24 Comments
Feb 15, 2023Liked by Stone Age Herbalist

I would like to point out a to me guite important aspect if Dionysius myth. Dionysius is also Hades, as per the Greeks. The god of death, sex and extacy. Of hidden secrets. Of shameful acts or resurrection. The immortal One being devoured by the 12 titans becoming the source of humanity.

Viewed from a philosophical point of view, we are looking at a very adcanced monist theology in action.

Expand full comment
Feb 15, 2023Liked by Stone Age Herbalist

I would read temporary escape to suffering and a shortened life span.

I used to beekeep and made a fermented syrup by simply filling a jar halfway with berries, the ones I like the best were black currants, then fill the jar up with honey. Every day for three days I would burp out the pressure and flip the jar on day two. Back up on day three. The honey became a light syrup imparted with the flavor of the berry.

So addicting I think this turned the cells in my body insulin resistant, symptoms increasingly dehabilitating I stopped.

One jar I had in the fridge, hidden back in the corner I forgot about it. Maybe a couple of years. Oh my, it was the best flavored drink I ever tasted.

I never tried to make this drink again thinking as a powerful life sucking force.

Those people were fattened also by eating seeds methinks.

Expand full comment
Feb 16, 2023Liked by Stone Age Herbalist

Really excellent, great work.

“Enter now life’s second portal,

Motherless Mystery; lo, I break

Mine own body for thy sake,

Thou of the Twofold Door, and seal thee

Mine, O Bromios”

Expand full comment
Feb 16, 2023·edited Feb 16, 2023Liked by Stone Age Herbalist

Hi, good article.

Two interesting points about Dionysus.

First, as Quift remembers, there is a strong association between Hades and Dionysius: i remember a crater where they were specular. It is in fact possible that Hades is Dionysus as dead God waiting for rebirth. This suggests wild speculations about Dionysus being brother and son of Zeus, being eaten by the Titans (like all Zeus' brothers), kidnapping and marrying his mother Persephone...

Second, Arnobious in Against Nations reveals that during Bacchic cults It was told the story of Dionysus self-sodomy with a fig rod above the tomb of Prosymnos: if we accept the "Neolithic framers homosexuality hypothesis" and recognize the Greek tabu upon true anal sex (Plato forbid it in The Laws) there is a second clue about Dionysus archaic origin in the pre-greek/pre-doric world.

Expand full comment
Feb 16, 2023Liked by Stone Age Herbalist

Fun essay, informative and enjoyable. Thanks!

Expand full comment

The arguments is "all a little too neatly wrapped up for my liking". Well, it is not a religion to like or not. You have something against? - give me counterarguments. Anyway this material you use is copyrighted. I had never received any of your requests to use it.. However, maybe it was for a reason to avoid counterarguments because there is none exists?

Expand full comment

Very interesting and informative. Thanks!

Expand full comment

I'm always particularly fascinated by the repurposing of Dionysus, symbol of wildness and madness, as the patron of Athenian drama. Of course the Great Dionysia wasn't the only or even the most important civic festival, but I suspect that fruitful tension between the ordered civic life and the Dionysian excess is at the heart of much of what makes Greek drama so compelling. Is the god constrained by the city (The Bacchae) or is he its partner (The Frogs)?

Can't wait to see where you go with the Apollonian!

Expand full comment
Feb 19, 2023·edited Feb 19, 2023

Please check your most recent twitter dms Ive shared a paper Ive read on cultural evolution that I honestly think is super interesting Id really really like to know your opinion about it if possible

Expand full comment

There's also a possible connection with Adonis (Baal?), who was clearly imported from the Semitic pantheon, another dying and resurrecting god, associated with human (esp. child) sacrifice.

We know that the Kura-Araxes culture of the South Caucasus was roughly contemporary with the early winemaking, influenced both Iran and Levant, and that this influence included wine. This means that wine was present in Levant very early, before the Greek civilization started to take shape.

We also know that not only Greeks were in contact with Levant&Egypt, they lived side-by-side with Phoenicians e.g. in Sicily.

In short there's wine, orgiastic cults, dying gods, bloody sacrifices... I think it might be at least a part of a puzzle.

Expand full comment