"Danzare per Fantasmata", or the Embodiment of the Immaterial in Fifteenth-century Italian Dance Discourse

Abstract

Within Italian fifteenth-century texts on court dancing we encounter the fairly elusive expression «danzare per fantasmata». It has been connected with the powers of the imagination and the techniques of memory, in relation to both the performers and their audiences. It seems suggestive of some ghost-like experience. It is introduced in the key source, Domenico da Piacenza, with extraordinary images, suggestive of a moment of absolute stillness, soon followed by a swift flight. The relevance of this stylistic category on Renaissance dance aesthetics has undergone recent re-evaluation; so would deserve its implications for the time and space perceptions of dancers and onlookers alike.