dancing
dancingFrom earliest times, the dance played an important role in the lives of the Greeks, and was sometimes regarded by them as the invention of the gods. It was generally associated with music and song or poetry in the art called mousikē, and frequently made use of a body of conventionalized gestures (cheironomia). The dance had a place in religious festivals, in the secret rites of mysteries, in artistic competitions, in the education of the young, and even in military training, especially in Sparta. People danced at weddings, at funerals, at the ‘naming-days’ of infants, at harvests, at victory celebrations, in after-dinner merrymaking, in joyous dance processions (kōmos) through the streets, in animal mummery, and even in incantations. Performances by professional dancers were enjoyed, especially at the symposium; such dancers were almost all slaves and...
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