The Art of Ballet

by Mark Edward Perugini

CHAPTER VIII
SCENIC EFFECT: THE ENGLISH MASQUE AS BALLET

In considering di Botta’s elaborate feast, and Beaujoyeux’s “ballet,” one is struck by their similarity to the English “disguisings” and masques, which, first introduced to the Court of Henry the Eighth in 1512 as a novelty from Italy, only began to assume definite literary form about a century later. That century contributed towards the development of scenic effect.

In studying Arbeau’s manual of contemporary dance and music, one is struck by another thing: he is dealing with a social amusement of the upper classes. The dances he describes were mainly the proper accomplishment of the well born, or were such of lower origin as might with adaptation become worthy of performance by more courtly dancers. It is certain he does not describe all the types of dance known to his period. The old Provençal “Rigaudon” which was later to come into such favour owing to Camargo, is not referred to by Arbeau; nor the languorous “Sarabande,” which was probably of Moorish origin derived through Spain—or possibly earlier through Augustan Rome; the lively “Chaconne” is another omission; the “Tresca” yet another. These, and perhaps others, must have existed in Arbeau’s time and long before; but would be among the traditional amusements of the people, and were not yet elected to the company of courtly dances.

It is needful to linger over these points here, for they account for much that we find in the subsequent development of theatrical ballets in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Speaking of Beaujoyeux’s “Ballet Comique,” Castil Blaze, the scholarly historian of the Paris opera, remarks that it “became the model on which were composed a number of ballets, sung and danced, a kind of piece which held the place of Opera among the French and English for about a century.” That century was, roughly, from about 1500 to 1600. And he adds: “The English gave them the name of masque.”

In the few years after Henry VIII came to be crowned the young monarch spent considerable time and spared no expense in entertaining himself and his Queen with “disguisings,” “revels” and masqued balls.

On Twelfth Night, 1511, before the banquet in the Hall at Richmond, so records the contemporary chronicler, Edward Hall, there “was a pageant devised like a mountain, glistering by night as though it had been all of gold and set with stones; on the top of which mountain was a tree of gold, the branches and boughs frysed with gold, spreading on every side over the mountain with roses and pomegranates; the which mountain was with (de) vices brought up towards the King, and out of the same came a lady apparelled in cloth of gold, and the children of honour, called the henchmen, which were freshly disguised and danced a Morris before the King, and that done re-entered the mountain: and then was the wassail brought in and so brake up Christmas.”

The next year the King himself took part in a similar pageant; and in the next, i.e. in 1513, so Hall tells us, “the King with eleven others were disguised after the manner of Italy, called a Mask, a thing not seen before in England. They were apparelled in garments long and broad, wrought with gold, with visors and caps of gold; and after the banquet these masquers came in with six gentlemen disguised in silk, bearing staff-torches, and desired the ladies to dance.”

A little later came the introduction of singing, and dialogue as well as dancing, some allegorical story forming the basis of the masque. In Beaujoyeux’s “ballet” of 1582, we have all this. Up to then in England the masque made no great advance beyond those of Henry VIII’s early years. In Beaujoyeux’s “ballet,” however, we have all that had been, and more. We have dancing, singing, dialogue, elaborate scenic effect, all in illustration of a mythic and allegorical story; and achieving a definiteness and grandeur of form hitherto unequalled, as well as publicity which made it famous throughout Europe. In some ways it was as much masque as “ballet,” and as much opera as masque. Actually it did stimulate the development of the Masque in England; and Opera in France.