宋元以来，“伶人”和“优伶”“优人”的意义逐渐混同，成为代指古代戏剧戏曲演员的总名。宋代，是中国传统戏剧戏曲逐步发展成熟的阶段。北宋杂剧、南宋官本杂剧、“南戏”，以及金代的北曲院本杂剧等各种戏剧形态蓬勃发展，而作为这些戏剧存在所不可或缺的演出人员，宋代演剧伶人也必然在戏剧戏曲史和宋代社会文化史中占据一席之地。论文以宋代（包括辽、金政权）的戏剧演员，即“演剧伶人”作为论述中心。因为这类人拥有着共同的特征，擅长戏剧这一艺术门类，而长期以来在社会上的地位也较为相似。虽然他们从事的具体戏剧演出形式可能不同，但其生活状况并不因此而有太大的迥异。论文将演剧伶人作为一个整体，由点及面，进行了综合概括与讨论。论文以时间地域为线索，先后讨论了北宋、南宋，以及辽夏金少数民族政权中演剧伶人的教演管理、生活状况以及地位影响。力图对各时代演剧伶人的自身特点加以归纳，继而探索伶人群体在当时社会发展中的影响与地位。最终达到从戏剧演员这个不太为人所重视的角度来观察宋代社会文化生活的目的。

From Song and Yuan Dynasties, the definition of “Ling Ren”“You Ling” and “You Ren” have been confused, and become a general name of ancient drama actors. Song Dynasty is the gradually maturing stage of Chinese traditional dramas and operas. Many kinds of dramas, like North Song’s Zaju, Yongjia Zaju,and Jin Dynasty’s Yuanben Zaju, have been greatly developed. As the indispensable factors of dramas, the drama artists of Song Dynasty is very important in the history of Chinese dramas and operas, as well as the history of social culture in Song Dynasty.The key of the paper is the drama artists in Song Dynasty, including Liao and Jin, which is called “Yan Ju Ling Ren”. They are all good at drama playing and have some common features, as a result, their statuses in society are also familiar. Though they are playing different kinds of dramas, their living conditions cannot be very different from each other. This paper will treat them as a whole, from individual to the general, and give a comprehensive summary and discuss. This paper using time and space as clues, discusses the drama artists’ teaching and performing system, their living conditions and their status and influence in North Song, South Song, Liao and Jin. It tries to summarize the features of drama artists in different time division and then study their status and influence in social developments of that time. Finally, this paper wants to achieve the goal to study the social and cultural life in Song Dynasty from the unpopular study of drama artists.