Back الباكوسيات Arabic Вакханки (трагедия) Bulgarian Les bacants Catalan Bacchanterne Danish Die Bakchen German Βάκχαι (τραγωδία) Greek Bakĥantinoj (tragedio) Esperanto Las bacantes Spanish Bakkhantit (Euripides) Finnish Les Bacchantes French
| The Bacchae | |
|---|---|
 Pentheus being torn apart by Agave and Ino, Attic red-figure vase painting, c. 450-425 BC | |
| Written by | Euripides |
| Chorus | Bacchae, female followers of Dionysus |
| Characters | Dionysus Tiresias Cadmus Pentheus Servant Messenger Second Messenger Agave |
| Date premiered | 405 BC |
| Place premiered | Athens |
| Original language | Ancient Greek |
| Genre | Tragedy |
| Setting | Thebes |
The Bacchae (/ˈbækiː/; Ancient Greek: Βάκχαι, Bakkhai; also known as The Bacchantes /ˈbækənts, bəˈkænts, -ˈkɑːnts/) is an ancient Greek tragedy, written by the Athenian playwright Euripides during his final years in Macedonia, at the court of Archelaus I of Macedon. It premiered posthumously at the Theatre of Dionysus in 405 BC as part of a tetralogy that also included Iphigeneia at Aulis and Alcmaeon in Corinth, and which Euripides' son or nephew is assumed to have directed.[1] It won first prize in the City Dionysia festival competition.
The tragedy recounts the Greek myth of King Pentheus of Thebes and his mother Agave, who were punished by the god Dionysus (who is Pentheus's cousin) for rejecting his cult. The play opens with Dionysus proclaiming that he has arrived in Thebes with his votaries to avenge the slander, repeated by his aunts, that he is not the son of Zeus. Disguised as a foreign holy man, the god intends to introduce Dionysian rites into the city, but the Thebans reject his divinity and king Pentheus orders his arrest.[2][3] Eventually, Dionysus drives Pentheus insane luring him to the mountains. The play ends with the women of Thebes, driven by Dionysus's orgiastic frenzy, tearing Pentheus apart, while his mother Agave bears his head on a thyrsus to her father Cadmus.[4][5]
Regarded as Euripides' masterpiece,[2] The Bacchae is classified among the greatest ancient tragedies.[6] The Bacchae is distinctive in that the chorus is integrated into the plot and the god is not a distant presence, but a character in the play, indeed, the protagonist.[6]
- ^ Rehm (1992, 23).
- ^ a b Bacchae. Encyclopaedia Britannica
- ^ Murray Gilbert. Euripides and His Age. Oxford University Press. 1965. ISBN 0-313-20989-8
- ^ Corrigan, Robert W. editor. Classical Tragedy, Greek and Roman; Eight Plays in Authoritative Modern Translations. Euripides. Bagg, Robert, translator. The Bakkhai. Applause Theatre Book Publishers. 1990. ISBN 1-55783-046-0
- ^ Euripides. Vellacott, Philip, translator. The Bacchae and Other Plays. Penguin Books. 1954. ISBN 0-14-044044-5. p. 193.
- ^ a b Euripides. Slavitt, David R., editor. Bovie, Palmer, editor. Epstein, Daniel Mark, translator. Euripides, 1. University of Pennsylvania Press. 1998. ISBN 0-8122-1626-1