Becoming a Bacchos – A fragment from the Cretans of Euripides – Page 2

[Ellopos’ note – the text above in the Greek original, ed. Austin, fr. 79: Φοινικογενοῦς τέκνον Εὐρώπης καὶ τοῦ μεγάλου Ζηνός͵ ἀνάσσων Κρήτης ἑκατομπτολιέθρου· ἥκω ζαθέους ναοὺς προλιπών͵ οὓς αὐθιγενὴς στεγανοὺς παρέχει τμηθεῖσα δοκοὺς Χαλύβωι πελέκει καὶ ταυροδέτωι κόλληι κραθεῖσ΄ ἀτρεκεῖς ἁρμοὺς κυπάρισσος. ἁγνὸν δὲ βίον τείνομεν ἐξ οὗ Διὸς Ἰδαίου μύστης γενόμην καὶ νυκτιπόλου Ζαγρέως βούτης τὰς ὠμοφάγους δαῖτας τελέσας μητρί τ΄ ὀρείαι δᾶιδας ἀνασχὼν μετὰ Κουρήτων βάκχος ἐκλήθην ὁσιωθείς. πάλλευκα δ΄ ἔχων εἵματα φεύγω γένεσίν τε βροτῶν καὶ νεκροθήκαις οὐ χριμπτόμενος τὴν ἐμψύχων βρῶσιν ἐδεστῶν πεφύλαγμαι.]

It is remarkable that the mystic, though he becomes a ‘Bacchos’ avows himself as initiated to Idaean Zeus. But this Idaean Zeus is clearly the same as Zagreus, the mystery form of Dionysos. …

A very curious account of a sacrifice to Dionysos in Tenedos helps us to realize how the shift from human to animal sacrifice, from child to bull or calf, may have come about. Aelian in his book on the Nature of Animals makes the following statement: ‘The people of Tenedos in ancient days used to keep a cow with calf, the best they had, for Dionysos, and when she calved, why, they tended her like a woman in child-birth. But they sacrificed the new born calf, having put cothurni on its feet. Yes, and the man who struck it with the axe is pelted with stones in the holy rite and escapes to the sea.’The conclusion can scarcely be avoided that here we have a ritual remembrance of the time when a child was really sacrificed. A calf is substituted but it is humanized as far as possible, and the sacrificer, though he is bound to sacrifice, is guilty of an outrage Anyhow, that the calf was regarded as a child is clear; the line between human and merely animal is to primitive man a shifting shadow.