were written on the interior walls of the Pyramids and tombs-deals with the resurrection of the deceased body, or the ascent of the souls of the deceased, to become one of the Imperishable Stars.

The drama next in sequence was the Memphite Drama, probably a Coronation Festival Play circa 3100 B.C. The plot of the Memphite Drama was the celebration of the claims to the supreme Godhood of Ptah.

A probable Coronation Festival Play was the next in sequence and dates from the reign of Senwosret I of the XII Dynasty, which is termed the Middle Kingdom period, approximately 2000 B.C. The festival plays acclaimed the elevation of Pharaoh to the throne. The Heb-Sed was a Coronation Jubilee Celebration and symbolized the renewal of the king's power through death and resurrection.

Egyptologists recognized one Medicinal play, the purpose of which was either faith healing or magic.

The sole Egyptian play known to historians, the Abydos Passion Play, otherwise known as the Osiris Passion Play, tells the story of the treacherous deat and dismemberment of Osiris and the re-assembling of his limbs by his sister-wife, Isis, and their son. Horus. This passion play was performed at Abydos. probably until the latter part of the XXVIth Dynasty, between 569 and 526 B.C.

Performances of these Egyptian plays were regularly arranged, and in most instances "theatres" were specially constructed for the purpose. The Pyramid Texts, the Coronation Festival Plays and the Heb-Seds were presented in so-called "mortuary temples," which excep in the reign of the XVIII-XX Dynasties were attached to the tombs of the kings. The Medicinal Drama an the Abydos Passion Play were presented at the "houses of gods".

There is much to explore in connection with the ancient Egyptian Theatre, and any exact interpretation. of its drama remains to be established by Egyptologists and scientists.

Between Egypt and Greece "there is a land called Crete, in the midst of the wine-dark sea, a fair, rich land, begirt with water, and therein are many men past counting and ninety cities", sang Homer. The rediscovery of the lost Cretan civilization is one of the major achievements of modern archæology. The Cretans' literature is a sealed book; no scholar could read the Cretan script. One may at least contemplate the ruins of the theatres which were erected in the palace courts.

In about 2000 B.C., at Phaestos, ten tiers of stone seats were built running some eighty feet along a wall, overlooking a flagged court. At Cnossos there is a much larger structure also in stone. These court theatres had an auditorium which seated between four hundred and five hundred persons. The Cretan theatres are the most ancient of which we know and are fifteen hundred years older than the famous Theatre of Dionysos at Athens.

What was enacted on the stage is a mystery. There are frescos depicting audiences, but no-one can tell us what they witnessed. There is a painting from Cnossos portraying a group of aristocratic ladies, surrounded by their gallants, watching gaily petticoated girls dancing in an olive grove. Other paintings show rustic folk dances or the wild dance of priests, priestesses and worshippers before an idol or sacred tree.

Only wealth and security, taste and leisure, tradition arm in arm with progress, could make possible such a high degree of culture as the Cretans'.

Proceeding from west to east we arrive in India, where Brahma is reputed to have invented the theatre. and to have commanded that the first playhouse should

be built, in order that Bharata, the father of Hindu drama, could present his plays.

The earliest Indian dramatic development known by theatre historians was most likely that of the dialogue form, employed in the Vedic hymns of the Rig-veda, approximately 1500 B.C., but the true beginning came later-about the same period as in Greece, i.e., 500 B.C. About this time the Epic Period of Hindu literature opened. Two great Indian epics, the Mahabharata and Ramayana, were source books of Hindu dramatists, even as the Iliad and Odyssey were to the Greek authors.

There were suppositions that the conquest by Alexander the Great may have exercised a Greek influence on the Indian theatre by way of travelling actors; however no evidence was found to substantiate this hypothesis.

The Indian theatre, like the Egyptian, began as a religious impulse in the hearts and souls of men, reaching the borderline of dream and reality.

On our arrival at the coast of the Yellow Sea, we soon realize that the theatre of China is recognized as second in point of world chronology. The theory of theatre historians is that the Chinese theatre was established in the Hsia Dynasty, 2205-1766 B.C., as a form of religious worship and celebration of military successes made by interpretive dancing theatrical in presentation.

The Hsia Dynasty was followed by the Shang Dynasty, and during the latter reign, from 1766-1122 B.C., these dances included other ceremonies in honour of deities controlling rain and drought, or harvest and famine. A stage was erected to heighten the dramatic effect and the dances were displayed upon it.

Speaking of ancient Chinese theatre, we should not interpret the word "theatre" in the accepted sense of to-day. These were religious "performances" and the

"plays" were not intended for the people but only for the Emperor, his court and the priests. Centuries passed before the performing of public plays.

In the Chou Dynasty, 1122-221 B.C., the shen-hsi, which were plays with a sacred motive, became essentially dramatic in manner of presentation. During this period, about 700 B.C., an attempt was also made by one Emperor to found a popular theatre, but his successors disapproved, and no records now remain to bear witness to the success of his venture. Perhaps the failure was due to the inherent hostility to poetic drama, but this could also have been due to political or other motives.

The Ch'in Dynasty, from which China derived its name, reigned from 221-206 B.C., and the Emperor Ch'in Shi Huang, who divided the country into provinces, employed large troupes of actors at his famous Ah Fong palace.

Although the later development of the Chinese theatre is interesting it has no place in the framework of this lecture.

WHEN

WHEN considering the classical theatre, we observe that, apparently from Crete and Asia, came that prehistoric culture of Mycena and Tiryns, which gradually transformed the immigrating Acheans and the invading Dorians into civilised Greeks. It would therefore appear that the roots of the Greek theatres are to be found in Crete, but then again, according to Herodotus, the Dionysiac festival of the Greeks had its inception in Egypt. Probably both places contributed to the development of the Greek Theatre.

The sixth century B.C. in Greece crowned the already distinguished accomplishme..ts by laying the foundation of the drama.

Dionysos was the god of wine and fertility and each year the Greeks held four Dionysiac festivals in his

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honour. On these occasions the worship of Dionysos took the form of dance and phallic songs of crudity and obscenity, which were sung, accompanied by music. Among the Dionysiac festivals the fourth-and final was the most important. This was the City Dionysia or Great Dionysia. This was celebrated with the greatest ceremony. Tragedy held first place here, even as comedy did at Lenæa, which was the second Dionysiac festival.

The festivities at first were improvised in a spirit of lively religious fervour. The poet Arion formalized them in the seventh century, B.C.

The poem composed to the honour of Dionysos was the dithyramb. A chorus of fifty men-Choreutiperformed the dithyrambs. They were dressed as satyrs in costumes of goatskin decorated with the tails of horses, snub-nosed masks, beards, long animal-like ears. and an artificial phallos, which symbolized fertility in the religion of the Greeks. The chorus did not impersonate the character of the satyr.

Thespis conceived the idea of improving the dithyramb in a simple but far-reaching manner, namely by introducing the first actor. Dialogue between the actor and the chorus was then introduced. With the first actor disguises were introduced, and the actor and the Choryphæus leader of the chorus enacted scenes from the life of the God.

The subjects of the early plays were firstly the life and adventures of Dionysos, secondly Homer's ancient epics.

When Thespis separated himself from the chorus he made a revolutionary reform. By giving himself individual recitative lines he developed the notion of conflict and gave us the drama in its more strict sense. On Greek vases, Thespis is mostly seen sitting in a car. The name of all touring actors-known as Thespians took its origin from here.