“I begin to sing of ivy-crowned Dionysus, the loud-crying god, splendid son of Zeus and glorious Semele. The rich-haired Nymphs received him in their bosoms from the lord his father and fostered and nurtured him carefully in the dells of Nysa, where by the will of his father he grew up in a sweet-smelling cave, being reckoned among the immortals. But when the goddesses had brought him up, a god oft hymned, then began he to wander continually through the woody coombes, thickly wreathed with ivy and laurel. And the Nymphs followed in his train [10] with him for their leader; and the boundless forest was filled with their outcry.” (-Homeric Hymn, translated by H.G. Evelyn white)
DIONYSUS (die-uh-ny-sus) the god of wine, vegetation, festivity, and on a darker note, madness and frenzy. Here we see our jovial deity riding a leopard and wearing a leopard skin, holding aloft his sacred wine chalice in one hand, and his pine cone tipped staff "Thyrsus". Below him dance his attendants in the cult of Dionysus, the Sileni, satyr, centaur, woman dancer, and bull and woman, with a centaur playing the Aulos (two head flute pipe). In the upper left-hand background, we can see hanging grapes for the wine, and below; a darker representation of Dionysus; the mad frenzy. Here we see the Maenads; "raving ones,” women followers who drink and dance into violent frenzies. In Euripedes’ play, "the Bacchae'', the Maenads, in a state of delusion, tear apart their own king Pentheus, limb from limb, thinking him a lion. Even poor Orpheus, the greatest lyre player of all, was torn apart when he refused to play for them in a state of mourning after returning from the underworld without his wife, Eurydice.
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