Lecture 8: Dionysus

 

I. Dionysus / Bacchus = Liber

A. Origins and Family
1. Zeus + Semele ==> Dionysus, "the son of Dios"?

2. Vegetation god (cf. Osiris, Duzumi, Adonis, Attis, Persephone) / death and rebirth

  • Near Eastern origins
  • Bronze Age evidence (1400 BC): need to make Dionysus the outsider
  • Principal partner: Ariadne (four sons on Lemnos)

B. Functions

1. Life-giving liquids (wine, blood, sap, semen) (Bacchae p. 284, 296)

2. Fertility, esp. trees: Dionysus Dendrites

3. Irrationality and the release from restraints

4. Theater

C. Attributes

1. Vines, grapes, wine, ivy

2. Thyrsos

3. Maenads = Bacchae

4. Satyrs, sileni or Silenus

5. Panther and Goat

D. Places of worship

1. Extensive. Athens

E. Cult

1. Elements: ritualized ecstasy and release
  • Leaving city, especially women, in a "thiasos" (Bacchae p. 282)
  • Enthousiasmos / ekstasis / mania (Bacchae p. 301)
  • Sexual freedom: orgies (Bacchae p. 286)
  • Dancing (Bacchae p. 282, 283, 285)
  • Wine but serious worship, "entheos" (Bacchae p. 285-6)
  • Omophagy; tearing animals apart = communion with the god (Bacchae p. 284; 306)
  • Suckling animals (Bacchae p. 296)
  • Transvestitism (Bacchae p. 301)
  • Return and release: Dionysus Lysius (Bacchae p. 309-10)
  • Rituals institutionalized into festivals (Athens = Dionysia: includes procession, theater, other rites)

F. Major myths

1. Myths of Dionysus' travels
  • Hera drives Dionysus mad
  • Picks up elements of cult from Cybele
  • Midas
  • Conquests
  • Rescue of Semele from Hades

2. Myths of rejection and punishment

3. Zagreus

II. Euripides' Bacchae

A. Introduction to Greek tragedy
1. Origins:
  • Dithyramb
  • Cult
  • Thespis (6th c. BC) and the three great tragedians: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides (5th c. BC)

2. Festival of Dionysus (every March)

  • Religious
  • Civic
  • Artistic
  • Competitive

3. Theater of Dionysus (Reconstruction)

  • Outdoors (seats about 17,000)
  • Parts: orchestra, skene, cavea, parodoi
  • Three actors and chorus of 24 men, accompanied by aulos, "flute"
  • All male performers
  • Masks

4. Reoccurring elements:

  • Messenger speeches
  • Agon
  • Long speeches and stichomythia
  • Tragic warner (Cadmus, Tiresias, Stranger in Bacchae p. 288)

B. The Bacchae

1. Structure

2. Themes and Interpretations

  • Xenia (Dionysus as Xenos = god in disguise motif): rejection ==> subversion of civilization: woman vs. men, city vs. country, etc. ==> destruction of ruling oikos ==> sacrificial killing ==> institution of polis cult
    • KEY: The whole polis must receive Dionysus
  • Ambiguity (p.300): "The god is the most terrible to mortals and the most gentle"
  • Rationality vs. irrationality in religion (Bacchae p. 285, 287, 311)

    --Web Reading: Rome 186 BC (Livy, Book 39, 8, 13)

  • Mediator between humans and the gods (Bacchae p. 286-7) (cf. Demeter)
  • Culture vs. nature or the Apollonian vs. Dionysian (Nietzsche)