The history of Rome

These pastimes obtained a fixed local background in the Latin "asylum of fools", for which they selected the formerly Oscan town of Atella, which was destroyed in the Hannibalic war and was thereby handed over to comic use; thenceforth the name of "Oscan plays" or "plays of Atella" was commonly used for these exhibitions[10]. But these pleasantries had nothing to do with the stage[11] and with literature; they were performed by amateurs where and when they pleased, and the text was not written or at any rate was not published. It was not until the present period that the Atellan piece was handed over to actors properly so called[12], and was employed, like the Greek satyric drama, as an afterpiece particularly after tragedies; a change which naturally suggested the extension of literary activity to that field. Whether this authorship developed itself altogether independently, or whether possibly the art-farce of Lower Italy, in various respects of kindred character, gave the impulse to this Roman farce[13], can no longer be determined; that the several pieces were uniformly original works, is certain. The founder of this new species of literature, Lucius Pomponius from the Latin colony of Bononia, appeared in the first half of the seventh century[14]; and along with his pieces those of another poet Novius soon became favourites. So far as the few remains and the reports of the old litteratores allow us to form an opinion, they were short farces, ordinarily perhaps of one act, the charm of which depended less on the preposterous and loosely constructed plot than on the drastic portraiture of particular classes and situations. Festal days and public acts were favourite subjects of comic delineation, such as the "Marriage", the "First of March", "Harlequin Candidate"; so were also foreign nationalities - the Transalpine Gauls, the Syrians; above all, the various trades frequently appear on the boards. The sacristan, the soothsayer, the bird-seer, the physician, the publican, the painter, fisherman, baker, pass across the stage; the public criers were severely assailed and still more the fullers, who seem to have played in the Roman fool-world the part of our tailors. While the varied life of the city thus received its due attention, the farmer with his joys and sorrows was also represented in all aspects. The copiousness of this rural repertory may be guessed from the numerous titles of that nature, such as "the Cow", "the Ass", "the Kid", "the Sow", "the Swine", "the Sick Boar", "the Farmer", "the Countryman", "Harlequin Countryman", "the Cattle-herd", "the Vinedresser", "the Fig-gatherer", "Woodcutting", "Pruning", "the Poultry-yard." In these pieces it was always the standing figures of the stupid and the artful servant, the good old man, the wise man, that delighted the public; the first in particular might never be wanting - the Pulcinello of this farce - the gluttonous filthy Maccus, hideously ugly and yet eternally in love, always on the point of stumbling across his own path, set upon by all with jeers and with blows and eventually at the close the regular scapegoat. The titles "Maccus Miles", "Maccus Copo", "Maccus Virgo", "Maccus Exul", "Macci Gemini" may furnish the good-humoured reader with some conception of the variety of entertainment in the Roman masquerade. Although these farces, at least after they came to be written, accommodated themselves to the general laws of literature, and in their metres for instance followed the Greek stage, they yet naturally retained a far more Latin and more popular stamp than even the national comedy. The farce resorted to the Greek world only under the form of travestied tragedy[15]; and this style appears to have been cultivated first by Novius, and not very frequently in any case. The farce of this poet moreover ventured, if not to trespass on Olympus, at least to touch the most human of the gods, Hercules: he wrote a Hercules Auctionator.

The tone, as a matter of course, was not the most refined; very unambiguous ambiguities, coarse rustic obscenities, ghosts frightening and occasionally devouring children, formed part of the entertainment, and offensive personalities, even with the mention of names, not unfrequently crept in. But there was no want also of vivid delineation, of grotesque incidents, of telling jokes, and of pithy sayings; and the harlequinade rapidly won for itself no inconsiderable position in the theatrical life of the capital and even in literature.

Dramatic Arrangements