greatly addicted to hunting, owing to which they are swift of foot. But there are people to be found who assert that Sicinnis is a word formed poetically from [Greek: kinêsis],[1] because in dancing it the Satyrs use most rapid movements; for this kind of dance gives no scope for a display of the passions, on which account also it is never slow.
Now all satyric poetry formerly consisted of choruses, as also did tragedy, such as it existed at the same time; and that was the chief reason why tragedy had no regular actors. And there are three kinds of dance appropriate to dramatic poetry,—the tragic, the comic, and the satyric; and in like manner, there are three kinds of lyric dancing,—the pyrrhic, the gymnopædic, and the hyporchematic. And the pyrrhic dance resembles the satyric; for they both consist of rapid movements; but the pyrrhic appears to be a warlike kind of dance, for it is danced by armed boys. And men in war have need of swiftness to pursue their enemies, and also, when defeated,
To flee, and not like madmen to stand firm,
Nor be afraid to seem a short time cowards.
But the dance called Gymnopædica is like the dance in tragedy which is called Emmelea; for in each there is seen a degree of gravity and solemnity. But the hyporchematic dance is very nearly identical with the comic one which is called Cordax. And they are both a sportive kind of figure.
29. But Aristoxenus says that the Pyrrhic dance derives its name from Pyrrhichus, who was a Lacedæmonian by birth; and that even to this day Pyrrhichus is a Lacedæmonian name. And the dance itself, being of a warlike character, shows that it is the invention of some Lacedæmonian; for the Lacedæmonians are a martial race, and their sons learn military marches which they call [Greek: enoplia]. And the Lacedæmonians themselves in their wars recite the poems of Tyrtæus, and move in time to those airs. But Philochorus asserts that the Lacedæmonians, when owing to the generalship of Tyrtæus they had subdued the Messenians, introduced a regular custom, in their expeditions, that whenever they were at supper, and had sung the pæan, they should also sing one of Tyrtæus's hymns as a solo, one after another; and that the polemarch should be the judge, and should give a piece of meat as a prize to him who sang best. But the Pyrrhic dance is not, motion.]
- ↑ [Greek: Kinêsis
