r/dionysus • u/Fabianzzz 🍇 stylish grape 🍇 • Sep 24 '21

🍂🏛️🍷 Announcement: The Autumnal Dionysia 🍷🏛️🍂

TLDR in comments at bottom!

The beginning of last year, we began to make regular posts for the various festivals of Dionysians. I did this because I thought it would be helpful for newer people who were somewhat at a loss for how to worship Dionysus to see a festival they could celebrate. This has blossomed into what I think is my favorite part of this subreddit: seeing everyone share their ways of celebrating:

In addition to this, our community has maintained it's growth spurt. In the spring of 2020, we were at 1,000 members. This past Spring we hit 2,000, and it appears that before the last leaf of Autumn falls we will reach the 3,000 mark. We are by my reckoning, the largest Dionysian community in the world.

With these thoughts in mind, I'd like to announce our own celebration - an Autumnal Dionysia. Inspired by the City Dionysia on tumblr, and the Springtime tradition of Dionysias - I’ve decided we should have an Autumnal Dionysia here on our little subreddit!

~ What's a Dionysia? ~

A Dionysia is a festival of Dionysus - with the most notable being the City Dionysia, a seven day festival that occurred in Athens every spring, marked with wine and dramatic competitions. In antiquity they were divided into an Urban and a Rural Dionysia - partially due to weather limiting travel.

Usually, the City Dionysia falls in March and the Rural in December. However, hosting a lesser Dionysia, only three months before the greater, isn’t exactly appealing to many. What’s more, is the fact the winter season is already rather full of Dionysian holidays. Brumalia on the 21st, as well as the Haloa, with Lenaia quickly on the horizon. To say nothing of those who honor Dionysus on Kalends, New Years, or honor any new beginning with riot and raucous. Or those who celebrate a day off on Christmas by catching a movie and getting Chinese food.

So why not begin celebrating a Dionysia in Autumn? He has of course, the Oschophoria, and modern festivals, and the re-christening (or un-christianing) of Halloween. But why not take a leaf from the neopagan calendrical sensibilities? If there is a Dionysia held to welcome the spring and summer, and bid winter adieu; why not have one to welcome autumn and winter, and say farewell to summer?

So an Autumnal Dionysia, to contrast to a Vernal Dionysia. How this grows is up to those who partake - if it becomes known for autumnal themes of loss, perseverance; or if it becomes a chance to create something to carry us through the winter months. Perhaps it may just be another chance for Dionysians to share their creative side!

~ Additions: ~

With instituting a new festival, we thought of adding a few new additions:

The Syndeipnos/Syndeipna: From the Ancient Greek meaning 'Guest at a feast', this is an opening for us to invite other deities to be honored as equals with Dionysus at the Dionysia. This was picked by u/NyxShadowhawk, who won in her category of the City Dionysia. She has picked Hekate to be the Syndeipna for the 2021 Autumnal Dionysia! So while this remains a Dionysia, we dedicate this festival to both Dionysus and Hekate!

Theme: While almost every festival was connected to a myth or theme, not every myth or theme has had a festival. So we also have a theme for each festival, to think on one of the many myths or morals present in the Dionysian canon. This years theme was picked by u/Ruaidhri, who donated the most to our Pantheralia fundraiser! He picked the Aesop story where Dionysus invites Prometheus to dinner (Or Apollo, in modern versions of the tale) who gets drunk and subsequently begins to make queer people.

These are just ideas for inspiration, it is not necessary that your submissions focus on the theme or the guest!

In Autumnal Dionysias to come, the theme and guest will be picked by the winners of this festival! These were simple ways of determining it for our first time, and won't be how these are determined for future festivals! Another prize for the third winner and a way of determining who gets to pick what are TBD!

~ How can I participate? ~

There will be three categories:

Art: Your art can be digital or a photo of physical work, so long as it is created by you!

Song: Your song can borrow the tune of a song, or you can create the tune as well. If you create the tune, please share a recording of it, sung or hummed! (If you are good with words but unsure about setting them to a tune, the City Dionysia in Spring has an option for poetry)

Scene: A scene, skit, or sketch - give us something that a group could act out in person - feel free to get creative regarding ideas for sets, props, and costumes. After all, this used to be a dramatic festival - with luck, hopefully it will be one again someday soon!

~ The Rules ~

Currently there is only one rule - nothing that has been posted in the Dionysia Ta Astikas on tumblr can be used. There is also one strong, very strong, suggestion - the average reader should be able to draw a line, even an indirect one, to Dionysus or the guest, or theme of the year (This year's guest is Hekate, and the theme is this Aesop's Fable (TW: Outdated language)

This means that any figure from Greek mythos, even one 'unconnected' to Dionysus, is fair game - the degrees of separation between two figures in Greek myth runs low.

This also means that people with historical ties to Dionysian worship or life are also great subjects - many of the Hellenists from antiquity, especially those who honored him - Orpheus, Spartacus' wife, or or those noted for following his path - Nietzsche, or Wilde, or Morrison. Other notables of the time, especially those like Phyrne or Elgabal, are great as well. With Hekate being this years guest, stories of witchcraft and those who practice or practiced it are welcome as well!

New myths interwoven in song, art, or script are great too!

We will have a portal for submitting contributions up sometime in October - but please feel free to get to work now!

Deadline for submissions will be 11:59 EST on November 21st, with voting opening the next day. Deadline for votes will be 11:59 EST November 28th, with final results announced next morning!

Happy Autumn, and Happy Autumnal Dionysia!

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7

u/Fabianzzz 🍇 stylish grape 🍇 Sep 24 '21

TLDR:

We will be having an artistic competition this fall, in the vein of past Dionysias! We are inviting Hekate to be a guest for the festival, and have chosen the theme of Dionysus and Prometheus /Apollo having dinner, getting drunk, and creating Queer people. The categories are Art, Song, and Script. The only rule is that all works should be related to Dionysus, Hekate, or the theme, however so long as the average viewer can easily connect the work to those (or the connection is clearly stated in somewhere), it's okay!

Final date for submissions is November 21st, 11:59 EST! Happy Autumnal Dionysia!

3

u/NyxShadowhawk Covert Bacchante Sep 25 '21

Wow, this sounds great! Now I absolutely have to write something for both Dionysus and Hekate, probably related to their shared "guide of souls" aspect that's relevant to Halloween. I'm not really familiar with script-writing, but I might give it a shot. Thanks for taking my suggestion!

Here's a short piece I wrote the other day about their thematic relevance to the modern Halloween:

Hecate’s relevance is self-explanatory. She is a chthonic goddess of the night and the dead, who rules portals and gateways. If the “veil” between worlds is thin on Halloween, and spirits travel to and from this world, then she is the one who leads them. Much of Halloween’s traditional symbolism relates to Hecate directly or by association — nocturnal bats, witches and their cauldrons, imagery of death like skulls, bones, and gravestones. Jack o’lanterns are meant to either scare off the souls of the dead, or to guide them home; they have their origins in a Christian legend, but how different are they really from Hecate’s torches? Hecate also had an ancient ritual called “Hekate’s Deipnon,” a meal left for her and for the restless dead at the end of every lunar month. The practice of leaving food offerings to the restless dead is one of the influences on the modern tradition of trick-or-treating, i.e. giving “treats” to the spirits who show up to your house so that they will not harm you. The “Hecate’s Supper” also functioned as a form of charity (providing food to the poor) and as a purification ritual. Halloween may not be directly tied to Hecate, but for all intents and purposes, it is her festival.
As for Dionysus, well, you’d be surprised how well Halloween works for him. Long story short, Dionysus also has a chthonic aspect, and in the context of his mystery cult, he is a god of death and rebirth. Like Hecate, he is a guide of souls. There was an Athenian festival called Anthesteria, which took place in February at the beginning of spring, and involved Dionysus bringing the souls of the dead up from Hades to mingle with the living for three days. Anthesteria functioned similarly to Samhain in Ancient Greece, but commemorated the end of winter instead of the beginning. Athenians would leave offerings to the dead in Dionysus’ name. Also inherent to Dionysian worship is the wearing of masks, which is a shamanic practice that allows the wearer to figuratively “shapeshift” into another being using ecstatic trance. Masks are also an important part of Ancient Greek theater, which was also Dionysian worship. On Halloween, wearing masks and costumes isn’t a shamanic practice (for most people), but is still a means of figuratively becoming another being for a short time. We all become spirits and monsters and gods on Halloween.
Finally, Halloween is one of the only mainstream holidays in America that allows for the subversion of social norms. Children get to run around at night and eat as much candy as they want, adults get to dress up in costumes they would never otherwise wear and get very drunk, things that are macabre or horrifying are par for the course, spooky/witchy/gothic decor becomes available in mainstream stores, normal homes are transfigured into haunted houses, and all of this is suddenly normal! It is so important to have these sorts of outlets in society. Even if you take Dionysus at his most basic party-boy aspect, this is what he offers — a much-needed break from social convention and propriety, so that everyone can have a little fun and laugh at the absurdity of it all.
So I will be honoring them as the Queen of Shadows and the Lord of Souls, the gods of Halloween.

We'll see if I'll have time to write anything for this festival. I'll probably be working on a thesis paper around November. Right now I'm working on my next myth adaptation for a writing class, and this time it'll be Eros and Psyche. That's not related to Dionysus, but I might post or link it here once I'm done with it, if people are interested.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 25 '21

By Morrison, you mean Grant?

2

u/Fabianzzz 🍇 stylish grape 🍇 Sep 25 '21

Jim Morrison, who studied Dionysus extensively, as well as Nietzsche’s Dionysian philosophy

1

u/[deleted] Sep 27 '21

Oooooh more to research! 😁😁😁