Bharatnatyam

The dancers who perform the dance at the temple is known as “ Devadashi”. The name clearly justifies the meaning is – “Servant of God”. In early ages, they enjoyed great deal of respects and were maintained by the King or the Government. All of them were very versed in Art, literature, music and obviously in Dance. This continued for a very very long time, specially, under Pallava and cholla rules.         A bharatnatyam dancer always starts and ends every dance by ‘ Pranam’ or ‘Namashkaram’. By this dancers show their respects firstly to the GOD, then GURU and the Audience.       At the time of British Rule, the discouragement of authority gradually grows throughout the 19 th century. Christian missionaries launched anti-dance movement in 1892 by saying it “a Disgraced System”.                 The Indian Cultural Community were worried that su...

Bharata muni is the creater of Natyasastra and believed to be written during the period between 200 B.C.E.and 200 C.E. The Natya Sastra discussed a wide range of topic, a practical manual for dramatic or performing art such as - music, dance, drama. It also consist of speech, costume, body language,gestures, stage decoration and most importantly the state of mind of the performer. an archieved image of Bharatnatyam dancers (image courtesy: Google) Indian traditional dance (nritya) - Bharatnatyam has its root in the asthetics of natyasastra. This is one of the seventh classical dance practices in India. There are lots of evidences in the 'Veda' which shows that the dance was used as a part of rituals to worship God. The epic period of Ramayana and Mahabharata also had evidences where dance was a part of worship rituals and entertainment. So by this we can say dance was flourished in India mainly for day to day worship of God.