Page "Danse Macabre" Paragraph 6

Short verse dialogues between Death and each of its victims, which could have been performed as plays, can be found in the direct aftermath of the Black Death in Germany ( where it was known as the Totentanz, and in Spain as la Danza de la Muerte ).

The French term danse macabre may derive from the Latin Chorea Machabæorum, literally " dance of the Maccabees.

" In 2 Maccabees, a deuterocanonical book of the Bible, the grim martyrdom of a mother and her seven sons is described, and was a well-known mediaeval subject.

It is possible that the Maccabean Martyrs were commemorated in some early French plays or that people just associated the book ’ s vivid descriptions of the martyrdom with the interaction between Death and its prey.

An alternative explanation is that the term entered France via Spain, the, maqabir ( cemetery ) being the root of the word.

Both the dialogues and the evolving paintings were ostensive penitential lessons that even illiterate people ( who were the overwhelming majority ) could understand.