Dionysus

• Final punishment: Cadmus and Harmony turned into snakes.

5. Ariadne (various versions): - Theseus abandons Ariadne on Naxos. - Dionysus finds her, falls in love with her, and marries her. - In some versions, the crown becomes the constellation Corona Borealis. - They had children, such as Oenopion ("wine drinker"). 6. Midas (king of Phrygia): He asks Dionysus that everything he touches turn to gold → he regrets it when he cannot eat → Dionysus frees him by washing him in the Pactolus River (hence the river's gold). 7. Orpheus and the Orphic Cult : In Orphic versions, the Titans tear apart the child Dionysus-Zagreus → Orpheus is a follower/devotee → then the Maenads tear him apart for not honoring Dionysus (or for preferring Apollo).### Cult in Ancient Greece - Main Festivals: - Dionysia (rural and urban in Athens → birth of tragedy and comedy). - Lenaia (January, theater). - Anthesteria (February-March: opening of new wines, souls of the dead). - Agrionia (in Boeotia: persecution and symbolic sacrifice).

• Rites: orgiastic, nocturnal, with wine, dance, music (tambourines, flutes), ecstasy, sometimes consumption of hallucinogenic substances (modern theories).
• Followers: mainly women (maenads), but also men (satyrs, initiates).
• Key places: Thebes, Naxos, Icaria, Delphi (shared a sanctuary with Apollo), Mount Parnassus.

Dionysus is the "foreign" god who comes from outside (Thrace, Phrygia, Asia), but at the same time very ancient (he appears in Mycenaean Linear B as "Di-wo-nu-so"). He represents the opposite of the Apollonian order: creative chaos, instinct, dissolution of limits.

• Companions: satyrs (men with horse tails, pointed ears, very horny), Silenus (the drunken old man), maenads / bacchantes / thyads *(women in ecstasy, with leopard skins, thyrsos, dancing).

Domain and Powers

• God of* wine *, the vine, the harvest, and drinking.
• God of* fertile vegetation *, fruit trees, and sap.
• God of* ecstasy (ekstasis = to go out of oneself), ritual madness *(mania), and liberation from worries.
• God of* theater *(especially tragedy) → the Great Dionysia of Athens were in his honor.
• Associated with* fertility (sexual and agricultural), transgression *, and the wild vs. the civilized.
• Power to induce* madness (in those who reject him) and to cure *madness (in his devotees).

Main Greek Myths (the most important)

1.* Birth and upbringing (already explained above). 2. The Tyrrhenian pirates (Homer Hymn 7): Some pirates kidnap Dionysus thinking he is a mortal prince. He turns the ship into a vine, makes wine spring forth, transforms into a lion and a panther → the pirates jump into the sea terrified and turn into dolphins (except for the pious helmsman). 3. Lycurgus ( Iliad 6 + other sources): King of the Edonians (Thrace) rejects Dionysus → the god drives him mad → Lycurgus kills his son with an axe, believing it to be a vine → he ends up mutilated or devoured by beasts. 4. Pentheus in Thebes ( The Bacchae by Euripides – the most famous myth):

• Dionysus arrives in Thebes (his motherland) to impose his cult.
• Pentheus (king, his cousin) rejects him, forbids the cult, imprisons the god (who magically escapes).
• He drives women crazy (including Agave, Pentheus' mother).
• Pentheus spies disguised as a woman on the orgies on Mount Cithaeron → the Maenads mistake him for a wild animal → they tear him to pieces (sparagmos) → Agave carries the head believing it to be that of a lion → when he comes to his senses, he sees that he killed his son.

Main names and epithets (Greek)

• Dionysus (the most common) - Bakkhos / Baccheus (the one who provokes Bacchic frenzy) - Bromios ("the thunderer" or "the noisy one") - Lyaeus (the one who releases or dissolves worries) - Eleutherios (the liberator) - Dithyrambos *(related to the dithyramb, a choral hymn)
• Others: Nyktelios (nocturnal), Omadios (the one who eats raw food), etc.

Origin and birth (the "twice-born" god)

The most classic and widespread version (Euripides in* The Bacchae *, Apollodorus, etc.):

• Son of* Zeus and Semele *(mortal daughter of Cadmus, king of Thebes).
• Hera, jealous, disguises herself as an old woman and convinces Semele asks Zeus to appear to her in his true divine form. - Zeus appears in lightning and thunder → Semele dies incinerated by the divine glory (she was ~6-7 months pregnant). - Zeus rescues the fetus by sewing it into his* thigh (hence "born of the thigh" = twice born: first from Semele, second from Zeus). - He is born complete as a god. Hermes takes him to the nymphs of Nysa (a mythical place) or to Ino (his aunt) to be raised disguised as a girl to protect him from Hera. There is a different Orphic tradition (later, but very Greek): Zeus fathers Dionysus with Persephone → the Titans tear him apart and eat him → Zeus resurrects him from his heart → he is reborn (this version is more mystical and linked to the cycle of death and rebirth). Appearance and Attributes/Symbols - Depicted as a handsome young man, beardless or with a soft beard (more mature on some vases). - Long, wavy hair, often with ivy or vine on his head. - Thyrsos : a fennel staff crowned with ivy or pine, sometimes with a pine cone at the tip. (symbol of fertility and magic weapon). - Kantheros *(two-handled wine cup).
• Animals:* panther/leopard , bull , goat , snake , dolphin .