us by Pylades and Bathyllus; and so popular were these
entertainments that even eminent poets, such as Lucan (d. A.D. 65),
wrote the librettos for these _fabulae salticae_ (ballets), of which the
subjects were generally mythological, only now and then historical, and
chiefly of an amorous kind. A single masked performer was able to
enchant admiring crowds by the art of gesticulation and movement only.
In what direction this art tended, when suiting itself to the most
abnormal demands of a recklessly sensual age, may be gathered from the
remark of one of the last pagan historians of the empire, that the
introduction of pantomimes was a sign of the general moral decay of the
world which began with the beginning of the monarchy. Comedy more easily
lost itself in the cognate form of the _mimus_, which survived all other
kinds of comic entertainments because of its more audacious immorality
and open obscenity. Women took part in these performances, by means of
which, as late as the 6th century, a _mima_ acquired a celebrity which
ultimately raised her to the imperial throne, and perhaps occasioned the
removal of a disability which would have rendered her marriage with
Justinian impossible.

The drama and the Christian Church.

Meanwhile, the regular drama had lingered on, enjoying in all its forms
imperial patronage in the days of the literary revival under Hadrian
(117-138); but the perennial taste for the spectacles of the
amphitheatre, which was as strong at Byzantium as it was at Rome, and
which reached its climax in the days of Constantine the Great (306-337),
under whom the reaction set in, determined the downfall of the dramatic
art. It was not absolutely extinguished even by the irruptions of the
northern barbarians; but a bitter adversary had by this time risen into
power. The whole authority of the Christian Church had, without usually
caring to distinguish between the nobler and the looser elements in the
drama, involved all its manifestations in a consistent condemnation (as
in Tertullian's _De spectaculis_, 200 c.), comprehended them all in an
uncompromising anathema. When the faith of that Church was acknowledged
as the religion of the Roman empire, the doom of the theatre was sealed.
It died hard, however, both in the capitals and in many of the
provincial centres of East and West alike. At Rome the last mention of
_spectacula_ as still in existence seems to date from the sway of the
East-Goths under Theo