(Bacchus), the god of wine and revelry, more generally called Dionysus by the Greeks, was, according to the common tradition, the son of Jupiter and Semele the daughter of Cadmus and Hermione. When Semele was pregnant, Juno, in the disguise of a friend, persuaded her to urge the fatal request that her lover, in order to assure her of his divinity, would come to her embraces invested with the attributes of majesty. Jupiter, who had sworn by Styx to grant whatever she might ask, was obliged to comply; when the mortal Semele, unable to endure the fiery splendours of the god, was reduced to ashes. The infant Bacchus was snatched from the flames by Mercury, or by the nymph Dirce, and sealed up in his father's thigh until the full period of birth; whence he has received the epithet of Bimatrix, Semele, under the name of Thyone, was immediately translated to heaven; or, as some report, she remained in Hades till brought thence by Bacchus. According to Ovid, the young Bacchus was brought up by his aunt Ino, and afterwards intrusted to the care of the nymphs of Mount Nysa. Others say that he was educated at Naxos by the nymphs Philia, Coronis, and Cleis. Pausanias relates a tradition of a more dramatic cast—that when Cadmus discovered the amour of his daughter, he exposed her with her infant to the perils of the deep in a coffer or chest, which was carried by the waves to the coast of Brasia in Peloponnese, where Semele was found dead, but the child still living. These various traditions appear to refer to different personages. Cicero enumerates five Dionysii: 1. The son of Jupiter and Semele; 2. the son of Nilus; 3. The son of Caprius or Cabeirus; 4. The son of Jupiter and the Moon; 5. The son of Nissus and Thyone (De Nat. Deor. iii. 23). Bacchus is often confounded with the Egyptian Osiris, or the sun, whose worship appears to have been introduced into Greece by the Orphici; and when Bacchus is represented seated on a globe bespangled with stars, he must be regarded as identified with that deity. Tradition represents Bacchus as having assisted the gods in their war against the giants, in which he was cut to pieces; but this story evidently relates to Osiris, who was killed by his brother Typhon. When Bacchus was grown up he was afflicted by Juno with madness, in which condition he wandered over many parts of the earth. There is also a tradition that while he lay asleep in the isle of Naxos he was carried off by some Tyrrhenian mariners, whom he transformed into dol- phins, but spared the pilot because he had opposed their design. (See Acors.) In his celebrated expedition to India, he is represented sitting in a chariot drawn by a lion and tiger, with a panther's skin flung about his shoulders. His attendants were Pan, Silenus, and the Satyrs, besides a motley multitude including numerous Bacchantic women, who are variously styled Lene, Menades, Thyades, Mimalones, Clodones, and Bassarae or Bassarides. Armed with the thyrsus, and crowned with vine and ivy leaves, they danced around him with cups in their hands, shouting "Evohe! Bacche!" "Evohe! Eleleu!" to the sound of Phrygian flutes, drums, and cymbals. His progress was triumphant, and generally without bloodshed; for men gratefully acknowledged the divinity of the hero who taught them the cultivation of the vine and instructed them in the useful arts. He was relentless, however, towards those who opposed his authority; and on that account he inflicted dreadful punishments on Damascus, on Lycurgus the son of Dryas king of Thrace, and others.

Bacchus is generally represented as young, handsome, and beardless, with an air of luxurious languor and effeminacy, and long flowing hair, holding in his hand a thyrsus, and crowned with vine or ivy leaves. Sometimes he has the appearance of age and decrepitude, as indicating the effects of intemperance; at other times he is seen as an infant in the arms of his foster-father Silenus, or riding on the shoulders of Pan, or on a goat, and accompanied by goats and satyrs. The horns with which he is sometimes represented are probably the symbol of victory or dominion, according to the Egyptian idea; but these are generally short, and concealed almost entirely by the hair. The phallus, which had a conspicuous place in the processions of Bacchus, was introduced from Egypt by Melampus. (See Herodot. ii. 49.) His several appellations of Liber, Bromius, Evan, Thyonaeus, Bassareus, Pallas, &c., were derived either from circumstances connected with his personal history, from the places where he was worshipped, or from the ceremonies observed at his festivals. These festivals, which were very numerous, were called Orgia, Dionysia, Bacchanalia, &c. The orgies were celebrated by night, and those held on Mount Cithaeron were especially noted for extravagance and licentiousness. The Dionysia at Athens were celebrated with extraordinary splendour. The rites of Bacchus were often attended with the grossest debauchery; and to such a pitch was this depravity carried at Rome, that it was found necessary to suppress the orgies by a decree of the senate. The vine, ivy, laurel, yew, fig-tree, and fir, were sacred to Bacchus; as were also the tiger, panther, ass, dolphin, magpie, and serpent; the last, as emblematic of immortality, being common to several of the gods. The ram was sacrificed to him, as was also the goat, on account of its destructiveness to vines. (See Ascolia.) It is said that in very early times this deity was propitiated with the blood of human victims; and even Themistocles had the barbarity to sacrifice three noble Persian youths on an altar which he erected to Bacchus Orestes on board his galley. (Plutarch, Themist.) Bacchus had numerous children by Ariadne, whom he espoused in the island of Naxos, after her desertion by Theseus. (See Ariadne.) The most interesting circumstance in connection with the worship of this deity is that of the dithyrambic and mummeries performed at the celebration of his mysteries, which were undoubtedly the first rude prototypes of scenic or theatrical representations, as eventually developed in the comedies of Cratinus, Eupolis, and Aristophanes. Tragedy also arose out of the worship of Bacchus. The worshippers, clad in the skins of goats and fawns, imitated the poetical fictions concerning the god; personating Silenus, Pan, the nymphs and satyrs, and arrayed in grotesque dresses, they smeared their faces with the lees of wine, and diverted themselves and others with their antic gestures and comic sallies.

The Greek word παράδοσις, tragedy, is generally admitted to have been derived from the name of the victim, παράδοσις, a goat, which was sacrificed on these occasions, accompanied with the singing of an ode or hymn, ἀπόδοσις.

The origin of Bacchus and of his name have given rise to a diversity of opinions. The name has been deduced from Λύκαι, and from Βούσα, because of the noise which prevailed at the celebration of his rites. Diodorus mentions three deities of this name: 1. The conqueror of India, who is known as the bearded Bacchus; 2. The horned Bacchus, son of Jupiter and Proserpine; 3. The son of Semele, called the Bacchus of Thebes. The ingenious Rudbeck conjectures that Bacchus was a Scythian or Thracian hero named Bagre, whom tradition represents as the conqueror of the Eastern world; and this name he derives from bagge, bokk, i.e. a goat or ram, metaphorically taken for dux. (Atlantic. ii. p. 146.) Ovid, indeed, makes Bacchus set out from the Hebrus, a river of Thrace:

Ibat arenoso satyris comitatas ab Hebro.—Fast. iii. 737.

The worship of this deity appears to have been of Eastern origin. The name Dionysus (Διόνυσος) is apparently a compound of Δίς and Νύσα, i.e. the deity from Nysa, which was the name of a mountain and city between the rivers Choaspes and Cophas; yet it should be observed that this name was borne by several other places in different parts of the world. (T.S.T.—L.)