may watch the slow process wherein the mind distinguishes between
fact and fantasy, the flowering of imagination and its subsequent dis-
cipline, the dawn of social consciousness. If he is particularly inter-
ested in theatre, he sees its beginning in the imitative propensity
which is natural to all children, that faculty through which the child
learns so much of the world around him. He watches the child assume
myriad characters and act out innumerable life situations: the little
girls plays mother, schoolteacher, nurse; the little boy plays father;
doctor, cowboy. Upon occasion children even play dog, cat, tree, or
bullfighter, creating situations and dialogue as the play progresses.

Making the analogy to the race of man, we see the beginnings of
theatre in the imitative faculty of primitive man, who used his skill
to show his fellow-tribesmen how he made the bow they so much ad-
mired, how he overcame the wily bear whose meat they enjoyed,
how he obtained the scalp that dangles from his belt.

The theatre historian is fortunate in the uneven development of
civilization, for he does not have to depend utterly upon speculation
concerning prehistoric man. Within recorded history civilized man
has come into contact with primitive man in practically all stages of
development and has noted his characteristics and his activities. Hu-
man beings in remote areas of the world, who have long been the
subject of study by ethnologists and anthropologists, have furnished
us with a fairly complete record of the progressive growth of social
institutions, including theatre. So we can suppose the steps which led in
remote ages to the sudden flowering of the great age of classic Greek
theatre, where, we generally contend, Western drama originated.

The rudiments of theatre seem to have developed in primitive
society for three basic reasons: (1) the need to supplement the
spoken language, (2)the need to insure and to increase food supply,
and (3) the need to insure victory over human foes. The reasons
could hardly be more fundamental. Other motivations for primitive
drama were initiation rites and pleasure plays.

What chiefly distinguishes man from his fellow-animals is his
power of articulate speech. In the very early eras of communication,
however, even this power was not sufficiently developed to transmit
from person to person all that was thought or desired. Even today we
have observed that among the Arapaho Indians of the Plains and in
some of the pygmy tribes of Africa language is in such a low state of
development that talk is impossible in the dark, since communication
relies so heavily on gesture. No doubt prehistoric man, impelled to

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