The principal Roman Mimas were:—­Arbuscula, Thymele, Licilia, Dionysia, Cytheris, Valeria, and Cloppia.

In the satirical interludes of the Grecian stage, and the Fabulae Atellanae of the Roman theatres, the Exodiarii and Emboliariae of the Mimes, were the remote progenitors (says Malone) of the Vice or Devil, and the Clown of our English Mystery plays, the latter series of plays being the origin of the drama of this country.  The exact conformity between our Clown and the Exodiarii and Emboliariae of the Roman stage is ascertained by that passage in Pliny—­“Lucceia Mima centum annis in scena pronuntiavit.  Galeria, Copiola, Emboliariae, reducta est in scenam:  annum certissimum quartum agens,” is thus translated by an English author, Philemon Holland, “Lucceia, a common Vice in a play, followed the stage, and acted thereupon 100 yeeres.  Such another Vice that plaied the foole, and made sporte between whiles in interludes, named Galeria Copiola, was brought to act upon the stage when she was in the 104th yeere of her age.”  We shall, in another chapter, return to the Vice, or Clown.

CHAPTER VII.

Introduction of the Roman Pantomimic Art into Britain—­First English reference to the word Pantomime—­The fall of the Roman Empire—­The sacred play—­Cornish Amphitheatres—­Pantomimical and Lyrical elements in the sacrifice of the Mass—­Christian banishment of the Mimis—­Penalties imposed by the Church—­St. Anthony on Harlequin and Punch—­Vandenhoff—­what we owe to the Mimis.

With the advent of Julius Caesar and the conquest of Britain by the Romans, about the year 52 B.C., we have, in all probability, the first introduction of the Roman Pantomimic Art into this country.  Inasmuch as we have it upon the authority of history that Caesar travelled with his Mimes, and it is, therefore, not improbable that they came into Britain with him.  England, then, during the occupancy of the Romans, must have known the Dramatic Art, or else (as Dibdin observes) Pacuvius, Accius, and Livius Andronicus were ignorant of it.  Martial tells us that it did, and so does Boadicea, so that we have not only Roman authorities for it, but also British.

The word “Pantomime” could not, I may say here, have been Anglicised earlier than sometime during the seventeenth century.  Dr. Johnson’s earliest example is from “Hudibras”—­

    “Not that I think those Pantomimes,
    Who vary action with the times,
    Are less ingenious in their art
    Than those who duly act one part.”

Bacon and Ben Jonson use the Latin Pantomimi—­“Here be certain Pantomimi that will represent the voices of players.”  Again in the “Masque of Love’s Triumph,” etc., 1630, “After the manner of the old Pantomimi they dance over a distracted Comedy of Love.”