Whether in Eastern art or in Western art, drama is the earliest art form, which has been loved by people since the moment of its birth, and many classic operas have been passed down to this day. However, from the archaeological findings, the ancient Western drama is different from the present, which can be found from the masks on the ancient Roman theater. If you are also curious, the following Xiaobian will reveal the secret to you from scratch.
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In the south of Turkey, there is an ancient Roman city, the ancient city of Castabala. In the 1980s, the ancient city of Castabala was discovered by archaeologists, but because it was not available for excavation at that time, it has been protected and little is known. By 2020, with the permission of the local authorities, archaeologists began to excavate the ancient city of Castabara, and in the process also discovered the ruins of corridor streets, baths, churches and castles, etc., and also unearthed a large number of pottery and iron tools, showing the social style of the ancient Roman period and the living conditions of people at that time.
It is worth mentioning that the experts also cleared out an open-air theater site, covering an area of about 3,000 square meters, which can accommodate at least 2,000 people at the same time. Archaeologists say the discovery of the theater site shows that people at that time were crazy about theater, otherwise they would not have spent time and effort to build such a large theater. In addition, the experts also cleared out the stage of the theater, but now only the residue is left, but the mask stone sculpture on the residue is very interesting. These relief masks are slightly larger than the human face, and the facial expression is squeezed eyebrows, which looks very exaggerated, but people can easily distinguish which is the expression of happiness and which is the expression of sadness. For a time, mask stone carving became the object of heated discussion, and its role also caused controversy.
Some experts said that there is nothing fussy about the relief of the mask carved in the theater, its role is to attract customers, it is a kind of decoration, and there is no actual effect. However, some experts have put forward the opposite opinion, saying that the relief surface has practicality, but it is still the soul of the ancient Roman drama, and in many ancient Roman sites, some masks that can be worn have been excavated, and their role is for actors to wear.
Experts believe that the drama actors of the ancient Roman period had to wear masks to perform, if it was a tragedy, they wore a sad mask; if it was a comedy, they wore a happy mask. In ancient Rome, many ordinary people did not know how to read, so the theater hung different masks to tell people whether to perform tragedy or comedy next. In addition, with different masks, one person can play many different roles, and it also effectively solves the problem of the lack of theater actors. Therefore, the ancient Roman opera mask is like our modern opera actors have to wear makeup, and different colors represent different roles.
In addition, the ancient Roman drama actor wearing a mask has another wonderful point, neither need to deliberately create a happy, or sad expression, because the expression mask can explain the state of the actor at this time, so the appearance of the expression mask also lowers the threshold of the theatrical actor, even if a person is expressionless, it can also be a good performance of a comedy, or a tragedy. In addition, because the theater area in the ancient Roman period was very large, sometimes the audience in the back row may not be able to see the expression of the actors, so it is necessary to perform with the help of emoji masks, so that every audience can see clearly.
Some experts believe that the expression surface has scientific significance. As mentioned above, the theaters in ancient Rome were very large, and there was no amplification equipment at that time, and many people could not hear the voices of the actors alone. After research, experts have found that their mouths are exposed from the excavated expression masks, so the masks have played a certain amplification role. Later, some experts also conducted experiments, they brought the expression mask recording, and then removed the expression mask recording, and found that the former's voice was 30% higher than the latter, so it also showed that the expression mask can indeed play a role in amplification. In this way, even the audience sitting in the back row can clearly hear the actor's lines, rather than deaf people listening to the play, or blind people watching the play.
Nowadays, drama has a history of more than 3,000 years, and the inheritance has changed to this day, even if the West performs tragedy or comedy, actors no longer wear expression masks, because modern technology is more advanced than before, making up for some deficiencies, so the expression masks have been eliminated. However, as a kind of cultural relic, the emoji mask is also worth continuing to study, after all, it is a proof of history, let us know how ancient Roman drama was performed.
Resources:
History of Ancient Roman Drama by Jiang Lan, Publisher: East China Normal University Press
Wenlan Hairun Studio Editor-in-Chief Wen Xiucai, this article is written: Special History Writer: Liu Lijiang