View source for Thyrsus

{{Short description|Wand or staff carried during Hellenic festivals and ceremonies}}
{{Other uses}}
{{Italics title}}
[[File:Colossal statue of Antinous as Dionysus-Osiris.jpg|thumb|300px|[[Antinous]] holding the ''thyrsus'' while posed as Dionysus ([[Museo Pio-Clementino]])]]

In [[Ancient Greece]] a '''''thyrsus''''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|θ|ɜː|r|s|ə|s}}) or '''''thyrsos''''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|θ|ɜːr|s|ɒ|s}}; {{Langx|grc|θύρσος}}) was a [[wand]] or [[Staff of office|staff]] of giant fennel (''[[Ferula communis]]'') covered with [[ivy]] vines and leaves, sometimes wound with ''[[Tainia (costume)|taeniae]]'' and topped with a [[pine]] [[Conifer cone|cone]], [[artichoke]], [[fennel]], or by a bunch of vine-leaves and grapes or ivy-leaves and berries, carried during [[Ancient Greece|Hellenic]] festivals and religious ceremonies.<ref>{{Cite web|title=A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), THYRSUS|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=thyrsus-cn|access-date=2021-05-13|website=www.perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Olszewski |first=Edward |date=2019 |title=Dionysus's Enigmatic Thyrsus |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/56/article/915077 |journal=Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society |volume=163 |issue=2 |pages=153–173 |doi=10.1353/pro.2019.a915077 |issn=2326-9243|url-access=subscription }} [https://www.amphilsoc.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/attachments/Olszewski.pdf Dionysus's Enigmatic Thyrsus]</ref> The ''thyrsus'' is typically associated with the Greek god [[Dionysus]] (and his subsequent Roman equivalent Bacchus) as a symbol of [[prosperity]], [[fertility]], and [[hedonism]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Moulton|first=Carroll|title=Ancient Greece and Rome: An Encyclopedia for Students|publisher=Gale|year=1998|isbn=9780684805030|volume=2|location=New York, NY|pages=7–9}}</ref>

== Religious and ceremonial use ==
In [[Ancient Greek religion|Greek religion]], the staff was carried by the [[thiasus|devotees of Dionysus]]. [[Euripides]] wrote that [[honey]] dripped from the ''thyrsos'' staves that the Bacchic [[maenad]]s carried.<ref>Euripides, ''[[Bacchae]]'', 711.</ref> The ''thyrsus'' was a sacred instrument at religious [[ritual]]s and [[fête]]s.

The fabulous history of Bacchus relates that he converted the ''thyrsi'' carried by himself and his followers into dangerous weapons, by concealing an iron point in the head of leaves.<ref>[[Diodorus]]. iii. 64, iv. 4; [[Macrobius]]. ''Sat.'' i. 19.</ref> Hence his ''thyrsus'' is called "a spear enveloped in vine-leaves",<ref>[[Ovid]]. ''Met.'' iii, 667</ref> and its point was thought to incite to madness.<ref>Hor. ''Carm''. ii.  19. 8; Ovid. ''Amor''. iii 1. 23, iii. 15. 17, ''Trist.'' iv. 1. 43.; Brunk, ''Anal''. iii. 201; Orph. ''Hymn''. xlv. 5, 1. 8.</ref>

== Symbolism ==
The ''thyrsus'', associated with the followers of Dionysus (the [[satyr]]s, ''[[thiasus]]'', and [[maenad]]s or Bacchantes), is a symbol of [[prosperity]], [[fertility]], [[hedonism]], and pleasure/enjoyment in general.<ref>[[Ioannis Kakridis]], Ελληνική μυθολογία Εκδοτική Αθηνών 1987 (in Greek)</ref> The ''thyrsus'' was tossed in the Bacchic dance:
<blockquote>''Pentheus'': The ''thyrsus''—in my right hand shall I hold it?
::Or thus am I more like a Bacchanal?
''Dionysus'': In thy right hand, and with thy right foot raise it.<ref>''[[The Bacchae]]''</ref>
</blockquote>

== Literature ==
[[File:Thyrsus.jpg|thumb|''Thyrsus'' staff tied with ''[[Tainia (costume)|taenia]]'' and topped with a [[Conifer cone|pine cone]]]]
In the ''[[Iliad]]'', [[Diomedes]], one of the leading warriors of the [[Achaeans (Homer)|Achaeans]], mentions the ''thyrsus'' while speaking to [[Glaucus (son of Hippolochus)|Glaucus]], one of the [[Lycia|Lycian]] commanders in the [[Troy|Trojan]] army, about [[Lycomedes of Scyros|Lycurgus]], the king of [[Skyros|Scyros]]:
<blockquote>He it was that/drove the nursing women who were in charge/of frenzied Bacchus through the land of Nysa,/and they flung their ''thyrsi'' on the ground as/murderous Lycurgus beat them with his oxgoad.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Homer|title=The Iliad|url=http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.6.vi.html|access-date=2021-05-21|website=The Internet Classics Archive|series=VI|at=132–137}}</ref></blockquote> The ''thyrsus'' is explicitly attributed to Dionysus and his followers in [[Euripides]]'s play, ''[[The Bacchae]],'' a Greek tragedy describing the degradation of Thebes in vindication for the sullied name of Dionysus's mortal mother. The story surrounds the murder of the young king and indoctrination of all of the Theban women into Dionysus's cult, with the ''thyrsus'' serving as a badge of sorts for members.
<blockquote>To raise my Bacchic shout, and clothe all who respond/ In fawnskin habits, and put my ''thyrsus'' in their hands–/ The weapon wreathed with ivy-shoots... Euripides also writes, "There's a brute wildness in the fennel-wands—Reverence it well."<ref>{{Cite book|last=Euripides|title=The Bacchae and Other Plays|publisher=Penguin Books|year=1972|isbn=0-14-044044-5|edition=Rev.|location=Harmondsworth, Eng.|pages=192|translator-last=Vellacott|translator-first=Philip|oclc=618722}}</ref></blockquote>[[Plato]] describes the hedonistic connotation of the ''thyrsus'', and thereby Dionysus, in his philosophical ''[[Phaedo]]'':
<blockquote>I conceive that the founders of the mysteries had a real meaning and were not mere triflers when they intimated in a figure long ago that he who passes unsanctified and uninitiated into the world below will live in a slough, but that he who arrives there after initiation and purification will dwell with the gods. For 'many', as they say in the mysteries, 'are the ''thyrsus'' bearers, but few are the mystics', – meaning, as I interpret the words, the true philosophers.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Plato|date=|title=Phaedo|url=http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedo.html|access-date=2021-05-21|website=The Internet Classics Archive}}</ref></blockquote>In Part II of [[Johann Wolfgang von Goethe]]'s ''[[Goethe's Faust|Faust]]'', [[Mephistopheles]] tries to catch a [[Lamia]], only to find out that she is an illusion and instead holds a ''thyrsus''. The play contains major themes of sin and hedonism, and makes connection to Dionysus through the ''thyrsus'':
<blockquote>Well, then, a tall one I will catch... And now a ''thyrsus''-pole I snatch! Only a pine-cone as its head.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Goethe|first=Johann Wolfgang von|title=Faust|series=II|pages=7775–7777}}</ref></blockquote>[[Robert Browning]] mentions the ''thyrsus'' in passing in ''The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St Praxed's Church'', as the dying bishop confuses Christian piety with classical extravagance. [[Ovid]] talks about Bacchus carrying a ''thyrsus'' and his followers doing the same in his Metamorphoses Book III, which is a retelling of The Bacchae.
<blockquote>The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me,/Those [[Pan (god)|Pans]] and [[Nymph|nymphs]] ye wot of, and perchance/Some [[Sacrificial tripod|tripod]], ''thyrsus'', with a vase or so.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Browning|first=Robert|title=Robert Browning : selected poems|date=2010|others=John Woolford, Daniel Karlin, Joseph Phelan|isbn=978-1-317-86491-2|location=Harlow, England|pages=56–58|oclc=869374843}}</ref></blockquote>

== Gallery ==
<gallery class="center">
File:Mainade satyros Staatliche Antikensammlungen 2654.jpg|A Maenad using her ''thyrsos'' to ward off a Satyr, [[Red-figure pottery|Attic red-figure]] ''[[kylix]]'', {{circa|480}} BC
File:Ménade relieve romano (Museo del Prado) 04b.jpg|Roman relief showing a Maenad holding a ''thyrsus'', 120–140 AD. [[Museo del Prado|Prado Museum]], [[Madrid]].
File:Satyr carrying the thyrsus.jpg|A [[Fresco|mural]] of a striding Satyr carrying the ''thyrsus'' painted in the 1st century AD. Archaeological park of [[Baiae]].
File:John Reinhard Weguelin – Bacchus Triumphant (1882).jpg|''Bacchus Triumphant'' by [[John Reinhard Weguelin]] (1882)
File:William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905) - Mailice (1899).jpg|A Bacchant holding a ''thyrsus'': ''Malice'' by [[William-Adolphe Bouguereau]] (1899)
</gallery>

==See also==
* [[Cult of Dionysus]]

== Notes ==
{{reflist}}

== References ==
* Casadio, Giovanni; Johnston, Patricia A., ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=RgL21NPlQQQC&q=thyrsus Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia]'', University of Texas Press, 2009
* Ferdinand Joseph M. de Waele, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=837NAAAAMAAJ&q=thyrsos The magic staff or rod in Græco-Italian antiquity]'', Drukkerij Erasmus, 1927

;Attribution
* {{EB1911|wstitle=Thyrsus}}

== External links ==
{{Commons category|Thyrsus}}
* [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=thyrsus-cn Thyrsus] at [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3atext%3a1999.04.0063 A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890)]
* [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/594724/thyrsus Thyrsus] at [[Encyclopædia Britannica Online]]
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20121022052657/http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-dgra/1136.html Thyrsus]}} at {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20050326084508/http://ancientlibrary.com/ The Ancient Library]}}
* [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/searchresults?q=thyrsus Thyrsus] at [[Perseus Project]]

{{Greek religion|state=collapsed}}

[[Category:Dionysus]]
[[Category:Objects in Greek mythology]]
[[Category:Religious objects]]
[[Category:Wands]]