Volchukova V. Problems of development and role ritual dance in early Christian culture

The dissertation is devoted to the problems of development and definition of a role ritual dance in early Christian culture. The influence of the Greek-Roman and middle East dancing traditions on it is determined. The dancing episodes from early Christian primary sources are analyzed which served for the Christians as samples of acceptable dancing movements. Some samples of early Christian ritual dances are given. The analysis which is carried out of the treatise "About music" and it is marked, for the ist time that Augustine Aurely gave the definition of Christian perception of ritual dance, and developed theology of reasoned rhythms of ritual. The role of ritual dance in interaction of religion and art of choreography, painting, music, poetry is shown. The carried out research has shown that ritual dance played an essential role and took a worthy place in the difficult process of the formation of early Christian culture.