1. Craft, Robert, “Genesis of a Masterpiece,” introduction to Igor Stravinsky and Robert Craft, The Rite of Spring Sketches, 1911–1913 (London: Boo and Hawkes, 1969), p. xvi–xviiGoogle Scholar.

2. Bronislava Nijinska quotes the St. Petersburg Gazette interview in which Roerich describes his scenario, in Bronislava Nijinska: Early Memoirs, edited and translated by Nijinska, Irina and Rawlinson, Jean, introduction by Anna Kisselgoff (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1981), p. 448Google Scholar. A letter from Svetoslav Roerich, the artist's son, gave me full details on the original scenario (August 22, 1981). The issue is discussed in Polyakova, E., Rerikh: Zhizn Iskusstvo (Roerich: Life in Art), (Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1973), pp. 168–17Google Scholar

3. This article develops material from my doctoral thesis, Nijinsky's New Dance: Rediscovery of Ritual Design in “Le Sacre du printemps“ (Univers California, Berkeley, 1985)Google Scholar. The thesis is not published but parts were adapted for two articles in Dance Research, the Journal of the Society for Dance Research, London, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Autumn, 1985) and Vol. 4, No. 1 (Spring, 1986). I would like to acknowledge the help and interest of my thesis chairman, Prof. Bertrand Augst, Comparative Literature, and committee member, Prof. Robert Hughes, Slavic Studies.

4. Useful references on primitivist models of Russian art in the late 19th and early 20th century are Camilla Gray, The Russian Experiment in Art, 1863–1922 (London: Thames and Hudson, 1962)Google Scholar, reissued in new format (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1971) and Compton, Susan P., The World Backwards: Rusian Futurist Books 1912–1916 (London: The British Library, 1978)Google Scholar. More general works on the social background of Russian art are Auty, Robert and Obolensky, Dimitri, An Introduction to Russian Art and Architecture (Cambridge University Press, 1980, paperback, 1981Google Scholar) and Alpatov, Mikhail, Russian Impact on Art (New York: Philosophical Library, 1950)Google Scholar.

5. “Conclusion”, Revue Musicale, XI (December, 1930), p. 103Google Scholar. Unless indicate otherwise, translations in this article are by the author.

6. Nijinska, p. 449.

7. Interview with Kenneth Archer (London, April 3, 1981).

8. My Life in Ballet, edited by Hartnoll, Phyllis and Rubens, Robert (London: Macmillan, 1968), p. 152Google Scholar. Also, interview with Leonide Massine (Berkeley, May 12, 1977).

9. Cottinet, Emile, “Le Sacre du printemps”, Le Feu, Paris (July, 1913), p. 831Google Scholar.

10. Interview with Marie Rambert (London, April 20, 1979).

11. “Nijinsky and 'Le Sacre“ New York Review of Books (April 15, 1976), p. 39Google ScholarPubMed.

12. “Introduction to Typescript of Notes for Le Sacre du printemps, Piano Scor for Four Hands” (Introduction, 1967; Notes, 1913). I would like to acknowledge Jane Pritchard, archivist of the Ballet Rambert, who made this material available to me.

13. Nijinska, pp. 315-316.

14. Ibid., p. 443.

15. Rivière, Jacques, “Le Sacre du printemps”, La Nouvelle Revue Française, Vol. VII (November 1, 1913), p. 723Google Scholar. The translation of this passage is from the doctoral thesis of Bullard, Truman C., The First Performance of Igor Stravinsky's “Sacre du Printemps” (University of Rochester, Eastman School of Music, June 6, 1971)Google Scholar. In addition to his written text, which is Volume I, Bullard included a collection of contemporary reviews, which is comprehensive if not complete, his translation of them comprises Volume II and the reviews in the original French constitute Volume III. His translation is direct, often literal, and I have found it useful for searching out choreographic clues. Another translation which reads well but is less helpful for dance data is the selection of excerpts by Lassman, Miriam, included as an appendix in Lincoln Kirstein, Nijinsky Dancing (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1975)Google Scholar. The Riviere quote given here is from Bullard, Vol. II, p. 296.

16. Ibid.

17. Ibid., p. 300.

18. Information on Yarilo cults and northern Slavic rites I have gathered from such sources as the following: Backman, E. Louis, Religious Dances in the Christian Church and in Popular Medicine (London: Allen and Unwin, Ltd., 1952)Google Scholar, a general book which deals with pagan antecedents; Billington, James, The Icon and the Axe (New York and London: Vintage, 1966)Google Scholar; Ralston, R.W., Russian Folktales (New York: Arno Press, 1927)Google Scholar; “Slavic Mythology”, Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Legend and Mythology (New York: Funk and Wagnalls 1949, 1972), pp. 1025–1027Google Scholar in particular; Unbegaun, B., “La religion des anciens Slaves”, Mana, Vol. II, 3 (Paris, 1948)Google Scholar.

19. Interview with Svetoslav Roerich (Bangalore, India, September 14,1983).

20. Karlinsky, Simon, “Preliterate Russian Theatre”, a chapter from a book-in-progress, which the author shared with me during a conversation on Le Sacre du printemps (Berkeley, May 20, 1982)Google Scholar. The quote is from the typescript, p. 23.

21. Ibid.

22. Beaumont, Cyril, Vaslav Nijinsky (London: Beaumont, 1932), p. 19Google Scholar.

23. Roerich, Nicholas, “The Stone Age”, Adamant (Paris: Franco-Russe, 1923Google Scholar, in French; New York: Coruna Mundi, 1924, in English, a translation which seems to have been by Roerich himself), pp. 125–139.

24. For discussion of the issue of rethinking cultural values, see Gray, especially pp. 110-130, and Compton, pp. 18-19, 26-31, and 92-95.

25. Buckle, Richard, Nijinsky (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1971), pp. 406–408Google Scholar. Buckle quotes Romola Nijinsky's account of the dance and puts it in context.

26. Cocteau, Jean, “Reminiscence”, in Lederman, Minna (editor), Stravinsky in the Theatre (New York: Pellegrini and Cudahy, 1949), p. 13Google Scholar.

27. Roerich, pp. 131-132.

28. The information about the horse as a sign of divination is from “Slavic Mythology,” Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend, p. 102 On Roerich's costumes for the women and men the horse charm and the decorated weapons can be seen in a photo of Sacre costumes published in Shouvaloff, Alexander and Borovsky, Victor, Stravinsky on Stage (London: Stainer and Bell, 1982), p. 69Google Scholar.

29. Roerich, p. 136.

30. This design for Act I is reproduced in “Nicholas Roerich and his Theatrical Designs: A Research Survey” by Kenneth Archer in this issue, p. 4. During the week of the Sacre première, the artist Valentine Gross made many sketches of the ballet, including five pastels which demonstrate the relationship of the choreographic groups and their costumes to the shapes and color masses of the décor. The series of pastels will be reproduced in the present author's book on Sacre at the time of her reconstruction of Nijinsky's choreography with the Joffrey Ballet in 1987-1988.

31. The design for Les Noces is published in Chamot, Mary, Gontcharova (London: Oresko, 1979)Google Scholar.

32. Conversations with Irina Nijinska (Los Angeles, December 17-18,1979).

33. Stravinsky, Vera and Craft, Robert, Stravinsky in Pictures and Documents (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1978), p. 92Google Scholar.

34. Ibid.

35. Ibid., p. 93.

36. Ibid.

37. Ibid., p. 90.

38. These collections include the Bakhrushin Theatre Museum in Moscow, the Stravinsky-Diaghilev Foundation in New York, the Bibliothèque de l'Opéra in Paris and the Theatre Museum, currently housed at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

39. See note 18.

40. Photographs of the costumes sold at Sotheby's are in the sale catalogue Costumes and Curtains for Diaghilev and De Basil Ballets (London: Sotheby and Co., December 19, 1969)Google Scholar.

41. Krassovskaya, Vera, Russkii Baletnyi Teatr Nachala Veka (Russian Ballet Theatre at the Beginning of the 20th Century (Leningrad: Iskusstvo, 1971), p. 438Google Scholar. Susan Cook Summer in New York and Ludmilla Bibikova Matthews assisted me with the translation of Krassovskaya's work.

42. Interview with Svetoslav Roerich.

43. Contemporary research needs to be done on the relationship between ritual dance pattern and talismanic designs on musical instruments and votive objects. What is available to read is either out-of-date or restricted to a single discipline, such as musicology or mythology. Probably the best results could be attained by combining methods of dance anthropology with those from the history of design. The necessity of combining methods no doubt results from the integration of ritual dance in social, cultural and metaphysical systems which draw upo n consistent visual symbolism. A number of available texts touch on this subject. Among those I found most useful are: Belo, Jane, Trance in Bali (New York, Columbia University, 1960)Google Scholar; Boas, Franziska, The Function of Dance in Human Society (1944; reprinted in New York: Dance Horizons, 1972)Google Scholar; Bourguigon, Erika, “Trance Dance”, Dance Perspectives, 35 (Autumn, 1968)Google Scholar; Deren, Maya, Divine Horsemen (New York: Thames and Hudson, 1953)Google Scholar; Halifax, Joan, Shamanic Voices (New York: Dutton, 1979; London: Penguin, 1980)Google Scholar; Hitchcock, John T. and Jones, Rex L., editors, Spirit Possession in the Nepal Himalayas (Warminster: Aris and Phillips, 1976)Google Scholar; Legeza, Laszlo, Tao Magic: The Secret Langauge of Diagrams and Calligraphy (London: Thames and Hudson, 1975)Google Scholar.

44. Buckle, Richard, Diaghilev (New York: Atheneum, 1979), p. 242Google Scholar.

45. The correspondence between Roerich and Nijinsky I learned about from Sina Fosdick, wh o was then director of the Nicholas Roerich Museum in New York. She quoted an article by Roerich in which he reflected on the life of an émigré and the dispersion of treasured possessions. In the article he asked, “And where are the letters from Nijinsky now?” Mrs. Fosdick, a Russian emigree herself, was then in her nineties, having worked in New York since her arrival in the early 1920s, shortly after which she met Roerich and began a lifelong association with him and his cultural projects. In our discussion she could not remember the name, date, or title of the article, or whether it ha d been published, but she could visualize the typed page, which was in Russian. Interview with Sina Fosdick (New York, October 15, 1982).

46. Conversations with Irina Nijinska. Bronislava Nijinska told her daughter of a wicker sewing basket in which she had kept Vaslav's letters to their mother; it was left for safekeeping with a Moscow friend when Nijinska left the Soviet Union in 1921, and contact with the friend ceased during the war.

47. Stravinsky and Craft, p. 94.

48. Nijinska, p. 460.

49. Stravinsky and Craft, pp. 92-94. This view is clear from the letters during the early rehearsal period, December 1912, through January 1913.

50. Krassovskaya, , and Rambert, Marie, Quicksilver (London: Macmillan, 1972). p. 59Google Scholar.

51. Stravinsky and Craft.

52. Nijinska, p. 458.

53. Ibid.

54. Ibid.

55. Nijinska, pp. 460-461.

56. Ibid.

57. The letter is published in Serge Lifar, Serge Diaghilev (London: Putnam, 1940), p. 200Google Scholar.

58. Nijinska, p. 461.