Death invites traveler-laborer.

In the bleak October of 1347, a bold grim guest arrived on Italian shores.  By 1348, Bubonic Plague had found its way into England. It would take years heaped like rotting cadavers upon those first two—1347 & 48—for the sudden awful grimness of the Plague to creep into the maw and marrow of men’s bones and chill them into giddy penitence.  The Bubonic Plague had in fact spread all the way from Asia (though little the Western world knew it then), and it ravaged Europe to her very core before crossing, in 1351, into Russia.

Soon after an unsuspecting person’s bloodstream was infected by the  bacteria, it traveled swiftly to any organ and all organs in the body including the brain. Symptoms were shivering, nausea, vomiting, headache, intolerance to light and a white coated tongue.  The infamous buboes would appear, blood vessels would burst, and the coagulated blood would turn black wherever it gathered, often at the ends of appendages. Untreated, the bubonic plague carried off 75% of its victims.

Amidst the stench, misery, grief and confusion, all manifestations of man’s existence changed to accommodate the unwelcome visitor: clothing, eating, traveling, language—even entertainment.  While populaces grew frenzied in casting blame upon one group or another for having brought God’s anger in the form of disease (though more truly in form of ignorance, which  plagues us still, begging your indulgence for my word play), Death had to be squarely looked in the eye or people would cease hope or any semblance of order.

Thus did a type of dramatic enactment develop, one portraying Death as a messenger from the Almighty (may it have a thousand wings and take us each with sweet gentleness on our day appointed).  At first the character of Death and his entourage moved slowly, with dignity.  Befitting sacred drama, the enactment took place inside a church or in its yard, perhaps in the cemetery itself, preceded and concluded always by a monk’s sermon on the certainty of death.

Northern Danse Macabre Guild performer, photo by David Urrutia

The end of the first sermon called forth actors from a real or seeming charnel house (morgue); with stately gait,wearing masks of death upon their faces and attired in tight yellowish linen suits painted with skeleton bones, they approached a victim. The chief of this crew addressed one to soon be taken, usually a king or pope.

Such an invitation was not received with welcome, as my reader shall quickly conclude. The recipient would decline, giving various reasons for inability to attend.  But the group would not be budged until, naturally, it had seized and led away its victim. This being but the very beginning of the message, another messenger would single out a second victim, of somewhat lower rank than the first, and so on, until all the levels of society had been touched, “the usual number being twenty-four.”

The Northern Danse Macabre Guild actors at the San Francisco Renfaire, 2008. Photo David Urrutia

When audiences grew accustomed—or perchance weary—of that slow and stately enactment with its profuse moralizing before and after, the characters and their movement evolved into what we know today as la Danse Macabre, ou bien, the Dance of Death.  The dance is known, naturally, most often by its French name, but the oldest traces of the early plays are found in Germany (Totentanz), while in Spanish, a text titled “La Danza General de la Muerte” dates back to 1360.

A monk named John Lydgate came to Paris in the year after the famous Danse Macabre painting was executed in the Cimetiere des Innocents. This was during the unfortunate period when France was subject to English rule (during the 100 Years War).  John went home and translated/painted the words and picture onto the walls of the cloister of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.   He added six dancers to the original number he saw in the Cimetiere des Innocents: four women, a juror and a magician.

L’acteur                                                              The Actor

O creature roysonnable                                                 Oh Reasonable Creature
Qui desires vie eternelle.                                                Who desires eternal life

Tu as cy doctrine notable:                                         You have this notable doctrine
Pour bien finer vie mortelle.                                  With which to finish mortal life:
La dance macabre sappelle:                                       It is called the Dance of Death.
Que chascun a danser apprant.                           That each one of us learns to dance
A homme et femme est naturelle,                         be ye man or woman; it is natural.
Mort nespargne petit ne grant.                  For Death disdains neither the lowly

nor the great
En ce miroer chascun peut lire                                    And in this mirror everyone                                                                                                                     can read
Qui le conuient ainsi danser.                               That he too will dance the dance.
Saige est celuy qui bien si mir                                       Wise is he who learns to see

Le mort le vif fait auancer.                         That death beckons the living to advance.
Tu vois les plus grans commancer         You will see the greatest on earth lead us,
Car il nest nul que mort ne fieret                         For noone can overcome Death.
Cest piteuse chose y panser.                                  It is a pitiable thing to consider–
Tout est forgie dune matiere.                                   Yet we  are all made of the same                                                                                                                  substance.

(My heart is so heavy at these thoughts, I must pause to gather my emotions. When I am stronger, I shall pick up the thread.)

St. Paul's Cathedral in London

Tags: 1348, Bubonic Plague, Cimetiere des Innocents, Dance of Death, Danse Macabre Guild, Northern Danse Macabre Guild, thedansemacabre