Dance has been a fundamental part of expression in every phase of human history. Movement of the human body in rhythmical patterns has been used to give expression to life experiences since before the use of material substance and word. To the ancient civilizations and to primitive peoples of the past and present-day world, almost nothing is more important than symbolic movement–the dance. It is not a sin, or a leisure activity merely to be tolerated, but instead it is a very serious part of life and a sacred act. It has to do with everything: birth, death, choosing a mate, planting and harvest, hunting, feasts, war, sickness, and changes of the moon–for all of these occasions and more, dance was used by peoples of ancient times and is still used today by primitive peoples for human expression and to make sense of life.
As early as the Stone Age, dance became an art form–art in the sense of "the recreating of things seen and heard, the giving of form and substance to the intangible and irrational perceptions of the half conscious, and the experiencing in the creative process of divine rapture of another world and of self-forgetfulness."(1)
If music and poetry exist in time, and painting, sculpture and architecture in space, then dance exists in both time and space at once; the creator and the thing created being one in the same. Dance is the mother of the arts. But, saying dance is an art does not explain sufficiently all that dance is. It is one of the most powerful means of auto-intoxication–developing energy in the body and then releasing it. Distinctions between body and soul are blurred, emotions and individuality are expressed in abandon. In essence, dance is life taken to a higher level.
In order to fully understand the role of dance in history, to some extent early religions and the myths and legends that surround them must also be understood.
All dance was once part of religious ritual. Early religious worship was dynamic and outwardly emotional. Today, there are many religions in which emotional release and physical movement are still vital to worship, as the worshippers are able to use them to reach a spiritual state and connect with the "life-force". However, religion for many people in Western society means going to church, sitting and standing obediently through a service and making the appropriate responses. In Western culture, spoken and written language are predominant as the code of communication, and dance exists only as a small, peripheral part of our lives.
Long ago, dance existed as an affirmation of life, and the life-force was celebrated with the cycles of nature, especially the start of spring, the rebirth of nature. Eventually, myths were created to explain the phenomena of nature.
One of the most common themes of the ancient myths is the birth of the universe, and although the names change according to the part of the world the myth originated, the stories are remarkably similar. As the story goes, the universe began as inert matter, then a goddess, and later a god, breathed life by sending out ripples of sound. The ripples awakened all life, and created moons, suns, and stars which slowly started to circle each other, as in a dance. After the earth was created and filled with animal life, the gods taught mankind to dance.
Whosoever knoweth the power of the dance, dwelleth in God. — Rumi, Persian dervish poet.
Perhaps the most well-known story to illustrate this notion is the Greek myth featuring Rhea, who’s name comes from an archaic word meaning ‘earth’. Rhea’s husband was Chronos, who was known to devour his children at birth. So, when their son Zeus was born, Rhea wrapped a stone in swaddling clothes and gave it to Chronos instead of the newborn baby. Then she fled with Zeus and took him to a caste of priests called the Curetes, where he could be cared for in safety. There, the Curetes danced over the baby with leaps and shouts and beat their shields with their swords as they had been taught by Rhea, so that Chronos would not hear Zeus’ cries. According to legend, the priests repeated this rite in their religious ceremonies for centuries.
By creating myths and rituals, people sought to understand the enigma of existence, especially birth, the biggest mystery of all. The tribal acts of early communities eventually gave way to organized religious ceremonies, and the most important rituals were those regarding the fertility of the earth and the human race. Among these ancient rites connected to fertility were the initiations of puberty and rites designed to attract a partner and celebrate marriage. Erotic dance always played an important part in all of these rituals, in all parts of the world.
It would seem that the basic link between copulation and birth was made early in human history. Communities living alongside livestock or wild herds undoubtedly noticed the cycles of nature in the herds and drew a parallel between human and other animal life. Art also attests to the fact that the connection was made early on. For instance, there exists a stone plaque found at a goddess shrine at Catal Huyuk in Anatolia (now southeast Turkey) that dates back roughly 8000 years. On one side of the plaque it shows two lovers embracing and on the other a woman holding a baby.
From archaeological findings we have been able to ascertain that goddess worship existed before men’s role in creation was clear. Goddess statuettes that are thousands of years old have been found in many parts of the world, especially the Middle East, where goddess worship had the most devoted and persistent support. These earliest works of art ever discovered are of female figurines with large hips and breasts and their arms raised overhead as if they were dancing.
Human fertility was believed to be linked to the fertility of the earth. Women did the agricultural work and the link between a woman’s fertility and the soil’s was easy to make for ancient folks. It was believed that woman possessed a magical power which made the crops grow and this belief gave rise to the myth of a Great Mother, or goddess. The goddess was believed to be the originator of all life, and women were respected and feared for possessing secrets of nature.
Thousands of years ago, women in Anatolia and the Mediterranean enacted fertility dance rites from which all men were excluded. From the late fourth century BC to the Christian era, in the Hellenistic and Greco-Roman world, many of the popular female deities came from places like Syria and Turkey. In Cyprus, where Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and fertility originated, women performed ecstatic and erotic dances to wild singing and drumming. And in Sparta, the same was true, only in honor of Artemis, goddess of the moon and fertility. It was necessary for the dancers to be unrestrained, trance-like, in order for energy in the body to be released and to enter another level of consciousness, then the power of the deity could be transferred to the dancer. In addition to performing ritual dancing at all-women fertility ceremonies, women worshiped the deities in other ways.
In the Middle East, women worshiped a fertility/love goddess by having sexual relations with strangers. This custom took place throughout Mesopotamia (part of present-day Iraq,) and was also found in Egypt, Arabia and Phoenicia (present-day Lebanon). In the fifth century BC the custom was formalized in Babylon. Once in each woman’s lifetime she would sit outside the temple of Mylitta and wait until a man would come by and, invoking the name of the goddess, throw her a coin in invitation to sexual intercourse. The payment was an offering to the goddess in return for the man being allowed to take part in her rites. Once this had occurred the woman would return home. In Cyprus, young girls walked along the seashore at dusk and had sex with men in return for money which would be placed on the altar of Aphrodite. The money remained there until it was needed as their dowry. In Egypt, the goddesses Hathor and Bastet were worshiped for their powers of fertility and women sang and danced and offered themselves to men in the service of the deity. A similar custom was observed in service to the goddess Attar in present-day Lebanon. During classical Greek times, large numbers of dancing girls at the Temple of Venus at Corinth had sexual relations with male worshippers. Throughout India, in the second and third centuries, temples had priestesses who were erotic dancers among their other accomplishments. It was a great honor to be a temple priestess because they personified the deity. Not only were they generally the most educated women in society, they were well-respected. Some owned land or were from noble families, some married. One aspect of the priestess persona was that of a sexual goddess. They performed erotic dancing and had sexual relations with male worshippers in return for money which contributed to the upkeep of the temple.
Regardless of where or how the rite took place, the main purpose of these rituals was to bring the power of the deities into contact with the lives of human beings.
"Our loss of an instinctive life and our division of matter and spirit make it difficult for us to appreciate the ancient belief that sexuality was an integral aspect of spirituality."(2) The exchange of money for erotic dance and sexual relations is a concept that we have a hard time accepting in our modern society. However, for ancient peoples, erotic dance and sex were not considered filthy, evil acts–it was simply the best way to reach and receive the power and grace of their deities.
A temple priestess whose functions included sexual rites is sometimes referred to by scholars as an hierodule. This word comes from the Greek and means ‘sacred servant’. However, they use the term ‘sacred prostitute’ more often, which to the modern mind is contradictory: ‘sacred’ suggests being consecrated or belonging to the divinity or a deity, ‘prostitute’ suggests defilement. Although priestesses who danced and gave themselves to male worshippers in return for money have been described as prostitutes by historians, early dancers were not prostitutes as we understand the word. There is no indication that they were regarded only as women who sold sexuality for personal gain. They were often powerful women in their society and they did not have the present-day stigma attached to their profession.
When a temple priestess had carnal relations with different men, she was engaging in a sacred rite, not selling a sexual commodity in the marketplace. When she danced, she performed with her back to the worshippers, making her sinuous movement not for them, but for the deity, represented in effigy before her. Dancing released an energy in her body, a power which enabled her to unite with the divine spirit and, because of this, the men who made love to her saw her as an intermediary with this sacred force. She transmitted her energy to them so that they too were able to make contact with the divine. There was in those days an understanding of sexual energy which we later lost through the process of civilization and men certainly did not go to a temple out of simple physical need of a woman, for there existed prostitutes in the accepted sense of the word, who fulfilled this need.(3)
Music and dance were found at all celebrations for the fertility goddesses, no matter what part of the world in which it took place. Much of the dancing included movements that resemble or are the same as present-day Middle Eastern dance, which is known as belly dance by most people. All ritual dancing included some fashion of hip movement, like rotation, quivering, swaying, and sometimes the shaking of the shoulders and undulating movements in the body and the arms. The undulating movements were present especially in Greece, where worship of a moon goddess was strongest.
What happened to religious fertility dances and goddess worship? And why? It is not entirely clear, for it happened over a long period of time. It seems fear and distrust of women grew and finally prevailed throughout the world, and as a result, women’s sexuality and their place in public life were drastically curtailed. As brutal as the oustings of the old goddess faiths sometimes were, suppressing the immense esteem in which women were held for so long did not come easy. Women continued to worship their old deities in secret during the hundreds of years that it took to suppress goddess faith. Alas, today, the majority of the human race lives in patriarchal societies and practice male-dominated religions.
There are theories as to what happened to make these changes occur. Perhaps man began to understand his role in creation of life and then wrongly assumed that he was wholly responsible, and woman was only a receptacle for his creation. Or maybe it was the excesses of goddess worship that eventually surfaced. All original beliefs in popular faiths eventually lose the purity of the message and become distorted. In goddess worship, like all agrarian religion, human sacrifice was an element of the faith. In the ancient goddess faiths, sacrifice came to include the voluntary castration of men and the burying of the male organs as a fertility offering. As time went on, these rituals became more distorted and excessive. For example, a spring festival held at the temple of the Syrian goddess Astarte was presided over by eunuch (castrated) priests who would slash their bodies with knives when urged on by chanting, singing, and drumming. The religious excitement would grow so great and the crowd so carried away with the primal power of the music, that men would pick up swords which were set nearby and castrate themselves. So, perhaps it was excesses like this, along with the new insight into creation that encouraged men to revolt against the power of women in society.
For whatever reason, a change in societies from matriarchies to patriarchies took place and the repercussions were harsh; women’s rights were stripped from them and men were given absolute authority over the family. This alteration of the laws meant that women lost their freedom to inherit and pass on property, and essentially, then, became possessions themselves–first to their fathers and then their husbands. Sadly, the severe laws that were created to control women tens of hundreds of years ago still linger to this day. For instance: "An ancient Hebrew custom of condemning a women to death if she were not chaste at the time of her marriage is still sometimes found today in part of the Mediterranean and the Arab world."(4)
The ancient Semites were the first to begin the dethroning of the female-centered faiths. Unlike other Middle Eastern peoples, Hebrew tribes did not allow priestesses to take part in their religion. Slowly the process of burying the pagan faiths continued for hundreds of years, and the deities were changed from female to male.
Christianity and Islam came to dominate the Middle East between the fourth through the eighth centuries AD. Even though the dark side of female sexuality had always been an accepted element of ancient myths, the new male-centered religions were very distrustful and fearful of it and were responsible for the action to curtail women’s freedom and all customs connected with the faith through which they derived their power. Sex as a sacred duty was certainly considered a travesty by these newer religions, as shown by St. Paul’s remarks that just by touching a woman a man was defiled, and that celibacy was the ideal state for humanity. It was impossible, however, for the male-centered religions to completely annihilate all the elements of pagan faiths, because they had been so prevalent in ancient society.
Instead, Christianity incorporated certain pagan beliefs and adapted their meanings to fit Christian views. For instance, Christians celebrate Easter and Christmas as two defining elements of the Christian faith. However, Easter is an adaptation of the spring fertility festival in honor of Eastre, the Saxon Queen of Heaven, and the date of Christ’s birth was fixed as the 25th of December to coincide with Saturnalia, the festival of winter solstice, the birth of the sun. Despite these and other adaptations of pagan faith, in order to establish themselves, Christianity and Islam had to destroy other rituals connected with goddess worship, and so, an attempt was made to eradicated the celebration of sexuality and fertility through female dance. There is almost no mention of women dancing in the Bible, even though references to men dancing is frequent. Ironically, the main reference in the Bible to a woman dancing is also based on a pagan myth–the Christian version is the tale of Salome.
Salome was the daughter of Herodias, who married Herod. John the Baptist condemned the marriage and declared it invalid. For this, the king Herod had him jailed. In her own act of revenge, Herodias instructed Salome to dance for Herod on the night of his birthday celebration. The king was so pleased by the girl’s dancing that he offered her anything, short of half of his kingdom, as a reward. Salome requested the head of John the Baptist, just as Herodias had told her to do. Herodias had her revenge on John, as the king could not go back on his word to reward Salome with whatever she desired. This Christian story emphasizes the dark, destructive side of woman’s power and demonstrates the belief that women are wily, conniving, and the root of all evil. However, the pagan myth from which it originates is based on the belief in woman’s beneficial powers of nature. The Babylonian goddess of love and fertility, Ishtar, is the oldest of the great mother prototypes and she embodies all qualities, good and bad. The story tells how Ishtar’s lover dies and is taken to the underworld, which represents the womb of the earth. Ishtar, distraught over her loss, dresses in all of her finest clothes and adornments, and goes to the underworld herself to bring him back. At each of the seven-times-seven gates of the secret chambers of the underworld, she must leave a jewel and veil. While she is gone, the earth is barren and there is no love and happiness, but when she returns with her lover in the spring, the earth blossoms again, hence, explaining the changing of the seasons.
The dance known as the "Dance of the Veils of Ishtar," became known as the "Welcome Dance" or the "Dance of Shalome," (shalome being the Hebrew word for welcome), and was rewritten in the Bible with a reverse meaning; Ishtar brings life with her dance, Salome used hers to take life.
We think only of Salome’s dance as a dance of seduction and destruction, and not as the enactment of a fertility rite from which it is a derivative. Where this type of dance remained after the disappearance of goddess worship, it lost its religious significance and became a secular activity as an entertainment and art form created for observation and not participation.
In classical Greece and India, the custom of hiring performers for festive occasions was popular, although the payment for entertainment services is far from the meaningful payment for religious services that the first female dancers provided. The well-bred women of the time enjoyed watching a good performer just as much as their husbands did, but would not begin to think of dancing as entertainment for their own husband or guests, as this was menial work for slaves and prostitutes. The dancers that worked as entertainers may have been prostitutes, but it was of little importance to those who hired them because these women were simply the best dancers around. (These women were also the most educated women in many societies–another accomplishment that the upper class ladies seemed embarrassed to acquire.) The same custom of hiring entertainers for every celebration is still true today in the Middle East (and wherever Middle Easterners reside). In fact, without performers, there really isn’t a celebration at all.
The dance performed as entertainment today is essentially the same dance that women performed to demonstrate their power in the ancient Middle East. Its role in society has changed, but women of many cultures continue to dance that of the most womanly of art forms for the sheer enjoyment, all the while struggling to maintain their dignity in a society that is plenty hostile and condescending to their art form.
The erotic element of Middle Eastern dance has become the dark, objectionable side of the art form. To remove this element, though, would be to take away the very root of the dance. If art is to be a reflection of human experience in its entirety, then excluding eroticism would be a false representation of life. Simply because eroticism has acquired a negative connotation throughout most of the world (bestowed upon mankind by newer religions, like Christianity), it is not a reason to exclude it from the arts. (Ballet was once considered to be an erotic art form–showing one’s legs was taboo, but to splay one’s legs open, toes pointing to the ceiling, was altogether blasphemous.)
Today’s Middle Eastern dancers, professionals and hobbyists alike, find themselves having to navigate around the prejudiced, misogynistic, and repressed elements of society that cling to preconceived notions about the dance. The vast majority of Westerners know little about Mid East countries, their diverse cultures, religions, histories, etc., and what they do know are derogatory stereotypes fed to them by mainstream media and Hollywood. Therefore, for women who do take their art form serious, it can be awkward and exasperating to tell people what they do for a living or hobby. People’s reactions to the dance can range from all out condemnation with correlations to whores, to non-judgmental, genuine interest. The average response is generally somewhere between the two extremes because most people just do not know what to think and have mixed emotions. It is not common knowledge to everyone that it is possible to study the dance, its variations and its history, and most have had very little, if any contact with Middle Eastern dance. So, when suddenly a person is confronted with meeting or seeing a ‘belly dancer’, the stereotypes and preconceived ideas rush forth to comfort them.
The reactions that a Middle Eastern dancer encounters may somewhat stifle her enthusiasm for her art form, in that she may feel as though she cannot speak openly about it without creating confusion or provoking off-color remarks from others. To combat this problem, many dancers resort to concealing, justifying, or downplaying their hobby/profession, unless they are in a situation where they feel their artistry will be respected or at least acknowledged thoughtfully.
Some women choose to identify their dance by any name but ‘belly dance’. There are several different names that dancers can use: Middle Eastern dance (the author’s personal choice), baladi, raqs sharqi, danse orientale, danse du ventre, to name some. However, for those not familiar with the dance form and are only English speaking, these names, with the exception of Middle Eastern dance, will not give a clue as to what type of dance it is. In that case, a dancer may end up having to explain the meaning, and by doing so, would reveal the dance as being belly dance. (I choose ‘Middle Eastern dance’ because it is easy to explain that it is a broad term that includes folkloric and orientale (belly dance), fusion, and I have knowledge and experience with all of them. It is hard to fool some, though. When I tell someone I am a Middle Eastern dancer, before I get to the explanation they furrow their eyebrows, then exclaim, "Oh, do you mean belly dance?")
Westerners know only one name for the dance, and if you try to fool them, they’ll figure it out on their own, or you’ll soon be explaining to them anyway. Belly dance is just another name for the type of dance, and it is well-known, so why would it be objectionable to be known as a belly dancer?
The term ‘belly dance’ is loaded with misconceptions. The greatest is the idea that it is only a fancier form of strip tease, or an equivalent to ‘exotic dancing’. If asked to describe a belly dancer and her surroundings, you may, more times than imaginable get a description like this: A slave-girl who lives in a harem of a rich, powerful man who has many wives and sleeps with all of his harem. The location is a tent in the desert, and all the women are dressed like Genie, as in I Dream of… Even though she dances beautifully and cheerfully, she actually hates dancing because she is forced to do so by a man for his own pleasure. Or, in another version, she may love to dance because she is a beautiful nymphet who is graced with the knowledge of every sexual secret and is only waiting to be invited to dance for a man for foreplay. This seemingly amusing notion is exactly the reason why, when ask what they do with their spare time or for a living, a Middle Eastern dancer might just decide to veil the issue with unfamiliar terms!
This is not to say that all dancers have reservations with identifying themselves as a belly dancer. It is not to say, either, that women who dance this exciting, sensitive art form and choose a different name for it are ashamed of what they enjoy. Sometimes it is merely a way of trying to educated others to the fact that belly dance is something of cultural value. It should go without saying that if a woman is dedicated to studying, performing, or teaching belly dance, that they are proud of their art form. And so they should be.
Belly dance, the ancient dance in its evolvement, is an artistic and complex dance that does not allow for neutrality. It tantalizes the senses of the dancer and the audience with its spiritual depth, musical subtleties, and a connection and awareness to the female body. In these times of over-simplified thinking, indifference and asexuality, belly dance is a viable way for women to express joy, strength and sensuality.
Notes:
(1) Curt Sachs,World History of the Dance, (W. W. Norton
& Co., New York, 1937), pg. 6.
(2) Wendy Buonaventura, Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance
in the Arab World, (Interlink books, New York, 1994), pg. 32.
(3) Wendy Buonaventura, Belly Dancing: The Serpent and the
Sphinx, (Viagro Press, London, 1983), pg. 26.
(4) Wendy Buonaventura, Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance
in the Arab World (Interlink Books, New York, 1994), pg. 34.
Sources:
Amana Dance Theatre. http://users.be/a/amana.htm
Buonaventura, Wendy. Belly Dancing: The Serpent and the Sphinx (Viagro Press,
London, 1983)
Buonaventura, Wendy. Serpent of the Nile: Women and Dance in the Arab World
(Interlink books, New York, 1994)
Sachs, Curt. World History of the Dance (W. W. Norton & C0., New York, 1937)
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©1997 Julie Roberts