmi, was a favourite subject for the early Indian Drama. Of Vedic Mythology Professor Max Müller observes that in it "There are no genealogies, no settled marriages between gods and goddesses. The father is sometimes the son, the brother, the husband, and she who in one hymn is the mother, is in another the wife. As the conceptions of the poet vary so varies the nature of these gods."
The Hindoo dramatic writer, Babhavñti—the Indian Shakespeare—introduced with success in one of his dramas, like in our "Hamlet," "a play within a play," and much in a similar way as our early dramatists used in their plays, the "dumb shows."
Between the native Tragedy and Comedy, as in China, there was no definite distinction, and, although both contained some of the best and noblest sentiments, yet the racial philosophy of caste enters greatly into the construction of each.
In the Hindoo Mythology we have prototypes of the gods of the Egyptian, Grecian, and Roman Mythologies. The god Vishnu, who, in Aryan Mythology, is the wind and "Traverses the heavens in three strides," is the greatest of all heathen deities. His dwelling-place was "The aerial mountains, where the many horned and swiftly moving cattle abide." In Grecian Mythology Hermes or Mercury took on some of the characteristics of Vishnu.
In the Eleusinian Mysteries of the Greeks, the signs and symbols that marked the worship of Vishnu by the Aryans, are apparent; and in the British Museum the scenes of the vases of the Hamilton collection agree closely with the Sacti rites of Hindustan.
After having briefly noticed and introduced Vishnu or Hermes to the notice of the reader, we will now take another of the Aryan deities—See-Va, the Wine god. This myth was the Dionysus, or Bacchus, of the Greeks, and the expedition of this "immortal" through the world to instruct mankind in agriculture, is likened as well as the god himself by the Egyptians to their deity Osiris—the god of the Nile. The worship of See-Va, Bacchus, or Osiris extended over Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy.
The visit and advent of the Wine or Pleasure god Bacchus to India, with his accompanying train of sylvan and rural deities, and nymphs, is supposed to have conquered the Hindoos, and taught them civilization, besides the cultivation of the vine. Strange to relate that when Alexander and his army reached the present Cabul they found ivy and wild vines (both sacred to Bacchus) growing in abundance, and they were met by processions dressed in parti-coloured dresses, playing on drums like the Bacchic festivals of Greece and Lower Asia of that time.
Female parts were acted by women, but it was not a general custom; and the Clown of the piece was always a Brahma, or if not, at any rate a pupil of Brahma.
Also among the minor characters was the Vita, "the accomplished companion," a part sometimes played by men and sometimes by women. Probably in this in the latter instance we have the origin of the Columbine and Soubrette part in after years of the European stage as the term "accomplished companion," would equally apply to both. It is only a surmise, yet history as we know is continually repeating itself—even in Soubrette parts, and in more senses than one.
Of scenic displays that it possessed there was little or none, though the exits and entrances to the stage had probably some device to denote them. What they possessed in the way of properties it is more than useless to speculate, as, whatever could be said, could only be conjectural. In dressing their parts propriety in costume, and in adhering to the habits of the Indian Drama, seems to have been observed with some show of consistency.
The Chinese Drama also arose from the Hindoo developing itself as time rolled on from Pantomimes and ballets. A very ancient Pantomime is said to have been symbolical of the conquest of China by Wou Wang. Others were on subjects of the Harvest, War, and Peace; whilst many were only of an obscure nature. With the rise and progress of the native drama about five hundred years before Christ Pantomimes fell into disrepute.
It is interesting to note that one of the penal codes of the Celestial Empire was, that those who wrote plays with vicious, or immoral tendencies, should stay in "purgatory" as long as their plays were performed. This precept was all right in theory, but in practice it was more honoured in the breach than in the observance, as amongst the whole of the Celestial dramatic writers only one in about ten thousand seems to have conformed to this rule.
The dramatic writers of China duly observed the question of rank and priority, and just as much as the native Hindoo writers observed that of the various phases of caste.
Plays were divided into acts and scenes, and occasionally were prefixed by a prologue. Performances took sometimes a single day, and favourite plays oftentimes longer.
The Japanese type of drama seems to have originally evolved itself from that of the Chinese, though its singing, dancing, historical, and Pantomimical displays are, of course, purely native.
A native of Japan, though of Chinese descent, Hadu Kawatsa, at the close of the 6th century (A.D.) gave dramatic entertainments in Japan. The Japanese claim for the Pantomimical dance Sambâso as a preventative of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions; and this dance, it is said, that within recent years, is used as a prelude to dramatic entertainments.
Isono Zenji is thought to have been the originator of the Japanese Drama, but her performances were more those of the Mima—dancing and posturing.
In the seventeenth century Saruwaka Kanzaburô introduced the drama proper into Japan by the erection, in 1624, of a theatre, and nearly fifty years later than the first permanent theatre that was erected (1576) in England.
Popular historical subjects were chosen for the plays, though the names of the characters were transformed. Fancy plays, operas, ballets, which in the latter women appeared, became also very popular.
Within sight of the closing years of the last century (the nineteenth), Japanese actors were more or less under a ban when the same was happily removed.
Siam was content with the Indian style of dramatic and Pantomimic entertainments. Theatrical performances were also slightly known—though no regular type of drama is known—amongst the South Sea Islanders, the Peruvians, the Aztecs, the Zulus, and the Fijis, the two last named having a similar version of our popular Pantomime subject, "Jack and the Beanstalk."
The Egyptians possessed no regular type of drama, yet in both the Books of Job and Ruth the dramatic element is strongly marked. At the rustic festivals of the native gods, as in Greece and Italy, there was, however, the dramatic elements of the union of song, dance, and Pantomime, and we are told that the priests not only studied music, but also taught the art to others. Again in the rites of the dead the Mysteries of the sepulture over the transmigration of souls, the dramatic element entered largely into these mystic rites and celebrations. Amongst the Pagan Greeks, as I have previously stated, and the Romans, we learn of similar celebrations, carried out with great pomp and ceremony, such as the apotheosis of the soul departing from its earthly to its heavenly abode.