2 Comments
Lunar beasts (part two)

1. Lunar Beasts (part 1)
2. Lunar Beasts (part 2)
3. Lunar Beasts (part 3)
4. Lunar Beasts (part 4)
5. Lunar Beasts (part 5)
6. Lunar Beasts (part 6)
7. Lunar Beasts (part 7)
8. Lunar Beasts (part 8 )

The God Dionysus

Dionysus , accompanied by his army of bacchic revellers, was accredited as the universal distributor of his own worship and the knowledge of the vine (The ambrosial plant). Like Noah, he was the inventor of wine, and like Soma, he himself was the ambrosial drink poured out, everywhere releasing mankind from suffering.

“Like Noah, he was the inventor of wine, and like Soma, he himself was the ambrosial drink poured out, everywhere releasing mankind from suffering.”

He was originally depicted as a bearded man, sometimes wearing a fawn or leopard-skin, and often carrying a wine cup (kantharos). From the 5th Century B.C onwards he primarily took the form of an effeminate youth.

In Euripides’ Bacchae, the god is invoked by the chorus to manifest himself as a bull and multi-headed serpent, both reflecting the god’s temporal aspect, as well as a fire breathing lion, representing his eternal all-consuming nature.

The Bull Dionysus

To demonstrate the rampant bull-ness of Dionysus, I need only to quote a paragraph from The Golden Bough:

…he is spoken of as “cow-born,” “bull,” “bull-shaped,” “bull-faced,” “bull-browed,” “bull-horned,” “horn-bearing,” “two-horned,” “horned.” He was believed to appear, at least occasionally, as a bull. His images were often, as at Cyzicus, made in bull shape, or with bull horns; and he was painted with horns. Types of the horned Dionysus are found amongst the surviving monuments of antiquity. On one statuette he appears clad in a bull’s hide, the head, horns, and hoofs hanging down behind. Again, he is represented as a child with clusters of grapes round his brow, and a calf’s head, with sprouting horns, attached to the back of his head. On a red-figured vase the god is portrayed as a calf-headed child seated on a woman’s lap. The people of Cynaetha held a festival of Dionysus in winter, when men, who had greased their bodies with oil for the occasion, used to pick out a bull from the herd and carry it to the sanctuary of the god. Dionysus was supposed to inspire their choice of the particular bull, which probably represented the deity himself; for at his festivals he 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 hither, 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!” The Bacchanals of Thrace wore horns in imitation of their god. According to the myth, it was in the shape of a bull that he was torn to pieces by the Titans; and the Cretans, when they acted 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.
James Frazer: The Golden Bough, Ch. 43 Dionysus

Representations of Dionysus

In one of many magnificent mosaics from the House of Masks in Delos, a youthful Dionysus rides on the back of a leopard (another solar beast), holding up a libation dish*, deliberately at an angle, identifying it with the new moon of rebirth.

The New Moon of Rebirth

An Attic vase from the 5th Century B.C (below), portrays the god (or rather an effigy of the god) hanging from a vertical post. Branches of ivy sprout from his body, a circular wreath hangs from his belt, and before him stand two large vases upon a table. He is flanked by four female attendants. On the left, one holds a flaming torch pointing downwards towards the realm of death, whilst to the right of the god — hanging, as it were, in liminal space — another holds a torch upwards towards the realm of life, that also correspond with the waning and waxing moons. Dionysus was known as Dithyrambos, ‘he of the double-door’, further identifying the god with the old and new moons.

He of the Double-Door

Dionysus was also said to have married Ariadne, the daughter of Minos, who helped Theseus navigate the labyrinth and slay the half-man half-bull Minotaur.

« Lunar beasts (part one) | Religious Roles in Judaism »