Page:Frazer (1890) The Golden Bough (IA goldenboughstudy01fraz).djvu/348

326 viving monuments of antiquity. On one statuette he appears clad in a bull’s hide, the head, horns, and hoofs hanging down behind. At his festivals Dionysus was believed to appear in bull form. The women of Elis hailed him as a bull, and prayed him to come with his bull’s-foot. They sang, “Come here, Dionysus, to thy holy temple by the sea; come with the Graces to thy temple, rushing with thy bull’s-foot, O goodly bull, O goodly bull!” According to the myth, it was in the shape of a bull that he was torn to pieces by the Titans; and the Cretans, in representing the sufferings and death of Dionysus, tore a live bull to pieces with their teeth. Indeed, the rending and devouring of live bulls and calves appear to have been a regular feature of the Dionysiac rites. The practice of representing the god in bull form or with some of the features of a bull, the belief that he appeared in bull form to his worshippers at the sacred rites, and the legend that it was in bull form that he had been torn in pieces—all these facts taken together leave no room to doubt that in rending and devouring a live bull at his festival his worshippers believed that they were killing the god, eating his flesh, and drinking his blood.

Another animal whose form Dionysus assumed was the goat. One of his names was “Kid.” To save him from the wrath of Hera, his father Zeus changed