Χορός: A stage-shifting periact on which all the earth will dance. A Paradigm for dance from Antiquity to Byzantium and beyond

Abstract

This article aims to contribute to Iconodansa with a new rich concept (χορός), which could be translated as dance, as well as performative (dancing) space. Thus, χορός is a prolific tool for the research of the choral space. The author puts forth the syntagm Byzantine Chorography as the inscription of sacred space, χώρα, by the mystical dance, χορός. The originality of this concept stands in unveiling and enforcing an important paradigm (χορός), which has deep roots in ancient practices, in which it was imagined as a kind of stage-shifting periact on which “all the Earth will dance” (Euripides, Bacchae 114). In the Christian world, dance had too a cosmological and initiatic dimension. The ontological state of being as a dancing man actually justifies and gives full meaning to the Passions of Christ, which are necessarily experienced so “That Adam may dance” (Romanos the Melodist, De passione). Here, Adam stands for the whole humanity. However, the Byzantine χορός reflects a unique ontology, a new mode of being in the world and a new vision. As Agamben says, the paradigmatic character of things lies not in the things themselves but in being. Therefore, this vision of χορός, while joining Iconodansa, where many visions of the dance have been shared, could only be seized, like any other dance, in its own “exemplary constellation.