This is a
very brief history and should in no way be considered complete or authoritative. The only thing we absolutely know about the Commedia is that we know very little about it. The information here is based on what historians and interested theatre artists have been able to piece together.
Commedia dell'Arte (translated literally as "Comedy of Art") is an Italian form of semi-improvisational street theatre, dating back to the 16th century.
The theatre was most widely known for its use of masks, which covered half the actors' faces at all times. Each mask represented a stock character, and each character usually had its origins in a specific region of Italy. As the Commedia spread and troupes became more popular, new characters arose, old ones changed, people started writing plays down and the players migrated to France, where they began to perform for the nobility. Just as it seemed that the Commedia had become somewhat "gentrified" (get it?), it was outlawed in France, and the form disappeared almost entirely until the mid-1900s.
Today, various artists around the world have tried to breathe new life into the Commedia, discovering ways to make masks of leather (as the old performers had), and finding where the stock characters of past centuries live today. The Landless Gentry are just a few people trying to do this.
