Greek Dance Timeline

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c. 1500 BCE
Images of female dancers, perhaps goddesses or priestesses, appear on gold rings and as clay figurines in Crete.
c. 740 BCE
Dipylon inscription, the oldest known text written in the Greek alphabet, labels the Dipylon wine-jug as the prize of a dance competition.
c. 600 BCE
Dithyramb, a form of choral song and dance in the honour of Dionysos, emerges in Delos.
c. 575 BCE
Unisex group of line dancers on Francois Vase represent the Athenian youths and maidens saved by Theseus from the Cretan labyrinth.
c. 550 BCE - c. 300 BCE
Dancing figures, men and women, frequently appear in painted and sculpted artworks all around the Greek world.
c. 509 BCE
Lasus of Hermione introduces the dithyramb choral competition, known as the Great Dionysia, in Athens.
c. 400 BCE - c. 300 BCE
Female draped dancers, a particularly attractive category of Tanagra figurines, are produced in Boeotia.
c. 200 BCE
A descriptive review of Greek dance, including its history and typology, is given by Athenaeus in Book 14 of his Deipnosophists.
c. 160 CE
Lucian of Samosa writes De Saltatione (Of Dance), the only extant treatise on dance from antiquity, about the Roman theatrical form, pantomime, and its roots in ancient Greek dance.