Euripides' BACCHAE Complete

Translated, with notes, by Th. Buckley.

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O dwelling of the
Curetes, and ye divine Cretan caves,[8] parents to Jupiter, where the
Corybantes with the triple helmet invented for me in their caves this
circle o'erstretched with hide; and with the constant sweet-voiced breath
of Phrygian pipes they mingled a sound of Bacchus, and put the instrument
in the hand of Rhea, resounding with the sweet songs of the Bacchae. And
hard by the raving satyrs went through the sacred rites of the mother
Goddess. And they added the dances of the Trieterides;[9] in which Bacchus
rejoices; pleased on the mountains, when after the running dance he falls
upon the plain, having a sacred garment of deer-skin, seeking a sacrifice
of goats, a raw-eaten delight,[10] on his way to the Phrygian, the Lydian
mountains; and the leader is Bromius, Evoe![11] but the plain flows with
milk, and flows with wine, and flows with the nectar of bees; and the smoke
is as of Syrian frankincense. But Bacchus bearing a flaming torch of pine
on his thyrsus, rushes about arousing in his course the wandering Choruses,
and agitating them with shouts, casting his rich locks loose in the
air,--and with his songs he shouts out such words as this: O go forth, ye
Bacchae; O go forth, ye Bacchae, delight of gold-flowing Tmolus. Sing Bacchus
'neath the loud drums, Evoe, celebrating the God Evius in Phrygian cries
and shouts. When the sweet-sounding sacred pipe sounds a sacred playful
sound suited to the frantic wanderers, to the mountain, to the
mountain--and the Bacchant rejoicing like a foal with its mother at
pasture, stirs its swift foot in the dance.

Tiresias: Who at the doors will call out Cadmus from the house, the son of
Agenor, who, leaving the city of Sidon, erected this city of the Thebans?
Let some one go, tell him that Tiresias seeks him; but he himself knows on
what account I come, and what agreement I, an old man, have made with him,
yet older; to twine the thyrsi, and to put on the skins of deer, and to
crown the head with ivy branches.

[8] Cf. Apollodor. l. i., § 3, interpp. ad Virg. G. iv. 152. Compare Porphyr. de Nymph. Antr. p. 262, ad. Holst. σπηλαια τοινυν και αντρα των παλαιοτατων πριν και ναους επινοησαι θεοις αφοσιουντων. και εν Κρητηι μεν κουρητων, Διϊ εν Αρκαδιαι δε, σεληνηι και Πανι Λυκειωι: και εν Ναξωι Διονυσωι. πανταχου δ' οπου τον Μιθραν εγνωσαν, δια σπηλαιου τον θεον ιλεουμενων. Cf. Moll. ad Longi Past. i. 2. p. 22 sq. ed. Boden.

[9] Cf. Virg. AEn. iv. 301, and Ritterh. on Oppian, Cyn. i, 24.

[10] Compare the epithet of Bacchus Ωμαδιος, Orph. Hymn. xxx. 5; l. 7, which has been wrongly explained by Gesner and Hermann. The true interpretation is given by Porphyr. de Abst. ii. 55, who states that human sacrifices were offered ωμαδιωι Διονυσωι the man being torn to pieces (διααπωντες).

[11] Persius i. 92. "et lynceus Maenas flexura corymbis Evion ingeminat, reparabilis assonat Echo." Euseb. Pr. Ev. ii. 3, derives the cry from Eve!

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