PERSŌNA

( larva , πρόσωπον or προσωπεῖον ), a mask. Masks were worn by Greek and Roman actors in nearly all dramatic representations. This custom arose undoubtedly from the practice of smearing the face with certain juices and colours, and of appearing in disguise, at the festivals of Dionysus. [ Dionysia . ] Now, as the Greek drama arose out of these festivals, it is highly probable that some mode of disguising the face was as old as the drama itself. Choerilus of Samos, however, (about B.C. 500) is said to have been the first who introduced regular masks. Other writers attribute the invention of masks to Thespis or Aeschylus, though the latter had probably only the merit of perfecting and completing the whole theatrical apparatus and costume. Some masks covered, like the masks of modern times, only the face, but they appear more generally to have covered the whole head down to the shoulders, for we always find the hair belonging to a mask described as being a part of it; and this must have been the case in tragedy more especially, as it was nece ary to make the head correspond to the stature of an actor, which was heightened by the cothurnus. IMG:6459379820872971714_ill291c.jpg: Comic Mask. (Statue of Davus in British Museum.)