On the daie of the Epiphanie at night, the kyng with a. xi. other were disguised, after the. maner of Italie, called a maske, a thyng not seen afore in Englande, thei were appareled in garmentes long and brode, wrought all with gold, with visers and cappes of gold & after the banket doen, these Maskers came in, with sixe gentlemen disguised in silke bearyng staffe torches, and desired the ladies to daunce, some were content, and some that knewe the fashion of it refused, because it was not a thyng commonly seen.
It has been pointed out many times that many entertainments under previous English kings, back at least to Edward III, involved the donning of masks. Upon this occasion, in 1512, however, the English nobility that were present saw this as something quite different.
What made this different was that the nature of masque involved especially lavish and exotic costumes. These were generally worn by the males. The females soon learned to join in, in their ball gowns, and to be swept into a series of the popular dances of the moment, with anonymous partners, on the ballroom floor. When it came time to end the game, the women would remove the maskers “visers” or masks to reveal who lay beneath.
These masks came from the Italian Carnival ̶ Venice being the venue best known to the English. At the time Venice seemed the center of the world. Merchants and diplomats from the English elite found trade and much more there to value. All the western world (and much of the eastern) took its cultural cues from that Italian lagoon.
The meaning of “mask” was not precisely settled upon until near to the reign of James I. A masque was alternately called a maskeler, masker, maskeline, mascerade, mascerie, etc. In time, the version practiced in the court of Henry VIII would be identified as a particularly lavish masquerade: a ball featuring masked dancers.
The popularity of the masquerade was such that the small core group of noble maskers was dropped in the dances outside of the Royal Court. Everyone wore a mask. At least every male. This version of the masquerade Shakespeare provided in plays such as Romeo and Juliet and Much Ado About Nothing.
Masquerades were not the only entertainments to be referred to as masks in various Tudor records. Pageants were common and sometimes featured masked characters. A memorandum which William Cecil, First Secretary to the Queen left for himself is entitled:
Devices to be shewed before the Queenes Majestie by waye of masking2
This serves as example of the loose general use of the term mask. None of the entertainments listed is actually a masque. Each is a “devise” in which masks feature. A devise is a catch-all term for an inventive scene. It is generally synonymous with an exotic interlude. A masque was a much more lavish affair.
It waited until 1595 for what we know as a modern Masque to be performed. Like so much of the performative innovations of the Elizabethan Court it was created by the members of Gray's Inn. Like so many of the definitions of such matters, we defer to Felix Schelling.
While the word masque was employed with much latitude both before Jonson’s time and after, in the heyday of its vogue, a masque meant definitely an entertainment of royalty, usually given at court, in which the nucleus is a dance; a lyric, scenic, dramatic frame, so to speak, or setting for what we should now call a ball. An invariable feature is the group of dancers, from eight to sixteen in number, called the “masquers,” and usually noble and titled people. These take no part in the dialogue nor in the music, but by means of their grouping and graceful pose, their handsome costumes and stately presence in the midst of gorgeous and appropriate setting, mark and hold the center of interest. Such dialogue and action as the masque involves was, from the first, in the hands of professional actors, as was the arrangement of scene and decoration, the music and prearranged dancing. In form the masque was made up of three essential parts, the “entry” which included the first appearance of the masquers, their march from their “sieges” or seats of state in the scene, followed by the first dance; secondly, the “main” or principal dance, and lastly the “going out.” All these were carefully prearranged and rehearsed. But between the latter two fell the “dance with the ladies” and the “revels,” this last made up of galliards, corantos, and lavoltas; and these were extempore.3
Henceforward, this is what we will refer to as a “masque”. The considerable innovation in the form, from 1595 to 1642, will occur almost entirely within this framework. Nevertheless, there is a great deal more to be said.
The first known modern masque, performed before the Queen, at Gray's Inn, in Shrovetide of 1594 (1595 N.S.), featured the mythological figure Proteus. Nearly all masques during the period cited had figures from classical mythology as speakers and singers. None was played by a nobleman (or gentleman, in such venues as the Inns of Court) or woman. The nobility / gentility were, instead, the featured dancers. The musicians (or “waights”) were masque / ballroom professionals.
We will be referring to Tudor / Stuart masques at length for a while at Virtual Grub Street. This in order to explore not only the fascinating social-milieu and ritual of the masque itself but to provide essential context to an explanation why Shakespeare's The Tempest contains a play and masque performed at the December 27, 1604, St. John's Day wedding of William Herbert and Susan de Vere, the daughter of Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford.
1 Hall, Edward. The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies Lancastre & Yorke,... (1548). Hall's Chronicle; Containing the History of England,... (1809).
2 Blanks, Kenneth Bailey. The Masque: a Courtly Entertainment. Citing Welsford, Enid. The Court Masque 153-154.
3 Schelling, Felix. Elizabethan Playwrights. 233-4.
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