in Heathen mythology, the god of wine, with whose fabulous adventures every school-boy is acquainted. This personage is seldom named in modern times but as a sensual encourager of feasting and jollity; but he was regarded in a more respectable light by the ancients, who worshipped him in different countries under the following appellations: in Egypt, he was called Osiris; in Mytili, Faunus; in India, Dionysius; Liber, throughout the Roman dominions; Adonaius, in Arabia; and Penheus, by the Lucanians. Mythologists furnish reasons for all these different names given to the same god, which may be seen in the second volume of Banier's Mythology.
It is natural to suppose that the Greeks and Romans, as usual, bestowed upon the one Bacchus which they wor- worshipped, the several actions and attributes of the many divinities known by that name, and by other equivalent denominations in different countries. However, antiquity chiefly distinguished two gods under the title of Bacchus: that of Egypt, the son of Ammon, and the same as Osiris; and that of Thebes in Boeotia, the son of Jupiter and Semele.
The Egyptian Bacchus was brought up at Nysa, a city of Arabia Felix, whence he acquired the name of Dionysius, or the God of Nysa; and this was the conqueror of India. Though this Bacchus of the Egyptians was one of the elder gods of Egypt, yet the son of Semele was the youngest of the Grecian deities. Diodorus Siculus tells us, that Orpheus first deified the son of Semele by the name of Bacchus, and appointed his ceremonies in Greece, in order to render the family of Cadmus, the grandfather of the Grecian Bacchus, illustrious.
The great Bacchus, according to Sir Isaac Newton, flourished but one generation before the Argonautic expedition. This Bacchus, says Hermippus, was potent at sea, conquered eastward as far as India, returned in triumph, brought his army over the Hellenic front, conquered Thrace, and left music, dancing, and poetry there. And, according to Diodorus Siculus, it was the son of Semele who invented farces and theatres, and who first established a music-school, exempting from all military functions such musicians as discovered great abilities in their art; on which account, says the same author, musicians formed into companies have since frequently enjoyed great privileges.
Dr Burney * observes, that the dithyrambs which gave birth to dramatic representations, are as ancient as the worship of Bacchus in Greece; and there is little doubt but that the ceremonies of his mysteries gave rise to the pomp and illusions of the theatre. Many of the most splendid exhibitions upon the stage for the entertainment of the people of Athens and Rome, being performed upon the festivals of Bacchus, gave occasion to the calling all those that were employed in them, whether for singing, dancing, or reciting, servants of Bacchus.
Paulanias, in his Attics, speaks of a place at Athens consecrated to Bacchus the singer; thus named, he says, for the same reason as Apollo is called the chief and conductor of the muses. Whence it should seem that Bacchus was regarded by the Athenians not only as the god of wine, but of song; and it must be owned, that his followers, in their cups, have been much inclined to singing ever since. Indeed we are certain, that in none of the orgies, processions, triumphs, and festivals, instituted by the ancients to the honour and memory of this prince of bons vivants, music was forgotten, as may be still gathered from ancient sculpture, where we find not only that musicians, male and female, regaled him with the lyre, the flute, and with song; but that he was accompanied by fawns and satyrs playing upon timbrels, cymbals, bagpipes, and horns: these Suidas calls his minstrels; and Strabo gives them the appellations of Bacchi, Sileni, Satyri, Bacche, Lene, Thya, Mamillones, Naïades, Nymphes, and Titryi. These representations have furnished subjects for the finest remains of ancient sculpture; and the most voluptuous passages of ancient poetry are descriptions of the orgies and festivals of Bacchus. See Orgia.