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mystery play
(redirected from Pageant wagon)

    Also found in: Wikipedia, Hutchinson 0.02 sec.
mystery play: see miracle play miracle play or mystery play, form of medieval drama that came from dramatization of the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church. It developed from the 10th to the 16th cent., reaching its height in the 15th cent.
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mystery play

Vernacular drama of the Middle Ages. It developed from the liturgical drama and usually represented a biblical subject. In the 13th century, craft guilds began producing mystery plays at sites removed from the church, adding apocryphal and satirical elements to the dramas. In England groups of 25–50 plays were later organized into lengthy cycles, such as the Chester plays and the Wakefield plays. In England the plays were often performed on moveable pageant wagons, while in France and Italy they were acted on stages with scenery representing heaven, earth, and hell. Technical flourishes such as flying angels and fire-spouting devils kept the spectators' attention. The genre of the mystery play declined by 1600. See also miracle play; morality play.

mystery play
(in the Middle Ages) a type of drama based on the life of Christ


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In an early 17th century map of Chester by John Speed (see next page), an inset on his map of the county of Cheshire, we can trace the usual course the pageant wagons followed.
Watching the watchers: drama spectatorship and counter-surveillance ... by Coldewey, John C. / Studia Anglica Posnaniensia: international review of English Studies
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