The symbolical language of ancient art and mythology : an inquiry / by Richard Payne Knight.
- Richard Payne Knight
- Date:
- 1892
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The symbolical language of ancient art and mythology : an inquiry / by Richard Payne Knight. Source: Wellcome Collection.
425/458
![No. 30. “ Rev. Serapis on a ram ; 6th year. 31. ]>AKCHOS (Bacchus) or Dionysos.—Rom. Mus 46 Homer makes Zeus say Dionysos is his son by .Semele (the earth), (See Xote 812), which is to say, of the hcr.ven and of the earth. The two names in later time Greek poetry came to denote very different ideals. Dionvsos was the son torn out of darkness, the worker through the long day of life, contender with and concjueror of enemies (clouds), sleeper in the dark, silent land (night), and he who rises again from sleep in the dawn-land. He is also the night-sun as Apollon is the day-sun. The nature of divinities is read in their names, and Brown, in “ 77ie Great Dionysiak MytlG' gives forty-three epithets of this god, each descriptive of some attribute. A few of these are : Agrionios, the savage, referring to an early time when human sacrifice was offered to the god; Bromios, the noisy, as j^atron of the noisy and vociferous rit- ual ; Choiropsalas, the sow-seeker, a phallic epithet (see Clement Alex- andrinus, Protrept. ii. 39, and Aristophanes, Sp/ie/ces, 1364, and Peter, ii, 22). The word Bakchos is said to mean to howl or .shout wildly. Associated with this god are many emblems; the sequent as a symbol of the sun, of time and eternity, of earth-life, fertilizing moi.sture, and as a phallic emblem; sesame (always put in the mystic chest), made into cake pyramids and knobbed cakes ; also salt, ivy, pomegranate, ser- ]ients and ferules. Dionysos was also said to be the son of Persephone, of 16, of Arge, of Dione, and of Amaltheia. See Myth, of the Aryan Nations, Sir G. ^V. Cox. The name Dionysos is referred to the Assy- rian Daiannisi, or Dian-nisi, judge of men, and it corresponds to the Kgyptian Rhotamenti, Rhadamanthys, the King of the Under World. 'I'he Dionysiak myth is a treatise on life, as conceived by the various people who invented it. Dionysos is the kosmic spirit of the material world, son of Zeus the first cause and all-father, and of Semele the foundation of nature (Brown). Orpheus says : “ The sun whom men call Dionysos as a surname. One Zeus, one Aides, one Helios, one Dionysos.” 32. Birth of Bakchos. — Gal. des Feints Bakchos is the sun, and was said to be a son of Dionysos and Aphro- dite, that is the Dawn in its loveliness and splendor, unruffled by cloud or wind. Apollo with his four horses ushers in the day, and Pan pipes a w'elcome, while I lermes bears the infant aloft to Zeus who waits on a cloud attended by his eagle. Various nymphs, gods and goddes.ses are near, and Narcissus (Narkissos) the weary sun, goes to sleep (turns into a flower). 33. Persian Banner; emblem of the Sun 34. 'Phe Mystic Egg; see Note 60. Pile Solar Egg is a manifestation of the Kosmic Egg, supported by two serpents of plenty, each crowned with the modius of Serapis. On some](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24885320_0425.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
