A is the circular orchestra, B the altar (θυμέλη) of Dionysus which invariably stood in the middle of it. C represents the “stage-buildings”; D, E, F, are the doors which led from the building to the open air. The building usually projected into side-wings (G, G), called παρασκήνια. H, H, are the passage-ways (πάροδοι), by which the chorus generally entered the orchestra, and by which the audience always made its way to the seats. J, J, J, is the auditorium, a vast horseshoe-shaped space rising up a hillside from the orchestra, and filled with benches. This space was intersected by gangways,[150] K, K, L, L, etc., called, perhaps, κλίμακες; the areas M, M, N, N, etc., so formed, had the name “pegs” (κερκίδες). In most theatres a longitudinal gallery O, O, O, was made for further convenience in getting to the seats. In the strictly Greek type the front line of “stage-buildings” never encroached on the circle of the orchestra. But these theatres were used in Roman times also, and altered to suit certain needs. The front of C was thrown forward so that it cut into the orchestra and obliterated the passages H, H. To replace these, entrances were tunnelled through the auditorium. Thus at Athens the orchestra is now only little more than a semicircle, though amid the ruins of the “stage-buildings” can still be seen a few feet of the kerbstone which surrounded the original dancing floor—the only surviving remnants of the Æschylean theatre; this masonry shows that the diameter of the whole was about 90 feet.
The “stage-buildings,” as we have called them for convenience, require a longer discussion. Originally there stood in that place only a tent, called scēnē (σκηνή), which took no part in the theatrical illusion, but was used by the one actor simply as a dressing-room. Soon, no doubt, came the important advance of employing it as “scenery”—the tent of Agamemnon before Troy, for example. Later a wooden booth was erected, and Sophocles’ invention of scene-painting—that is, of concealing this booth with canvas to represent whatever place or building was needed—added enormously to the playwright’s resources. This booth was afterwards built of stone and became more and more elaborate; Roman “stage-buildings” survive which are admirable pieces of dignified architecture. The building of course contained dressing-rooms and property-rooms. There were doors at the narrow ends. The front of the building was pierced by three, later by five, doors.
Upon what did these doors open? Was there a stage in the Greek theatre? This problem has aroused more discussion than any other in Greek scholarship save the “Homeric Question”. That all theatres possessed a stage (λογεῖον) in Roman times is certain; the Athenian building—which in its present condition dates from the alterations made by Phædrus in the third century after Christ—shows quite obviously the front wall of a stage about 4½ feet high. But did the dramatists of the fifth and fourth centuries before Christ write for a theatre with a stage or not? There is a good deal of prima-facie evidence for a stage, and a good deal to show that the actors moved to and fro on that segment of the orchestra nearest to the booth. That is, the question lies between acting on top of the proscenium (or decorated wall joining the faces of the parascenia G, G) and acting in front of it. A brief résumé[151] of the evidence is all that can be attempted here. It is confined to the consideration of the fifth and fourth centuries B.C., to which belongs practically all the extant work. For the period after 300 B.C. the use of a stage seems indisputable.
A. Arguments For a Stage
§ 1. A High Stage.—Vitruvius, the Roman architect, who wrote at the end of the first century B.C., in his directions for building a Greek theatre says: “Among the Greeks the orchestra is wider, the back scene is farther from the audience, and the stage is narrower.[152] This latter they call logeion (speaking-place), because the actors of tragedy and comedy perform there close to the back scene, while the other artistes play in the ambit of the orchestra, wherefore the two classes of performer are called scænici and thymelici respectively.” [Literally, “those connected with the booth” and “those connected with the central altar”.] “This logeion should be not less than 10, and not more than 12, feet in height.”[153] This, says Dörpfeld, applies to the Greek theatre of Vitruvius’ own time, but has been extended by modern writers to the fifth century. Supposing, however, that Vitruvius was thinking of the fifth century, then:—
(a) The stage is too narrow for performances, viz. 2·50 to 3 mètres, from which 1 mètre must be subtracted for the background. The remaining space is not enough for actors and mutes, not to mention any combined action of players and chorus.
(b) It is also too high. Many passages in the plays show that chorus and actors are on the same level; in all these cases the chorus would have to mount steps, or the actors descend. This is absurdly awkward; nor is there evidence for steps. An attempt has been made[154] to meet the difficulties by the assumption of another platform about half the height of the stage, erected on the orchestra for the chorus. But the various objections to such a subsidiary platform are so strong that it is no longer believed in. With it, however disappears the only way by which plays with a chorus could be performed on the high stage of Vitruvius.
§ 2. A Low Stage.—Many scholars, abandoning Vitruvius as evidence for the fifth century, postulate a low stage. Their arguments are:—[155]
(a) Aristotle in the fourth century calls the songs of the actors τὰ ἀπὸ τῆς σκηνῆς, and says that the actor performed ἐπὶ τῆς σκηνῆς, phrases which seem to mean “from the stage” and “on the stage” respectively. And though Dörpfeld would take σκηνή as “background” (not “stage”) translating Aristotle’s phrases by “from the background” and “at the background,” there remains the difficulty that Aristotle plainly thinks of actors and chorus as occupying quite distinct stations, which scarcely suggests that they move on contiguous portions of the same ground.
(b) The side-wings or parascenia must have been meant to enclose a stage. What else could have been their use?