Dionysus God: The Nonbinary God of Greek Mythology

Dionysus, god of wine, displays significant nonbinary aspects. Let’s explore them further.

I’d known that Dionysus was a genderqueer icon for a long time, but their story was fairly low on my priority list.

There are so many topics I’d love to dig into, so many y’all have been clamouring for me to cover.

Whatever topic you’re asking about, I’ll get there one of these days. If you want me to get to it faster, the Patreon link is in the description. This isn’t my full-time gig yet. 

But when I came across this statue, it intrigued me so much that it bumped Dionysus up higher on the list. So here we are. 

If you’re new here, welcome.

I’m Sophie Edwards, and this is We Have Always Existed. It’s a series where we explore the wealth of transgender history in the ancient Mediterranean.

Dionysus isn’t a real person, of course. So, this is more about transgender mythology than history. But that’s not the first time we’ve explored mythology, of course.

RELATED: Siproites’ Greek Mythology: Artemis Turning a Man into a Woman

What’s the story with this statue?

We’ll find out as we go.

But what’s more, we’ll discover A LOT more evidence. 

So, what makes Dionysus stand out as a gender fluid god? 

Is Dionysus the god of LGBTQ?

When did this idea first appear in mythology? 

What can this tell us about attitudes toward androgyny in ancient Greece? 

And what can it tell us as modern trans people? 

Let’s take a look. 

We’ll start by exploring Dionysus’ origins, both mythological and in the historical and archaeological record.

Naturally, there’s a lot of it, since they’re one of the twelve Olympians and all.

We could spend all day talking about Dionysus as a nature deity, as a fertility symbol, etc. etc. But that’s not the point of this video. 

Instead, we’ll take a look at how Dionysus’ femininity was depicted in ancient art and literature.

As we do, we’ll be exploring their myths, as best we can, through the lens of the people who wrote them.

That means putting aside some of our modern ideas of sex and gender.

Our goal is to understand what a nonbinary figure would have looked like and what it would have meant to the ancient Greeks and Romans.

From there, we can see what these stories might mean to modern queer and trans people. 

I’ll also be referring to Dionysus mostly using they/them pronouns.

That’s kind of an anachronism, I know, since they/them pronouns weren’t really a thing in Greek or Latin.

But as you’ll see going forward, they were referred to in both masculine and feminine ways, and using they/them is the closest I can get to reproducing that in English. 

Besides, using they/them to refer to a nonbinary deity makes more sense to a modern audience, I think, and there aren’t too many ancient Greeks watching my videos, so here we are. 

Chapter I: The Origins of Dionysus

So when we’re talking about the origins of Dionysus here, we’ve got two angles. First, we’ll deal with their appearances in the historical record. Then, we’ll look at their mythological origins. 

So, when did Dionysus first show up to the party? 

For the longest time, it was thought that they were a late addition to the squad on Olympus.

It kind of makes sense too.

After all, they aren’t mentioned much in Homer.

They’re often viewed as an outside influence on Greek society.

And they’re often treated as the new guy by the other Olympians, who bullied them by stuffing them in a locker and stealing their lunch drachmae. 

But they’re not the new guy.

In fact, they might be one of the oldest guys.

The earliest evidence we have of Dionysus comes from a Mycenaean Linear B inscription.

That means it’s really old. 

These were the same Greeks who would have fought in the Trojan War, so yes, Matt Damon and Elliot Page are Mycenaean Greeks.

I haven’t been able to find a date for the specific Linear B inscription we’re looking at.

But the Mycenaeans flourished from roughly 1700-1100 BCE, which means the tablet we’re looking at here is pretty old.

We do know it comes from Pylos, though, on the Southwest coast of the Peloponnese.

In the Classical era, it was enslaved by Sparta, but in the Mycenaean era, it was a strong and proud state in its own right. 

I really wish I could show you the tablet itself, but the Cambridge Linear B Research Archive is a jerk about sharing its content.

You can sign up for a free account on their website to see it for yourself, but they don’t allow people to republish their photos, even for scholarly reasons.

If you don’t feel like signing up for an account (and I don’t blame you, honestly), I traced the inscription for you.

Anyway, the tablet is labelled PY Ea 102, catchy name, and it shows this.

That clearly says Dionysus, right? 

No? 

Yeah, it’s an old script.

“Telephone pole tent cubed tie fighter weird hammer dripping 5” doesn’t say much to modern eyes. 

What, you don’t think it looks like “telephone pole tent cubed tie fighter weird hammer dripping 5”?

Alright, well, what’s your idea then, smarty pants?

Drop it in the comments, and we’ll see who’s right!

But if we look at the Mycenean alphabet, we can see what these letters are – di-wo-nu-so-jo.

Diwonusojo.

And if you drink enough wine, you’ll slur that into Dionysus. 

This bit is a broken part of a larger tablet that reads, in full, “to the sacrificial hearth of Dionysos, two large parts and two small parts of grain” (Bernabé 24-27).  

This isn’t the only time Dionysus’ name shows up in Linear B tablets, either.

We found another one in Chania, on the Greek island of Crete, which connects Dionysus with Zeus as father and son.

The Chania tablet describes offerings of honey, which may have been used to brew mead. 

So, where did Dionysus come from?

It’s hard to say.

We know there were Dionysiac cults in Pylos and Chania.

Probably at Knossos, too, which was the main Minoan palace on Crete.

Possibly some other areas as well. 

But as for the specifics of Dionysus’ origins, we don’t know. 

Now, we can see from this evidence that Dionysus had been worshipped in Greece for a long time. But the Greeks themselves didn’t know that. 

In fact, the Classical Greeks didn’t know a whole lot about their Bronze Age predecessors. So much was lost during the Bronze Age Collapse that later Greeks regarded some of what they found with wonder. 

So when Herodotus was putting his histories together, he deduced based on the different stories he found that Dionysus was a relatively new addition to the Pantheon, quote:

To me, therefore, it is quite manifest that the names of these gods [Dionysus and Pan] became known to the Greeks after those of their other deities, and that they count their birth from the time when they first acquired a knowledge of them.

– Herodotus – Histories, 2.146

So as we’ll see, the Greeks saw Dionysus as a foreign god who brought their cult to the area at a much later date. 

Neato. 

Chapter II: A Tale Of Two Bacchuses

If you’ve spent any time at all exploring Greek mythology, you’ll know one of the only consistent things about it is how inconsistent it is. Everyone has multiple origin stories, and nobody really seems to care that they all contradict each other. 

And in case we couldn’t pick this up on our own just by reading, the Greek historian Diodorus Siculus tells us this himself, quote: 

The greatest and most disconcerting obstacle of all consists in the fact that those who have recorded the deeds and myths of the earliest times are in disagreement among themselves.

– Diodorus Siculus – Bibliotheca Historica, 4.1.1

There are tons of origin stories for Dionysus, and they’re full of contradictions. So if you saw the Teiresias video, you know where this is going. 

I’m terribly sorry, but we’ll have to use a spreadsheet. 

This is the best way I can think of to make sense of the various differences in the origin story of Dionysus.

Keep in mind, though, that for the most part the ancients didn’t really care about inconsistencies.

Diodorus Siculus may have been a NERD about it, but he’s in the minority.

And that’s self-evident, right?

If ancient writers were concerned with inconsistencies, they would have tried to be more consistent. 

I bet he would have loved the Star Trek fandom.

Imagine watching him get into it with Discovery stans, oh man… 

We won’t go in-depth into each author this time like we did in the past, but here’s a quick overview of them, in roughly chronological order: 

Homer is best known for writing the novelization of that Christopher Nolan film, and also the Iliad, I guess. Probably lived during the 8^th century BCE. 

The Homeric hymns were probably not written by Homer, but they’re from around the same time. There are 33 of them, and 3 are dedicated to Dionysus. 

Hesiod wrote the Theogony, an important source for the origins of various gods. He was roughly contemporary with Homer. 

Euripides was a tragic playwright from Athens. He’s one of the three whose works survive. He wrote more than 90 plays, and today we have nineteen of them. One of them, the Bacchae, focuses heavily on Dionysus. 

Apollonius Rhodius lived in the 3rd century BCE. He wrote the Argonautica, an epic poem about Jason and the Argonauts, and a bunch of other stuff that has survived only in fragments. 

Diodorus Siculus was a Sicilian Greek from the 1st century BCE. He wrote a big historical work in 40 books, and today we have 15 of them. 

Ovid’s our boy. I gave him a full treatment in the main video on the Enarees, but he shows up all the time. He wrote in Latin, and a lot of his works survive. Today we’re interested in the Metamorphoses and the Fasti, both of which were published in 8 CE. 

Hyginus lived in Roman Iberia during the 1st century CE. He wrote the Fabulae, which sort of just summarizes existing myths. It’s pretty bland, but it’s an important source for some lesser-known myths that don’t survive today.

Pliny the Elder was a Roman admiral from the 1st century CE. He wrote a lot. His work, Naturalis Historia, is sort of an encyclopedia of knowledge of the ancient world. He was present for the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and died while trying to rescue people.

Seneca the Younger was a 1st-century Roman poet and philosopher. He was exiled by Claudius, then allowed to return to be Nero’s tutor. He was one of Nero’s advisors until Nero forced him to take his own life. He wrote a lot, including the tragic play Oedipus. It’s a retelling of the story of Oedipus Rex, which we talked about in the Teiresias video, but with a very different tone.

Plutarch lived during the 1st century CE. He wrote a series of Parallel Lives in Greek, where he pairs a notable Greek with a similarly notable Roman. We have a bunch of them today; they’re a really important source. Plutarch gets a more in-depth biography in the video on Hypsikrates if you’d like to know more. 

Apollodorus wrote the Bibliotheca in probably the 1st or 2nd century CE. It’s a collection of mythologies and genealogies. 

Pausanias was a Greek who lived during the 2nd century CE. His work is essentially a travel blog of Greece. It’s a really cool work. 

Philostratus the Elder was from Lemnos, a Greek island, in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. He wrote a description of a bunch of different paintings in an art gallery in Neapolis (modern-day Naples). 

Cynegetica is a Greek poem about hunting, written in the 3rd century CE by Oppian of Apamea, from Roman Syria. 

We talked about someone named Nonnus in the Pelagius video, but this is a different guy. He was a 5th-century CE Greek poet. His main work is the Dionysiaca, an epic poem about Dionysus, written in Homeric Greek. It’s the longest epic poem from antiquity, as long as the Iliad and the Odyssey combined. Geez. 

Alright, there we go. 

Some of these writers tell us there was more than one Dionysus, and the myths of these two figures were combined into a single character. I’ve called them Dionysus the Elder and Dionysus the Younger, for simplicity’s sake. 

Let’s take a look at these different Dionysi. 

Dionysus the Elder

What we know about Dionysus the Elder comes mostly from Nonnus, Diodorus Siculus, and Hyginus. 

Hyginus is the shortest, so let’s get that out of the way first. He’s going to refer to “Liber”, which is an earlier Roman deity whose mythology became associated with Dionysus. The name literally means “freedom” because he was AMERICAN – no, because he was associated with the freedom from inhibitions you feel when you’re drunk. Anyway, quote: 

Liber, son of Jove and Proserpine, was dismembered by the Titans, and Jove gave his heart, torn to bits, to Semele in a drink. When she was made pregnant by this, Juno, changing herself to look like Semele’s nurse, Beroe, said to her: “Daughter, ask Jove to come to you as he comes to Juno, so you may know what pleasure it is to lie with a god.” At her suggestion Semele made this request of Jove, and was smitten by a thunderbolt. He took Liber from her womb, and gave them to Nysus to be cared for. For this reason they are called Dionysus, and also “the one with two mothers.” 

– Hyginus – Fabulae, 167

Two mothers, eh? Neato. 

But here’s a fun bit – the word they used for heart in Greek might be a pun, because it’s similar to “fig-wood”, AKA Dionysus’ wood.

You know what I mean (Stamper 50). 

Now, Diodorus Siculus. He actually mentions THREE different Dionysi. 

The oldest one is from India and was associated with wine because India had an excellent climate for grape cultivation at the time.

Apparently, it still does, and the Indian wine industry is growing. Cool!

He also had a long beard and travelled the world teaching people about winemaking (Diod. Sic. 3.63.1-5).

This might be worth exploring in its own right, but for our purposes today, it doesn’t tell us much. So, let’s move on. 

About the second Dionysus, to whom we’re referring as the Elder Dionysus, he tells us, quote: 

The second Dionysus, the writers of myths relate, was born to Zeus by Persephone, though some say it was Demeter. He is represented by them as the first man to have yoked oxen to the plough, human beings before that time having prepared the ground by hand. Many other things also, which are useful for agriculture, were skilfully devised by him, whereby the masses were relieved of their great distress; and in return for this those whom he had benefited accorded to him honours and sacrifices like those offered to the gods, since all men were eager, because of the magnitude of his service to them, to accord to him immortality. And as a special symbol and token the painters and sculptors represented him with horns, at the same time making manifest thereby the other nature of Dionysus and also showing forth the magnitude of the service which he had devised for the farmers by his invention of the plough. 

– Diodorus Siculus – Bibliotheca Historica, 3.64.1-2

Later, he tells us the rituals of the Elder Dionysus were performed at night and in secret because there was a lot of sex involved, which we’ll take a closer look at later in this video.

Not that way, you perv. He was also the first person to figure out that you could use oxen in farming, which is why they often depicted him with horns. 

But the big one is where he says, quote:

The younger one also inherited the deeds of the older, and so the men of later times, being unaware of the truth and being deceived because of the identity of their names thought there had been but one Dionysus.

– Diodorus Siculus – Bibliotheca Historica, 4.4.5

So, the myth of the Elder Dionysus was incorporated into the younger one. 

Do you know what that means? 

It means this isn’t just a tangent I’m indulging in because I have ADHD and the classical world is really interesting to read about! It’s actually useful to the end result! What a plot twist.

Didn’t see that one coming, did you? Just call me M. Night Shyamalan. 

So what do we know about the elder Dionysus thus far? 

He was still the son of Zeus, but his mother was Persephone, of Hades and Persephone fame.

He still has the ecstatic night festivals associated with the younger Dionysus, but without the effeminacy.

He also has horns and a beard. 

Then, he was killed and dismembered by the Titans.

Semele drank his heart, or his aubergine emoji, which made her pregnant, and Dionysus was reborn as the genderqueer deity we know and love.  

What else do we know about the elder Dionysus? 

Well, there’s Nonnus. 

And if Homer is the brilliantly crafted concept album that represents a band’s creative peak, Nonnus’ Dionysiaca is what you get if a cover band decides to write originals and makes a self-indulgent triple album for their debut. 

Nobody needs to write a triple album.

Almost nobody needs to write a double album.

Just pare it down, keep all the best songs, and make a great single album.

Like, I can count on one hand the number of double albums I’ve listened to that were actually worthwhile. 

Anyway, I could spend a lot of time reading Nonnus, and I already have, because it actually is kind of interesting.

But I don’t bloody well have time to read THAT long a piece just to talk about the elder Dionysus, which is really just a lead-in to the trans bit. 

In fact, I’m pretty sure Nonnus had ADHD as well.

The Elder Dionysus isn’t even born until Book VI.

It’s like he’s cramming every myth he can think of that’s even tangentially related to Dionysus into the story, which makes me realize that’s basically what I do with my work.

But the tangents are interesting, damn it!

At least, I hope they are. 

Should I streamline my work, or do you like the tangents?

Inscribe your truth into the comments, but keep in mind that it’s not going to change how I do things.

So we’ll just say that Nonnus’ elder Dionysus has a lot in common with what we’ve already discussed.

Anyway, Zeus gets upset, floods the world, makes everything awful, and then says the birth of Dionysus will make things right. 

Man needed an editor.

Man, I need an editor. 

Anyway, that’s the Elder Dionysus. 

Anyway, we can see he’s got some ivy leaves and a beard. 

Neato. 

Dionysus the Younger

This one’s much more interesting for our purposes. 

I’ll tell the story of Dionysus the Younger as best I’m able, spreadsheet be damned. It’s not that interesting to look at anyway. 

Once upon a time, Zeus fancied a lady.

That’s not unusual, of course, but this time the woman was Semele, daughter of Cadmus, the founder of Thebes.

She was descended from Aphrodite after all, so I guess it’s not surprising that she would be a babe.

Anyway, Zeus, being Zeus, appeared to Semele and had his way with her. And, being a god and all, his spunk is super potent, so Semele got pregnant. 

Semele somehow got it into her head that she wanted Zeus to appear to her in his full glory.

Sometimes she’s convinced to do so by Hera, but not always.

Seriously, Zeus is terrible.

Al Bundy-ass husband, Worf-ass father.

It’s rough.

Hard to find many examples of him actually being good to anyone.

They’re nursed by Semele’s sisters, Ino, Autonoe, and Agave, or by Ino alone, or by Thetis, Achilles’ mom, or by unnamed nymphs. Then they’re raised by Ino and her husband Athamas, or by nymphs, or by Silenus, or by Makris. 

Hera is likely angry, so she might make Dionysus’ caretaker go mad.

At that point Dionysus will have been rescued, probably by Hermes, and brought somewhere else, or the nymphs might hide Dionysus with ivy leaves, or Zeus might turn Dionysus into a goat. Also, Dionysus may have been raised as a girl or have acted like one.

That’s a lot more inconsistent, as you can see, but let’s remember why we’re here.

Three ancient authors refer to Dionysus as either being raised as a girl or acting like a girl.

As we learned from the effeminate Dionysus statue from which we started this journey, this sort of behaviour isn’t isolated to mythology either. 

Chapter III: Dionysus and Femininity

August Guszkowski tells us in the preface to their translation of the Bacchae, quote: “Dionysus is attractive to men and women. Dionysus’ gender presentation confuses and disturbs those who do not believe in them” (4). 

I kind of love this. 

It reminds me of a quote from Janelle Monae when she was promoting her album The Electric Lady. When asked about her sexuality, she was noncommittal, but she said: “I want women to still be attracted to me – go get my album! And I want men to still be attracted to me” (Reagan).

Awesome. 

Let’s take a closer look at what evidence we have for Dionysus’s femininity. 

Literary Sources for Dionysus’ Femininity

When it comes to Dionysus’ gender, perhaps there’s no better place to start than their birth. 

Semele died while six months pregnant with Dionysus. Zeus rescued them from the flames and sewed them into his thigh, which served as the baby’s womb for the final three months of pregnancy. Thus, they were born from a woman, then from a man. 

Zeus gave birth to Dionysus. There’s something interesting there related to this channel’s topic, but we’ll save those details for another time. 

Anyway, this dual birth is a great foreshadowing for Dionysus’ life and attributes later on. 

Euripides’ Bacchae is a great source on Dionysus’ femininity, so let’s take a closer look. 

Euripides is one of the three authors of Greek tragedy whose work survives today. We have 19 of his complete (or mostly complete) works. That’s more than the other two combined – we have seven from Sophocles, and seven or maybe six from Aeschylus – it’s arguable whether or not he wrote Prometheus Bound. Anyway, The Bacchae was one of Euripides’ last plays. It was only produced after his death (Lattimore 228). 

It begins with Dionysus introducing themselves to the audience at the palace of Thebes. They tell the story of their birth, and that they’re visiting the city to punish the Thebans who refuse to recognize their divinity. Their plan is to establish a cult in the city of their birth, where their grandfather Cadmus, aunts, and other family still live. 

Dionysus has driven the women of Thebes mad, causing them to leave the city and enter the forest, where they’re observing the god’s sacred rites. 

Cadmus plans to go join in the revelry, along with his dear friend Teiresias. If you know that name, you know where this is going. There’s some great transgender mythology around Teiresias, so much so that I’ve already done a full video on their stories. 

Anyway, Pentheus, King of Thebes, Cadmus’ grandchild, and Dionysus’ cousin, is really not happy to see all of this.

He says, quote:

I am also told a foreigner has come to Thebes from Lydia, one of those charlatan magicians, with long yellow curls smelling of perfumes, with flushed cheeks and the spells of Aphrodite in their eyes. Their days and nights they spend with women and girls, dangling before them the joys of initiation in their mysteries.

– Euripides – The Bacchae, 232-237

“Long yellow curls smelling of perfumes” was a clear sign of femininity in Classical Athens.

Euripides may as well be telling us they were wearing makeup and a skirt.

Pentheus later calls them “that effeminate stranger” as well (Bacchae 353).

You know, just in case it wasn’t clear. 

Anyway, Pentheus tells his guards to go find Dionysus and arrest them, because he wants to execute them.

Teiresias calls him a reckless fool for doing this, but that doesn’t stop him.

Poor Teiresias. They always know what’s going on, but nobody listens.

I’m sure they have a lot to talk about with Cassandra of Troy in the Underworld. 

We get a chorus of Maenads, devotees to Dionysus, singing an ode to the god here.

After that, the guards return with Dionysus in shackles.

The guards tell Pentheus that Dionysus didn’t put up a fight at all when they were arrested.

From there, Pentheus addresses Dionysus, quote: 

So, you are attractive, stranger, at least to women-which explains, I think, your presence here in Thebes. Your curls are long. You do not wrestle, I take it. And what fair skin you have—you must take care of it—no daylight complexion; no, it comes from the night when you hunt Aphrodite with your beauty.

– Euripides – The Bacchae, 453-458

I love that “at least to women” part there.

No homo, right, Pentheus? 

Dionysus has long, curly hair.

They don’t have the scars and other marks of injury you’d get from manly pursuits like wrestling.

And their skin is so fair, so delicate. 

Again, clear signs of femininity. 

Diodorus Siculus tells us about this as well, quote:

The Dionysus who was born of Semele in more recent times, they say, was effeminate in body and altogether delicate; in beauty, however, they far excelled all other men and was addicted to indulgence in the delights of love, and on their campaigns they led about with themselves a multitude of women who were armed with lances which were shaped like thyrsi… And in the battles which took place during their wars they arrayed themselves in arms suitable for war and in the skins of panthers, but in assemblages and at festive gatherings in time of peace they wore garments which were bright-coloured and luxurious in their effeminacy. 

– Diodorus Siculus – Bibliotheca Historia 4.4.2-4

That’s interesting because it points out the dual nature of Dionysus.

When the situation called for heroic masculine exploits, they could lead an army, but otherwise, they were pretty feminine.

They could move fluidly within the gender binary, as well as exist somewhere in between. 

When describing Hermaphroditus, Ovid says they were “no longer man and woman, but neither, and yet both” (4.379-380), and that feels relevant here as well. 

Here’s another one.

This one’s from Aeschylus’ play The Edonians, the first in his Lycurgeia tetralogy.

It only survives in fragments, unfortunately.

But from what we can tell, Dionysus played a key role in it.

At one point, Lycurgus declares, quote:

Whence hails this femboy? What’s their country? What are they wearing?

– Aeschylus – The Edonians, Fragment 31

“Woman-man” is a more literal translation than femboy, but y’know.

Gotta localize it, not just translate it. 

So, here we have multiple examples of ancient writers pointing out how feminine Dionysus was.

It’s a whole thing. 

But that’s not strictly related to their mannerisms. 

What Does Dionysus Wear? Dionysus and Women’s Clothing

What does Dionysus wear?

Later, a Christian writer we know as Pseudo-Justin told us some more about Dionysus’ femininity as well, quote:

… And I say nothing of the masculine character of Minerva, nor of the feminine nature of Bacchus… What seemliness is there in a woman’s girding herself with armour, or in a man’s decorating himself with cymbals, and garlands, and female attire, and accompanied by a herd of bacchanalian women?

– Justin Martyr – Discourse to the Greeks, chapter 2

So, what does Dionysus wear?

Women’s clothing.

What do we know about that?

Justin isn’t specific, but other sources are. 

That includes Aristophanes’ Frogs, a hilarious play that opens with a fourth-wall break and some poop jokes, lest you think the ancient Greeks were more dignified or intelligent than we are today. 

After a dialogue between Dionysus and their slave, who’s tired of carrying their load, they arrive at Herakles’ house and knock on the door. 

Herakles laughs at the sight of his sibling, quote:

I just can’t get rid of this laughter. It’s the sight of that lionskin atop a krokotos. What’s the idea? Why has a war club joined up with lady’s boots? Where on earth have you been? 

– Aristophanes – Frogs, 45-48

This play also has one of my favourite little things from ancient writing. 

You know how we tell children “the frog goes ribbit ribbit”, but frogs don’t actually say “ribbit, ribbit”?

Like, that’s an onomatopoeia we came up with to try to verbalize the sound of a frog without having to actually make a frog sound.

We can’t really make that sound anyway.

Or at least, most people can’t. 

But does everyone think frogs say “ribbit, ribbit”? No! 

The chorus of the play The Frogs is made up of, well, frogs, who were there seemingly for the sole purpose of being annoying to Dionysus. And their choral ode begins with the following: 

Βρεκεκεκὲξ κοὰξ κοάξ

Βρεκεκεκὲξ κοὰξ κοάξ

– Aristophanes – The Frogs, 246-247

That’s what the Greeks thought frogs sounded like.

I love that, and it makes me wonder what people in other places think frogs sound like.

Here in Canada, it’s “ribbit, ribbit,” but what do frogs sound like where you come from?

Drop it in the comments below.

I’d love to hear it. 

Anyway, Aristophanes tells us Dionysus was wearing a κροκωτῷσ (krokotos) in the original Greek.

A fragment from Cratinus, a comic playwright contemporary with Aristophanes, describes something similar, quote (Jameson 323):

(A) What sort of outfit did they have on? Tell me this.

(B) A thyrsus, krokotos with lots of decoration, large drinking cup.

– Cratinus – Fragment 40

What does Dionysus wear? A krokotos.

What’s a krokotos?

It was a distinctively feminine outfit.

It was commonly worn by hetairai – prostitutes – and Maenads, the worshippers of Dionysus.

It gets its name from the plant Crocus Sativus, from which we get the spice saffron and from which the ancients extracted a potent yellow dye (Benda-Weber 134-135).

Dionysus’ Painting: The Femininity of Dionysus in Visual Art

Now, we already know at least one example of Dionysus being depicted as feminine in art – the statue we started this whole thing with. But are there other examples? Yeah, there are tons of them. 

The same goes for the women in front of Dionysus.

This was a common way that Greeks and, later, Romans depicted women in art (Hurwit).

So, let’s take a look at some depictions of Dionysus. 

Skirtos’ skin is darker, and Telete’s skin is lighter. That’s to be expected.

But what about Dionysus?

Looks a whole lot more like their daughter than Skirtos, hm?

And their pose is also quite feminine, showing off their lovely curves. 

That’s true. But compare Dionysus’ clothes with what their daughter Telete was wearing in the first mosaic we saw.

That’s a woman’s outfit.

It even looks like they have breasts in this one as well.

Though that might just be how the top of the dress fits with that fashionable empire waist. 

Their primary religion was Zoroastrianism.

However, they would have been exposed to Greek and Roman culture as well, through trade, through conquest, and through being conquered.

So, this is Dionysus.

And it’s probably the most feminine depiction we’ve seen so far.

There are clear breasts there. 

So, that’s kind of neato.

The object that sparked our search into the nonbinaraety of Dionysus turned out to be a red herring.

But we found plenty of evidence of their gender fluidity anyway. 

And of course, that’s not the end of it. 

Dionysus’ Male Lovers

What can Dionysus’ sexuality tell us about their nonbinarocity? 

They had several female lovers, but they did also have at least two male lovers.

First is Polymnus, or Hyplipnus, or Prosymnos, all the same guy, who showed Dionysus how to reach the underworld in exchange for sex (Clem. Al. Prot. 2.30, Hyg. Poet. astr. 2.5, Paus 2.37.6).

But as a quick overview, the Romans didn’t think to define their identities in terms of their sexuality.

So there isn’t actually an equivalent to “gay” and “straight” in Latin. 

Of course, they still had a concept of homo sex.

They just didn’t define themselves by it.

Instead, they’d be defined by their roles during sex.

To be masculine was to be the penetrator, and to be feminine was to be the penetrated.

Roman men were permitted to have sex with other men without losing social standing, so long as they were the former. 

This was similar to the Athenians’, though it also includes other elements I’d rather not discuss because they’re deeply unpleasant. 

In the cases mentioned above, the gods either took a dominant role, or their role wasn’t mentioned.

So it would have been perfectly in line with normative male behaviour. 

But what about Dionysus? 

Clement of Alexandria, an early Christian writer who was very much interested in portraying pagan traditions in the worst possible light, tells us a bit about Dionysus and Prosymnos, quote:

Dionysos was anxious to descend into Hades, but did not know the way. Thereupon a certain man, Prosymnos by name, promises to tell him; though not without reward . . . It was a favour of lust, this reward which Dionysos was asked for. The god is willing to grant the request; and so they promise, in the event of their return, to fulfil the wish of Prosymnos, confirming the promise with an oath. Having learnt the way, they set out, and came back again. They do not find Prosymnos, for he was dead. In fulfilment of the vow to their lover Dionysos hastens to the tomb and indulges their unnatural lust. Cutting off a branch from a fig-tree which was at hand, they shaped it into the likeness of a phallus, and then made a show of fulfilling their promise to the dead man. As a mystic memorial of this passion phalloi are set up to Dionysos in cities. ‘For if it were not to Dionysos that they held solemn procession and sang the phallic hymn, they would be acting most shamefully,’ says Herakleitos.

– Clement of Alexandria – Protrepticus 2, pg.73

With Prosymnos, we can see that Dionysus took what the ancients would have considered a passive, feminine role.

I can’t really be any more specific than that while keeping this YouTube-friendly.

You’ll have to use your imagination. Don’t ask me about it in the comments. 

So, here’s another example of Dionysus being feminine, according to the sexual mores of the peoples who wrote their myths. 

Dionysus’ Likes Being Feminine

So I hope I’ve made it clear by now that Dionysus has many feminine characteristics.

But it’s even more interesting to me that they seem fine with it.

Even proud of it.

This is strange. 

Why?

To understand this better, let’s take a closer look at a piece of rhetoric that survives to us today, called Against Timarkhos by Aeschines.

It’s one of the best sources we have when it comes to understanding Greek homosexuality.

So much so that the focus of nearly half of the book Greek Homosexuality is on analyzing it. 

The speech is delivered by Aeschines, an Athenian politician.

He denounces his opponent, Timarkhos, and attacks his former ally, Demosthenes.

For example, he charges Demosthenes with “unmanliness”.

He associates this with a lack of courage, calls him “unmanly and womanish in temper”, and accuses him of being a deserter, among a bunch of other negative things (Dover 75).

In this regard, being feminine is clearly a bad thing. 

In fact, at one point, he tells the assembly, quote:

For, Demosthenes, if anyone should strip off those exquisite, pretty mantles of yours, and the soft, pretty shirts that you wear while you are writing your speeches against your friends, and should pass them around among the jurors, I think, unless they were informed beforehand, they would be quite at a loss to say whether they had in their hands the clothing of a man or of a woman!

– Aeschines – Against Timarchus 131

Obviously, cowardice is a bad thing.

But here, Aeschines is clearly associating cowardice with effeminacy.

The portrayal of Demosthenes as ladylike was seen as a slight against his character (Dover 75-76). 

Demosthenes probably wasn’t actually wearing women’s clothing, by the way.

His outfit was probably just a little flashier than most.

But the mere implication that he was would have signaled his weakness. 

How can we mesh this with everything we know about Dionysus?

As we saw, they were repeatedly depicted in a deeply feminine manner.

If they were ashamed of it, they wouldn’t do it.

But there’s more to it than that. 

Let’s go back to the Bacchae for a moment.

Later in the play, Dionysus force-femmes Pentheus and leads him to his death for his impiety. 

No, really, Dionysus hypnotizes Pentheus and convinces him to dress as a woman so he can watch the Maenads do their thing.

Pentheus objects a few times, but then Dionysus just reminds him he wants to see the Maenads, and he goes back to it. 

I guess sissy hypno stories have always existed too, huh? 

Anyway, when Pentheus first appears dressed like a woman, he’s insecure about how he looks.

He seems to have fully embraced a feminine role, coyly primping himself and worrying about how his hair looks, quote (Bacchae 925-931):

“Then let me be your maid”. 

Here, we see Dionysus deliberately taking on a feminine role.

Pentheus is still being dominated, though, so you could say the gender role is more ambiguous here.

But then again, that’s the whole thing, isn’t it? 

Whereas Greek men would, by and large, have regarded feminine behaviour as negative, Dionysus seems to embrace it. 

That’s really interesting. 

Why would the ancients worship an androgynous deity when they would view a human in the same form as shameful? 

Why indeed. 

Chapter IV: Was Dionysus Female? Femininity Vs. Womanhood

Was Dionysus female?

Us modern woke folks understand that gender and presentation are two very different things. 

One can be a feminine man or a masculine woman.

One can transition from one gender to another.

One can be a gender that’s different from how they prefer to present.

One can be nonbinary without medical or physical transition.

One can be gender fluid, feeling more affinity to different genders at different times.

The list goes on. 

Our internal sense of gender may be different from how we present ourselves to the outside world, but that makes it no less valid.

The answer to the question “What is a woman?” is “A woman is anyone who sincerely identifies as one.”

I know it’s circular logic, but that’s the best we’ve got. It’s really not that complicated. 

That means you can present as feminine but still identify as a man.

There are plenty of femboys out there to prove this point. 

So, was Dionysus female?

In spite of all their femininity, they’re consistently referred to as a man.

Sometimes a woman-man, or a girly-boy, or a femboy, or whatever, but a man nonetheless.

Occasionally, people mistake them for a woman, but that’s not the same as being a woman. 

In Frogs, Herakles calls Dionysus his “little brother” (59), and Dionysus doesn’t correct him. 

In the very first line of The Bacchae, Dionysus says “I am Dionysus, the son of Zeus.”

Ovid retells the story of the Bacchae in his Metamorphoses. In it, he describes Dionysus as “a young man, as pretty as a lady” (3.607). 

The seventh Homeric Hymn is dedicated to Dionysus.

At the very end, the writer says “I salute you, child of fair Semele” (58).

That’s a more gender-neutral term, but it begins by talking about “Dionysus, glorious Semele’s son” (1).

So it seems more like poetic license than deliberate gender play. 

Even Clement doesn’t call Dionysus a woman, among all the other harsh words he has for the god. 

So, was Dionysus female? The popular opinion seems to be no.

Dionysus Pseudanor

The closest I’ve found to Dionysus being called something other than a man is the Macedonian epithet “Dionysus Pseudanor.”

That basically translates as Dionysus the false man (Macurdy 192).

That seems like a pretty cut-and-dry example, right?

But if we look at the term’s origin, it’s not really related to Dionysus’ gender. 

It comes from a Macedonian story, as told to us by Polyaenus in his Stratagems of War.

If you watched the video on Hypsikrates, we used him as a source there as well.

He was a 2nd-century Macedonian-Roman writer.

He dedicated Stratagems to the emperors Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius, who were at war with the Parthians at the time.

That means it was written sometime between 161 and 166 CE.

He wrote in Greek. 

Anyway, Polyaenus tells us about King Argaeus of Macedonia.

During his reign, King Galaurus of the Taulantii attacked, and Argaeus had a relatively small military.

So, he sent a large group of young women to charge down from Mount Ereboea as Galaurus’ forces approached.

They did, charging forward and waving their thyrsi – that’s the thing Dionysus is always shown carrying.

Galaurus thought they were men, so he retreated.

As a result, Argaeus built a temple to Dionysus Pseudanor (IV.I). 

So it seems like the “false man” epithet refers more to the women who were mistaken for men than it does to Dionysus themselves. 

Was Dionysus Female?

So, Dionysus acts like a woman, dresses like a woman, and looks like a woman, but is distinctively not a woman. 

Now, of course, Dionysus wasn’t a person in the historical sense.

We’re talking about mythology here.

But this can still tell us something about the people who wrote these myths. 

So at this point, we’ve thoroughly established Dionysus’ femininity.

We understand that it would have been shameful for someone who was not a woman to display feminine traits.

We’ve also recognized that they were not a woman. Was Dionysus female? No.

How do we make sense of this? 

Well, up to this point, we’ve talked mostly about the feminine aspects of Dionysus.

But they also had unmistakably masculine elements.

This dual nature may at first seem contradictory, but it’s actually critical to understanding the god and their role in ancient life.

To better understand these, we need to look beyond Dionysus in isolation. 

Chapter V: Dionysus’ Entourage

I’d be remiss not to mention Dionysus’ squad.

This isn’t just for the purposes of cataloguing things though; it’s actually pretty fun. 

Besides, one can’t really fully understand a god without understanding their retinue.

We’ll explore both mythological figures and real people here, looking to understand more about Dionysus’ myth and cult. 

Because mythology is great, but actual cult worship practices are the only true insight into pagan religions.

As Walter F. Otto said, “myth is nothing but poetry” (13). 

As we’ll explore, the members of Dionysus’ group chat play pretty well into their representation as a nonbinary figure, displaying both masculine and feminine aspects. 

That’s because most of them also embody elements of duality. 

What Are Satyrs Known For?

First, we’ve got Satyrs.

What are satyrs known for?

Satyrs were little animal guys.

Originally, they had horse ears and tails and a long beard, but walked upright.

Later, they were sometimes represented with goat legs and horns, but not always.

But there’s also Silenus, Dionysus’ tutor and foster daddy. 

Satyrs are the personification of male excess, both in sex and alcohol.

But they also made wine and were skilled musicians, so they weren’t just maniac guys.

In fact, satyrs were said to have great wisdom to impart, if you could get them to reveal it. 

Animal and man.

Wild and civilized.

Foolish and wise.

Duality.

Just not in terms of gender. 

The Dionysus Maenads: The Female Follower of Bacchus

The attendants of the other gods are generally of the same gender.

For example, Artemis is attended by a group of nymphs who hunt with her.

But Dionysus is surrounded by women (Otto 175).

Yes, Satyrs were exclusively male.

But maenads were exclusively female, and they were arguably the most significant part of Dionysus’ thiasos. 

Maenads differ from satyrs because they were real people, not mythical forest creatures.

Their mythological counterparts are nymphs, which are lesser forest deities.

But maenads can tell us a lot more than nymphs can, so we’ll focus on them. 

In the Bacchae, the chorus is made up of maenads.

They tell us about their worship practices during the first choral ode, quote:

Blessed, blessed are those who know the mysteries of god. Blessed is one who hallows their life in the worship of god, whom the spirit of god possesseth, who is one with those who belong to the holy body of god. 

Blessed are the dancers, and those who are purified, who dance on the hill in the holy dance of god. 

Blessed are they who keep the rite of Kybele the mother. Blessed are the thyrsus-bearers, those who wield in their hands the holy wand of god. 

Blessed are those who wear the crown of the ivy of god. 

Blessed, blessed are they: Dionysus is their god!

– Euripides – The Bacchae, 73-82

So, let’s start in the middle, just like The Odyssey. 

After all, most *male* gods didn’t have a retinue of women followers.

And the maenads themselves were mistaken for men as they charged down the hill at the army invading Macedonia. 

Now, what we know about their cult practices is extremely limited.

Why?

Because you weren’t supposed to talk about it. 

We talked about mystery cult worship back in the video on the ritual practices of the Gallae, then we went more in-depth into these practices in the Bearded Venus of Cyprus video.

If you’d like to know more about them, queue up those after this one.

We’ll do a quick review here. 

When we use the word “cult,” we’re not using it in the same way we do today.

The modern usage of the word is mostly negative.

But in this sense, it simply refers to the worship practices of a particular god. 

Okay, what about the mystery bit? 

We don’t know a lot about ancient mystery cults, but that’s not why they’re called mystery cults. That’s just a coincidence. 

They’re called mystery cults because their cult practices were closed off to outsiders.

The Greek word for it is μυστήριον (mysterion).

To take part in these practices, you’d need to be initiated.

Once you were, you’d become a μύστης (mystes), and you weren’t supposed to tell anyone what happened. 

Maenad worship of Dionysus would have been closed off to outsiders, which would have made it a mystery cult as well.

As a result, there’s a lot about these practices we don’t know, and probably never will. 

So from here, we’ll do our best to explore the private worship practices of the maenads of Dionysus.

But as we do, keep in mind that you’ll have a lot of questions along the way, and the answer to many of them will be “we don’t know”. 

I know how frustrating that is, but that’s just the way things go sometimes. 

So, what do we know? 

Pausanias tells us, quote: “The nocturnal rites performed every year in honor of Dionysus I must not divulge to the world at large” (2.37.6).

Alright, that’s a start I guess. 

That said, we do know one of the attributes of the worship of Dionysus was to use music and dance as an ecstatic release (Morford and Lenardon 292). 

They also represent a similar wild/civilized dichotomy that we see in satyrs, but there’s an additional layer as well – chaste and promiscuous. 

It’s reasonable to assume that these women would wander off into the forest and do something more than just dance ecstatically.

If your mind went there, you’re not alone.

You’re still a perv, but at least you’re in good company. 

It seems like plenty of Greeks thought the same thing. In fact, Clement of Alexandria tells us about them, quote:

The raving Dionysus is worshipped by Bacchants with orgies in which they celebrate their sacred frenzy by a feast of raw flesh. Wreathed with snakes, they perform the distribution of portions of their victims, shouting the name of Eva, that Eva through whom error entered into the world; and a consecrated snake is the emblem of the Bacchic orgies.

– Clement of Alexandria – Protrepticus, 2.12

This is almost certainly a massive exaggeration.

Clement was an early Christian writer with a vested interest in making pagan worship practices sound as terrible as possible.

But Greek society, at least, was heavily patriarchal, and women had very little autonomy.

So it’s hard to imagine Greek men would have allowed their women to wander off and engage in such things (Jameson 331).

Besides, Euripides tells us in the Bacchae that “even in the rites of Dionysus, the chaste woman will not be corrupted” (317-318). 

On the other hand, it’s hard to imagine all of this would be entirely chaste. 

There’s an interesting tidbit in the choral ode of the Bacchae that makes me raise an eyebrow though – “Blessed are they who keep the rite of Kybele the mother.”

If you’ve been here before, your eyebrow probably raised as well. We’ll explore that further another time

Anyway, we see a dual nature here in the maenads.

They’re wild and civilized, but they’re also women mistaken for men.

They’re chaste, but they’re also getting down to BUSINESS. 

Once again, reinforcing Dionysus as a nonbinary figure, one of contradictions and liminality. 

Priapus

You have to know Priapus, right? 

His mother is usually Aphrodite, but his father is sometimes different.

Hermes, Zeus, Pan, and even Dionysus are all implicated, depending on the source you read (Kerenyi 176). 

Few stories directly associate Priapus with Dionysus beyond their parentage.

The exception to this is in Lucian’s Dialogues of the Gods, where Dionysus tells Apollo about the time Priapus was so drunk he tried to have sex with them (3.23). 

But uhh, Priapus is.

Yeah.

Priapus is. 

So uhh, Priapus is not a symbol of femininity. 

He’s a fertility symbol.

Blah blah blah yeah yeah fertility symbol. I know, it’s always a fertility symbol.

But I mean, he’s weighing his colossal dong on a Libra scale against a bag of money, and there’s a bowl of fruits and vegetables in front of him.

What else could that be? 

But his association with Dionysus is, again, part of the gender variance we see.

He might almost be seen as a foil to Dionysus.

Whereas our genderqueer pal shows us a whole lot of femininity, Priapus has to walk around with a wheelbarrow. 

But in a way, he, too, has liminal elements in terms of gender. 

Myth comes to us from all sorts of places, and one of them is from what we call scholia.

These are comments placed in the margins of ancient manuscripts.

Often they were written by medieval monks, but not always, and we almost never know their names.

They sometimes describe myths with no other sources, which is pretty awesome. 

Anyway, a scholia on Apollonius Rhodius tells us Priapus was the son of Aphrodite.

He was cursed by Hera because of jealousy, which is a theme that shows up all the time.

Mythology does Hera so dirty.

Anyway, Priapus was born with a giant tongue, a giant belly, and a giant…you know what.

He was also extremely ugly, apparently, and “phallic to the rear”.

What the hell does that mean? 

I think it means it pointed backward? 

I’ve looked all over the place, but I can’t find an actual manuscript with the scholia, so I’m reading it paraphrased through Karl Kerenyi’s work.

So we’re doing our best here. 

But here’s an interesting bit – Kerenyi tells us Aphrodite abandoned Priapus after he was born.

He was later found by a herdsman, who noticed, quote: “that characteristic which was not merely phallic, but hermaphroditic–[which] was useful to the fertility of plants and animals”. 

What’s the original source for this anecdote?

We don’t know. But it seems like Priapus might have had something in common with-

Hermaphroditus

There’s a lot to say about Hermaphroditus.

I’ve talked about them in a previous video, and plan to do more in the future.

But Hermaphroditus was the child of Hermes and Aphrodite.

They’re considered an intersex figure, not a transgender one.

But there are clear parallels to modern audiences, and ancient audiences wouldn’t have made such a distinction. 

They’re generally depicted as having a feminine, curvaceous body, but with a phallus.

They’re also often associated with Dionysus and their retinue. 

It doesn’t take a professional to see that Hermaphroditus represents a combination of genders.

And while I, of course, understand that some women have phalluses – trust me, I understand – we also need to understand that the way the Greeks and Romans would have viewed these things is different than how we do today. 

So, Hermaphroditus would have been the closest figure to Dionysus in this whole thing. 

So, that’s Dionysus’ squad.

We’ve got a combination of gender presentations.

Horny wild guys.

Wild ladies.

A guy with an absolute battering ram of an eggplant emoji.

And an intersex figure. 

Each of these helps reinforce the liminality of Dionysus, in one way or another. 

The City Dionysia Festival: The Feast of Dionysus

Lest you think Dionysus was just a minor deity, Teiresias tells us they were one of the two most supreme blessings given to humanity.

The other is Demeter, who provides delicious food, and Dionysus, of course, provides wine (Bacchae ~275).

Because Teiresias is known as the truth-teller, I tend to take Euripides’ words seriously.

So there was a great deal happening in terms of worship of Dionysus.

We talked about maenads earlier, but ancient pagan religions had two layers of worship.

Mystery cult worship was commonplace, which we already talked about, but there was also public worship of Dionysus.

This generally included festivals and processions. 

The worship of Dionysus wasn’t limited to just women.

In the Bacchae, Teiresias says Dionysus “desires his honor from all mankind. He wants no one excluded from his worship” (209-208).

But that seems to be referring to the maenad rites, not the public festival.

And besides, Teiresias has been both a man and a woman, so his involvement at this point is more complex. 

Okay, so what about the City Dionysia festival?

These seem largely to be limited to Greece.

Rome had its share of Dionysiac worship, but it was largely confined to cult practices rather than public festivals (Brady-Garnand 25).

Meanwhile, ancient Greece was divided into poleis, or city-states.

These were separate, independent states.

They recognized each other’s mutual Greekness, but they also fought among each other all the time.

Athens, Sparta, Corinth, Thebes, etc. were all independent poleis.

Each had its own festival calendar, maintained independently of the others. 

They also had their own city dionysia, which they practiced in different ways.

In their festival, women would dance at the temple of Dionysus in the city.

Meanwhile, men would leave town to drink wine at a pastoral sanctuary to the god. 

That said, we know more about Athenian worship of Dionysus than the rest of Greece (Jameson 332).

That’s pretty common, though, since Athenian history is more well-documented.

In fact, if you take a Classical Studies 101 course, about half your class will focus on Athens (the other half will be Rome).

The Athenians wrote more, and more of their writings survived.

So while we can draw some tidbits from other places, keep in mind we still don’t know much.

So, we do know, at least, that at many of these festivals, the public worship of Dionysus featured, *ahem*, extensive phallic imagery.

Back in the Hermaphroditus video, we talked about the phallus as an apotropaic symbol.

People often used it to ward off evil, much like Turks use the nazar eye or Italians use the cornicello.

In fact, the metal horns symbol came from Ronnie James Dio’s nonna, who used to do it to ward off the mal’occhio, the evil eye (Dio).

But it doesn’t seem like that was their purpose here. 

So, why was it there? 

It may have been a celebration of life force, of life after death, or as a… drumroll, please… FERTILITY SYMBOL. 

Everything is always a fertility symbol. 

But also, it makes sense to see Dionysus as a fertility deity.

How can you make wine if you don’t have a good crop yield of grapes? 

So, what would they do with these phalloi?

In Athens, at least, at their City Dionysia, their colonies would bring phalloi to the festival every year and march them through the city.

Then, they’d bring them to the statue of Dionysus at the theatre.

They had a procession of a phallic image of Dionysus on Lesbos as well.

Meanwhile, on Delos, they built a big multicolored phallus every year. (Jameson 328).

Awesome. 

So there are lots of phalluses everywhere, but we know that women were an important part of their worship.

And USUALLY, women aren’t associated with phalluses.

So, what gives?

Why is Dionysus, the phallic god, so closely associated with women? 

Why indeed. 

Chapter VI: What Does All This Tell Us?

As modern readers, we’re tempted to see all this as contradictory.

But that’s a modern interpretation, and wouldn’t have been a concern for the ancients.

Your brain has been poisoned by fandom discourse.

Who cares if the myth doesn’t exactly follow established canon?

That’s for NERDS [derogatory].

Focus on what the myth is actually trying to say from a thematic perspective.

Stop viewing fiction like a historian. 

*ahem*, sorry. 

As we’ve peered more closely at Dionysus, we can see a liminal, contradictory figure.

On one hand, we see extreme violence and aggression. On the other, demure softness (Jameson 332).

On one hand, sex and debauchery. On the other, temperance and control. 

They’re a god of civilization, in that wine cultivation and grape-making require agriculture to happen.

But they also represent the tearing down of societal norms and expectations through ecstatic release.

During their worship, maenads left the city for the forests and mountains.

The symbolism is easy to see. 

They’re a god of masculinity, in the form of the phallus, and femininity, in the form of maenadic worship practices. 

Masculinity, too, in that Dionysus is a “male” god, but with so many feminine aspects that it’s sometimes difficult to distinguish their depictions from those of women. 

They’re surrounded by figures that exemplify masculinity or femininity, or in the case of Hermaphroditus, combine them. 

Classicist Michael Jameson argues that this double nature reflects itself in us as well. 

When the original Dionysus, Dionysus the Elder, was devoured by the Titans, Zeus destroyed them with a thunderbolt.

Humanity sprang from the ashes (Jameson 293-294). 

That means we arose from something evil and base: the charred corpses of the Titans.

But you are what you eat, right?

So because they devoured Dionysus, within them was something divine.

That means there’s some divinity in us, too.

So, within this nonbinary deity we can find many elements of duality. 

But perhaps even moreso, their mythology represents a threat to the social order that’s built on very clear boundaries between such things. 

That’s displayed very clearly in the Bacchae.

Pentheus represents an established social order, and Dionysus very clearly overturns that.

The primary difference here, however, is that Dionysus is a divine figure, not a human.

So we don’t see it as a power struggle, even if Pentheus thinks it will be.

Mortals don’t generally defeat gods.

Pentheus is going to meet a horrible fate, and we as an audience know that.

We’re just waiting to see what that horrible fate looks like. 

Today, the soulless minions of orthodoxy are also pushing to force those they dislike into similar rigid categories.

Unfortunately, none of us has supernatural abilities we can use to resist them.

Or at least, nobody has made their powers known.

If you do have secret supernatural powers, what are you waiting for?

Let’s get down to business here, huh? Before it gets any worse? 

No, we’re just mortals. And we have only the tools of mortals with which to defend ourselves. 

But some people rely on a simplistic understanding of the world to get through their day.

And when something comes along to challenge that, it might be disturbing.

Because if this binary isn’t true, maybe other binaries aren’t true as well.

Maybe some other things we thought were fundamental truths of the universe aren’t actually true. 

If you’re a trans or queer person yourself, you probably understand this all too well.

Each of us had to go through this inner struggle to accept and love ourselves in spite of being constantly exposed to a societal narrative that tells us our identities are wrong, or sinful, or unnatural, or not real. 

But unlike cishets, that dissonance isn’t just an idle curiosity we can dismiss with a thought-terminating cliché.

We can’t shrug it off. It’s a fundamental aspect of who we are. 

I think that’s why so many trans and queer folks are also anti-capitalist, anti-war, anti-racist, anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist, pro-Palestinian liberation, and so many other leftist ideologies.

Because once you realize the dominant narrative about gender isn’t as simple as it seems, it’s reasonable to assume that may be the case for other things as well. 

It’s also why right-wing trans people will never make any sense to me.

How one can confront the process of questioning and accepting their gender and still come out the other end a conservative… I don’t get it. 

So, Dionysus was clearly a threat to the status quo of Greece.

But eventually, the myth and cult of the god became an integral part of Greek and later Roman culture. 

That has also been true for trans and queer folk in the modern age.

I’ve been around the sun a few more times than people seem to expect of me.

So even though I know it might seem like the current resurgence of right-wing psychopaths has been ever-present, that wasn’t always the case.

I know it’s hard for Zoomers and Gen Alpha to believe, but **when I was your age**, things really looked like they were on a trajectory of improvement.

Gay marriage was first legalized in the Netherlands in 2001, then in Belgium, then Spain, then Canada, then South Africa, then Norway and Sweden, Portugal, Iceland, Argentina, Denmark, Brazil, France, Uruguay, New Zealand; the list goes on.

Today, it’s recognized in 38 countries, and none of the horrible things right-wingers predicted have happened. 

But even with trans people, our increasing visibility made acceptance seem inevitable too for a long time.

More people confident they could live the lives they wanted without fear.

More people who expressed themselves freely. That’s good. 

Did God punish the world?

Did people start marrying animals?

Did we see human sacrifices? Dogs and cats living together? Mass hysteria? 

No. 

The worst thing that happened as a result of this was the resurgence of reactionary conservatism.

Is that God punishing us? I guess that’s debatable.

Again, every accusation is a confession with these perverts. 

The soulless minions of orthodoxy push back, like they always do.

In Greece, they couldn’t resist it, and the cult of Dionysus took hold.

But I think that’s true for us today as well. 

We live in dark times, my trans and queer siblings.

But I don’t believe this will last forever.

The Transgender Tipping Point might have been a little oversold, but cultural acceptance of transgender people is still quite high.

And so long as right-wing freaks continue to oppose our existence, they’ll continue to connect transphobia with all the other demonstrably terrible ideas they have. 

Is our rate of acceptance falling?

Yes, it is; I’m not going to lie to you about it.

But in spite of a multibillion-dollar nonstop propaganda campaign of hatred against us, the most powerful and insidious one in all of human history, they were only barely able to move the needle of public opinion against us.

We’re still doing pretty well. 

Look what they need to mimic a fraction of our power.

And besides, when you think of the faces of the anti-trans movement, who comes to mind? 

Graham Linehan, a competitor for the Most Divorced Man award,whose own children won’t speak with him over his obsession with us? 

Elon Musk, the widely reviled Other Most Divorced Man, whose stupid truck has become synonymous with the aesthetic of modern-day fascism and who has become reviled the world over after the Nazi salute?

J.K. Rowling, the supposed “feminist” who posts upskirt photos of trans women with the excuse that “she was dressed like that” and whose brain is so poisoned with mold she can barely think straight? 

Hillary Cass, whose eponymous report has, according to the British Medical Council’s Medical Research Methodology journal, quote:

A high risk of bias in each of the systematic reviews driven by unexplained protocol deviations, ambiguous eligibility criteria, inadequate study identification, and the failure to integrate consideration of these limitations into the conclusions derived from the evidence syntheses. We also identified methodological flaws and unsubstantiated claims in the primary research that suggest a double standard in the quality of evidence produced for the Cass report compared to quality appraisal in the systematic reviews. (Noone Et Al, Results)

Kier Starmer, the supposed liberal who resigned barely two years into being Prime Minister because of his utter failure to meet the moment? 

Pierre Poilievre, the worthless career politician who’s never been prime minister and (hopefully) never will be? 

Donald Trump, whose brain is melting before our very eyes and whose dedicated cultists are even beginning to peel away from him? 

This isn’t sustainable. 

It’s a nonstop parade of losers and freaks with whom a dwindling number of people want to be associated.

So many of them seem to define themselves through a Christian lens, but their beliefs are in such clear contradiction with what the Bible actually says. 

So, maybe it’s not as strange as it seems for a culture with such strict and rigid gender norms to worship a gender nonconforming deity. 

But at the same time, while the soulless minions of orthodoxy have always found a way to fight us, so too have people found beauty in our existence and our lives. 

The 5^th century BCE Athenian writer Kritias, quoted by a later Roman writer, tells us, quote “In males, the most beautiful shape is that which is female; but in females, the opposite” (Dover 68).

We don’t know the exact context of this statement, unfortunately.

But if you’re someone who doesn’t quite fit neatly into the fascist-enforced gender binary, I hope you’ll take heart in that statement, and in everything else we’ve explored today related to Dionysus. 

Dionysus never fit into the binary either, but people revered them throughout antiquity.

They were one of the greatest gifts to humanity, and that gift came in a queer package. 

Was that only because of the wine? It’s pretty great, after all.

But I think more than that, Dionysus brought with them a sense of freedom.

A liberation from the strict, rigid norms enforced on Greek and later Roman societies, especially for women. 

You, too, my trans and queer siblings, are a gift to the world.

We, too, bring with us a sense of freedom.

Freedom from conformity.

Freedom from oppression.

Freedom from the narrative lie that biology is destiny, and the tyranny of being forced to live a life we know is wrong for us. 

Is there a God? I don’t know.

None of us does. So far as any of us knows, this is all there is.

Should we squander our limited existence living a life that causes us misery?

Or should we pursue joy, liberation, and freedom?

Dionysus, and trans and queer people today, represent the latter, whereas the soulless minions of orthodoxy of any age represent the former.

They drape themselves in the trappings of freedom, but their values reflect anything but. 

No matter where you look in the ancient Mediterranean, you’ll find someone who represents that same sense of freedom too.

We’re part of a glorious, millennia-long tradition of rejecting conformity and living our lives in accordance with what we know to be right.

From mythology to archaeology to historical writings and more, people have always pursued their own truths, status quo be damned. 

Because we have always existed.

And so long as humanity continues to endure, so too shall we. 

Ancient Works Cited:

►Aeschines. Speeches. Translated by C. D. Adams. Loeb Classical Library 106. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1919.
►Aeschylus. Fragments. Edited and translated by Alan H. Sommerstein. Loeb Classical Library 505. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009.
►Apollonius Rhodius. Argonautica. Edited and translated by William H. Race. Loeb Classical Library 1. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009.
►Aristophanes. Frogs. Assemblywomen. Wealth. Edited and translated by Jeffrey Henderson. Loeb Classical Library 180. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002.
►Clement of Alexandria. “Protrepticus”. Translated by G. W. Butterworth. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960.
►Diodorus Siculus. “Library of History, Volume II: Books 2.35-4.58”. Translated by C. H. Oldfather. Loeb Classical Library 303. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1935.
►Euripides. “Three Tragedies: Electra, The Phoenician Women, The Bacchae”. Translated and with an introduction by William Arrowsmith, edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: Phoenix Books, 1970. 
►Euripides. Fragments: Aegeus-Meleager. Edited and translated by Christopher Collard, Martin Cropp. Loeb Classical Library 504. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008.
►The Greek Anthology, Volume III: Book 9. Translated by W. R. Paton. Loeb Classical Library 84. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1917.
►Homeric Hymns. Homeric Apocrypha. Lives of Homer. Edited and translated by Martin L. West. Loeb Classical Library 496. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003. 
►Hyginus, Gaius Julius. “Fabulae”. Translated by Mary Grant. Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1960. 
►Justin Martyr. “Discourse to the Greeks”. Translated by Marcus Dods. From Anti-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1. Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing Co, 1885.
►Lucian. Dialogues of the Dead. Dialogues of the Sea-Gods. Dialogues of the Gods. Dialogues of the Courtesans. Translated by M. D. MacLeod. Loeb Classical Library 431. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1961.
►Ovid. “Fasti”. Translated by A.J. Boyle and R.D. Woodard. London: Penguin Books, 2000.
►Pausanias. Description of Greece, Volume I: Books 1-2. Translated by W. H. S. Jones. Loeb Classical Library 93. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1918.  
►Polyaenus. “Stratagems”. Translated by R. Shepherd. Attalus.org, 1793.

Modern Works Cited:

►Ajootian, Aileen. “Natus Diformis: Hermaphrodites in Greek and Roman Art.” PhD dissertation, Bryn Mawr College, 1990.
►Benda-Weber, Isabella. “Krokotos and Crocota Vestis: Saffron-Coloured Clothes and Muliebrity”. Production and Trade of Textiles and Dyes in the Roman Empire and Neighbouring Regions (2014):129-142. Accessed 29 June 2026.
►Bernabé, Alberto. “Dionysos in the Mycenaean World”. Redefining Dionysos, edited by Alberto Bernabé, Miguel Herrero de Jáuregui, Ana Isabel Jiménez San Cristóbal and Raquel Martín Hernández, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2013, pp. 23-37. Accessed 14 June 2026. 
►Brady-Garnand, Nicholas. “Close Encounters of the Third Gender: Hermaphroditus, the Welcomed Guest of the Cult of Dionysus”. The Pennsylvania Communication Annual 79.2 (2024): 22-37.
►Cole, Susan Guettel. Landscapes, Gender, and Ritual Space: The Ancient Greek Experience. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004.
►Cole, Susan Guettel. “Dionysus.” In A Companion to Greek Religion, edited by Daniel Ogden, 325–341. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2007.
►Delcourt, Marie. “Her*******ite; Myths and Rites of the Bisexual Figure in Classical Antiquity”. London: Studio Books, 1961. 
►DeMone, Brittany, and Lisa A. Hughes. “Sensing Hermaphroditus in the Dionysian Theatre Garden”. Open Arts Journal, Issue 10 (2021): 68-88. 
►Dio, Ronnie James. Interview by EvilG. Metal-Rules.com, 2001. Archived 10 May 2017.
►Dover, Kenneth James. “Greek Homosexuality”. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1989. 
►Guszkowski, August. “This Effeminate Stranger: Dionysus’ Gender in Translation and Performance”. Independent Student Projects and Publications 5 (2022). Accessed 22 June 2026. 
►HRC Staff. “New HRC Data Finds Record High Americans Know a Transgender Person, Broad Bipartisan Support for Transgender Rights”. Human Rights Campaign Press Release, 31 March 2026. Accessed 26 July 2026.
►Hurwitt, Jeffrey M. “Book Review: Tan Men/Pale Women: Color and Gender in Archaic Greece and Egypt, a Comparative Approach”. American Journal of Archaeology 119.1 (2015). Accessed 20 June 2026. 
►Isler-Kerényi, Cornelia, and Wilfred G. E. Watson. “An Iconography in Process”. Dionysos in Archaic Greece: An Understanding through Images, Brill, 2007, pp. 5–16. JSTOR. Accessed 19 June 2026. 
►Jameson, Michael, ‘The Asexuality of Dionysus’, Sex and Difference in Ancient Greece and Rome (Edinburgh, 2003; online edn, Edinburgh Scholarship Online, 22 Mar. 2012). Accessed 4 July 2026. 
►Jeanmaire, Henri. “Dionisus. Histoire du Culte de Bacchus”. Paris: Payot, 1951. 
►Johns, Catherine. “Sex or Symbol? Erotic Images of Greece and Rome”. New York: Routledge, 1982.
►Kerenyi, Karl. “Gods of the Greeks”. New York: Thames and Hudson, 1951. 
►Macurdy, Grace Harriet. “Klodones, Mimallones and Dionysus Pseudanor.” The Classical Review, vol. 27, no. 6, 1913, pp. 191–92. JSTOR. Accessed 14 July 2026. 
►Minglu, Luka Cai. “The Fragility of Gender: Gender Essentialism in Sophocles’ Antigone”. Dean James E. McLeod Freshman Writing Prize, University of Washington, 2017. 
►Morford, Mark P.O, and Robert J. Lenardon. “Classical Mythology Seventh Edition”. New York: Oxford University Pess, 2003.
►Musée du Louvre. “Hermaphrodite debout; atelier pergaménien;  IIe s. av. J.-C. (?)”.  Département des Antiquités grecques, étrusques et romaines. Numéro de collection Cp 6471. Accessed 29 July 2026.
►Noone, Chris, Et Al. “Critically appraising the cass report: methodological flaws and unsupported claims.” BMC medical research methodology vol. 25 (2025): 1 128. Accessed 26 July 2026. 
►Olson, Kelly. “Roman Underwear Revisited.” The Classical World, vol. 96, no. 2, 2003, pp. 201–10. JSTOR. Accessed 3 July 2026. 
►Otto, Walter F. “Dionysus: Myth and Cult”. Translated by Robert B. Palmer. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1965. 
►Pantel, Pauline Schmitt. “Dionysos, the Banquet and Gender”. A Different God?: Dionysos and Ancient Polytheism, edited by Renate Schlesier, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2012, pp. 119-136. Accessed 5 July 2026. 
►Reagan, Emily Bonocan. “Janelle Monáe Speaks On Sexuality On Sway In The Morning”. Okayplayer. 24 September 2013. Accessed 22 June 2026. 
►Seaford, Richard. “Dionysos”. New York: Routledge, 2006.
►Rubarth, Scott. “Competing Constructions of Masculinity in Ancient Greece”. Athens Journal of Humanities & Arts 1.1 (2014): 21-32.
►Smithsonian. “Plate”. Smithsonian Website. Accessed 19 June 2026.
►Stamper, Michael K. “Give Me That Old Time Religion: A Study in Dionysian Ecstatic Rites”. PhD thesis, Pacifica Graduate Institute, 2006. Accessed 8 July 2026.
►Von Stackelberg, Katharine T. “Garden Hybrids: Her*******ite Images in the Roman House.” Classical Antiquity, vol. 33, no. 2 (2014): 395–426. JSTOR. Accessed 21 July 2026.

Images Used:

All images used are either public domain or created by Sophie Edwards, except:

►Venus de Milo by Livioandronico2013 CC4.0
►Venus de Milo 3/4 view by Shawn Lipowski CC3.0
►Hermaphroditus by Sandstein CC3.0
►Dionysus Dinos by The Trustees of the British Museum CC4.0
►Women wearing Krokotos and Akrotiri Fresco by Isabella Benda-Weber, used without permission under Fair Use
Crocusd Sativus
►Lupanar brothel erotic fresco by Sarahhoa CC2.0
►Fresco depicting Daedalus presenting his wooden cow to Pasiphae by Chappsnet CC4.0
►Dionysus Triumph Mosaic by Dosseman CC4.0
►Oceanus and Thetys mosaic bvy Dosseman CC4.0
►Antiope Mosaic by Dosseman CC4.0
►Dionysus mosaic by Dosseman CC4.0
►Crocus Sativus plant by Kat Kight CC2.0
►Tablet with Linear B script by TimeTravelRome CC2.0
►Bikini girls mosaic by Berthold Werner CC4.0
►Dionysus fighting Indians by Mark Cartwright CC4.0
►Pouring Satyr by Zde CC4.0
►Sassanian Empire map by Ro4444 CC4.0
►Feminine Dionysus from Persia copyright Smithsonian, used without permission under Fair Use
►Faravahar by Bernard Gagnon CC4.0
►Silenus detail from a Roman-era marble sarcophagus by Wolfgang Sauber CC3.0
►Satyr and Maenad by ArchaiOptix CC4.0
Pan and Hermaphroditus Fresco by ArchaiOptix CC4.0
►Illustration of Dionysus and Pentheus by Spencer Alexander McDaniel CC4.0
►Satyr and goat by Marie-Lan Nguyen CC2.5
►Mask of Agamemnon by Xuan Che CC4.0
►Bacchus e Ampelus by Yair-haklai CC4.0