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Dithyramb

Attic relief (4th century BCE) depicting an aulos player and his family standing before Dionysos and a female consort, with theatrical masks displayed above

The dithyramb (/ˈdɪθɪræm/;[1] Ancient Greek: διθύραμβος, dithyrambos) was an ancient Greek hymn sung and danced in honor of Dionysus, the god of wine and fertility; the term was also used as an epithet of the god.[2] Plato, in The Laws, while discussing various kinds of music mentions "the birth of Dionysos, called, I think, the dithyramb."[3] Plato also remarks in the Republic that dithyrambs are the clearest example of poetry in which the poet is the only speaker.[4]

However, in The Apology Socrates went to the dithyrambs with some of their own most elaborate passages, asking their meaning but got a response of, "Will you believe me?" which "showed me in an instant that not by wisdom do poets write poetry, but by a sort of genius and inspiration; they are like diviners or soothsayers who also say many fine things, but do not understand the meaning of them."[5]

Plutarch contrasted the dithyramb's wild and ecstatic character with the paean.[6] According to Aristotle, the dithyramb was the origin of Athenian tragedy.[7] A wildly enthusiastic speech or piece of writing is still occasionally described as dithyrambic.[8]

  1. ^ Wells, John C. (2000) [1990]. Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (new ed.). Harlow, England: Longman. p. 229. ISBN 978-0-582-36467-7.
  2. ^ Dithurambos, Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, at Perseus. Dithyrambos seems to have arisen out of the hymn: just as paean was both a hymn to and a title of Apollo, Dithyrambos was an epithet of Dionysos as well as a song in his honour; see Harrison (1922, 436).
  3. ^ Plato, Laws, iii.700 B.
  4. ^ Plato. Republic.
  5. ^ Plato. The Republic | Edited by Robert Hutchins and Mortimer Adler.
  6. ^ Plutarch, On the Ei at Delphi. Plutarch himself was a priest of Dionysos at Delphi.
  7. ^ Aristotle, Poetics (1449a10–15): "Anyway, arising from an improvisatory beginning (both tragedy and comedy—tragedy from the leaders of the dithyramb, and comedy from the leaders of the phallic processions which even now continue as a custom in many of our cities), [tragedy] grew little by little, as [the poets] developed whatever [new part] of it had appeared; and, passing through many changes, tragedy came to a halt, since it had attained its own nature"; see Janko (1987, 6).
  8. ^ Definition of dithyrambic. TheFreeDictionary.com.

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