DAS REICH TANZT … DANCE IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE AND ITS DISCONTENTS Frederick G. Naerebout Rituals in their first, living existence are dynamic, always and every- where. 1 Unchanging traditions are a contradiction: if something manages to persist over longer stretches of time, it is because of its adaptability, the capability to change. Dance and other nonverbal components of ritual share in this dynamism. Nonverbal elements are often supposed to be relatively unchanging: the rituals develop, but nevertheless retain age-old movement patterns. This is a romantic notion disproved by the evidence: dance is as dynamic as any other element of ritual, if not more so, because of serious issues involved in how to ensure that the essence of a performance, by its very nature realized in the performance itself, is transferred across generations. 2 So dance is a dynamic element of ritual, and this was also true in the Roman Empire. Although it was not the Roman Empire that introduced dynamism, it is likely to have had an impact on the nature of the dynamism, i.e. its direction, speed and intensity. This impact can be labelled with the problematic but probably ineradicable word „romanisation‟, if by romanisation we understand the opening up of ever more avenues for the traffic of people, behaviours and mindsets, what one could call the „multiculturalism‟ of the Empire. 3 Within this context, rituals changed and were exchanged – with the concomitant music, song, dance and other nonverbal communication. In this paper we will focus almost exclusively on dancing. A detailed view on the phenomenon of dance in the Roman Empire contributes to our understanding of that society, the image of which will remain 1 For the concept of „first/second existence‟, see F. Hoerburger, „ηnce againμ on the concept of “folk dance”‟, Journal of the International Folk Music Council 20 (1968), 30-32. 2 F.G. ζaerebout, „εoving events. ϊance at public events in the ancient Greek worldμ thinking through its implications‟, inμ E. Stavrianopoulou (ed.), Ritual and Communication in the Graeco-Roman World (Liège 2006), 37-67. 3 F.G. ζaerebout, „Global Romans. Is globalisation a proper concept for understanding the Roman Empireρ‟, Talanta 38-39 (2008), 149-170.