Pageant Wagon (Quicktime Movie)
Wagon Arriving: Faster Downlaod (wagon1.mov; 189kb)
Wagon Arriving: Better Quality (wagon2.mov;
355kb)
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Actors and stagehands pull a decorated platform,
called a pageant wagon or simply a pageant, into a pre-arranged performance
location, known as a station, where the audience has already gathered.
This pageant, depicting the creation of the universe and the fall of Lucifer,
began the York Cycle. |
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Each play-mounted wagon was the responsibility
of a different guild (or group of guilds). In many cases, the guilds and
their plays were thematically related. For instance, the play depicting
Noah's construction of the ark was sponsored by the shipbuilders' guild;
the play of the Wedding Feast at Cana (where Christ turned water into wine)
was produced by the vintners; and the play of the Last Supper was sponsored
by the bakers. This play, the Creation and the Fall of Lucifer, was sponsored
by the Tanners. |
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Historical records from the town of York suggest
that the most successful guilds invested quite a lot of money into their
annual production, which we can think of as a combination of corporate
bowling league, community theatre, and Thanksgiving Day parade. |
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The actor playing God stands on the upper level
of the stage; angels stand on the main level, and a chute descends from
the main stage, down through a gaping and smoking mouth, and to hell (the
ground).
Although this production shows the actors facing
the long side of the wagon, some recent scholars conjecture that the streets
of medieval York actors may have been too narrow for large crowds to fit
between the wagon and the neighboring building. The actors may have
delivered their lines over the long end of the wagon, to a crowd that could
spread out down the length of the street. |
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Deus (God), delivers the first lines:
Ego sum Alpha et O vita via
Veritas primus et nouissimus.
I am gracious and great, god without beginning.
I am maker unmade, all might is in me.
I am life and way unto wealth winning
I am foremost and first, as I bid shall it be.
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