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Bring the god, the son of a god, Thunderer Dionysus,
For a womb, Zeus took him straight into the cavern of his thigh and sewed him up secretly with golden fasteners to hide him from Hera.
may you be crowned in ivy, and may you run green with creeping vines, run fruitful and green.
his thundering call:
thunderously incites the rush
wreathe our heads in fresh ivy.
I’m not the one to look down on gods. I’m human.
No sophistic arguments will throw them down, no, not from the best brains of all.
The god won’t care who’s young, who’s old: we all must dance, because he wants honor from all of us, together.
He’ll not exclude anyone who gives to him the glory he desires.
It’s this brand-new god, [220] Dionysus, whoever that is; they’re dancing for him!
I hear there’s a foreigner come to town, a wizard with magic spells from Lydia, who has long blond curls—perfumed!—upon his head, and the bloom of wine, the grace of Aphrodite, on his cheeks.
And he’s the one who says Dionysus is a god, that he was sewn up in the thigh of Zeus— when actually he was burnt to ashes by lightning, along with his mother, because she lied when she named Zeus as her lover.
You, on the other hand, have a tongue that runs on smoothly and sounds intelligent. But what it says is brainless.
when the god enters people in force, he maddens them and makes them tell the future.
Even in a Bacchic revel, a woman who is really virtuous will not be corrupted.
We are gray-haired, the pair of us, but still we must dance.
You are flitting about, you know, so thoughtless, the way you think.
Track down that foreigner, the one who looks like a girl. He carried this new disease to our women, put this filth in our bedrooms.
Pentheus’ name means “grief”; I hope he brings no grief upon your family. This is not fortune-telling— I’m looking at facts: he who speaks foolishness is a fool.
insult to Thunderer
But a life lived in peace with good sense holds family together, stays unshaken.
Wisdom? It’s not wise to lift our thoughts too high; we are human, and our time is short.
A man who aims at greatness will not live to own what he has now.
To rich and poor alike he grants delight of wine without pain.
What is ordinary, what the crowd thinks right, is good enough for me.
The chains simply fell off their feet, all by themselves, and the doors—no human hand touched them, but they were unlocked. So many miracles this man [450] has brought to Thebes!
Speak wisdom to a fool and he’ll think you have no sense at all.
Even now he’s very near, and he sees what I am suffering.
You do not see him because you lack reverence.
Believe me, I am sane and you are crazy.
pay attention to the Thunderer.
What anger, oh what anger shows now from the earthborn spawn of a serpent,
There I made a fool of him. He thought he’d tied me up, but he never laid a hand on me—he only fed himself on hope.
Autonoe,
One took her thyrsus, struck a rock, and water leapt out, pure as dew.
If anyone was thirsty for a drink of milk she scrabbled her sharp fingers in the earth [710] and it came, spurting white.
And they, at the appointed time, spun into a Bacchic dance, shaking the thyrsus and crying, “Iacchus,” to the thunderborn child of Zeus, all with one mouth, and the entire mountain danced for Bacchus, wild beasts too, all racing into motion.
And the fire they carried in their hair never singed a curl.)
women over men! only a god could make that happen.
If you take wine away, love will die, and every other source of human joy will follow.
I’m nervous about speaking freely to a king, but even so, I have to say it: No god is greater than Dionysus.
This is worse than anything—that the source of so much trouble to us is women.
Most important: I don’t want the Bacchae laughing at me.
Now I’m off to get the fine clothes I will fit to Pentheus for his trip to Hades when his mother kills him.
No one should ever be above the law, neither in thought nor action.
What is fine is loved always.
Hope may lead a man to wealth, hope may pass away; [910] but I admire a man when he is happy in an ordinary life.
Mind you, you must not smash the Nymphs’ temples or the places where Pan loves to play his pipes.
Intelligence gone mad, [1000] spirit struck to arrogance, he has appointed himself to suppress the unconquerable by violence.
