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Lesser Known Dionysia

Essay by John H. Wells ~ More information on obscure Dionysian festivals

Lesser Known Dionysian Festivals by John H. Wells

Worshipers of Dionysos who have devoted significant amounts of time studying the god and actively practicing his worship are aware of the festivals of Athens and Attica that were either partially or entirely devoted to the god: Oskhophoria, Haloa, Country Dionysia, Lenaia, Anthesteria, and City Dionysia. Most of the information available both in print as well as on the Internet is devoted to discussion of these festivals. This is not surprising-the majority of what we know about ancient Greece comes from Athens, due primarily to the high value their culture placed upon written works compared to the other Greek states.

This might lead the modern worshiper to conclude that the Athenian festivals represented the typical cycle of Dionysian festivals celebrated throughout the whole of ancient Greece. Nothing could be further from the truth. Dionysos was a very popular god in the ancient world, and dozens of different festivals dedicated to him existed throughout the ancient Greek world. While there were parallels between the Dionysian ritual practices from different localities, there were also some very marked differences.

The problem with the surviving information for many of these lesser-known festivals is that the information is typically quite fragmented. Often, only a line or two describing a particular festival exists; sometimes, neither the name nor the date for a particular festival has survived the ravages of time. However fragmented the material may be, information about these more obscure festivals could still be of considerable interest to modern worshippers of the god.

This article presents known information for a number of obscure Dionysian festivals celebrated in the ancient world. The majority of information that follows is drawn from L. R. Farnell's book Cults of the Greek States, Volume V. It is important to note that this is an older reference published in 1909. So while the existence of festivals described by Farnell's text is inarguable (instead of referencing "Text A by Scholar B" he simply provides the actual Greek or Latin text from Pausanius, Firmicus Maternus, Diodorus Siculus, and others), more modern interpretations may exist regarding the purpose or details of some of the festivals he describes. Some of the information herein is supplemented and/or supported by Kerenyi in Dionysos: Archetypal Image of Indestructible Life, Otto in Dionysos: Myth and Cult, Parke in Festivals of the Athenians, and a nifty web page consisting solely of quotes from ancient writers at: www.theoi.com/Cult/DionysosCult.html.

The intent of this article is not to provide an exhaustive description of the wide variety of Dionysian festivals observed in the ancient world; rather, this article serves more as a set of notes organized by festival name or type, intended to serve as a springboard for further research and/or the development of new festivals for use by the modern Hellenic pagan community.

The author intends to continue his research into the more obscure Dionysian festivals celebrated in the ancient world, and is open to comments from anyone who has additional information to add regarding the festivals described herein.

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A note about dates: often, no date exists for a particular festival described herein. It is generally accepted that Dionysos had no summer festivals of his own (he may have been a "guest" at some festivals, like Hermes is at the Anthesteria), so one may reasonably assume that the festivals without dates that are described below took place sometime between the modern months of September and April.

A note about festival names: if the underlined name for the festival is in quotes, the name provided is a descriptive name arbitrarily invented by the author of this document.

Agrionia - While the Athenians were celebrating the City Dionysia, much of Greece was busy celebrating some local version of this festival. Similar festivals took place in a wide range of ancient Greek states, often going by alternate but obviously similar names such as Agronia, Agrania, Agriania, etc. The Boeotian version of the Agrionia is based upon a myth involving the oleiai, three daughters of King Minyas who in their madness craved human flesh and devoured one of their own children. At the festival, the Priest of Dionysos pursued the oleiai with a drawn sword. Any of the oleiai that the priest caught was slain-evidence suggests this may have involved actual human sacrifice in rare cities. The death of the oleiai, whether it was actual or merely symbolic, served as atonement for the ancestral sins of the people of the city, and thus was a holy, albeit fearful act.

At some point during the Boeotian Agrionia, female votaries of the god would search for the god as if he had run away and had "taken refuge with the muses". This supposedly played into the myth of Lykurgos, who had "provoked the muses" during his outrage towards Dionysos. Farnell suggests that these muses were actually "Thracian water nymphs" who were companions to the god when he was thrown into the water (see "Emergence from the Waters Festival" described below, which probably had some mythological tie in to this ritual practice).

In Kos, Sparta, Kalymna, and Rhodes, this festival took place during their month of Agrionios and was called the Agriania. In Argos, the local version of the Agrionia was called the Nekusia; was often referred to as a "feast of the dead"; and the Proitides may have replaced the oleiai, who were chased over the mountains by Melampus and his sacred troop. In Orchomenos, men would wear black garments at their local Agrionia, and the festival had an air of gloom and death.

"Emergence from the Waters Festival" - In Argos and surrounding areas, the tale of Dionysos descending into the underworld to retrieve his mother Semele was the key myth behind a group of local festivals. Lake Alkyonia, near Lerna, was believed to be the lake into which Dionysos descended into and emerged from the underworld. It is also the lake into which, according to local myth, Perseus flung the dead body of Dionysos.

It is believed that these festivals typically involved the following:

" Dionysos descends into the underworld, usually symbolized in the form of an effigy of some type (usually a straw man) that was thrown into a lake, well, or other body of water. At the same time, they threw a lamb into the waters as a sacrifice to placate Kerebos (the guardian at the gates of Hades).

" Later, a trumpet was blown over the water, both to signify that Kerebos had been placated and to summon Dionysos back to the world of the living.

" Dionysos then reemerged from the underworld, with his mother Semele in tow.

This is believed to have been a spring rite, probably intended to bring Dionysos into mystic union with Demeter & Kore and their myth cycle. This festival may also have been imported to Rhodes, where an inscription was found describing a functionary of the god "who rouses the god with the water organ."

Some localities (e.g. Macedonia) tied this festival in with the myth of Ikarios, who disguised himself as Dionysos and distributed wine to the people. The people subsequently passed out from drinking too much, blamed Ikarios for poisoning them, and then killed him and tossed his dead body into a well (or under a tree in some versions of the myth). Elements of this festival have even survived into modern times; in Macedonia (circa 1900, and possibly to the present day) a local festival is celebrated where a straw man is thrown into a well.

Trieteric Rites - Sources describe a wide range of "trieteric" rites (collectively known as "trieterica") that were celebrated throughout Greece. "Trieteric" means "every other year", and these festivals typically involved the myth of the god's death and rebirth. Some cities celebrated two separate festivals, one for death and one for rebirth. Evidence for such festivals exists from Arcadia, Thebes, Orchomenos, Delphi, and many other localities. Some of the other rituals described herein, such as the Agrionia, are sometimes categorized as Trieterica.

Farnell theorizes that the Trieterica were associated with the shifting of land cultivation and may have been consecrated by a special ritual to the god of the soil. We know that the Thracians shifted their cornfields every year. The maenads would be called to charge themselves with vegetative magical potency from the fountainhead of all life (Dionysos) and did so through typical practices used to invoke entheos (e.g. omophagia, whipping, wild dancing with tossing of head, whirling of torches, frantic clamor of wind and percussion instruments, holy silence, wearing goat skins, wearing fawn skins, etc.). This magical vegetative energy would be used to revive the earth for the new growing season.

While the Trieteric festivals were by their very definition Dionysian festivals of the "two-year period" some localities, such as Delphi and Phrygia, may have observed their Trieteric festivals on an annual basis.

Thyia - A festival from Elis. Three large, empty pitchers were placed inside a temple, and the doors to the temple were closed. The priests then placed a seal upon the doors, and the citizens of Elis were allowed to affix seals of their own to assure that the temple was not entered. Then, according to ancient accounts, the priests checked the seals, opened the temple doors, and found the pitchers miraculously filled with wine. There are also references to 16 women at the festival who would engage in an orgiastic chant of "evoi" at some point during the festival.

Turbe - A festival celebrated near the source of the Erasinos, somewhere on the road between Argos and Tegea. The festival consisted of sacrifices offered to Dionysos and Pan. As the name suggests, it was a "turbulent" festival of ecstatic and violent character.

"Orgies at Taygetos" - No details are available, other than the fact that Taygetos was considered by the ancients to be one of the celebrated centers of furious Bacchic orgy.

"Divine Funeral Festival" - In Crete there was a divine funeral festival, organized in accordance with a sacred year of "trieteric" (celebrated every other year) rites. During the festival, the Cretans would celebrate everything the boy-god did or suffered from his birth to his death. They would rend a living bull with their teeth and simulate madness by shrieking with discordant clamor while running through secret places in the forest. It is unknown if this was an official, state sponsored festival like those of other cities, or if it was a private festival sponsored by wealthy families.

Feast of the Worthy Bull - The name is lost for this festival that took place on the island of Tenedos, but Pausanius described it as the "Feast of the Worthy Bull". The men of Tenedos would select a pregnant cow and tend her in great reverence until its calf was born. When the time for the festival came, they would take the calf, dress it up in buskins (boots, probably for hunting) of the god, sacrifice it, and then devour its flesh. The people would then pretend to stone the official who slew the "calf god" and symbolically banish him from the city until he successfully ran to the sea. Overall, this was a quiet and more "civilized" omphagia than those observed in other locations.

"Dionysian Foot-Race Festival" - In Sparta, 11 maidens would run a ritual race in honor of the god. These 11 women may have also served as the official bacchae for this and other festivals dedicated to Dionysos at Sparta.

"Orgies to Dionysos and Netherworld Aphrodite" - In Melangeia in Arcadia, orgies of Dionysos were associated with a "nether-world Aphrodite" where the Meliastai were sacred functionaries of the god and whose name expressed the magic by which ash trees were made to grow.

"Mystic Chest Orgy" - Little is known about this Cretan orgy, where a "mystic chest" in which "the sister buried the heart" played part. This may refer to the myth of Athena salvaging the heart of the dismembered Zagreus.

Kateunasmoi - A Phrygian winter burial rite. This was an orgiastic rite, part of a two ritual cycle celebrating the annual death and rebirth of Dionysos as a seasonally dying god. This festival was followed up in the spring by its companion festival, the Anegerseis.

Anegerseis - A Phrygian spring resurrection rite. Also orgiastic, this was the companion ritual to the Kateunasmoi, where the god is reborn as part of their seasonally dying god cycle.

"The Awakening of the Liknites" - A festival celebrated in Delphi. According to Plutarch, "The Delphians believe that the remains of the dismembered Dionysos are stored in their keeping by the place of the oracle; and the holy ones offer a secret sacrifice in the Temple of Apollo whenever the Thyiades awaken Liknites." The liknites refers to baby Dionysos who was placed in the liknon, a cradle consisting of a winnowing fan shaped like a shovel. This winter festival was intended to arouse the infant god, to return life to the vegetation and bring back the vivacity of spring.

Liknophoria - A Thracian festival obviously having something to do with the liknon, but no other records survive describing this festival. May have been similar to the Delphic "Awakening of the Liknites" festival.

"Chest Emerging from the Sea Festival" - Like Perseus, Dionysos had a myth where he and his mother Semele were placed in a chest and set afloat on the sea. In a number of coastal cities, festivals were celebrated where the divine child Dionysos is brought up from the sea in a chest. In one local myth cycle at Prasiai, the inhabitants believed that Semele and Dionysos were put into an oblong chest called a larnaz by Cadmus and thrown into the sea. The chest washed ashore, and Semele died. Ino then tended to the infant god. The Dionysian Priest at Prasiai would take the larnaz out of the temple in the middle of the night and down to the local river. The worshippers would follow, bathe in the river and crown themselves with ivy. They would then retrieve the chest and bring it back with them to the Temple of Dionysos. This festival is believed to have taken place during the late winter or early spring.

"Ship-Chariot Festival" - In Smyrna during the spring, there was a Dionysian festival where a holy trireme (an ancient Greco-Roman ship with three banks of oars) was borne around the marketplace in honor of the god. The trireme probably brought from the sea a revivified image of the god for spring, to ensure a good agricultural year. This festival may not originally be a Dionysian festival, considered by some to have evolved from a festival celebrating some ancient naval victory.

"Travail of Semele" - Described in an Orphic verse, this apparently was a Theban ritual where a holy drama was enacted either every year or every other year to honor Semele as Dionysos' mother and her tragic death. In Thebes, there was a "Thalamos of Semele" which was a smoldering ruin marking the place where she died from Zeus' lighting and probably where this festival took place.

"Return of Semele Festival" - In Thebes, they had an annual festival to celebrate the return of Semele in the early spring. This festival may have involved a drama or puppet show of some sort to reenact her return. There is also record of maenads from Thebes called katabatai who descended into the underworld to assist with Semele's resurrection. In Delphi, a similar festival called Herots was celebrated once every 8 years. In Attis, a somber version of this festival called Katabasis was celebrated just before the day of Semele's resurrection.

Katagogia - Not much is known about this festival from Priene. It may have involved Aphrodite, since local records describe an Aphrodite festival (Anagein) where the goddess is put to sea, and the Katagogia was celebrated 9 days after her return. The season for this festival is unknown, but suspected to be during the spring.

"The Torches of Dionysos" - A mid-winter festival observed in Parnasos and elsewhere. Torches were believed in some areas to call the god by name, hinting at its mystical power. The use of torches may have had something to do with vivifying the warmth of the earth, as seen in some Demeter/Kore observances. Torches would be thrown into a pit in some non-Dionysian observances; this may or may not have occurred here. The maenads at this festival would whirl torches, which may have served to purify the air of impure influences. Parallels of this ritual act are seen in several other ancient world rituals, including some Dionysian celebrations in Athens.

Lampteria - A winter "Feast of Torches" celebrated in Pellene. Men carried lighted torches to the Temple of Dionysos during the night, and would set up bowls of wine throughout the city.

Theodaisia - Translated as "the entertainment of the gods" this was a festival consecrated to Dionysos and the nymphs. This festival was observed in January in many states, including Anaphe, Lesbos, Kos, Kaymnos, Rhodes, Lindos, Crete, and Kyzikos.

Skiereia - A festival celebrated in Arcadia and Alea during the winter, where women/maenads were flogged in accordance with instructions from the Delphic Oracle.

"Winter Bull Feast" - In Kynathea in Arcadia, a winter festival was celebrated, where men would smear themselves with grease, and take a bull from the herd (the choice was made by the god) in their arms to the sanctuary of Dionysos.

"Festival of Dionysos Melanaigis" - In Hermione in Argolis, an annual festival was held in honor of Dionysos Melanaigis (of the black goat-skin) where they held a competition for music and offered prizes for swimming races and boat races.

Protrygaia - An autumn rite in honor of Poseidon and Dionysos-location unknown. This was an atonement rite after the gathering of the grapes, to ensure that they were cleared of impure influences. This ritual may have some similarities to the Oskhophoria.

Astrydromia - A festival celebrated in Kyrene, also known as the "Town Running Festival", was a birthday festival for the city that somehow involved Dionysos.

Phellos - A festival celebrated in the "rocky lands" where goats were grazed in Attica. No other details are available.

"Revelation of the Grape Cluster" - In Laconia, there was a festival were a grape cluster was miraculously revealed. No other details are available.

"Dionysia to Honor the Fallen Gods" - In Boeotia, there was a spring festival where Dionysian revelers brought "an amphora of wine, a small vine-spray, a goat, a basketful of dried figs" as offerings to the gods who had fallen at the season. We see some similarities to this preserved in the procession at the Athenian City Dionysia.

Trygeton - An Athenian festival (known from inscriptions-perhaps an older festival), where a vintage offering to Dionysos and the other gods was made on the 18th of Beodromion (right before the Greater Eleusinia). Participants may have smeared their faces with wine lees at the time of the vintage.

Theoinia - We know of this Athenian festival's existence, as well as the Iobaccheia, from surviving texts describing the oath taken by the Gerarai at the Anthesteria: "I sanctify myself and am pure and holy, from all things which are not purifying and particularly from intercourse with a man, and I shall act as Gerara at the Theoinia and Iobaccheia in the ancestral fashion and at the appropriate times". This festival celebrated Dionysos Theoinos, or "Dionysos of the wine". According to Harold Willoughby in Pagan Regeneration, the festival of Theoinia was "celebrated by those families who were believed to be direct descendents of Dionysos' original followers, in whose vineyards grew vines which were offshoots from the vine spray that the god himself had given them. Under such circumstances the devotees of Dionysus would be sure of the presence of the very god himself in the consecrated wine made from the sacred grapes." The ancient author Suidas suggests that the Theoinia may have been an early version of the Country Dionysia.

Iobaccheia - Little is known about this Athenian festival, other than the fact that it existed.

More information on obscure Dionysian festivals

SOURCE: A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890) (eds. G. E. Marindin, William Smith, LLD, William Wayte)

AGRIO´NIA (agriônia), a festival which was celebrated chiefly at Orchomenus, in Boeotia, in honour of Dionysus, surnamed Agriônios, i. e. the wild or boisterous. It appears from Plutarch (Quaest. Rom. 102), that this festival was solemnised during the night only by women and the priests of Dionysus. It consisted of a kind of game, in which the women for a long time acted as if seeking Dionysus, and at last called out to one another that he had escaped to the Muses, and had concealed himself with them. After this they prepared a repast; and having enjoyed it, amused themselves with proposing riddles to one another. This festival was remarkable for a feature which proves its great antiquity. Some virgins, who were descended from Minyas, and who probably used to [p. 93] assemble around the temple on the occasion, fled and were followed by the priest armed with a sword, who was allowed to kill the one whom he first caught. The sacrifice of a human being, though originally it must have formed a regular part of the festival, seems to have been avoided in later times. One instance, however, occurred in the days of Plutarch (Quaest. Graec. 38). But as the priest, Zoilos, who had killed the woman was afterwards attacked by disease, and severál extraordinary accidents occurred to the Minyans, the priest and his family were deprived of their official functions. The festival, as well as its name, is said to have been derived from the daughters of Minyas, who, after having for a long time resisted the Bacchanalian fury, were at length seized by an invincible desire of eating human flesh. They therefore cast lots on their own children; and as Hippasos, son of Leukippe, became the destined victim, they killed and ate him, whence the women belonging to that race were at the time of Plutarch still called the destroyers (ogeiai or aiolaiai) and the men mourners (psoloeis). Agrionia of a similar kind were celebrated also at Thebes and at Argos (Hesych. s. v. Agriania, which seems to be only another form for Agriônia). At Thebes the festival was celebrated with games and contests, while at Argos it was a festival of the dead (nekusia). (Müller, Die Minyer, p. 166, &c.; K. F. Hermann, Gottesd. Alterth, § 63, n. 13; Schömann, Griech. Myth. vol. i. p. 429.) [L. S.]

AMBROS´IA (ambrosia), festivals observed in Greece, in honour of Dionysus, which seem to have derived their name from the luxuries of the table, or from the indulgence of drinking. According to Tzetzes on Hesiod (Op. et D. v. 504) these festivals were solemnised in the month of Lenaeon, during the vintage. (Etym. M. s. v. Lênaiôn, p. 564. 7; G. E. W. Schneider, Ueber das Attische Theaterwesen, p. 43; K. F. Hermann, Lehrb. d. gottesdienstl. Alterth. d. Griechen, § 58, n. 7.) [L. S.]

There was also a quinquennial festival called Brauronia, which was celebrated by men and dissolute women, at Brauron, in honour of Dionysus. (Aristoph. Pax, 870, with the note of the Scholiast; and Suidas, s. v. Braurôn.) Whether its celebration took place at the same time as that of Artemis Brauronia (as has been supposed by Müller, Dor. ii. 9, § 5, in a note, which has, however, been omitted in the English translation), must remain uncertain, although the very different characters of the two festivals incline us rather to believe that they were not celebrated at the same time. According to Hesychius, whose statement however is not supported by any ancient authority, the Iliad was recited at the Brauronian festival of Dionysus by rhapsodists. (Comp. Hemsterh. ad Pollucem, ix. 74; Welcker, Der Epische Cyclus, p. 391; A. Mommsen, Heortologie, p. 409 foll.) [L. S.]

LERNAEA (lernaia) were mysteries celebrated at Lerna in Argolis in honour of Demeter and also to Dionysus, for both deities had shrines there. Dionysus had descended by the marsh of Lerna to the nether world to seek his mother Semele. Pausanias says that part of these rights might be revealed to the uninitiated, but that which belonged to Dionysus might not. Probably these mysteries reproduced the doctrines of Eleusis about a future life. We are told that there was a doubtful tradition to the effect that Philammon instituted these mysteries. In ancient times the Argives brought firs for them from the temple of Artemis Pyronia on Mount Crathis. (Pans. ii. 36, 37, viii. 15; Maury, Relig. de la Grèce, ii. 370.) [L. S.] [G. E. M.]

PROTRYGAEA (protrugaia) a festival celebrated in honour of Dionysus and Poseidon (Hesych. s. v.; Aelian, V. H. iii. 41; cf. theoi protrugaioi, Poll. i. 24). The origin and mode of celebration of this festival at Tyre are described by Achilles Tatius (ii. init.). On the association of Poseidon, see Plut. Symp. 5, 1; Preller, Gr. Myth. i. 554. [L. S.] [G. E. M.]

THALY´SIA (thalusia), a festival celebrated in honour of Dionysus and Demeter (Menand. Rhet. quoted by Meursius), or according to others of Demeter alone, as it is described by Theocritus in his seventh idyll, and by the grammarians who wrote the arguments to the same. It was held in autumn, after the harvest, to thank the gods for the benefits they had conferred upon men (Spanheim ad Callimach. Hymn. in Cer. 20 and 137; Wüstemann ad Theocrit. Idyll. vii. 3). [L. S.]