Pageant Wagons

The York Cycle plays were performed on pageant wagons that were pulled from one location to another around the town of York for different audiences. Basically, it is the equivalent of the modern day  parades. Because the wagons had to travel to several locations and also had to be moved quickly due to the following play coming up behind it, they had to be light, mobile, and small enough to be moved easily. Most of the time the pageants were moved by members of the guild that were putting on the particular performance.

The Wagons were a decorated wheeled platform which the actors performed on. They were small, about 8 feet by 12 feet. Some of the wagon had special effects as well, such as trap doors and rope-pulley systems. There were also wagons that had a separate scaffolding that could be attached to the wagon to allow another level of acting space.

The wagon for "The Building of the Ark" play would have to include a pulley system or a scaffolding for God to make his appearance because God should be raised above all other actors and audience members because of his spiritual importance to the religion. In medieval England especially, the artwork that portrays God, they show him always raised above the rest to honor his importance. Also, the wagon would have to show several aspects of the Shipwright's guild including some part of an ark assembled or in the process of being assembled. Also, because the wagons were so small and there was no back stage area, the set would have to be very minimal. Possibly a landscape and a heavenly sky would suffice for this particular play.

"Staging of the York Corpus Christi Plays (PSim 2.1)." Dennis G. Jerz. Web. 03 Dec. 2010. <http://jerz.setonhill.edu/resources/PSim/staging.html>.

CWU Brooks Library - Login from Off Campus. Web. 03 Dec. 2010. <http://www.oxfordreference.com.ezp.lib.cwu.edu/views/SEARCH_RESULTS.html?y=0&q=pageant wagons&authstatuscode=202&category=t40&x=0&ssid=63870849&scope=global&time=0.700288969431629>.

 "Pageant Wagon (vehicle) -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia." Encyclopedia - Britannica Online Encyclopedia. Web. 03 Dec. 2010. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/438245/pageant-wagon>.

"Medieval Theatre: Facts, Discussion Forum, and Encyclopedia Article." AbsoluteAstronomy.com. Web. 03 Dec. 2010. <http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Medieval_theatre>.

The ORO definition of Noah and the Ark

Noah:  

The son of Lamech, and the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, Noah was the hero of the biblical Flood narrative and the first vintner. After observing the corruption of all creation, God determined to cleanse and purify the earth through a flood. Noah, however, found favor with God, and he, together with his family and the seed of all living creatures, entered the ark and survived the deluge. From them the earth was then repopulated.

In many respects Noah was a second Adam. The genealogy of Genesis 5 makes his birth the first after the death of the progenitor of humanity. Like Adam, all people are his descendants. God's first command to the primordial pair to “be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth” (Gen. 1.28) is echoed in God's first command to Noah and his sons after the Flood.

Noah has traditionally been viewed as an exemplary righteous person in extensive postbiblical Jewish, Christian, and Muslim literature. However, the phrase “righteous in his generation” has also been interpreted to mean that at any other time Noah's righteousness would not have been viewed as extraordinary (b. Sanh. 108a).

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The main idea to remember when analyzing the character of Noah is that he was chosen by God to be the only family to survive the flood because of his righteousness. God saw Noah as the best suited to repopulate the earth and lead humankind on the right path. Thus Noah should be acknowledged and highlighted as a central and prominent character and portrayed as the example to all humankind. 

"Noah's Ark"  A Dictionary of British Place-Names. A. D. Mills. Oxford University Press, 2003. Oxford Reference Online. Oxford University Press.  Central Washington University.  3 December 2010  <http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/ENTRY.html?subview=Main&entry=t40.e9845>

Further Reading

Lay Performances of Work and Salvation in the York Cycle

The above link is to a scholarly article that deals with the York Cycle and some of its deeper meanings. It uses "The Building of the Ark" as an example to support its claim that the pageant plays were to show how "good work" was the way to earn salvation and to ensure you would arrive in Heaven.

         "In exchange for his work, Noah is promised deliverance from physical pain and spiritual death. At this moment, the play becomes an encomium to labor. Work is God’s gift that rejuvenates its receiver. Noah’s work earns his rescue on earth and redemption in heaven; it is symbolic of the good works that Christians perform to earn their salvation" (Boboc, p. 251).

It is important to understand the deeper meanings behind the author's choices when writing the scripts so that they can be conveyed properly to the audiences. Therefore in this particular play, the audience should leave the show knowing that their good works, be it physical work like doing their jobs or mental work of giving good thoughts to others, would secure them a place in God's graces.

Boboc, Andreea. "Lay Performances of Work and Salvation in the York Cycle." Comparative Drama 43.2 (2009): 247-71. Web.

"The Building of The Ark" -the play

I chose to write a dramaturgical blog on the York Cycle play, "The Building of the Ark," mainly because it was one of the only biblical stories that I was familiar with and could therefore understand. The script itself is a little hard to understand due to the Latin phrases and the old English writing, but after deciphering some of the language, the story itself is easily identifiable. 

The Script

This particular pageant play was put on by the Shipwrights Guild of Medieval York. Some of the script reveals the Shipwright's influence on the pageant itself. For instance, Noah uses some terms specifically related to the Shipwrights skill.

Ex) Lines: 98-104

Noah: Now bud it be all inlike thin,
So that it neither twin nor twine.
Thus shall I join it with a gin
And sadly set it with simmon fine: Thus shall I work it both more and min
Through teaching of God, master mine.

Translation:
Now must it be all equally thin,
So that it neither twin or warp
Thus shall I join it with a tool
And carefully secure it with good cement
Thus shall I work in every respect
Through teaching of God, my master.

This is just one of the sections of the script that talks of the proper way to build a ship and uses technical terms of the era for the Shipwrights.

These reflections back to the Shipwrights should be carefully noted when choosing to put on this particular production because the Shipwrights would have wanted to not only portray the biblical story of Noah, but to also advertise their craft.


Beadle, Richard, and Pamela M. King. York Mystery Plays: a Selection in Modern Spelling. Oxford [Oxfordshire: Clarendon, 1984. Print.

Scoville, Chester N., and Kimberley M. Yates. "The York Plays." Blackboard Learn. Web. 03 Dec. 2010. <https://courses.cwu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_4_1&url=/webapps/blackboard/execute/launcher?type=Course&id=_56297_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2FdisplayIndividualContent%3Fmode%3Dview%26content_id%3D_1030773_1%26course_id%3D_56297_1>.