My name is Cosi and this is episode one
of my hoes for history series where I'll
give you a rundown of a saucy and
compelling piece of ancient history.
Today I'm going to explain who and what
the Maenads of ancient Greece were
in under three minutes. Let's get into it.
The Maenads were followers of
Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, decadence
and theater. The Maenads were all adult
women and were all about wild femininity
and unrestricted sexuality. The Maenads
were frenzied and animalistic, ecstatic
with earthy cthonic power and their own
primal energy. When they took part in
orgiastic rituals
Maenads were believed to be possessed
by Dionysus himself. Dionysiac rituals
were performed by women in the wild, away
from the civilized world.
Maenads taking part in these rituals
wore animal skins and would wear their
hair loose with snakes as belts. They
also breastfeed baby deer and wolf cubs
These gals also ripped apart
sacrificial animals, an act known as
sparagmos and ate the flesh raw as a
part of their religious rites.
Maybe the mythology surrounding the Maenads suggests that this was the state of
women when left to their own devices. If
you allowed a woman to leave her loom
she would rip a bunny in half and gnaw on
it's flesh. Maenads were also depicted
carrying a thyrsus. Pretty much a long
stick made out of fennel with a pine
cone on top of it. This long stick thing
carried by these erotically charged women
is said to be a phallic fertility symbol.
That's a pretentious way of saying the
thyrsus looks like a dick. Also the
pinecone on top of the thyrsus
symbolized the spreading of seed so the
Maenads who are all about orgies,
pleasure and indulgence walked around
carrying large vegetable dildos. This
long vegetable dildo could also be used
as a weapon.
Truly multi-purpose. The Maenads are
said to represent the fear within
patriarchal society that attempts to
restrain and control women may not
actually work. The most famous account of
this notion and in Maenadic behavior
comes from Euripides' tragedy the Bacchae,
written during the Classical period. This
play portrays male displeasure resulting
from these wildly violent, sexually
charged
women abandoning their domestic duties
and taking to the mountains. The
caricature of women that Maenads
represent perpetuates the notion that
women are wild and sexually insatiable
and need to be reined in by dudes. The
rites of the Maenads ritualized
sexuality, indulgence and intoxication,
all hugely transgressive and a bit too
raunchy.
These wild sexual women were
antithetical to the restrained civilized
ancient Greek world and that was
Maenads in under three minutes.
