Thailand: Twelve members of a theatre troupe enact a Siamese ballet, c. 1900

Although ballet in the classical European sense was unknown in Siam at the turn of the 20th century, the Siamese were avid theatre-goers. Mime, dance, plays and shadow puppetry were all very popular. Many of the stage plays involved dancers, mostly female, who adorned themselves in jewellery and exhibited lithe movements portraying beauty and flexibility, especially in bending the fingers back. The most common plays were called ‘khon’, which essentially feature scenes from the ‘Ramakien’, the Thai version of the Hindu epic ‘The Ramayana’. In this scene, half the dancers wear male costumes, while the others (left of picture) wear a female ‘phasin’ or long sarong