The birth of tragedy in late sixth-century Attica was a moment of major innovation in Greek poetry and society. For the first time, gods and mythical figures came to life and walked onto the stage before the eyes of their audiences. Homeric bards sung about them, but tragic poets gave them a voice, making them interact both with each other and with a collective entity, the chorus. Combining the legends of epic with the songs of various lyric genres, tragedy was a hybrid genre that appropriated and transformed other artistic traditions. Its flexible and rich texture contributed to its appeal, and so did its production: masks, music, dance and stage effects in general.