The type and attributes of the god Dionysus (Bacchus). - Eastern Bacchus and Bacchus of Thebes. - Vine, ivy and thyrsus. - God Dionysus and God Apollo. - God Dionysus as the founder of the theater. - Bacchic masks. - Mystical chalice. - Bacchanalia - holidays in honor of the god Dionysus.

Type and attributes of the god Dionysus (Bacchus)

Dionysus(or Bacchus; romanized form of the last name - Bacchus), the god of grapes, personified wine. The cult of the god Dionysus was established much later than the cult of the rest of the Greek gods. It gained importance and began to spread in ancient Greece as the culture of the vine spread. Dionysus was very often combined with the goddess Demeter (Ceres) and they organized common holidays for these two representatives of agriculture.

In ancient Greece, primitive art was limited only to the image of one head of the god Dionysus (Bacchus) or his mask. But these images were soon replaced by the beautiful and dignified image of the old god Bacchus in a luxurious, almost feminine dress, with an open and intelligent face, holding a horn and a vine branch in his hands.

Only since the time of the ancient Greek sculptor Praxiteles, who was the first to depict the god Dionysus as a young man, has this type of youth in ancient art with soft, almost muscular forms, something between a male and female figure. The expression on the face of such a god Dionysus is a mixture of bacchanal ecstasy and gentle daydreaming, long, thick hair is loose over the shoulders in bizarre curls, the body is devoid of any clothes, and only a goat's skin is casually thrown over, legs are shod in luxurious caturnas (ancient shoes), in in his hands is a light stick, entwined with grape branches, reminiscent of a scepter.

In later times, the god Dionysus (Bacchus) is quite often at the monuments of art dressed in luxurious women's clothing. In group and individual sculptural images, Dionysus is usually presented in a comfortable reclining position or sitting on a throne. Only on cameos and engraved stones is the god Dionysus depicted walking with an unsteady gait of a drunk person or riding on some favorite animal.

Eastern Bacchus and Bacchus of Thebes

The most beautiful image of the god Bacchus with a beard is a statue that was known for a long time under the name "Sardanapalus", thanks to the later inscription made, but which all connoisseurs of art history recognized as a statue of Dionysus. This statue is a true type of Eastern Bacchus.

In art, the most common image is Dionysus, known as the Theban Bacchus, a beardless and slender youth.

The Greek painter Aristides painted the beautiful Bacchus. This painting was taken to Rome after the conquest of Corinth. The Roman writer Pliny the Elder says that the consul Mummy was the first to introduce the Romans to foreign works of art. During the division of the spoils of war Attalus, king of Pergamum, offered to pay for Bacchus, written by Aristides, six hundred thousand denarii. Struck by such a figure, the consul, suspecting that the painting possessed some miraculous power unknown to him, withdrew the painting from the sale, despite the king's requests and complaints, and placed it in the temple of Demeter (Ceres). It was the first foreign painting to be publicly exhibited in Rome.

On all the statues of the Theban type, the god Bacchus is depicted as a beardless youth in all the splendor of youth and beauty. The expression on the face of the god Dionysus is dreamy and languid, his body is covered with the skin of a young deer. The god Dionysus is also very often depicted riding a panther or on a chariot carried by two tigers. Vines, ivy, thyrsus (rod), bowls and Bacchic masks are common attributes of Dionysus-Bacchus.

Grapevine, ivy and thyrsus

The vine, ivy and thyrsus are emblems of the manufacture of wine and the action it produces. In antiquity, it was assumed that ivy has the property of preventing intoxication. This is why feasts often adorned their heads with ivy. The ivy, like the vine, on many statues of Dionysus entwines thyrsus, at the end of which there was a pine cone. In many areas of ancient Greece, pine cones were used in the manufacture of wine, which should have been very different from today's wine. Judging by how easily Odysseus managed to put Cyclops to sleep by giving him a little wine, we can probably say that wine in those days was much stronger than today. The ancient Greeks mixed honey or water with wine, and only as a very rare exception drank pure wine.

Many antique coins and medals, embossed in honor of the god Dionysus, depict sista, or a mythical basket in which items used in solemn services were kept, and also a snake dedicated to the god Asclepius is depicted, as if hinting at this healing properties which the ancient Greeks attributed to guilt.

The tiger, panther and lynx are the usual companions of the god Dionysus in all the monuments of ancient art depicting his triumph. They point to the Eastern origin of the entire Dionysus myth.

The presence of the donkey Silenus is explained by the fact that Silenus was the adoptive father or educator of the god Dionysus. The donkey of Silena became famous, in addition, for his participation in the battle of the gods with the Giants (gigantomachy). At the sight of the Giants lined up in battle formation, Silenus's donkey began to scream so that the Giants, frightened by this cry, fled.

The appearance of the hare in some Bacchic groups is explained by the fact that this animal was considered by the ancient Greeks and Romans as a symbol of fertility.

In addition, the following animals are found on antique cameos, engraved stones and bas-reliefs depicting solemn processions in honor of the god Dionysus: a ram, a goat and a bull - a symbol of agriculture. Therefore, Dionysus is sometimes depicted as a bull, then personifying the fertility of the earth.

God Dionysus and God Apollo

A slight intoxication, acting excitingly on the human mind, evokes inspiration, and therefore the god Dionysus is credited with some of the qualities of Apollo, this god of inspiration par excellence.

God Dionysus as the founder of the theater

Sometimes the god Dionysus is depicted accompanied by Melpomene, the muse of tragedy, because Dionysus was considered the inventor of the theater, that is, theatrical show. At the festivities in honor of the god Dionysus, plays began to be performed for the first time. Festivals in honor of Dionysus were held at the time of the grape harvest. Grape pickers, sitting on carts and painting their faces with grape juice, uttered funny and witty monologues or dialogues. Little by little, carts were replaced by a theater building, and grape pickers by actors.

Bacchic masks

Numerous masks, which often adorned ancient tombstones (sarcophagi), were indispensable accessories of the mysteries in honor of the god Dionysus as the inventor of tragedy and comedy.

On the sarcophagi, the Bacchic masks indicated that human life, like theatrical plays, is a mixture of pleasures and sorrows, and that every mortal is only a performer of some role in life. Thus, the god Dionysus, who at first personified only wine, became a symbol of human life.

Mystical chalice

The cup is also one of the attributes of the god Dionysus and had a mystical meaning. “The soul, - explains the scientist researcher of ancient myths Kreutzer, - drinking this cup, gets drunk, it forgets its high, divine origin, wants only to incarnate into a body through birth and follow the path that will lead it to an earthly home, but there, to fortunately, she finds the second cup, the cup of reason; having drunk it, the soul can heal or sober up from the first intoxication, and then the memory of its divine origin returns to it, and with it the desire to return to the heavenly abode. "

Bacchanalia - holidays in honor of the god Dionysus

Many bas-reliefs have survived, as well as picturesque images of holidays in honor of the god Bacchus-Dionysus - Bacchanalia. The rites performed in the Bacchanals were very diverse.

For example, in some localities, children crowned with ivy and vine branches surrounded the chariot of the god Dionysus, decorated with thyrsus and comic masks, bowls, wreaths, drums, tambourines and tambourines, in a noisy crowd.

Dionysus' chariot was followed by writers, poets, singers, musicians, dancers - in a word, representatives of those professions that require inspiration, since the ancient Greeks and Romans believed that wine is the source of all inspiration. As soon as the solemn procession ended, theatrical performances and musical and literary competitions began, which lasted several days in a row.

In Rome, the Bacchanalia gave rise to such scenes of licentiousness and immorality, even to the point of crimes, that the Roman Senate was forced to ban the Bacchanalia.

In Greece, at the beginning of the establishment of the cult of the god Dionysus, his holiday bore the character of a modest, purely rural holiday, and only later did it turn into a luxurious orgy.

The processions in honor of the god Dionysus in Alexandria were especially luxurious and magnificent. To give at least a faint idea of ​​this procession, it is enough to mention that, in addition to richly dressed representatives of all the peoples of Greece and the Roman Empire, representatives of foreign countries took part in it and, in addition to a whole crowd of dressed satyrs and strongmen riding donkeys, hundreds of elephants participated in the procession , bulls, rams, many bears, leopards, giraffes, lynxes and even hippos.

Several hundred people carried cages filled with all kinds of birds.

Richly decorated chariots with all the attributes of the god Bacchus alternated with chariots depicting the entire culture of grapes and the manufacture of wine - up to and including a huge wine-filled press.

ZAUMNIK.RU, Egor A. Polikarpov - scientific editing, scientific proofreading, design, selection of illustrations, additions, explanations, translations from Latin and Ancient Greek; all rights reserved.

Dionysus - god of the fruitful forces of the earth, vegetation, viticulture, winemaking
The deity of Eastern (Thracian and Lydian-Phrygian) origin, spread in Greece relatively late and with great difficulty established there. Although the name Dionysus is found on the tablets of the Cretan linear letter "B" in the XIV century. BC, the spread and establishment of the cult of Dionysus in Greece dates back to the VIII-VII centuries. BC. and is associated with the growth of city-states (policies) and the development of polis democracy.

During this period, the cult of Dionysus began to supplant the cults of local gods and heroes. Dionysus, as a deity of the agricultural circle, associated with the elemental forces of the earth, was constantly opposed to Apollo - as, first of all, the deity of the clan aristocracy. The folk basis of the cult of Dionysus was reflected in the myths about the illegitimate birth of a god, his struggle for the right to become one of the Olympic gods and for the widespread establishment of his cult.
Note: the authors and titles of the paintings pop up when you hover over them.


France. Fine arts of the 1st century. BC NS. - 17th century F. Girardon. "Apollo and the Nymphs" (decorative group in the grotto of the park at Versailles), Marble. 1662-72.

There are myths about various ancient incarnations of Dionysus, as if preparing his arrival. The archaic hypostases of Dionysus are known: Zagreus, son of Zeus of Crete and Persephone; Iacchus associated with the Eleusinian Mysteries; Dionysus is the son of Zeus and Demeter (Diod. III 62, 2 - 28). According to the main myth, Dionysus is the son of Zeus and the daughter of the Theban king Cadmus Semele.

At the instigation of the jealous Hera, Semele asked Zeus to appear to her in all his greatness, and he, presenting himself in a flash of lightning, incinerated the mortal Semele and her tower with fire. Zeus snatched Dionysus out of the flame, who was born prematurely, and sewed it into his thigh. In due time, Zeus gave birth to Dionysus, loosening the stitches not on the thigh (He. Theog. 940-942; Eur. Bacch. 1-9, 88-98, 286-297), and then gave Dionysus through Hermes to be raised by the Nisean nymphs (Eur. Bacch. 556-569) or sister of Semele Ino (Apollod. III 4, 3).
The boy who was born three months later was the god Dionysus, who, having reached maturity, sought out his mother in the underworld, after which Semele was transferred to Olympus. Semele's envious sisters interpreted her death as a punishment sent by Zeus for giving herself up to a mortal. Subsequently, Zeus took revenge on the sisters of Semele, sending all kinds of disasters on their sons.
The name Semele is of Phrygian origin, it means "earth"; probably Semele was a Phrygian-Thracian deity of the earth. The myth of the birth of Dionysus from Zeus was supposed to ensure the introduction into the Olympic pantheon of a god who did not originally belong to him.

Dionysus found a vine and taught people how to make wine.
Hera instilled madness in him, and he, wandering through Egypt and Syria, came to Phrygia, where the goddess Cybele-Rhea healed him and introduced him to her orgiastic mysteries.

After that Dionysus went through Thrace to India (Apollod. III 5, 1). From the eastern lands (from India or from Lydia and Phrygia), he returns to Greece, to Thebes. During his voyage from the island of Ikaria to the island of Naxos, Dionysus was kidnapped by sea robbers - the Tyrrhenians (Apollod. III 5, 3). The robbers are horrified at the amazing transformations of Dionysus. They bound Dionysus in chains to sell him into slavery, but the fetters themselves fell from the hands of Dionysus; braiding with vines and ivy the mast, the sails of the ship, Dionysus appeared in the form of a bear and a lion. The pirates themselves, who threw themselves into the sea out of fear, turned into dolphins (Hymn. Nom. VII).
This myth reflected the archaic plant-zoomorphic origin of Dionysus. The vegetative past of this god is confirmed by his epithets: Evius ("ivy", "ivy"), "bunch of grapes", etc. (Eur. Bacch. 105, 534, 566, 608). The zoomorphic past of Dionysus is reflected in his werewolf and the concept of Dionysus the bull (618 920-923) and Dionysus the goat. The phallus was the symbol of Dionysus as the god of the fruitful forces of the earth.

On the island of Naxos, Dionysus met his beloved Ariadne, abandoned by Theseus, kidnapped her and married her on the island of Lemnos; from him she gave birth to Enopion, Foant and others (Apollod. epit. I 9). Wherever Dionysus appears, he establishes his own cult; everywhere on its way teaches people viticulture and winemaking.

In the procession of Dionysus, which was of an ecstatic nature, Bacchantes, satyrs, maenads or Bassarids (one of the nicknames of Dionysus - Bassaras) with thyrsus (wands) entwined with ivy took part. Belted with snakes, they crushed everything in their path, seized by sacred madness.

With cries of "Bacchus, Evoe" they glorified Dionysus - Bromius ("stormy", "noisy"], beat the tympans, reveling in the blood of torn wild animals, carving honey and milk from the ground with their thyrsus, pulling out trees from the roots and dragging crowds with them women and men (Eur. Bacch. 135-167, 680-770).

Dionysus is famous as Lei ("liberator"), he frees people from worldly concerns, removes from them the shackles of measured life, breaks the shackles with which his enemies are trying to entangle him, and breaks down walls (616-626). He sends madness to enemies and punishes them terribly; so he did with his cousin, the Theban king Pentheus, who wanted to prohibit the Bacchic rampages. Pentheus was torn to pieces by the Bacchantes under the leadership of his mother Agave, who, in a state of ecstasy, mistook her son for an animal (Apollod. III 5, 2; Eur. Bacch. 1061 - 1152).
On Lycurgus, the son of the king of the Aedons, who opposed the cult of Dionysus, God sent madness, and then Lycurgus was torn to pieces by his own horses (Apollod. III 5, 1)

Dionysus entered the number of 12 Olympic gods late. At Delphi, he began to be revered along with Apollo. On Parnassus, every two years, orgies were held in honor of Dionysus, in which fiades - bacchantes from Attica (Paus. X 4, 3) participated. In Athens, solemn processions were held in honor of Dionysus and the sacred marriage of God with the wife of the archon Basileus was played out (Aristot. Rep. Athen. III 3).

From the religious and cult rites dedicated to Dionysus (Greek tragodia literally "song of the goat" or "song of the goats", that is, goat-footed satyrs - companions of Dionysus), an ancient Greek tragedy arose. In Attica, the Great, or City, Dionysias were dedicated to Dionysus, including solemn processions in honor of God, competitions of tragic and comic poets, as well as choirs performing praises (held in March - April); Lenei, which included the performance of new comedies (in January - February); Small, or Rural, Dionysias, which preserved the remnants of agricultural magic (in December - January), when the dramas already played in the city were repeated.

In Hellenistic times, the cult of Dionysus merged with the cult of the Phrygian god Sabazius (Sabazius became the constant nickname of Dionysus). In Rome, Dionysus was worshiped under the name Bacchus (hence the bacchante, bacchanalia) or Bacchus. He was identified with Osiris, Serapis, Mithra, Adonis, Amun, Lieber.

Maenads (M a i n a d e z, "insane"), Bacchantes, Bassarids · companions of Dionysus. Following the fias (crowds) of Dionysus, the maenads, decorated with grape leaves, ivy, crush everything in their path with thyrsus, also entwined with ivy. Half-naked, in the skins of a sika deer, with matted hair, often belted by strangled snakes, they call out in mad delight to Dionysus Bromius ("The Noisy") or to Dionysus Ivy, exclaiming "Bacchus, Evoe."

They tear wild animals to pieces in the forests and mountains and drink their blood, as if communing with the torn deity. Tirsami maenads knock milk and honey out of rocks and earth, human sacrifices are not uncommon. They carry women along with them, introducing them to the ministry of Dionysus.

The source of the myths about the maenads is the tragedy of Euripides "Bacchae", but already in Homer Andromachus, who learned about the death of Hector, is called "a maenad with a strongly beating heart" (Homer "Iliad", XXII 460 next).

Bacchanalia - this is how the Romans called the orgic and mystical festivities in honor of the god Bacchus (Dionysus), which came from the East and spread first through southern Italy and Etruria, and by the 2nd century. BC NS. - throughout Italy and in Rome.

The Bacchanalia was carried out in secret, attended only by women who gathered in the grove of Similia near the Aventine Hill on the 16th and 17th March. Later, men began to come to the ceremony, and the celebrations began to be held five times a month.

The ill fame of these festivities, which planned many different crimes and political collusion, which was partly disseminated by the Senate - the so-called Senatus consultum de Bacchanalibus (inscription on a bronze tablet found in Calabria in 1640) - contributed to the prohibition of Bacchanalia throughout Italy except in isolated special cases, which had to be approved directly by the Senate.

Despite the heavy punishment imposed on violators of this decree, the Bacchanalia was not eradicated, at least in southern Italy, for a very long time. In addition to Dionysus, Bacchus is equated with Lieber (and also with Lieber Pate). Lieber ("free") was the god of fertility, wine and growth, he was married to Lieber. The holiday in his honor was called Liberalia, it was celebrated on March 17, but according to some myths, the holiday was also celebrated on March 5.

These festivities were combined with the wild, frenzied revelry of the lowest animal passions and were often accompanied by violence and murder. In 186 the Senate took the most stringent measures against them (Senatusconsultum de Bacchanalibus has come down to us on a bronze plaque now kept in Vienna). Consuls carried out searches throughout Italy, which resulted in many executions, exile and imprisonment (Livy, 29, 8-18). However, it was not possible to completely eradicate these immoral mysteries, and their name remained for a long time to denote noisy drinking, and in this sense is used in Russia.

There are many sources of information, including: http://www.greekroman.ru, http://mythology.sgu.ru, http://myfhology.narod.ru, http://ru.wikipedia.org

Kretschmer tried to deduce the name Semele from the Thracian-Phrygian word meaning "goddess of the earth", and such etymology was agreed by such prominent scientists as Nilsson and Vilamovitz. Whether this explanation is true or not, it does not provide anything for understanding the myth. First, it is difficult to imagine the hierogamy of Mother Earth and the heavenly god, which would end with the death of the first in the fire. On the other hand, the earliest traditions, significantly, emphasize this very fact: mortal woman, Semele, gave birth to god. And it is precisely this paradoxical duality of Dionysus that is important for the Greeks, since only it can explain the unusual fate of this god.

Born a mortal woman, Dionysus had no right to belong to the Olympic pantheon; however, he managed to establish himself in it, and in the end to bring there his mother, Semele. Many references show that Homer knew about Dionysus, but neither the poet nor his audience was interested in the "foreign" god, so unlike the Olympians. And yet we owe the very first testimonies of Dionysus to Homer. The Iliad (VI, 128-40) tells a famous story: the Thracian hero Lycurgus pursues the nurses of Dionysus, "and they all at once drop the objects of their worship on the ground," while the god, "filled with horror, threw himself into the waves of the sea, and Thetis pressed him, trembling, to her chest, because a tremor seized him when he heard a war cry. " But Lycurgus "aroused the wrath of the gods," and Zeus blinded him, and he did not live long, because "all the immortal gods hated him."

In this story, where there is an escape from the "wolf-man" and a jump into the sea, traces of an ancient initiatory scenario can be discerned. However, in Homer's time, the meaning and intent of the myth were different. Homer shows us an episode characteristic of the fate of Dionysus - his "pursuit" by hostile characters. But the myth also suggests that Dionysus is recognized as a member of the family of gods, because not only his father Zeus, but all other gods feel offended by the actions of Lycurgus.

In this persecution finds its dramatic expression "resistance" to the nature of Dionysus and the religious "load" of his image. Perseus directs his army against Dionysus and the accompanying "sea inhabitants"; according to one of the legends, he threw God to the bottom of Lake Lernaeus (Plutarch. De Iside, 35). We again come across the theme of persecution in the analysis of Euripides' Bacchae. Attempts are known to interpret such episodes as mythologized traces of rejection, which the cult of Dionysus came across. They are based on the theory that Dionysus is supposedly a "foreign" deity, as he appeared relatively late in Greece. After Erwin Rode, most scholars regard Dionysus as a Thracian god who came to Greece either directly from Thrace or from Phrygia. But Walter Otto draws attention to the ancient and pan-Hellenistic character of Dionysus, and the fact that his name is di-wo-nu-so-jo- is in the Mycenaean monuments, it seems, confirms his hypothesis. Nevertheless, Herodotus believed that Dionysus "appeared late" and that in Euripides' Bacchae (lines 220-21) Pentheus speaks of "this alien god: what kind of god, I do not know."

But regardless of what the history of the penetration of the cult of Dionysus into Greece was, the myths and mythological fragments indicating the rejection he met have a deeper meaning: they give us knowledge about the Dionysian religious experience, and about the special structure of the deity himself. Dionysus would inevitably provoke resistance and persecution, because the religious experience associated with him threatened the entire lifestyle and world of values ​​at that time. The supremacy of the Olympic religion and its institutions could be shaken. But in rejection, a more subtle drama also expressed itself - of those that are abundantly recorded in the history of religions - resistance to any absolute religious experience due to the fact that such an experience can only be realized through denial everything else(no matter what term it is designated - balance, personality, consciousness, mind, etc.).

Walter Otto was well aware of the relationship between the theme of "persecution" of Dionysus and the typology of his many and varied epiphanies. Dionysus is such a god who suddenly appears and then mysteriously disappears. At the celebrations of Agrionius in Chaeronea, women searched in vain for him and announced that God had poisoned himself to the Muses, who hid him. (Otto. Dionysos, p. 79). He dives to the bottom of the Lerna or into the sea and disappears, and then appears - as in the celebration of the Anfesteria - in a boat on the crests of the waves. Mentions of his "awakening" in a wicker cradle (Otto, p. 82 sq.) Indicate the same mythical theme. These periodic phenomena and disappearances place Dionysus among the gods of vegetation. He does show some solidarity with plant life: ivy and pine are almost inseparable from his image, and the most popular holidays in his honor coincide with the agricultural calendar. But Dionysus is life in its entirety, which can be seen from the way he is connected with water, with blood, sperm, with growth processes, and by the exuberant vitality that his "animal" epiphanies (bull, lion, goat) demonstrate ... In his unexpected appearances and disappearances, one can see the analogy of the origin and extinction of life, that is, the alternation of life and death and, ultimately, their unity. But this is not an "objective" observation of a cosmic phenomenon, whose ordinariness could not give rise to a single religious idea or give rise to a myth. Through his appearances and disappearances, Dionysus reveals the mystery - and holiness - of the union of life and death. And this revelation is religious in nature, for it is the presence of the deity that produces it. In addition, Dionysus' apparitions and disappearances are not always associated with the seasons: he may appear in winter, but hide at the very spring festival, where he performs his most triumphant epiphany.

Disappearance is a mythological expression of the descent into Hades, death. And indeed, in Delphi they showed the grave of Dionysus; it was also said that he died in Argos. And when, during a ritual in Argos, Dionysus is called from the depths of the sea ( Plutarch. De Iside, 35), he again comes from the land of the dead. One of the Orphic hymns (§ 53) says that when Dionysus is not, he is with Persephone. Finally, the myth of Zagreus-Dionysus, which we will discuss below, tells of the terrible death of a deity, killed, torn to pieces and eaten by the titans.

These diverse and complementary features of the image of Dionysus can still be discerned in the public rites dedicated to him, despite the inevitable amendments and interpretations.

§ 123. Archaic nature of some national holidays

Since the time of Lysistratus, four festivals have been held in Athens in honor of Dionysus. Rural Dionysias, which took place in December, were village festivals. The procession carried a huge phallus, crowds with songs accompanied him. Widespread in the world and essentially archaic, "phalloforia" is certainly older than the cult of Dionysus. Among the ritual entertainment were different kinds competitions, and most importantly - a parade of mummers in masks or in animal costumes. These rituals themselves appeared before Dionysus, but in this case it is not difficult to understand how the god of wine became the leader of the procession of masks.

We know much less about the Lenei in the middle of winter. In Heraclitus, you can read that the word "Lenei" and the verb "perform Lenei" were used as equivalents of the word "bacchante" and the verb "play bacchante". God was called with daidouchos. According to the interpretation of one of the verses of Aristophanes, the Eleusinian priest, "holding a torch in his hand, says:" Call God! ", And those present exclaim:" Son of Semele, Iacchus, giver of riches! "

Anfesterias were celebrated around February-March, and the Great Dionysias, which appeared later, in March-April. Thucydides (II, 15.4) regards Anfesteria as the earliest known festival in honor of Dionysus, and also the most important. On the first day, called Pythogia, earthen jugs were opened (pithoi- pithos) with wine from the harvest of the previous fall. The casks were transferred to the sanctuary of Dionysus "in the Swamp", a libation was offered to God, and then the new wine was tasted. On the second day (called Choes,"jugs") competitions were held on the speed of drinking: the participants received full jugs of wine and at the signal had to drink them in a race. This competition, like some competitions in rural Dionysia (for example, askoliasmos, where young people are trying to maintain balance on oiled fur), takes place according to the same well-known scenario as all kinds of fights and tournaments (in sports, in public speaking), the meaning of which is to contribute to the renewal of life. But the intoxicating euphoria of these festivities speaks of the expectation of a different afterlife than the one that the Homeric gloomy underworld promises to people.

In a day Choes there was also a procession symbolizing the entry of God into the city. Since he was believed to be from the sea, a boat was carried through the city on four wheels from a chariot, in which Dionysus sat with a vine in his hand, and with him - two naked satyrs playing flutes. A large crowd, perhaps in masks or costumes, the sacrificial bull who walked first, the flutist, and those who carried the garlands, made up the procession that moved to Lenya, an ancient sanctuary open only on this day. Various ceremonies took place there, in which they took part basilinna,"Queen", that is, the wife of the king-archon, and her four associates. From now on basilinna, the heiress of the ancient queens of the city, was considered the wife of Dionysus. She rode beside him in a cart, and now a new procession, of a wedding type, was heading for Bukoley (literally "bull's stall"), the ancient residence of the kings. Aristotle claims that there, in Bukole, the sacred marriage of God and the queen was played out (Ath. Pol. 3,5). The fact that it was Bucoli that was chosen for this indicates that the belief in the "bullish" epiphany of Dionysus was preserved.

Attempts were made to interpret this union in a symbolic sense, and the god, presumably, was portrayed by the archon. But Walter Otto does not accidentally emphasize the importance of Aristotle's testimony.

The queen accepts God in the house of her husband, the heir to the kings, - therefore, Dionysus acts as a king. Perhaps this union symbolizes the marriage of the deity with the city itself, a marriage that promises the latter all kinds of benefits. But this act is characteristic of Dionysus - a deity whose epiphanies are brutal and who demands that his supremacy be publicly proclaimed. We do not know of any other Greek cult in which God was united with a queen.

But the three days of Anfesterius, and especially the second of them - the day of the triumph of Dionysus, is an unfavorable, evil time, because on these days the souls of the dead return to earth, and with them - the kera, carriers of the harmful influence of Hades. In addition, the last day of the Anfesterii was directly dedicated to these creatures. Prayers were pronounced to the dead, from various cereals they prepared panspermia- thin porridge, which had to be eaten before dark. With the coming of night everyone shouted in chorus: "To the gates, keri! The enfesterias are over!" A similar ritual scenario is well known and recorded in almost all agricultural civilizations. Fertility and wealth depend on the dead and on the forces of the underworld: "From the dead," Hippocrates writes in one treatise, "food, seeds and the ability to grow come to us." In all ceremonies, Dionysus acts as the god of fertility and death at the same time. Already Heraclitus said (fragment 15) that "Hades and Dionysus are one and the same."

Above, we mentioned the relationship of Dionysus with water, moisture, plant juices. It should also be said about the "miracles" that accompany or foreshadow his epiphanies: a spring begins to gush from the rock, the rivers are filled with milk and honey. Spring water turns into wine in Teos at a festival in honor of Dionysus (Diodorus of Siculus, III, 66, 2). In Alice, three bowls, left empty in the evening in a tightly closed room, turn out to be full of wine in the morning. (Pausanias, VI, 2, 6,1-2). Similar "miracles" took place elsewhere. The most famous was the "one-day grape", which blossomed and bore fruit in a few hours; this happened in different places, as evidenced by several authors.

§ 124. Euripides and the orgiastic cult of Dionysus

Such "miracles" are characteristic of the frantic and ecstatic cult of Dionysus, which reflects the most original and, quite possibly, the most ancient aspect of the image of this god. In the Bacchae of Euripides we have an invaluable illustration of what may have formed from the contact of the Greek genius with the Dionysian orgiasticism. Dionysus himself is the main character in The Bacchae, which has never been seen in an ancient Greek drama before. Outraged that his cult is not recognized in any way in Greece, Dionysus arrives from Asia with a retinue of maenads and stops in Thebes, his mother's homeland. Three daughters of King Cadmus deny that their sister Semele was the beloved of Zeus and gave birth to a god. Dionysus amazes them with "madness", and his aunts, along with other Theban women, flee to the mountains, where they perform orgiastic rituals. Pentheus, who inherited the throne after his grandfather Cadmus, forbade such ceremonies and remained adamant about it, despite the warning received. Dionysus, who was acting under the guise of a priest of his own cult, was captured and taken into custody by Pentheus. But he is miraculously released from prison and even manages to persuade Pentheus to go and spy on the women during their orgiastic ceremonies. The Maenads notice him and tear him apart; Pentheus' mother Agave solemnly brings his head into the city, thinking that it is the head of a lion.

Whatever Euripides wanted to say when he wrote The Bacchae at the end of his life, this masterpiece of Greek tragedy is the most important document related to the cult of Dionysus. The theme of "rejection, persecution and triumph" finds its most brilliant illustration here. And yet the old opposition to the cult was not forgotten, and one of the edifying ideas of the Bacchae was, of course, that God should not be rejected because of his "novelty." Pentheus does not accept Dionysus, because he is "a stranger and a sorcerer ... His head is all in golden curls / And fragrant, he himself is ruddy from his face, / And the bliss of Aphrodite is in his eyes / In his eyes; the deceiver spends these days and nights / With girls he teaches them / He is to the orgies of a jubilant god ... "(lines 234 et seq.) Women abandon their homes, run away at night to the mountains and dance there to the sound of tympans and flutes. And Pentheus is mainly afraid of the power of wine: "No, the rite where wives are served / Grape juice, I do not recognize as pure" (261–262).

However, it is not wine that brings the Bacchantes into ecstasy. One of Penfey's servants, who came across them at dawn on Kiferon, says that they are dressed in goat skins, their heads are decorated with ivy, their bodies are entwined with snakes, they hold goats or wolf cubs in their arms, sucking from their breasts. Many specific Dionysian miracles take place: Bacchantes hit the rock with their thyrsus, and water or wine begins to flow from there; they "scrape the earth with their fingertips" - milk will pour; honey oozes from ivy-covered thyrsus. The servant says to Pentheus: "You blaspheme Bacchus, king; but, once you saw / All this, you would pray to him" (712-13).

Discovered by Agave, the servant and his companions barely escape death. The Bacchae then rush "with their bare hands" on the grazing cattle. "Defeated by the darkness of the girls' hands", the ferocious bulls are torn to pieces in the blink of an eye. After that, the maenads rush to the valleys. "I saw how they, kidnapping the children, / They carried them on their shoulders, without tying them up, / And the little ones did not fall to the ground. / All they wanted, they could lift them into their hands; neither copper nor iron / The weight did not resist them ; On their curls / They had a fire - and they didn’t burn. / The peasants, seeing that their belongings were being carried mercilessly, tried to raise the weapon. the thyrsus will raise - and they run / Men; how many wounded are left! (753 ff.).

There is no point in delving into the differences between these wild, wild nocturnal orgies and the Dionysian folk festivals (see paragraph 123 above). Euripides introduces us to a secret cult that is characteristic of the sacraments. "What kind of sacrament? Tell me," asks Pentheus. And Dionysus replies: "It is impossible for the uninitiated to know about them." "What's the use of them for the fans?" - "You cannot find out; but it is worth knowing them" (471-74).

The mystery consisted of the participation of the Bacchantes in the epiphany of Dionysus from beginning to end. The ceremonies are performed at night, far from cities, on mountain slopes or in forests. Union with God is achieved by the sacrifice of an animal, which is torn to pieces. (sparagmos) and eaten raw (omophagia). Everything else: extraordinary physical strength, invulnerability to fire and weapons, miracles (water, wine, milk exuded by the earth), fearless relationships with snakes and young wild animals are the result of exaltation, identification with God. Dionysian ecstasy means, first of all, overcoming human limitations, achieving complete liberation, gaining freedom and immediacy, not characteristic of human beings. The fact that among these freedoms there is freedom from the prohibitions, rules and conventions of etiquette and social order seems obvious, and this is one of the reasons for the mass adherence of women to the cult of Dionysus.

But the Dionysian experience extended to more intimate depths. Devouring raw flesh, the Bacchantes did what had been suppressed for tens of thousands of years; such a frenzy was a connection with vital and cosmic forces, which can be interpreted as divine obsession. Obsession was naturally confused with "madness" mania. And on Dionysus himself "madness" found, and the Bacchantes only shared his trials and passions with him - after all, it was the most the right way enter into communication with him.

The Greeks were also familiar with other cases when the gods sent mania. In the tragedy of Euripides "Hercules", the madness of the hero is the work of Hera; in Sophocles' Ajax, Athena causes madness. Coribantism, which the ancients compared with Dionysian orgiasticism, was mania, summoned by the Coribants, and his therapy ended with nothing more than initiation. But Dionysus and his cult were distinguished not by psychopathic crises, but by the fact that these crises were given value religious experience, whether it was a deity-sent punishment or a sign of favor. Ultimately, the interest in comparing externally similar rituals or collective actions - for example, medieval dances in which convulsive movements predominate, or the ritual homophagy of the Aissav, the North African mystical brotherhood - is explained by the fact that such a comparison reveals the uniqueness of the Dionysian religion.

Very rarely, in any historical period, a deity suddenly appears, so "loaded" with an archaic heritage: rituals using theriomorphic masks, phallophoria, sparagmos, homophagy, anthropophagy, mania, enthousiasmos. But the most remarkable thing is that, while preserving this heritage, these remnants of prehistoric times, the cult of Dionysus, once entering the spiritual universe of the Greeks, did not cease to generate new religious values. Indeed, the frenzy caused by divine obsession - "madness" - interested many authors, and often caused irony and ridicule. Herodotus (IV, 78–80) tells about the adventure of the Scythian king Skyla, who, being in Olbia, on Borisfen (Dnieper), was "initiated into the rites of Dionysus-Bacchus." During the ceremony (teletē) he, possessed by a deity, turned "into a bacchante and a madman." In all likelihood, we are talking about a procession in which the initiates, "under the influence of a deity", allow themselves to be carried away by a frenzy, taken by outsiders, as well as by the possessed themselves for "madness" (mania).

Herodotus confines himself to retelling the story he heard in Olbia. Demosthenes in the famous passage (De corona, 259), trying to ridicule his opponent Aeschines, essentially describes some of the rites performed by the tias (thiasoi), unofficial religious brotherhoods, in Athens, in the IV century. BC e., to the glory of Sabazius - a Thracian deity, akin to Dionysus. (The ancients considered him to be the Thracian Dionysus with a local name). Demosthenes mentions rites followed by reading from "books" (probably from some written text containing hieroi logoi); he talks about "nebrizo"(hint at nebris,"goatskin" "perhaps it was a sacrifice with eating raw animal meat), about "kraterizo" (krater- a vessel in which wine and water were mixed, "mystical drink"), about "purification" (katharmos), which consisted mainly of rubbing the initiate with clay and flour. At the end, says Demosthenes, the minister raised the prostrate on the ground in exhaustion, the initiate who repeated the formula: "I escaped evil and found the best." And the whole meeting burst into screams (ologlygé). The next morning, there was a procession of initiates wearing wreaths of fennel and silver poplar branches. Aeschines walked at the head of the procession, waving snakes, shouting " Evoe, mysteries of Sabazia! "and danced to the shouts of the audience: "Hyes, Attès, Attès, Hyes". Demosthenes also mentions the basket, the "mystical winnower", liknon, the first cradle of baby Dionysus.

The central part of the Dionysian ritual has always been, in some form, an ecstatic experience of a greater or lesser degree of frenzy - mania. This "madness" served as a kind of proof that the initiate was entheos- "filled with God." Of course, the experience was unforgettable, because it made the participant feel intoxicating freedom, introduced to the creative immediacy, superhuman strength and invulnerability of Dionysus. Unity with God temporarily broke the shackles of human limitation, although it could not overcome it: neither the Bacchae, nor such a late work as Nonna's Dionysiaca speaks of immortality. This alone is enough to see the difference between the Greek god and Zalmoxis, with whom, since the publication of the book of Rode, Dionysus has been compared and sometimes confused; this god of the Getae "immortalized" initiates in his mysteries. The Greeks, however, did not dare to throw a bridge over the infinity that separated, in their eyes, the divine and human states.

§ 125. When the Greeks rediscover the presence of God

The activities of the unofficial tias were definitely initiatory and secret (see: Bacchae, 470-74), despite the fact that some part of the ceremonies (for example, the procession) was public. It is difficult to clarify when and under what circumstances the secret and initiatory Dionysian rites acquired the special functions of the mystery religions. Some very authoritative scholars (Nilsson, Festugier) dispute the existence of the Dionysian mysteries on the grounds that there is not a single indisputable indication of an eschatological hope in them. But it must be borne in mind that we know very little about secret rituals in general, and even more so in the ancient era, not to mention their esoteric meaning (which probably existed, because the esoteric meaning of secret and initiatory rites is recorded throughout the world and at all levels of culture ).

Moreover, the morphology of eschatological hope should not be reduced to expressions made famous by Orphism or the mysteries of the Hellenic period. The disappearance and epiphany of Dionysus, his descent into Hades (comparable to death and subsequent resurrection), and most importantly - the cult of the Infant Dionysus with the celebration of his "awakening" - even if we leave aside the mythological and ritual theme of Dionysus-Zagreus, to which we will turn a little later - all this indicates the desire for spiritual renewal and hope for it. Everywhere in the world, the child of divine nature is endowed with initiatory symbolism, behind which lies the mystery of the mystical "new birth" (from the point of view of religious experience, it does not matter whether there is a rational understanding of this symbolism or not). Let us recall that already the cult of Sabazius, identified with Dionysus, had a sacramental order ("I escaped evil!"). Of course, immortality is not mentioned in the Bacchae; however, union, even temporary, with the deity does not remain without consequences for the posthumous state bacchos. The presence of Dionysus in the Eleusinian Mysteries allows us to think of an eschatological meaning in at least some of the orgiastic experiences.

But it was precisely from the time of Dionysus-Zagreus that the cult definitely took on mystery features. The myth of the dismemberment of the infant Dionysus-Zagreus is known to us mainly from the works of Christian authors, whom, as one might expect, he did not like, and therefore was presented by them fragmentarily and tendentiously. However, thanks to their freedom from the prohibition to talk about sacred and secret things, Christian writers have brought to us a number of valuable details. Hera sends titans to little Dionysus-Zagreus, who at first lure him with toys (rattles, crepundia, a mirror, grandmothers, a ball, a spinning top, a ratchet), and then they kill, cut into pieces, boil in a cauldron and, according to some versions, eat. The heart of Dionysus-Zagreus is received (or she manages to keep it) by the goddess - Athena, Rhea or Demeter - and she hides it in a chest. Upon learning of the crime, Zeus strikes the titans with a lightning strike. Christian authors do not talk about the resurrection of Dionysus, but the ancient authors knew about him. The Epicurean Philodemus, a contemporary of Cicero, writes about the three births of Dionysus: the first from his mother, the second from the thigh of Zeus, and the third, which took place when Rhea put together the pieces of his body, torn apart by the titans, after which he returned to life. Firmik Matern concludes his essay with the story that in Crete (where, in his interpretation, the action takes place), this murder is celebrated with annual rituals that reproduce everything that "the child did and experienced at the moment of death": "in the depths of the forests, they scream terribly, depicting the furious throwing of the soul "- as if making it clear that the crime was committed in a moment of madness -" and tearing a living bull apart with their teeth. "

The mythological-ritual theme of the suffering and resurrection of the infant Dionysus-Zagreus has given rise to countless controversies, especially in connection with its Orphic interpretations. We will now restrict ourselves to only indicating that the information reported by Christian authors is confirmed in earlier documents. For the first time the name Zagreus is found in the epic poem of the Theban cycle "Alcmaeonis" (VI century BC); it means "great hunter", which corresponds to the wild, orgiastic nature of Dionysus. As for the atrocity of the Titans, Pausanias (VIII, 37.5) tells something about it, and this testimony remains valuable to us, despite the skepticism of Vilamowitz and other researchers. Pausanias reports that a certain Onomacritus, who lived in Athens in the 6th century BC. e., under the Pisistratids, wrote a poem on this topic: "Taking the name of the titans from Homer, he established Dionysian orgies, making the titans villains and tormentors of the deity."

According to this myth, the titans, before approaching the infant, were smeared with alabaster so that they would not be recognized. So, in the Sabazian mysteries held in Athens, one of the initiatory rites consisted in the fact that the faces of the initiates were covered with chalk or alabaster. These facts have been linked together since antiquity (cf. Nonnus. Dionys, 27, 228 sq.). But in fact, we have here one of the forms of an archaic initiatory ritual, well known in primitive societies: the initiates rub their faces with chalk or ash to resemble ghosts, that is, they go through ritual death. "Mystical toys" have also been known for a long time: in the papyrus of the 3rd century BC. BC, found in Fayyum and, unfortunately, spoiled, mentions a top, a rattle, bones and a mirror (Orphicorum, fr. 31).

The most dramatic episode of the myth - and especially the fact that, having tore a child to pieces, the titans threw pieces of his body into a cauldron, boiled, and then fried - was known as early as the 4th century; moreover, all these details were "rehearsed" in connection with the celebration of the Mysteries. Euphorion knew about a similar tradition in the third century (ibid., P. 53). Jeanmère convincingly showed that boiling in a cauldron and passing through fire are initiation rites that confer immortality (cf. the story of Demeter and Demophon) or rejuvenation (the daughters of Pelias stabbed their father and boiled in the cauldron).

Thus, in the "atrocity of the titans" we can recognize an ancient initiatory script, the original meaning of which has been forgotten. Titans behave like "masters of initiation", that is, they "mortify" the initiate so that he is "reborn" for more high level existence (in our example, they give the baby Dionysus the divine nature and immortality). However, in the religion that proclaimed the absolute supremacy of Zeus, the titans could only play a demonic role, for which they were incinerated by Zeus' lightning. According to some versions of this myth, important to the Orphic tradition, humans were created from the ashes of the Titans.

The initiatory nature of the Dionysian rites was also felt in Delphi, when women honored the reborn god. As Plutarch testifies (De Iside, 35), in the Delphic basket lay, ready for rebirth, torn to pieces by Dionysus-Zagreus, and this Dionysus, "who was reborn under the name of Zagreus, was at the same time the Theban Dionysus, the son of Zeus and Semele"

Perhaps Diodorus of Siculus also has in mind the Dionysian mysteries when he writes that "Orpheus transferred the torn to pieces of Dionysus into the mystery rites" (V, 75.4). And elsewhere, Diodorus presents Orpheus as a reformer of the Dionysian sacraments: "That is why the initiation rites in honor of Dionysus are called Orphic" (III, 65.6). For us, Diodorus's message is valuable insofar as it confirms the existence of the Dionysian mysteries. But at the same time, it is likely that already in the 5th century BC. NS. these ordinances contained some "Orphic" elements. Then Orpheus, indeed, was proclaimed "the prophet of Dionysus" and "the founder of all initiations" (see Volume II, Chapter 19).

Dionysus surprises us more than all other Greek gods with his numerous and unusual epiphanies, the variety of his transformations. He is always on the move; he penetrates everywhere - to all countries, to all peoples, to all religious systems, ready to intermarry with a variety of deities (even with such antagonists as Demeter and Apollo). In fact, he is the only Greek god who, with his diversity, amazes the imagination and attracts to himself ignorant villagers, the intellectual elite, and politicians, and hermits, and lovers of orgies, and ascetics. Drunkenness, eroticism, the fertility of the world, and also unforgettable experiences: when the dead periodically appear, when a person is seized mania, when he sinks into animal unconsciousness, when he experiences ecstasy enthousiasmes,- and all these delicious and chilling sensations have one source - presence deities. By the very way of existence, this deity expresses the paradoxical unity of life and death. That is why Dionysus was so radically different from the Olympians in the type of his divinity. Did he stand closer to man than other gods? Hard to say; but one could approach him, one could even let him into oneself; and ecstasy manias served as proof that human limitation is surmountable.

His rituals developed unexpectedly. Dithyrambe, tragedy, satirical drama are, to a greater or lesser extent, a Dionysian product. It is extremely interesting to trace how the transformation of the collective rite went dithyrambes, including ecstatic fury, in the performance, and then in the literary genre. If some public rites became spectacles and made Dionysus the god of the theater, others, secret and initiatory, turned into mysteries. Orphism owes much to the Dionysian tradition, at least indirectly. Other Olympians cannot be compared to Dionysus, this a young god who never ceased to delight fans with his new epiphanies, unexpected messages and eschatological hopes.

Notes:

This highly archaic idea survived into Mediterranean antiquity; not only were animals sacrificed instead of people (a custom, ubiquitous), but people were also sacrificed instead of animals. Wed: Walter Burkert. Homo Necans, p. 29, p. 34.

David R. Harris. Agricultural systems, ecosystems and the origins of agriculture. - The Domestication and exploitation of plants and animals, p. 12.

William Solhein. Relics from two diggings indicate Thais were the First Agrarians. - New York Times, January 12, 1970.

Hainuwele is a cultural heroine of the Vemale people (Eastern Indonesia), whose murder brought death to the world, and with it - fertility (see Myths of the peoples of the world. Vol. 2. P. 576).

Wed: Eliade. Aspects du mythe, p. 132 sq.

Cm.: Atuhiko Yoshida. Les excrétions de la Déesse et l "origine de l" agriculture.

Pindar, fr.85; Herodotus II, 146; Euripides. Bacchae, 92 sq .; Apollodorus, Bibl., III, 4.3. sq.

In the Iliad (XIV, 323) she is called “Theban”, and Hesiod in Theogony, 940 sq. speaks of her as a "mortal woman".

Cm.: H. Jeanmaire. Dionysos, p. 76. Jeanmaire. On Lycurgus and the initiations of the youths see Idem. Couroï et Courètes, p. 463 sq.

On the tablet of the Cretan Linear B from Pylos (X a O 6).

See about this: Losev A.F. Decree. Op. P. 142.

Agryony is a holiday in honor of Dionysus in Boeotia.

Anfesteria, antesteria - a spring holiday associated with the cult of Dionysus. The first day was called the opening day of pithos (wine barrels), the second - "mugs" (khoi): these days the statue of Dionysus was taken around the city in a boat on wheels (images of such boats are known among petroglyphs of the Bronze Age - such boats have survived in the tradition of European carnivals ). The last day was called "pots" and was associated with the cult of ancestors: food for the souls of the dead (and other spirits of the underworld - ker) was taken out in pots.

Attempts were made to represent Dionysus as the god of the tree, or grain, or grapes, and the myth of his dismemberment was considered as an illustration of the preparation of wine or the "passion" of cereals (see the mythographers mentioned by Diodorus of Siculus, III, 62).

The fact that two of them bear the names of their respective months - leneon and anfesterion - testifies to their antiquity and Panhellenic character.

In the Eleusinian Mysteries, the spirit of the processions of Iacchus was identified with Dionysus; cm.: W. Otto. Dionysos, p. ten; Wed: Jeanmaire. Dionysos, p. 47.

This is, of course, an extremely ancient scenario, pervasive throughout; being one of the most important vestiges of prehistoric times, it still retains a special place in all types of societies.

This is a completely different alliance than, for example, the alliance of Bel in Babylon with the hierodule (which took place when the god was in the temple) or Apollo with the priestess who had to sleep in his temple in Patara in order to receive knowledge directly from God and then transmit it through the oracle; cm.: Otto. Dionysos p. 84.

The expulsion of the souls of the dead invited to the calendar festival is known, in particular, to the Iranian tradition (see above about the fravash) and the Slavs (the expulsion of souls and evil spirits at Christmas time).

Sophocles. Thyestes (fr. 234); other sources are quoted by V. Otto: Otto. Dionysos, pp. 98–99.

There are other examples of the "madness" sent by Dionysus in response to the non-recognition of his divine nature, for example, the madness of the women of Argos (Apollodoms, II, 2.2, III, 5.2) or the daughters of Minius in Orchomenos, who tore the son of one of them (Plutarch. Quaest., Fr. XXXVIII, 299e).

In the fifth century, Thebes became the center of the cult, since it was there that Dionysus was conceived and there was the tomb of Semele.

Translation by I.F. Annensky.

Tiresias nevertheless defends God: "Of course, it is not Dionysus's business to teach women modesty / It is a gift / of Nature itself. Pure in soul / And the dance in Bacchus will not be corrupted" (Bacchantes, 317-20).

What distinguishes a shaman from a psychopath is the ability to heal himself on his own and become, as a result, a more resilient and creatively stronger personality than others.

Rohde compares the spread of the ecstatic religion of Dionysus to the epidemics of convulsive dancing in the Middle Ages. R. Eisler (R.Eisler) drew attention to the Isāwiyya, who practiced ritual homophagy (called frissa, from the verb farassa,"tear"). Mystically identified with the predators, whose names they bore (jackals, panthers, lions, cats, dogs), members of the brotherhood tore, gut and eat bulls, wolves, rams, sheep and goats. After chewing on raw meat, the participants indulged in a frenzied, jubilant dance, "to enjoy wild ecstasy and get in touch with the deity." (R. Brunel).

According to ancient interpretations, the term saboi(or sabaioi) in Phrygian language was the equivalent of Greek bacchos; Jeanmaire. Dionysos, pp. 95-97.

See: Nonn Panopolitan. The deeds of Dionysus.

Zalmoxis, Salmoxis - Thracian (Getan) god mentioned by Herodotus (IV. 94–96). The Thracians sent a messenger to him, piercing the messenger with spears. Herodotus tells (in the spirit of the aforementioned Greek author Eugemer) that Zalmoxis was a slave of Pythagoras, from whom he learned wisdom; freed, he gained great wealth and appeared in Thrace. He promised immortality to his companions in Thrace. To assure them of his supernatural abilities, he hid in secret peace, and the Thracians began to mourn him as dead. On the fourth he appeared again, and they believed in his teaching. A special work of Eliade himself is dedicated to Zalmoxis: De Zalmoxis à Gengis-Khan, P., 1970.

In this regard, it should be remembered that during the Anfesteries, some rituals were performed exclusively by women and in the strictest secrecy.

The cult of the Infant Dionysus was known in Boeotia and Crete and tended to spread throughout Greece.

Firmicus Maternus. De errore profanarum religionum, 6; Clement d "Alexandria. Potreptikos, II, 17, 2; 18.2; Arnobus. Adv. Nat., V, 19; the texts are reproduced in: O. Kern. Orphicum fragmenta, pp. 110-111.

Philodemus. De piet., 44; Jeanmaire. Dionysos, p. 382.

Fr. 3, Kinkel. vol. 1, p. 77; Euripides. Fr. 472; Callimachos (fr. 171) holds that Zagreus is a special name for Dionysus; for other examples see: Otto. Dionysos, p. 191 sq.

Demosthenes. De corona, 259. To participate in the Dionysian festivals, the Argives covered their faces with chalk or alabaster. chalk (titanos) emphasized the connection of the episode with the titans (Titanes). But this mytho-ritual complex arose due to the confusion between the two terms (cf. Farnell. Cults, vol. 5, p. 172)

Wed the "problem" attributed to Aristotle (Didot. Aristote IV, 331, 15), which, following Salomon Reinach, is discussed by Molyneux (Moulinier. Orphée et l "orphisme, p. 51).

Jeanmaire. Dionysos, p. 387. For other examples, see: Marie Delcourt. L "oracle de Delphes, p. 153 sq. The same two rituals - dismemberment and placement in boiling water or passage through fire - are also characteristic of shamanistic initiations.

Eliade's reference to Plutarch in this case is inaccurate: in his work there is no mention of the cradle-basket itself, in which, according to Orphic myth, Zagreus was torn to pieces by the titans. But Dionysus himself is called Liknit, from lïknon- baskets with the first grains of the harvest, which were offered to God.

Delcourt, pp. 155, 200. Having told about the torn to pieces and resurrection of Osiris, Plutarch turns to his friend Klee, the leader of the maenads in Delphi: "That Osiris is the same Dionysus, who can know better than you, who controls the fiads, whom his father initiated into the mysteries of Osiris?"

Dithyrambe, "a circular dance, the rhythmic movements of which, ritual exclamations and outcries evoked collective ecstasy during the sacrifice, managed - and it was during that period (VII-VI centuries), when the great genre of choral lyrics was developing in the Greek world, - to evolve into a literary form due to the fact that it increasingly included vocal fragments performed by exarchon, as well as lyrical passages on themes more or less connected with episodes of life and with the personality of Dionysus " (Jeanmaire. Dionysos, pp. 248-249).

Cult of Dionysus

Dionysus - in ancient Greek mythology, the youngest of the Olympians, the god of vegetation, viticulture, winemaking, the productive forces of nature, inspiration and religious ecstasy.

The cult of wine has undergone the most fantastic transformations in the course of European history. And one of its most striking variations was the cult of Dionysus in Ancient Greece, and its culmination was Menadism, the movement of the Maenads, the most faithful and violent female fans of Dionysus. In addition to the fact that it was associated with wine, there is an interesting fact that it was a manifestation of female activity.

Maenads ("mad"), they are also fiads ("violent"), they are chewachanes (from the Roman name of Dionysus - Bacchus, or Bacchus) - this is the main army of Dionysus, his most loyal, most fanatical followers.

For almost the entire last millennium BC, the cult of Dionysus was incredibly widespread throughout the Greek world. And it was women who distinguished themselves with special enthusiasm in serving him. The men only joined him at the end, when the Dionysias became official public holidays. In the VI century. BC. they were legalized by the authorities in order to somehow curb this feminine element. Actually, the maenads were ordinary women - mothers, wives, daughters, who went away from time to time, and the general female escape was very worried about the entire male population of Ancient Greece.

Several times a year, Greek women gathered in crowds and fled to the forests and mountains. Their main pilgrimage, once every two years, in winter, the maenads made to Mount Parnassus.

Furious fun, dancing, orgies

What did they do there, in their campaigns? The main goal of the orgy, of course, is not revelry as such, it is still a religious movement, and the maenads in the forests performed services to their god, prayed, sang and danced in his honor. But to an outsider's glance, it looked pretty frightening.

Half-naked, in animal skins and wreaths of grape leaves, with thyrsus at the ready (thyrsus is a long rod, an attribute of Dionysus, entwined with a vine or ivy, with a pine cone on top) - they rushed around the neighborhood, frightening the herds and the local population. Intoxicated with wine and mad dances, in a semi-conscious state, they grabbed coals from the fire with their bare hands, played with live snakes, performed rituals of animal sacrifice, and also arranged sexual orgies. Sometimes with captured, and sometimes with representatives of the opposite sex who voluntarily joined the orgy. Although the Greeks were sure that - with the satyrs.

Cruel and bloody rituals

Dancing, dancing, wandering in the mountains and sexual games - these, however, did not exhaust the activity of the maenads. The cult demanded the abandonment of all and all sorts of prohibitions, the awakening of natural, animal principles in oneself. All of them were intoxicated with wine, but in addition, according to historians, they were under the influence of stronger drugs mixed into wine. And plus the crowd effect. In a fit of mass hysteria, they could tear the bull open with their bare hands and eat it raw.

The bloodthirstiness of the maddened Bacchantes, however, is not some natural quality of a Greek woman; the cult of Dionysus itself demanded blood, which, with the hands of its followers, dealt with its enemies. The Greeks believed that the gods actively interfere in the affairs of mortals, and brutally avenge their non-recognition. And Dionysus, in general, was feared, maybe even more than many other gods. It was not only a god of wine and fun, but also a god who sends obsession and madness. All who were outside the cult, who did not support him, were in danger, including from his frantic admirers, the maenads. Their rage towards the enemies of Dionysus is reflected in many myths. For example, the myth about the death of Orpheus - they killed not only bulls.

According to one version, he sang the praises of the gods, but missed Dionysus, and the vengeful god sent his maenads to him. According to another version, Orpheus witnessed the secret mysteries of the maenads. But in any case - they tore him to pieces. As well as King Pentheus, who chased the maenads in the woods in order to return his mother, drugged by Dionysus. The famous ancient Greek tragedy of Euripides "Bacchae" - about this monstrous story - how the maenads tore Penfey.

Causes of Menadism

Why did they indulge in the cult of Dionysus so passionately? There are several versions.

Psychiatric version Historians explain Menadism, firstly, by analogy with female alcoholism - the female psyche and physiology are more vulnerable to drug and psychogenic influence, they are more easily addicted. Menadism is sometimes even interpreted as a type of hysteria. On hundreds of ancient images found - on red-figured ceramics and in sculpture - the dancing maenad resembles a person in a hysterical fit. The body and neck are convulsively bent back, the head is strongly thrown back.

Socio-psychological version And the second explanation of Menadism is even simpler. The Bacchic cult freed women from everyday worries, removed the shackles of measured life from them, tore the shackles that bound them to everyday life and boredom. It was women who, all the rest of the year being law-abiding enough, in the days of the orgy, abandoned their household duties, left their home, husband, children to dance until exhaustion and praise their God.

These versions are not enough These versions of the causes of Menadism, however, do not explain the mystical, religious foundations of the Dionysian cult. To see in orgy only madness or only escape is to see only the outer side of the matter. Menadism was not at all an accidental, episodic phenomenon of a kind of falling away from civilization of certain "possessed" representatives of Greek society, inclined, for example, to debauchery and orgies. And it would be rather superficial to interpret these escapes of women into the forests solely as a desire to resist prohibitions and established order. There was something of a protest here, but that was not the main thing.

There must be more religious and mystical version Menadism Bacchanalia was precisely a religious ritual, had a very powerful mystical foundation.

The ritual itself demanded cruelty

There was no direct connection between the ferocity of Dionysus worship and intoxication. People became mad and tore animals to pieces not at all in a fit of primitive savagery, and not because they were "drunk to madness." Quite the opposite - the cruelty of bloody actions was deliberately, deliberately built into the cult as the most important ritual sent by the maenads. They tore up animals - as a symbol of the terrible, cruel death that their god once suffered. It was something like a theatrical re-enactment of mythological events. Dionysus was ripped apart and eaten by the Titans when he assumed the form of a bull - and centuries of Greek history passed under the sign of the ritual of sacrificing bulls and eating their raw flesh.

The meaning of the ritual is religious ecstasy

But faking the death of your god is not the ultimate goal of the ritual, but only its outer side. Its meaning is deeper. They drank wine both as a "gift from God" ("juice of Dionysus", "delight of Bacchus"), and - as "blood of God." They ate the meat of the sacrificial animals as "the flesh of God." This is quite reminiscent of the communion rituals in Christianity. And not only in Christianity - in many ancient religious cults similar rituals were performed, with the same purpose - to directly connect with their god. To connect almost literally, tangibly - through his "blood" and "flesh". Drinking wine is "drinking God." The desire is more than understandable - at all times, in all religions, the most powerful experience of a believer is to feel God in himself, to get in touch with God, to hear the "voice of God." (In Christianity - the miracle of "Epiphany".) Naturally, in an ordinary, normal, rational state of mind it is impossible to achieve such a mystical perception of reality; it was necessary, as they would now say, to achieve an "altered state of consciousness." And for this, in particular, they needed wine - in the function of an intoxicating drink, freeing from the shackles of reason and accepted norms of behavior. But not only wine.

Initially, it was the personification of the luxurious abundance of plant power, manifested by the juiciness of herbs and fruits, producing bunches on the vine, giving a great taste to juicy fruits of fruit trees, and the ability to amuse a person to the juice of grapes. The vine and its bunches were for the ancient Greek the most complete manifestation of this abundance of plant power; therefore they were a symbol of Dionysus, the ancient Greek god of winemaking. “The essence of Dionysus is most clearly manifested in this plant,” says Preller. - Grape juice is a combination of moisture with fire, the result of a combination of earthly dampness with solar warmth, and in an allegorical sense, a combination of tenderness and courage, pleasure and energy; these are the essential features of the concept of Dionysus. " The founder of winemaking and horticulture, Dionysus, was in ancient Greece, like Demeter, a god who taught people to lead a settled, comfortable life, which he gives fun with the juice of grapes. In the myths of Ancient Greece, he is not only the god of winemaking, but also of joy, the brotherly rapprochement of people. Dionysus is a powerful god who overcomes everything hostile to him. In myths, he harnesses lions and panthers in his chariot, pacifies the wild spirits of the forest, softens and heals the suffering of people.

Dionysus with a drinking goblet. Image on an Attic amphora, c. 490-480 B.C.

Like Apollo, Dionysus gives inspiration, excites a person to sing, creates poetry; but the poetry emanating from him has a character more passionate than the poetry of Apollo, his music is noisier than Apollo's. Dionysus gives thoughts an enthusiasm that rises to the level of praise, gives them a liveliness, the power of which creates dramatic poetry and theatrical art. But the exaltation caused by the god of winemaking leads to the darkening of reason, to orgiastic madness. In the ancient Greek cult of Dionysus, in the myths about him and especially on the holidays of Dionysius, various feelings were expressed, aroused in a person by the course of changes in plant life: the fun given to a person that time of the year when everything turns green, blooms, smells sweet, the joy of the ripening of fruits, sadness during wilting, with the death of vegetation. The combination of joyful and sad emotions of the soul under the influence of the mystical rituals of Eastern service to the forces of nature gave rise to exaltation among the ancient Greeks, manifested by the feasts of the maenads. In the myths of Ancient Greece, the symbol of the generative force of nature, the phallus, was the belonging of the cult of Dionysus.

Ancient Greece myths. Dionysus (Bacchus). Stranger in hometown

Initially, Dionysus was a god of the villagers, a giver of wine and fruits, and they glorified him at rural feasts with merry songs, joked, and danced in places filled with wine. But little by little, the importance of Dionysus grew. Periander, KlisSikion hair dryer, other tyrants transferred to the ministry the brilliance with which the service of the war gods of the aristocrats was performed. The songs and processions of festivals in honor of Dionysus gradually took on an exalted character under the influence of Eastern religions.

Dionysus. The birth of the theater. Video

Holidays of Dionysus

Everywhere in Ancient Greece, where grapes and fruit trees grew, there was a service to Dionysus, holidays were celebrated to him, which had a great influence on the development of ancient Greek civilization. The festivals of Dionysus, which were celebrated in Attica, Boeotia and on the island of Naxos, which were the main centers of this cult, became especially important for cultural life. The oldest temple of Dionysus in Athens was the Lenaion, which stood at the foot of the Acropolis in a damp lowland called Limne (Swamp). Soon after the end of the grape harvest, the festival of "Small" or "rural" Dionysius was celebrated in ancient Athens. It was a merry holiday of the villagers, amusing themselves with jokes, dressing up, and various country amusements in the common, coarse taste. Around the time of the winter solstice there was a holiday of "Laziness", the "squeezing" of juice from grapes, - the holiday of the end of this business. Making this celebration, they decorated the temple of Dionysus with ivy, put on ivy wreaths, made a sacrifice, feasted, drank grape juice at a feast, walked in processions, amused themselves with jokes.

When the first greens of the returning spring were shown, in Attica, on the Greek islands, in the Greek colonies they celebrated in honor of Dionysus Anfesteria; they lasted three days; on the day the barrels were uncorked, the gentlemen and the slaves drank new wine together, rejoiced together; on the day of pouring new wine, they put on wreaths, feasted with singing, with music, with symbolic rites, celebrating the return of the gods of the earth from its depths to life under the light of day; joked, organized competitions in drinking wine. Women of the noblest Athenian families walked in procession to the Lena temple and performed the mystical ceremony of the marriage of the wife of the archon-king to Dionysus; this rite acquired the patronage of Dionysus for the olive trees ”and the vineyards of Attica. On the third day, sacrifices were made in memory of the dead. A month later, in March, the feast of the Great Ones, or the cities, was celebrated in Athens. ”Dionysius was a brilliant feast of spring, in honor of Dionysus, the liberator from winter poverty. Among the rites of this ancient Greek holiday was a magnificent procession in honor of Dionysus, the procession of which was accompanied by the singing of noisy praises; the singers walked with ivy wreaths on their heads; girls carried baskets with flowers and new fruits, citizens and metecs carried furs with wine; they were accompanied by the disguised; orchestras thundered, in front of the procession they carried a wooden image of Dionysus and a phallus attached to a pole, a symbol of fertility The splendor of the great Dionysios attracted the Athenians and many foreigners to this holiday in Athens. With the development of ancient Greek culture, the celebration became more luxurious and elegant. All the dramatic poetry of the Greeks - tragedy, comedy, and satirical drama - developed from the rites and gaiety of the Athenian holiday of the Great Dionysios.

Dionysus and Satyrs. Painter Brigos, Attica. OK. 480 BC

There were celebrations in honor of Dionysus and on the ancient Greek islands, rich in vineyards: in Crete, Chios, Lemnos; but especially splendid was his feast on the island of Naxos, where Dionysus married Ariadne (Ariagnos, "Most Holy"), abandoned there by Theseus, the beautiful-haired goddess who was the personification of the earth, awakening from winter sleep. Dionysus was the main god of folk religion on this island. His holiday began with rituals expressing sorrow for the abandoned Ariadne, and ended with the joyful songs of her marriage to Dionysus. Dionysus is not always the god of the luxurious development of vegetation: nature for a while plunges into the sleep of death; at this time he is a suffering, murdered god, the god of the underworld. In this capacity, he bears the mystical name Zagrei. Dionysus Zagreus was sacrificed in Ancient Greece with the performance of symbolic rituals expressing grief over the death of the god of the generative force of nature; these mystical festivals were of an exalted character. In the winter cold, women and girls from Delphi, neighboring places and even from Attica converged on the heights of Parnassus, covered with snow, to celebrate the Feast of the Maenads, and whirled, ran there in sacred ecstasy, like drunks. Waving thyrsus and torches, with snakes in their loose hair and in their hands, these servants of Dionysus maenads or fiyads (thyiades) or, as they were called otherwise, Bacchantes, with beating tambourines and under the piercing sounds of flutes, furiously prowled through the forests and mountains, danced, jumped, grimaced. Ancient Greek myths said that Dionysus strikes with madness all those who resist him, refusing to participate in his noisy processions. The feasts of the maenads were imitations of the processions that were told about the myths.

Cult of Dionysus

The nature of the cult of Dionysus in different areas of Ancient Greece was different, in accordance with the difference in the education of their population: in some places it was rough, in others it was graceful, favorable to the development of art and poetry. In the Peloponnese, especially in Argos Achaia, Elis and Taygetus, the accessories of the cult of Dionysus were night orgies, rituals of atonement, sacrifices in memory of the dead. In ancient times, people were even sacrificed on the islands. The maenads who served Dionysus tore goats, young deer, and other animals to pieces; these were symbolic actions that meant that nature was dying a painful death from the cold of winter. Dionysus was sometimes depicted as a bull or with bull horns. Women in Elis exclaimed at his holidays: "Come, O lord, to your temple, come with the Kharitas to your holy temple, knocking with a bull's foot!" In ancient Greece, a goat, a representative of voluptuousness, was dedicated to Dionysus.

In Asia Minor, the orgiastic cult of Dionysus was combined with the exalted rites of the "Great Mother," Cybele. Therefore, the fantastic creatures that made up the retinue of this goddess: kurets, koribants, cabirs, dactyls of Mount Ida - were also transferred to the myths about Dionysus. Excellent works of art have come down to us, the motives of which are taken from the orgiastic festivals of Dionysus: artists loved to depict maenads in the ecstasy of passionate excitement. The orgiastic cult also provided the ancient Greek poets with material for legends that symbolically expounded philosophical thoughts. The feasts of the cult of Dionysus were not celebrated every year, but once every two years; therefore it was called triester (biennial). At the basis of all his rituals was the idea that the god of the luxurious development of vegetation was killed by the power of winter and that he would soon rise again, awaken the dead nature to a new life.

When the ancient Greeks got acquainted with other countries, they brought closer to the cult of Dionysus all the rituals that reminded them of his holidays. They found such rituals in Macedonia, Thrace, Lydia, Phrygia. Processions, torchlight races, noisy songs, thunder of music, frantic dances, fantastic costumes at the holidays of the Pessinunta "Great Mother" and the Syrian goddess of birth inspired them with the idea that this was the cult of Dionysus. The Osiris holiday made the same impression on them in Egypt: the crowds that walked at night with torches to look for the body of the murdered Osiris, other fantastic rituals, the phallus, seemed to the ancient Greeks to be accessories of service to Dionysus. When the Greeks, who were in the army of Alexander, saw in India endless magnificent processions of people in colorful clothes, they saw decorated animals in these festive processions, they saw chariots carried by panthers and lions, when they found ivy and wild grapes on a mountain whose name seemed to them similar in the name of Nisa - all this was transferred to the myths about Dionysus and to his cult. Thus, in ancient Greece, the legend of the victorious campaign of Dionysus through all the lands from Greece to the Indus and to the Arabian desert was gradually formed; it provided material for the glorification of Alexander and his successors who went to India: they were likened to Dionysus. Therefore, in Macedonian times, as many bas-reliefs of that era prove, the myth of the campaign of Dionysus with his retinue (thiasos) of satyrs, Silens, centaurs and other fantastic creatures, personifying the generative forces of nature and the revelry of villagers' revelry when picking grapes, became one of the favorite objects of art. Through the addition of foreign legends to the old Greek myths, the myth of Dionysus gained enormous proportions. The fantasy of ancient Greek artists and poets expanded the cult of Dionysus with new episodes; along with legends, the number of mystical and orgiastic rites grew. But in the teachings of the sacraments, the Greeks preserved its main meaning behind the myth of Dionysus, the idea of ​​the eternal cycle of the emergence, death and rebirth of plant life.