Like several forms of expression, booing originated in Ancient Greece and particularly in the theater, as a means to express dissatisfaction with the play.
Booing is not the most polite way to show displeasure, but it is not the worst either. It is definitely a more peaceful show of disapproval than, for example, hurling rotten tomatoes or spoiled eggs at the recipient who caused the reaction with his work.
Booing performers has a very long history, with the first written record of such an expression of disapproval or dissatisfaction coming from Ancient Greece.
At the annual Festival of Greater Dionysia in Athens in the 6th century BC, playwrights competed to determine whose tragedy was the best. According to tradition, the first performance of tragedy at the Dionysia was by the playwright and actor Thespis (from whom the word “thespian” originates) in 534 BC.
The award Thespis received was reportedly a goat, a common symbol for Dionysus, and this “prize” possibly suggests the origin of the word “tragedy” (τραγωδία which means “goat-song”). The festival was held during the lunar month of late March—early April.
It was a festival in honor of Dionysus, god of grape, harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and of ecstasy in Greek mythology. It was the theatrical festival of the year.
It is estimated that about 16,000 people attended the festival in the 5th century BC to watch the plays of Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, Aristophanes and others, performed at the Theater of Dionysus.
Plato and booing
In the Greater Dionysia, trilogies of tragedies were put on in competition, and Plato tells us that the audience did not disguise its feelings about its choice of winner, though the judges had the final say.
Plato disapproved of those who yielded to the “howling of the mob,” yet such uncouth behavior was common. In general, disapproval of any aspect of a play was expressed by hissing and booing, and the kicking of heels against the seats.
Some people hissed while others applauded, there were those who applauded while others remained silent, those who belched disrespectfully during quiet passages, and those who slept through the performances—and were left to sleep on after everyone left.
However, audience disapproval expressed by booing, on which many sources comment, is in fact a mark of the seriousness with which ancient Greeks took these performances. For example, the precision and accuracy of the actor’s voice, emerging from behind a mask, were vitally important in an open air theater of maybe 20,000 people. Audiences expected the best and technical mistakes in that area were ruthlessly mocked.
Ancient Greek audiences also responded to sentiments in a play that seemed especially praiseworthy or morally offensive. One actor was met with a wave of booing for extolling money. There was an uproar when one play began with the line “Zeus, whoever he is: I know him only by report;” the playwright changed it to “Zeus, as men truly say of him.”
When Socrates heard the lines “There is nothing so dreadful to relate, no suffering, no heaven-sent disaster whose burden mortal man will not have to bear,” he commented: “You can say that again.”
Interestingly, Sophocles’ tragedy Oedipus Rex—about the king who killed his father and married his mother, used by Aristotle as his ‘perfect’ example of the tragic genre—did not win.
When the democratic reformer Cleisthenes came to power in the sixth century BC (508-507), he dictated that audience participation should be regarded as a civic duty. The audience applauded to show its approval and shouted and whistled to show displeasure.
In gladiator fights, too
Gladiatorial games (munera) were introduced to Rome in 264 BC, when the sons of Junius Brutus honored their father by matching three pairs of gladiators. The fights were so exciting that the spactators’ participation was guaranteed. In 65 BC, Julius Caesar commemorated his father, who had died twenty years before, with a display of 320 pairs of gladiators in silvered armor. Most matches employed a senior referee (summa rudis).
Here, audience participation went beyond booing: it often determined whether a competitor lived or died. The crowd decided by booing or cheering the wounded gladiator, yelling ‘missum’ or ‘mitte’ (release or send away) as a gesture of mercy and conversely yelling ‘iugula’ (to kill).
However the final decision about the life or death of the gladiator who lost was not made by popular crowd appeal and was usually left to a single judge or adjudicator.
“Next taunts or mutual abuse without any warrant of hate, and applause, unsupported by affection . . . The perversity of it! They love whom they lower; they despise whom they approve; the art they glorify, the artist they disgrace,” is a quote from De Spectaculis, a treatise by Tertullian of Carthage written sometime between 197-202 describing the gladiator games and the morality of them.
Booing through the centuries
While people have expressed displeasure in a play or a game publicly since the first booing in Ancient Greece, the English word boo was first used in the early 19th century to describe the sound that cattle make. Later in the 1800s, the word came to be used to describe the disapproving cry of crowds.
Hoot, another onomatopoeic English word, was used as early as 1225 to describe the sound of disapproval. Ancient Greek and Latin both contain words resembling boo that mean “to cry or shout aloud,” though there is no known etymological connection to the modern English word. Displeasure was also expressed with hissing, groaning, hooting and hurling objects, often rotten vegetables or fruit but sometimes stones as well.
Since the beginning of organized sports, booing directed at the rival team has been part of the behavior of fans. Booing has also become an acceptable form of audience response to a poor performance at entertainment events.
This practice has in recent times come under criticism. The opinion is often expressed that to boo a bad performance is unkind to the performers and demonstrates a lack of sophistication. However, the counterargument goes that the combination of booing and applause help keep the quality of public performance high, by emotionally rewarding the good and punishing the bad.
Sports fans mainly boo to vent frustration and disappointment, or boo the opposing team. People overall can vent their frustrations at games, events, players, entertainers and politicians in a public forum. Sometimes it acts as a catharsis because one can’t do this anywhere else in everyday life.
#Booing #Started #Ancient #Greece
