Thailand: A leading actor in a Siamese play poses in his theatre dress, c. 1900. The Siamese were avid theatre-goers at the turn of the 20th century. 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’.

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Photo credit: © Pictures From History / Alamy / Afripics
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