Like other Zen arts, the No was fashioned out of materials from distant times and places. The first Japanese dramatic arts were derived from various forms of Chinese farces and court dances. The farces, or _gigaku_, were popular with the Nara aristocracy, while the dances, or _bugaku_, came into favor with the more refined Heian court. Although the _bugaku _form undoubtedly influenced Japanese ideas on the blending of drama and dance, by the end of the Heian era it had become a lifeless ceremony for the emperor and his court--a role it still enjoys on occasions when performances are staged for the imperial family. The real origins of the No are traceable to a somewhat lustier Chinese import, a circus-type entertainment called by the Japanese _sarugaku_. In addition to the display of various physical feats of daring, the _sarugaku _included farcical playlets and suggestive, sometimes indecent dances. A common theme seems to have been the lampooning of clergy, both Buddhist and Shinto. (In this respect, the development of native drama in Japan ran parallel with the resurgence of dramatic art in Europe after the Middle Ages, as citizens on both sides of the globe taunted the theological enslavement of feudal society by burlesques and dances ridiculing hypocritical authority figures.) The studied indecency of early _sarugaku _was undoubtedly intended to parody the pomposity of Shinto rituals. But as time went by, the rustic dance-stories evolved into a more structured drama, the _sarugaku-no- No_, which was the thirteenth-century Japanese equivalent of the European morality play. The earlier farces were transformed into comedies known as _kyogen _(in which wily servants repeatedly tricked their masters), which today serve as interlude pieces to relieve the gravity of a program of No plays, just as the early Greek satyr plays were performed after a trilogy of tragedies in the Athenian theater. In the early versions of the sarugaku-no-No, the performers sang and danced, but as the form matured a chorus was added to supply the verses during certain segments of the dance. By the middle of the fourteenth century, about the time of Chaucer's birth, Japanese No was already an established dramatic form, containing all the major elements it has today. It was, however, merely village drama, and so it might have remained except for a chance occurrence in the year 1374.