An ekkyklêma was a wheeled platform rolled out through a skênê in ancient Greek theatre

Theatre of Ancient Greece

The theatre of Ancient Greece, or ancient Greek drama, is a theatrical culture that flourished in ancient Greece between c. 550 and c. 220 BC. The city-state of Athens, which became a significant cultural, political and military power during this period, was its centre, where it was...

. It was used to bring interior scenes out into the sight of the audience. Some ancient sources suggest that it may have been revolved or turned.

It is mainly used in tragedies

Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of art based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of...

 for revealing dead bodies, such as Hippolytus' dying body in the final scene of Euripides

Euripides

Euripides was one of the three great tragedians of classical Athens, the other two being Aeschylus and Sophocles. Some ancient scholars attributed ninety-five plays to him but according to the Suda it was ninety-two at most...

' Hippolytus

Hippolytus (play)

Hippolytus is an Ancient Greek tragedy by Euripides, based on the myth of Hippolytus, son of Theseus. The play was first produced for the City Dionysia of Athens in 428 BC and won first prize as part of a trilogy....

, or the corpse of Eurydice draped over the household altar in Sophocles

Sophocles

Sophocles is one of three ancient Greek tragedians whose plays have survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus, and earlier than or contemporary with those of Euripides...

' Antigone

Antigone (Sophocles)

Antigone is a tragedy by Sophocles written in or before 442 BC. Chronologically, it is the third of the three Theban plays but was written first...

. Other uses include the revelation in Sophocles' Ajax

Ajax (Sophocles)

Sophocles's Ajax is a Greek tragedy written in the 5th century BC. The date of Ajax's first performance is unknown, but most scholars regard it as an early work, circa 450 - 430 B.C....

of Ajax surrounded by the sheep he killed whilst under the delusion that they were Greeks. The ekkyklêma is also used in comedy to parody

Parody

A parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...

 the tragic effect. An example of this is in Aristophanes

Aristophanes

Aristophanes , son of Philippus, of the deme Cydathenaus, was a comic playwright of ancient Athens. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete...

' Thesmophoriazusae

Thesmophoriazusae

Thesmophoriazusae is one of eleven surviving plays by the master of Old Comedy, the Athenian playwright Aristophanes. It was first produced in 411 BC, probably at the City Dionysia...

when Agathon, portrayed as an effeminate, is wheeled onstage on an ekkyklêma to enhance the comic absurdity of the scene.

Sources

• Brockett, Oscar G. and Franklin J. Hildy. 2003. History of the Theatre. Ninth edition, International edition. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. ISBN 0205410502.
• Csapo, Eric, and William J. Slater. 1994. The Context of Ancient Drama. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P. ISBN 0472082752.
• Davidson, John. 2005. "Theatrical Production." In Gregory (2005, 194-211).
• Goldhill, Simon
  Simon Goldhill
  Simon Goldhill is a professor of Greek literature and culture at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of King's College, Cambridge. He is also Director of CRASSH, the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities at the University of Cambridge...
  
  . 2007. How to Stage Greek Tragedy Today. Chicago and London: U of Chicago P. ISBN 0226301281.
• Gregory, Justina, ed. 2005. A Companion to Greek Tragedy. Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World ser. Malden, MA and Oxford: Blackwell. ISBN 1405175494.
• Ley, Graham. 2007. The Theatricality of Greek Tragedy: Playing Space and Chorus. Chicago and London: U of Chicago P. ISBN 0226477576.
• Rehm, Rush
  Rush Rehm
  Rush Rehm is an Associate Professor of Drama and Classics at Stanford University, California, in the United States. He also works professionally as an actor and director. He has published many works on classical theatre.- Bibliography :...
  
  . 1992. Greek Tragic Theatre. Theatre Production Studies ser. London and New York: Routledge. ISBN 0415118948.