THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
In all this the Church endeavored not only to provide a substitute for pagan and secular plays, but also to teach the masses, who were ignorant of Latin, the lessons of Scripture and 2. Gradual doctrine which they would not other- Extension wise comprehend. The gradual exof Action, tension of the text gave increasing independence of diction, and new passages in prose and poetry were gradually added to the mosaic of passages from the Bible and the chants of the Church which make up the oldest religious plays. The richness of the popular Latin poetry of the period is a component in the Daniel of Abelard's pupil Hilarius, the first definite personality in the history of the religious drama (b., probably in England, about the middle of the twelfth century), as well as in the eleventh century Antichrist, preserved in a manuscript from the monastery of Tegernsee. Beginning with the twelfth century the Easter plays manifest a tendency to extend the time of action, one of the early thirteenth century beginning with the calling of Peter and Andrew, and, though now ending abruptly with the negotiations between Pilate and Joseph of Arimathea concerning the sepulcher of Christ, once evidently carried on to the resurrection. This is, accordingly, the oldest specimen thus far known of the Passion play, which was to become the chief theme of medieval drama; but this type was not developed from the liturgy for Good Friday in the same sense as the Easter play from the liturgy for Easter, the deep solemnity of Good Friday forbidding free play to dramatic imagination. The twelfth century also witnessed the rise of dramas dealing with the saints, although these seem to have been intended primarily for schools, since they all deal with St. Nicholas, the patron of younger pupils, with the exception of one, which is devoted to St. Catherine, the patron of the older scholars.
The departure of the religious drama from its original limits was unpleasant to some of the more rigorous, and complaints were made as early as the twelfth century, when Gerhoh of Reichersberg and Abbess Herrad of Landsberg both attacked the drama as the work of the devil, the latter especially objecting that, while the plays were laudable and useful in their primary form, they had degenerated into irreligion and license. The costuming of monks as warriors, women, and devils, instead of symbolic renderings of the roles, was evidently offensive, and the abbess particularly objected to the horse-play, thus evidencing a further departure from classic models in the melodramatic mingling of comic and tragic elements. The production of plays in churches was finally forbidden, though the prohibition seems to have been aimed at unworthy productions rather than at religious dramas proper, the latter being expressly excepted from condemnation in the decretals of Gregory ("Decretals," book III., tit. i., chap. xii.).
The first traces of the use of the vernacular in religious dramas date from the twelfth century. In Germany this was effected by a spoken German paraphrase following the chanted Latin sentence, and with the triumph of the vernacular over Latin also went the gradual supremacy of spoken over
chanted lines. The earliest extant specimen of the vernacular religious drama is the twelfthcentury French Adam. A number of
3. Rise of French dramas of the saints have also Objections; been preserved, the most important of Vernacular which is the St. Nicholas of Jean Bodel
Plays. of Arras (c. 1200), which, as in the later romantic style, combines religious, knightly, and imaginative elements with a realistically burlesque presentation of everyday life. A later cycle of dramas shows how the Virgin miraculously intervenes in time of need or danger to succor those who adore her. The grotesque element comes to the fore in certain fourteenth-century German Easter plays, especially in those scenes where Satan, having lost so many souls through the descent of Christ to hell, sends the devil to recoup, this affording an opportunity for the satirization of the most varied estates of man. To the same period belongs the play of The Wise and Foolish Virgins, an eschatological drama. No texts of religious dramas in England have been preserved from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, though it is certain that such plays were then produced; and the only Spanish play of the period is a fragment of an Epiphany drama of the twelfth century, which, like the French Adam, is a veryearly specimen of the vernacular religious drama. In Italy the beginnings of national religious drama came, not from the Latin liturgy, but from the songs, rich in dialogue, of the Flagellants of the thirteenth century (see Flagellation, Flagellants, II., § 5); and apparently after the Flagellant brotherhoods had been permanently organized, the dramatic elements of their songs were given appropriate theatrical action.
Though numerous specimens have been preserved of the Latin drama, which may be said to have come to an end about 1200, few examples survive of the national plays of the oldest period (1200- 1400), so that their process of development must remain uncertain; yet the dramatic merit of even the earliest vernacular plays is far su-
4. Increa- perior to the Latin mysteries of the sing Elabo- closing medieval period. In the cities
rateness of the presentations became more im- Production. posing and the casts larger; in the great
squares were erected stages, the location permitting the action to proceed without needing change of scenery; above was the throne of God and heaven, whence angels could descend to aid the good; and at the end of the stage was the abyss of hell, from which figures of grotesque devils constantly ascended. Since such productions required fair weather, the time of presentation tended to abandon the seasons of Christmas and Easter; and with increasing frequency the time of action extended throughout the earthly life of Christ, or even from the creation to the last day, the actual time of presentation now covering several days. This growth also involved the increasing introduction of the laity, although the clergy jealously arrogated to themselves the preparation of texts and the training of actors. The presentation of a religious drama, moreover, was held to be essentially pleasing to God, and was often motived either by thanksgiving for