Page:The Tragic Drama of the Greeks (1896).djvu/30

 i6 EARLY HISTORY OF GREEK TRAGEDY. [cH. drowning of her cries with the clash of cymbals, and the safe removal of the child in the midst of the uproar From such parallel examples we may derive some notion of the character of the dithyrambic dances performed by the satyrs in honour of Dionysus. The wealth and variety of the Bacchic legends — the various stories about the mysterious birth of the god, about his education upon Mount Nj'sa, his invasion and conquest of India, his conflict with the kings of Thrace and Thebes, his perilous voyage to Naxos, and his marriage with the deserted Ariadne — would supply abundant materials for mimetic representation. Some scholars, it is true, are of opinion that the dithyramb was restricted in early times to a single fable — the birth of Dionysus ; and that the performance of this legend at the spring festivals was intended to typify the annual revival of Nature in the spring-. This theory, however, is unsupported by adequate testimony ; and it seems on general grounds more reasonable to suppose that the old Bacchic h3'mns were co-extensive in range with the whole of the Bacchic mythology. § 4. Avion and the Dithyramb. For a long time after its first introduction into Greece the dithyramb was regarded more as a kind of folk-song than as a regular branch of literature, being performed by the voluntary efforts of the farmers at the rustic festivals ''. Its elevation to the rank of artistic poetry was due to the Dorians. Among the ' Strabo, 10. 3) li- (<5 5i9vpafx0os^. . . 8ta to Su^ai yevtcrOai ^ So Bergk, Griechische Literatur- Sis, en re ttjs Se/xeA.?;? Kal rod nrjpov rod geschichte, vol. iii, p. 12. This view is Aioy. It is not likely that Plato had based on Plat. Legg. 700 B Kal dWo any special information concerning the 'fiSos wSrji) Aiovvaov ytveais, oifiai. contents of the primitive dithyrambs. Sidvpa/jiPos Kcyofxtvos. But Plato's dc- Nor is it probable that the early Greeks scription of the dithyramb as the ' birlh wereconscious of any typical significance of Dionysus ' is apparently derived from underlying the story about the birth of the fanciful etymology which con- the deity. nected the word ' dithyramb ' with ' two The real derivation of the word Si6v- doors,' and referred it to the double pa/xPos is unknown. It is apparently birth of Dionysus, from Semele and connected with 6piafi0os, and may per- from Zeus. Cp. Ktym. Mag. v. hdvpapL- haps be of l'Iir)'gian origin. )3os' and ToC Sva Oiipai ^alvfiv. .Schol. " Aristot. Problem. 19. 15; Poet. Plat. Rep. 394 C ui'oiiaC,(rai ynp ovrws c. 4.