Global InformationCharition mime information
The Charition mime is a Greek theatre play, in fact more properly to be called a farce or burlesque rather than a mime, which is found in Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 413. The manuscript, which is possibly incomplete, is untitled, and the play's name comes from the name of its protagonist. It is approximately dated to the 2nd century CE,[1] and the play was probably performed in Egypt, where the manuscript was found.[2]
The play alludes to earlier texts such as Iphigenia in Tauris and Odyssey. Charition (Χαριτίων), the protagonist, is a Greek girl held captive at a temple in India (like Iphigenia), and her brother comes to her rescue. The Greeks escape by getting the Indian king drunk, an element possibly borrowed from Odyssey.[3] The introduction of humorous elements suggest that it may originally have been written as a spoof.[4] The play's character makes it almost a burlesque, representing a type of drama which was prior to the play's discovery not known in antiquity. The manuscript contains signs at various points which are almost certainly instructions to play percussion instruments and, possibly, the aulos, a Greek double-piped reed instrument, which suggests that the use of music in Greek mime was much more extensive than was earlier thought.[5]
- ^ Timothy J. Moore (2012). Roman Theatre. Cambridge University Press. p. ix. ISBN 9780521138185.
- ^ Ruth Webb (2008). Demons and Dancers: Performance in Late Antiquity. Harvard University Press. pp. 108, 129. ISBN 9780674031920.
- ^ Tim Whitmarsh & Stuart Thomson (2013). The Romance between Greece and the East. Cambridge University Press. p. 288. ISBN 9781107038240.
- ^ Daniélou, Alain (1985), Histoire de l'Inde, Fayard, Paris. ISBN 2-213-01254-7.
- ^ Hall, Edith (2002), "The singing actors of antiquity," in Pat Easterling & Edith Hall, ed., Greek and Roman Actors: Aspects of an Ancient Profession, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. ISBN 0-521-65140-9. Page 5.