Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/417

BACCHIGLIONE. canalized as far as Padua, whence a canal connects it with the town of Este and the river Adige.

BACCHUS, baklcus (Gk. Βάκχος, Bakchos). Also called Dionysus (Gk. Διόνυσος, Dionysos) by the Greeks. A god who originally belonged to the great group of vegetation-spirits, whose worship was widely spread among European nations. As such his coming in the early part of the year was received with joy and revelry, while his departure or death was also celebrated at the winter season. In some cases the old spirit is regarded as dying that the new one may be born, and there is some reason for believing that this feature was also found in the rites of Dionysus. The god never lost his early connection with the flourishing of vegetation and with fruitfulness generally, but he came to be associated more and more closely with the vine and its inspiring produce. His worship was exceedingly widespread, and appears in manifold local forms and with large admixtures of foreign elements. Indeed, some of the myths seem to indicate the presence of a god of light as well as a true chthonic deity. There is also much in the worship and legends that indicates a foreign origin for the cult, though there can be no doubt that many features, such as the satyrs, are purely Greek. So widely different are the stories and so varied the myths in which the god appears, that only some of the more important can be indicated. The common legend of his birth seems to have been that of Thebes. Zeus loved Semele, the daughter of Cadmus; but the jealous Hera induced her rival to beg the god to appear to her in all his splendor. Naturally, the mortal was consumed by the thunderbolt; but Zeus saved her unborn child, and sewed it in his thigh, whence in due time it was born. The infant was intrusted to Hermes, who delivered him to the nymphs of Nyssa, in Thrace. Here he discovered and taught the powers of the grape, and headed a band of nymphs and satyrs, the so-called Thiasos, with whom he wandered over the earth, communicating his new gift to men, blessing those who received him gladly, and punishing his enemies. For the legends have much to tell of opposition to the new worship. So Lycurgus, King of Thrace, drove Dionysus in terror to the depths of the sea; but later perished miserably. The story of Pentheus, King of Thebes, who cast Dionysus into prison, but was himself later torn in pieces by his own mother. Agave, and the Theban women who had been driven by frenzy to celebrate the rites of the god, forms the subject of the Bacchæ of Euripides. There is much to indicate that in these stories we have really versions of the death and return of Dionysus himself. In friendship Dionysus visits Icarus at Icaria, in Attica; but even here the story ends in death, since Icarus is killed by peasants, who fancy themselves poisoned by his new gift of wine. Another instance of his power is furnished by the story of the transformation into dolphins of the Tyrrhenian pirates, who bound him in order to carry him to Italy. It is told in a Homeric hymn, and also in the marble reliefs which decorate the choragic monument of Lysicrates in Athens. Legend also makes him wed Ariadne (q.v.), when abandoned by Theseus on the island of Naxos. The conquering tour of Dionysus was greatly extended under the influence of Alexander's conquests; and the god's subjection of the East and India became a subject of later poets, and is preserved to us in the epic of Nonnus (q.v.).

In art, two types prevail. In the earlier period the god is represented as bearded and fully draped, and this type was not unknown in later times, when it was sometimes called 'the Indian Bacchus.' From the middle of the Fourth Century B.C., another type steadily gains in popularity, representing the god as a beardless youth, nude or wearing only the fawnskin, or nebris. The chief attributes of the god are the thyrsus, or rod ending in a pine cone, and wreathed with ivy, and the great two-handled drinking-cup (the cantharus). He is often accompanied by a panther, and the bull and goat were closely associated with his worship. Naturally, as a god of vegetation and the vine, Dionysus was associated with Demeter, Core, and the Eleusinian Mysteries (q.v.), where he bore the name Iacchus. In the mystic worship which grew up in the Sixth Century B.C., under the name of Orpheus (q.v.) Dionysus Zagreus played a prominent part, and no doubt Orphic influence helped to produce the confusion of elements which is so marked in all this cult.

In the worship of Dionysus two distinct forms may be traced. The one appears most distinctly in the Attic festivals, especially the country Dionysia. It is essentially a joyous but rude and boisterous vintage festival, celebrated by men, and abounding in mummeries and coarse jests. Its connection with vegetation and fruitfulness is shown by the phallic procession, which held a prominent place in the celebration. (For an account of the Attic Dionysia, see .) The other form of Dionysiac worship was highly orgiastic, and celebrated by women, at the time of the winter solstice in alternate years; hence called the Triateric Dionysia. The celebrants, in Greek Mainades, or Mænads, wandered among the mountains, indifferent to the cold, wearing fawnskins and carrying the thyrsus and torches, for the chief rites were held at night. The god was said to be lost, and was sought with wild cries. The culmination of the orgy was in tearing in pieces fawns, kids, and other animals, and devouring the raw flesh in honor of the god. We even hear of human victims being rent asunder. These rites were thought to be an endeavor to arouse the dead or sleeping god; but it is also clear that originally the slain animal was the god, who was killed to be reborn. It is a common feature of primitive religions for the worshiper to partake of the god, especially if it be a deity connected with vegetation or fertility. These orgiastic rites were especially associated with Thebes and Delphi, though we hear that even Athenian women went to Mount Parnassus to join in this fierce and bloody worship. In later times the mysteries celebrated under the name of Dionysus became more and more occasions for intoxication and gross licentiousness.

The Bacchanalia were introduced into Rome early in the Second Century B.C, and at first were celebrated on three days of the year by women only. Later a priestess opened the mysteries to men, introduced evening celebrations, and greatly increased their frequency. The gathering soon became suspected of gross immoralities; and in B.C. 186, the Senate ordered the consuls to arrest the priests, and forbid further