Treading Measures Grave And Gay

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 153, 29 June 1940, Page 6 (Supplement)

Treading Measures Grave And Gay

IJAV.K you ever watched * group *•* of laughing little girl* join hands for a game of ring ©* roses ? There you see in crude form the pattern for one of the oldest types •f dance, the circle dance. They have no elaborate steps and no special rhythm, but have the joyeusness and spirit of the dance. - Dancing is the poetry of human motion just as verse is the poetry •f human literary expression. It can portray every human emotion from grave to gay. from frolic to war. Dancing to-day among ciTiEsed people is regarded alnraet entirely as a form of entertainment. But it was not always so. Dan' eing as well as athletic sport was msed to express religion* fervour and rejoicing. We read that many times the Hebrew women of the Old Testament went forth to meet their victorious armies singing and dancing to the sound of clashing cymbals. Among many peoples in our times ritual dancing has an important place, especially in the East, in parts of Africa and the New World. The most famfius religious dancers, are the whirling dervishes. They are Mohammedans and have practised this form •f worship for over seven hundred years. Their headquarter* are at Ktfnieh. but they appear in many cities of Turkey and other parts •f Asia Minor. While aft iman ■coda the Koran the dervishes

PROGRESS OF THE DANCE

stand with their eves fixed on the ground. Other dervishes play on pipes. The leader then begins a solemn dance, which gradually turns to a whirl in which his companions join, and which is slow or incredibly rapid according to the music. The dancing may last for hours until the performers collapse from utter exhaustion. i jfae natives ot Bali, Siam anil Indo-Ctrina are noted for their religious and dramatic dances* dances portray happening* in the early mythology of the race. The dancing consists for the most part of a series of gestures arid postures, the elaborate costumes of the performers preventing any vigorous exercises. Their heavy embroidered and bejewelled garments are worn with a richly-decorated head-drees tike a pagoda in miniature. The movements of the datteers 1 , though Slow, are often very intricate and require loner training to . bring them to perfection. tlfhis begins when the dancers, most of them gifts, are small children. The Indians of North America perforin annual dance* that hare special religious significance, hut 'much of it is how lost owing to the teaching of missionaries.

Those still held are mora in the nature of displays for tourists than religions ceremonies. The Sun Dance is an annual festival lasting for several days. It lias for centuries been one Of the chief festival* of tribes of the plains and is celebrated to ensure abundant food supplies during coining reasons. Almost equally famous are the Snake Dances of the Hopi and Pueblo Indian*. For these the dsneere carry live rattlesnakes. Many traditional dances have lost their early Significance. Many of the Greek traditional dances Suggest some ancient sacred meaning that was vital and important to the people -Who poured libations to Apollo and vowed vows to Zens and his great family of gods in the days when he looked dotrn from Olympus on the "glory that was Greece * la th« golden evenings of this, century Greek villagers Of the mainland join hands and the linked chain at dancers treads a measure to some old half-forgot-ten rhythm. In the isles of Greece— Sparade*, the Cyclades And Crete* still more of these old dantfas lite on*

■ England lias Iter traditional dances. There are maypoles, connected with the ancient springtime festival of May, cod Morris danc*s, which formed part of the May Celebration* and afe »upposed to be of Moorish origin. The oldest English traditional dams* is the Floral Dance of Hel* ston Furry, danced every yea* on May 8, in the Cornish Tillage of Hektton. Nobody know* exactly when the dance began. Some say it is a relic of Dmidkal celebrations, others that it dates back to the Soman occupation of Britain. There is another atory which relates how it Was firs* danced by the villagers rejoicing on the return to their noma* after an attack of the plague had driven them away. Whatever ita origin it is one of the most beautiful traditional celebration* in England and visitors flock to Heist on on May 8 to see the townsfolk tripping down the streets and in and out the houses to the haunting music of the floral song. England has many other folk dances that have fortunately been saved from extinction, mainly. through the efforts of Cecil Shafpe. He went through tie British Isles taking down the old tunes from the old folk, soma of them bed-ridden, and he learnt the steps sometimes from old men and women who had to hobble about on sticks.