Dinner (Hastings' Dictionary)

See FOOD. DIONYSIA {Aioviaia, Bacchanalia, EV ' Feast of Bacchus'), 2 Mac 6'. — A festival in honour of Dionysus. Dionj'sus is usually regarded as the god of the vine, but, as Fiazer shows in the Golden Bou(jh, he was a god of trees in general.

As he comes before us in Greek worship, he is quite clearly a vegetation deity ; but Jevons may be right in think- ing that two cults have been combined, — that of the vegetation spirit and that of the wine-god Dionysus, the latter lending its name to the former, which at first w.as naturally nameless.

The char- acter of the god is to bo determined, not from the myths told about him, which are tales invented to explain the ritual, but from the ritual itself, interpreted through comparison with parallel rites among other peoples. The festival was intended to celebrate the revival of vegetation in spring after the long sleep of winter. Not only to cele- liialc it, however, but by sympathetic magic to secure the fertility of the fielils.

This imitation of the processes of nature was associated with the wildest orgies and excesses, stimulated no doubt, in this instance, by the connexion of Dionysus 608 DIONYSIUS DIOSCURI with the vine. Jevons givea a reconstruction of the festival as it was held at Thebes and other places. A branch, or something else representing the vegetation spirit, was carried round the cul- tivated fields, to secure his blessing on the crops.

A human figure, also representing this spirit, was fastened to the top of a tree trunk, wliich had been felled and prepared for the purpose. This was hoisted up and then pelted till it fell. The women then tore it in pieces, and the woman who got the head raced with it to the temple or cliief liouse and nailed it to the door.

But in many cases the rites were much more savage, and bulls or goats, which represented the god himself, were torn to pieces by the worshippers in a mad scram- ble to possess themselves of portions of the flesh, and even human beings suffered at times in this way. The flesh was taken home and some of it buried in the fields. (For parallels to this custom of killing the god the Golden Bough should be consulted.

It secured a certain communion with the deity, the preservation of his vigour through the deatb of his temporary representative and his re-incarnation in a fresh life, and the fertility of the land in which the flesh was buried). The most famous festivals of Dionysus were held in Attica. Besides the Anthesteria and Lencea there were two, known as the Lesser and the Greater Dion- ysia.

The former was held in country districts in December, and was a vintage festival, accompanied by dancing, songs, improvised dramatic perform- ances, and a procession, in which the phallus was borne. The utmost licence of speech and conduct characterized it. The Greater Dionysia were held in the city, and were chiefly important from the fact that at them the great dramas of the tragic and comic poets were produced.

Before the dra- matic performances there was a great public pro- cession of worshippers, wearing masks and singing the dithyramb, in which an image of Dionysus was carried from one temple to another. This was followed by a chorus of boys. According to 2 Mac 6' Antioclius compelled the Jews, when the feast of Dionysia (RVm) came, to go in procession in honour of Dionysus, wearing wTeaths of ivy. The ivy was specially sacred to the god. See further xmder DiONYSUS. A. S. Peake.