ABSTRACT
In the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries, religious drama of all kinds suddenly leapt into prominence, both in England and on the continent. From being largely an occasional affair in Latin taking place in or near a few major churches on important religious festivals, it suddenly blossomed into a large number of impressive performances in the vernacular, drawing huge crowds, in most of the major cities of Europe. Sometimes these consisted of specially mounted shows which received only a single performance, but more often what was involved was the annual presentation of a complete cycle of plays, either stretching from the Creation of the world to the Last Judgement or, more often, surveying Christ's life from his birth to his death and Resurrection, with reference to only a few major events from the Old Testament.
