Joan Hausner, age 13, of Albuquerque, N.M., for her question:
WHEN DID BALLET DANCING BEGIN?
Ballet dancing can be traced to Italy during the 1400s at the time of the Renaissance. During this period of time, people developed a great interest in art and learning.
During the Renaissance trade and commerce expanded rapidly and the dukes who ruled Florence and other Italian city states grew in wealth. The dukes did much to promote the arts. The city states became rival art centers as well as competing commercial centers.
The Italian dukes competed with one another in giving costly, fancy entertainments that included dance performances. The dancers were not professionals. They were noblemen and noblewomen of the duke's court who danced to please their ruler and to stir the admiration and envy of his rivals.
Catherine de Medicis, who was a member of the ruling family of Florence, became the queen of France in 1547 and she introduced into the French court the same kind of entertainments she had known in Italy.
A gifted musician named Balthazar de Beaujoyeulx came from Italy to be Catherine's chief musician. Ballet historians consider one of Beaujoyeulx's entertainments, the Ballet Comique de la Reins, to be the first ballet. It was a magnificent five and a half hour spectacle performed in 1581 in honor of a royal wedding.
Beaujoyeulx's ballet told the ancient Greek myth of Circe, who had the magical power to turn men into beasts. The ballet included specially written instrumental music, singing and spoken verse as well as dancing all based on the story of Circe.
Dance technique at this time was extremely limited, so Beaujoyeulx depended on lavish costumes and scenery to impress his audience. Still the ballet was a great success and was much imitated in other European courts.
Soon Paris became the capital of the ballet world.
King Louis XIV, who ruled France during the late 1600s and early 1700s, strengthened Paris' leadership in the ballet world. He greatly enjoyed dancing and even took part in all of the ballets given at his court, which his nobles performed. But as middle age came on, he founded the Royal Academy of Dancing in 1661 to train professional dancers to perform for him and his court.
Professional ballet began with the king's dancing academy. With serious training, the French professionals developed skills that had been impossible for the amateurs.
Similar companies developed in other European countries. One of the greatest was the Russian Imperial Ballet at St. Peterburg whose school was founded in 1738.
The professional dancers became so skilled that they began to perform publicly in theaters.
As time passed, ballet technique was expanded, especially for women, to express new ideas. Women learned to dance on their toes. This achievement helped them look like heavenly beings visiting the earth but barely touching it.