PAGE INTRODUCTION BY ANNA PAVLOWA vii CHAPTER I. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF DANCING 1 Æsthetic basis of the dance; national character expressed in dances; ‘survival value’ of dancing; primitive dance and sexual selection; professionalism in dancing--Music and the dance; religion and the dance; historic analysis of folk-dancing and ballet. II. DANCING IN ANCIENT EGYPT 12 Earliest Egyptian records of dancing; hieroglyphic evidence; the Astral dance; Egyptian court and temple rituals; festival of the Sacred Bull--Music of the Egyptian dances; Egyptian dance technique; points of similarity between Egyptian and modern dancing; Hawasis and Almeiis; the Graveyard Dance; modern imitations. III. DANCING IN INDIA 24 Lack of art sense among the Hindoos; dancing and the Brahmin religion; the Apsarazases, Bayaderes and Devadazis; Hindoo music and the dance; dancing in modern India; Fakir dances; philosophic symbolism of the Indian dance. IV. DANCES OF THE CHINESE, THE JAPANESE AND THE AMERICAN INDIANS 30 Influence of the Chinese moral teachings; general characteristics of Chinese dancing; court and social dances of ancient China; Yu-Vang’s ‘historical ballet’; modern Chinese dancing; dancing Mandarins; modern imitations; the Lantern Festival--Japan: the legend of Amaterasu; emotional variety of the Japanese dance; pantomime and mimicry; general characteristics and classification of Japanese dances--The American Indians: The Dream dance; the Ghost dance; the Snake dance. V. DANCES OF THE HEBREWS AND ARABS 43 Biblical allusions; sacred dances; the Salome episode and its modern influence--The Arabs; Moorish florescence in the Middle Ages; characteristics of the Moorish dances; the dance in daily life; the harem, the Dance of Greeting; pictorial quality of the Arab dances. VI. DANCING IN ANCIENT GREECE 52 Homeric testimony; importance of the dance in Greek life; Xenophon’s description; Greek religion and the dance; Terpsichore--Dancing of youths, educational value; Greek dance music; Hyporchema and Saltation; Gymnopœdia; the Pyrrhic dance; the Dipoda and the Babasis; the Emmeleia; The Cordax; the Hormos--Greek theatres; comparison of periods; the Eleusinian mysteries; the Dionysian mysteries; the Heteræ; technique. VII. DANCING IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE 72 Æsthetic subservience to Greece; Pylades and Bathyllus; the _Bellicrepa saltatio_; the Ludiones; the Roman pantomime; the Lupercalia and Floralia; Bacchantic orgies; the Augustinian age; importations from Cadiz; famous dancers.