Liturgical jumping

A priest of Auxerre writing in the early middle ages recorded some details of the Easter celebration: “Having receive the pilota [a leather ball] from the newest canon, the dean, or someone in his place, in former times wearing an amice on his head and the other clergy likewise, began antiphonally the sequence appropriate to the feast of Easter, Victimae paschali laudes. Then taking the ball in his left hand, he dance to the meter of the sequence as it was sung, while the others linked hand in hand did the dance around the maze (circum Daedalum). And all the while the pilota was delivered or thrown by the ringed dean alternately to each and every one of the dancers whenever they whirled into view. There was sport, and the meter of the dance was set by the organ. Following the dance, the singing of the sequence and the jumping having concluded, the chorus proceeded to a meal.”