In Greek mythology '''Semachos''' was a doublet of Ikarios, the recipient of Dionysus' gift of wine, who welcomed Dionysus to Attica, with a tragic outcome. Semachos was the founder-hero of the Athenian priestesses of Dionysus, the '''Semachidai'''.<ref>Stephen of Byzantium, ''s.v.'' Σημαχίδαι, noted by Kerenyi 1976:143 note32.</ref>
The name could be given a Hellenic twist by linking it with ''machia'', "battle", but M.C. Astour<ref>Astour, ''Hellenosemitica: an ethnic and cultural study in West Semitic impact on Mycenaean Greece'' 1967:195, noted by Karl Kerenyi, ''Dionysos: Archetypal image of indestructible life'' 1976:146 note 44.</ref> recommended a derivation from a Northwest Semitic word, represented by the Hebrew ''šimah'', "made to rejoice".<ref>''Semachos'', as a plural of ''simchah'', "joyous occasion", appears in the euphemistically titled Talmudic ''Tractate Semachos'', which deals with customs of death and mourning.</ref>
Dionysus was welcomed by the women of Semachos' ''oikos''. His daughter received the gift of a deer skin (''nebris''), which Karl Kerenyi identified as the bestowal of the rite of maenads in rending limb from limb the animals they sacrificed to Dionysus: "''nebrizein'' also means the rending of an animal."<ref>Kerenyi 1976:147.</ref>
The date of the introduction of wine making to Greece, which certainly occurred during the Bronze Age, was given the confident precision of 1497 BCE by Jerome in his adaptation of Eusebius' ''Chronicon''.<ref>Under year 1497 ''Dionysus verum non ille Semelae filius, cum in Atticam pervenisset, hospitio receptus a Semacho filiae eius capreae pellem largitus est''; Jerome makes this distinction between the "true" Dionysus and that born of a virgin Semele, under year 1387 ''Dionysus, qui Latine Liber pater, nascitur ex Semele''.; noted in Kerenyi 1976:143 note 32.</ref>
An inscription<ref>''Inscriptiones Graecae'' II part 2, 1582, lines 53f, noted by Kerenyi 1976:147 note 45.</ref> records the site of the ''heroon'' of Semachos, which lay along the pathway that led to Laurion. <!--rather than mark this a stub, see if you can add one fact.--> <!--this article has used the convention BCE since its inception-->
== Notes == {{reflist|2}}
== References ==
* Stephanus of Byzantium, ''Stephani Byzantii Ethnicorum quae supersunt,'' edited by August Meineike (1790-1870), published 1849. A few entries from this important ancient handbook of place names have been translated by Brady Kiesling. [https://topostext.org/work/241 Online version at the Topos Text Project.]
Category:Greek mythological heroes Category:Mythological people from Attica Category:Mythology of Dionysus
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