Summary:
A glance at the Greek god Dionysus in literature and art.
Dionysus, god of wine, in ancient Greek and Roman mythology is argued to have come late to the divinity family. Scholars continue to debate the idea. Myth scholars, fascinated by his stature and appearance believe that Dionysus was perceived as a god, and yet there are images of Dionysus that depict him as a goddess as well. The divine family tree of Dionysus begins with Dionysus as a gender specific male. I merely argue that, perhaps it is not a question of gender, but of perception. In order to receive the full understanding of Dionysus, one must start at the very beginning of Dionysus's "divine story."
Zeus and Persephone had a son, Dionysus. The Titans at the directions of Hera dismembered Dionysus, whom they had seen playing around the Heavens. Realizing what had happened, Zeus cast out the Titans to Tartarus. Athena, goddess of wisdom, saved Dionysus's heart, the only surviving part, and returned it to Zeus. (Sheppard 1) The story of Dionysus's first life ends. However, he has a second coming in which there are many versions. Euripides's The Bacchae is a favorable version. This play suggests that Zeus swallowed Dionysus's heart. Zeus fell in love with Semele, daughter of Cadmus (a mortal) and Harmonia (the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite), coveted her, and re-inseminated Dionysus in Semele. Hera, Zeus's wife, in a jealous rage went to Semele as her nurse and pursued Semele to ask Zeus into her house as he did to Hera. Zeus appeared as a lightning bolt as he did Hera. Zeus rescued Dionysus, Semele's unborn child, from the ash. However, Semele was unable to withstand the sight burned to death. To hide Dionysus from Hera, Zeus sewed him into his own thigh. Once Dionysus became a young boy, Zeus sent him to live with his Aunt Ion, Semele's sister, and the Nymphs of Nysa in Arabia. To further the deception Zeus made a replica of Dionysus and gave it to Hera. Ion and the Nymphs took their own precautions and raised Dionysus as a girl.
Dionysus's raising encourages the belief of Dionysus as female rather than a male. His childhood is only partially responsible for his feminine characteristics and style. These elements also come from his association with the mother earth goddess, Demeter, and his travels. On his travels, Dionysus gained the ability to cultivate grapes, turning their juices into wine. Believers of the time say that Demeter gives the ability to him. Readers and scholars alike consider Demeter as Dionysus's counterpart. Some research actually links Demeter as Dionysus's mother Semele. (Hodges 2) The festival held in Dionysus's honor, Dionysia, is also a symbol of the connection of Dionysus to the mother earth goddess. Demeter is responsible for the changing of season, the winter of cold and death, to the spring, a rebirth of greenery and life. Dionysia is held in the spring. It is a symbol of Dionysus's rebirth.
Dionysus's garland of ivy can also link Dionysus to Demeter. When Dionysus was born, Zeus gave him a garland of snakes. The trading in of the snakes for the ivy, indicated in the chorus of Euripides's The Bacchae, could be a symbol of trading a more masculine way of dealing with life for the feminine ivy.
He crowned him with a crown of snakes, which the Maenads hunt eagerly...
Semele's nurse put on your crowns of ivy bloom with starflowers...
Be crowned with boughs of oak and pine. (Euripides 232)
The ivy also symbolizes his life and death. Ivy if pulled from the earth it grows quickly back, and one cannot get rid of it.Because of Dionysus's characteristic of indestructible life, he is Zoë. Zoë in ancient Greek terms is everlasting life, limitless life without attributes, the human soul without the ego persona. Our individual lives are strung upon the unending thread of Zoë as bead upon a necklace. Each of us then contains both an infinite and finite. The source of Zoë is the primal mother, Gaia, the goddess Earth. Dionysus is Zoë. (Sheppard 3)
The Bacchae also includes insinuations made by Pentheus, King of Thebes and grandson to Cadmus, and his followers. Upon Dionysus's return to Thebes, Pentheus denies Dionysus's divinity rights, not only because of the story that Dionysus is not dead, but also because of Dionysus's appearance. Pentheus believes Dionysus died in the fire along with his mother, Semele. Not knowing that Dionysus was saved by is father Zeus, Pentheus considers Dionysus arrival and his preaching to be blasphemy. Pentheus also inquires about the fact that Dionysus has come from a far away land and merely seems more like a sorcerer than a god. Pentheus believes that Dionysus is quite feminine. Pentheus's comments are generally of Dionysus's appearance. Supposing that Dionysus has spent most of his life with Maenads in the shaded gardens, pampered, it would seem to readers that Dionysus is pale with out color just like the women.
They tell me some stranger came from Lydia,
A sorcerer and magician with golden locks perfumed,
And rosy-cheeked from wine...(Euripides 237)
Not only do these comments illustrate a Dionysus for the reader but also his actions and words. For example in The Bacchae Dionysus presents these feminine actions in the transforming scene of Pentheus into a woman.
Pentheus: How shall I best go about this business"
Dionysus: Come into the house, my friend. I will dress you.
Pentheus: In that lady's gown? No, I'd be a shamed!
Pentheus: Well how exactly would you have me look"
Dionysus: First I would like your hair long and curly.
Pentheus: Then"
Dionysus: A floor-length skirt. A turban on your head.
Pentheus: Anything else"
Dionysus: A thyrsus to hold, a fawnskin wrap.
Pentheus: But...but I can't wear a woman's clothes.(Euripides 260)
Later Dionysus puts Pentheus's hair in its proper place, refers to himself as Pentheus's beautician, and tells Pentheus how to straighten his girdle. Beauty tips are not one of a typical man during this period. A man was not seen as a man if they knew so much about women's clothing and parcels.(Euripides 264)
Dionysus is also the god of transgression and transcendence. Being raised as female yet a male; Dionysus transcends male and female genders. (Sheppard 3) Though Dionysus was genetically male, his transcendence allows his feminine characteristics to display themselves in The Bacchae. Such characteristics that are commonly associated with women since Adam and Eve and because of Eve may include; deception, persuasion, and seduction. Other characteristics may be embellishment, nurturer, and a relationship to the large cat family. With the ability to transgress and transcend Dionysus sends a clear line of deception.
In The Bacchae, several deceptions take place just because of his presence and power. The first of the deceptions, carried out through the whole play has Dionysus disguised himself as one of his male followers or priests. He does not reveal himself to anyone until the very end. When explaining his presence and punishment. One of the most important is in the case that Pentheus had locked Dionysus away. However, it was not he locked away, only a bull, an animal in which is also associated with Dionysus. The most important is the illusion that Agave has killed a lion. Agave and the other Maenads have ripped apart a supposed lion. Agave takes great pride in her accomplishment, only to find out that the lion she had killed is none other than her son, Pentheus. This event would not have taken place if Dionysus had not been able to pursue Pentheus to dress as a Maenad.
Seduction is probably one of the most vital of his characteristics in Pentheus's eyes. Because of Pentheus's, several references to his appearance one may believe that Dionysus is one of glamour and glory. Considering that many of the women of Thebes have decided to follow Dionysus, Pentheus, I believe, is quick to speculate that Dionysus has seduced them all in to the woods in their bareness.
What woman in Thebes could resist you?
That long hair is made for love, not wrestling?
Those thick curls bouncing on your cheeks so sexy... (Euripides 244)
It has been for centuries that the woman is the nurturer in a household. Women are left to stay at home and take care of the children, stay in the house for house chores, and when husbands are way at war take care of the farmland. Dionysus has never had the duties as a man perhaps would normally have. He has lived his life with the Maenads in travel and leisure. The skill to cultivate grapes came from a goddess. The ability to nurture the women while they worship in the woods, is too a characteristic of women specifically mother earth goddess. Dionysus gave the ability for the Maenads to spring water, milk, and wine from the ground if needed for the young ones. These abilities normally are those of Demeter, however, Dionysus has come across such wonders also.
Messenger: One took her thyrsus, struck it on a rock,
And there gushed a spring of purest water,
Another stuck her wand in the earth's lap,
Whence the god sent up a spring of wine.
Any who had a craving for white milk,
had only to scratch the ground with fingertips
to sluice all they could drink(Euripides 255).
Dionysus's relationship to the big cats is one of some character. Dionysus is often in art with them mainly the panther. Women are likely to be associated with the cats because of their ever so delicate walk. The cats act quickly in what hey do, but all the while with slyness. Dionysus has clearly portrayed the slyness and perhaps even his walk resembles that of the cat and the woman, considering that is all he had to model after most of his life. Perhaps there is one other quality of a cat, having nine lives, which Dionysus has. Dionysus has been twice born by the time The Bacchae comes along. There are other trials and incidents of madness that no normal person could survive but does not kill Dionysus, this is of similar to cats jumping from high distance and landing flat on their feet.
Statues of Dionysus lend us eyes as to what artists may have thought Dionysus looked like. The terracotta busts of Dionysus in Greece gives us two depictions of Dionysus both created around the same time possibly by the same artist, because of the style. The caption noted with the sculptures states that because Dionysus was represented as both a man and a woman, he was called the Erect, the Betesticled, the Hybrid, the Man-Woman.
In Dionysian frenzy, the devotee identified himself with every aspect of nature, becoming similar to a hermaphrodite plant, capable both of flowering and the bearing of fruit, of circularly giving and receiving the seed of life and light.
There has been no story that I have found that refutes the idea that Dionysus was indeed a male, or the fact he was a god worshiped by many cultures, called by different names. However, in the play The Bacchae Euripides allows the reader to believe that Dionysus is ultimately a god of deception and demise. He also leads readers to question ideals put out by characters in the play about Dionysus's appearance and character, all of which seem to have the qualities of a woman. Believably because of these remarks and Dionysus childhood, one may make the depictions as artists have done of Dionysus as female. The artists have merely shown one side of Dionysus. Dionysus is the ultimate god of transcendence and transgression, which allows him to be male yet be perceived as female. I believe Dionysus is as John Donne, a poet puts it, "We Two being One." Dionysus is male, but his outer appearance, character, and skills allow him to depicted as female.
Works Cited
Euripides. "The Bacchae". Ed. Slavitt. University of Pennsylvania. 1997.
