Ancient Dance References Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ancient Dance References - Essay Example Ancient Dance References Dance is a pastime and a ritual that, while historical, has very little traceable history. There is plenty of evidence to show that it has existed for many millennia, perhaps even since the dawn of mankind, but there are great gaps between the dance that we know now and the dance that existed back then.Dance, being a physical activity, is unable to leave behind concrete proof of its presence. As such, it is only a guess that dance has been around since the beginning of human beings. We are able to rely on the few bits of historical evidence to accompany this assumption, even though it still remains to be just an assumption. Likewise, the questions of where dance originated from, why it was started, and how it was originally practiced are only able to be answered with educated guesses. Descriptions of ancient dances are few and far between, but they do exist. This allows us a glimpse into the past of dancing. One of the first greatest descriptions of dance com es from India and was written by Bharata Muni, a man who lived approximately between 500 BC and 200 BC. The textbook that he wrote, which was called the Natya Shastra, outlined many things in regard to theatre and music, but the majority of the book was based on dance. Bharata wrote in great detail about a variety of dances, focusing a lot of pages to every movement in each of the dances. He also divulged into descriptions of the social contexts that these dances would be used in. This book is considered to be the first detailed account of dance.