While drama was a Panhellenic development, the major Dionysiac festivals can be assigned to the Ionian and Athenian Greeks (Anthesteria, Lenaia) or to the Dorians and the Aiolic speakers of Thessaly and Boiotia (Agriania and its variants, Theodaisia). This division also corresponds to two early centers of Dionysiac activity, the Aegean islands and Boiotian Thebes. The islands, particularly Chios and Naxos, were leading producers of wine and proponents of Dionysos as the god of viticulture whose sacred marriage with Ariadne ensured prosperity. The rituals and myths that involve Dionysos’ arrival from the sea, as in the ship processions of East Greece and Athens, seem to reflect the influence of the islands. The silens or satyrs, who are featured in the vase iconography of several myths set in Naxos (e. g. the return of Hephaistos and the meeting of Dionysos and Ariadne), are also a part of this Aegean Dionysiac tradition.3 They are conspicuously absent from the myths of Boiotian origin that involve resistance to Dionysos by royal women (the daughters of Kadmos, Minyas, Eleutheros, and Proitos). The Boiotian/ Theban strand of Dionysiac cult, exported to the rest of the mainland and beyond, focused on the god’s birth, themes of death and resurrection, and various benefits and purifications obtained through initiation into Dionysiac thiasoi (groups organized for worship). Mainadic activity seems to have been present in both traditions, though emphasized far more heavily on the mainland. The geographical position of Attica ensured that both the Aegean and Boiotian strands played an important role in the Athenian worship of Dionysos.
Dionysos, rather surprisingly, is a winter god. His festivals everywhere take place in the months we call December, January, February, and March:
The seasons of winter and early spring. The biennial nature of many of these festivals, generally the winter ones with mainadic elements, has never been satisfactorily explained. One theory relates the phenomenon to the need for intercalary periods to reconcile the lunar and solar calendars and keep the months synchronized with the seasons.4 The Dionysiac festivals of winter have been described as rites by which the quiescent grape vines and other vegetation were recalled to life. While Dionysos is certainly a god who dies or vanishes and reappears periodically, it is difficult to plausibly match his comings and goings with the growth cycles of plants. On the other hand, he unquestionably has affinities with certain trees (pine, fig, plane) and vines (grape, ivy). The ivy, ubiquitous in art, actually eclipses the grapevine as the emblem of the god, perhaps because it retained foliage through the winter and was thus available for ritual use.5 The spring festivals are more easily explained because they correspond to the tasting of the new wine, but it is notable that no major Dionysiac festival addresses the vintage.
World History
