# Thyrsus

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Wand or staff carried during Hellenic festivals and ceremonies

For other uses, see [Thyrsus (disambiguation)](/source/Thyrsus_(disambiguation)).

[Antinous](/source/Antinous) holding the *thyrsus* while posed as Dionysus ([Museo Pio-Clementino](/source/Museo_Pio-Clementino))

In [Ancient Greece](/source/Ancient_Greece) a ***thyrsus*** ([/ˈθɜːrsəs/](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/English)) or ***thyrsos*** ([/ˈθɜːrsɒs/](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/English); [Ancient Greek](/source/Ancient_Greek_language): θύρσος) was a [wand](/source/Wand) or [staff](/source/Staff_of_office) of giant fennel (*[Ferula communis](/source/Ferula_communis)*) covered with [ivy](/source/Ivy) vines and leaves, sometimes wound with *[taeniae](/source/Tainia_(costume))* and topped with a [pine](/source/Pine) [cone](/source/Conifer_cone), [artichoke](/source/Artichoke), [fennel](/source/Fennel), or by a bunch of vine-leaves and grapes or ivy-leaves and berries, carried during [Hellenic](/source/Ancient_Greece) festivals and religious ceremonies.[1][2] The *thyrsus* is typically associated with the Greek god [Dionysus](/source/Dionysus) (and his subsequent Roman equivalent Bacchus) as a symbol of [prosperity](/source/Prosperity), [fertility](/source/Fertility), and [hedonism](/source/Hedonism).[3]

## Religious and ceremonial use

In [Greek religion](/source/Ancient_Greek_religion), the staff was carried by the [devotees of Dionysus](/source/Thiasus). [Euripides](/source/Euripides) wrote that [honey](/source/Honey) dripped from the *thyrsos* staves that the Bacchic [maenads](/source/Maenad) carried.[4] The *thyrsus* was a sacred instrument at religious [rituals](/source/Ritual) and [fêtes](/source/F%C3%AAte).

The fabulous history of Bacchus relates that he converted the *thyrsi* carried by himself and his followers into dangerous weapons, by concealing an iron point in the head of leaves.[5] Hence his *thyrsus* is called "a spear enveloped in vine-leaves",[6] and its point was thought to incite to madness.[7]

## Symbolism

The *thyrsus*, associated with the followers of Dionysus (the [satyrs](/source/Satyr), *[thiasus](/source/Thiasus)*, and [maenads](/source/Maenad) or Bacchantes), is a symbol of [prosperity](/source/Prosperity), [fertility](/source/Fertility), [hedonism](/source/Hedonism), and pleasure/enjoyment in general.[8] The *thyrsus* was tossed in the Bacchic dance:

*Pentheus*: The *thyrsus*—in my right hand shall I hold it?

- - Or thus am I more like a Bacchanal?

*Dionysus*: In thy right hand, and with thy right foot raise it.[9]

## Literature

*Thyrsus* staff tied with *[taenia](/source/Tainia_(costume))* and topped with a [pine cone](/source/Conifer_cone)

In the *[Iliad](/source/Iliad)*, [Diomedes](/source/Diomedes), one of the leading warriors of the [Achaeans](/source/Achaeans_(Homer)), mentions the *thyrsus* while speaking to [Glaucus](/source/Glaucus_(son_of_Hippolochus)), one of the [Lycian](/source/Lycia) commanders in the [Trojan](/source/Troy) army, about [Lycurgus](/source/Lycomedes_of_Scyros), the king of [Scyros](/source/Skyros):

He it was that drove the nursing women who were in charge of frenzied Bacchus through the land of Nysa, and they flung their *thyrsi* on the ground as murderous Lycurgus beat them with his oxgoad.[10]

The *thyrsus* is explicitly attributed to Dionysus and his followers in [Euripides](/source/Euripides)'s tragedy *[The Bacchae](/source/The_Bacchae),* which describes the degradation of Thebes in vindication for the sullied name of Dionysus's mortal mother. The story concerns the murder of the young king and the indoctrination of all the Theban women into Dionysus's cult, with the *thyrsus* serving as a badge of sorts for members.

To raise my Bacchic shout, and clothe all who respond / In fawnskin habits, and put my *thyrsus* in their hands– / The weapon wreathed with ivy-shoots ... There's a brute wildness in the fennel-wands; reverence it well.[11]

[Plato](/source/Plato), in his philosophical dialogue *[Phaedo](/source/Phaedo)*, quotes an Orphic[12] proverb that [metonymically](/source/Metonymy) distinguishes the "thyrsus-bearers" of a religion — those who display its external trappings, but do not necessarily understand its mysteries — from the "[mystae](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mystae&action=edit&redlink=1)" (mystics, [Bacchantes](/source/Bacchantes)) who have been initiated into its secrets. This proverb has entered the lexicon, with a meaning similar to "[Many are called, but few are chosen](/source/Parable_of_the_Great_Banquet)."[13][14]

I conceive that the founders of the [mysteries](/source/Mystery_religion) had a real meaning and were not mere triflers when they intimated in a figure long ago that he who passes unsanctified and uninitiated into the world below will live in a slough, but that he who arrives there after initiation and purification will dwell with the gods. For 'many', as they say in the mysteries, 'are the *thyrsus* bearers, but few are the mystics', – meaning, as I interpret the words, the true philosophers.[15]

In Part II of [Johann Wolfgang von Goethe](/source/Johann_Wolfgang_von_Goethe)'s *[Faust](/source/Goethe's_Faust)*, [Mephistopheles](/source/Mephistopheles) tries to catch a [lamia](/source/Lamia), only to find out that she is an illusion and that he instead holds a *thyrsus*. The play contains major themes of sin and hedonism, and makes connection to Dionysus through the *thyrsus*:

Well, then, a tall one I will catch... And now a *thyrsus*-pole I snatch! Only a pine-cone as its head.[16]

[Robert Browning](/source/Robert_Browning) mentions the *thyrsus* in passing in *The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St Praxed's Church*, as the dying bishop confuses Christian piety with classical extravagance. [Ovid](/source/Ovid) talks about Bacchus carrying a *thyrsus* and his followers doing the same in his Metamorphoses Book III, which is a retelling of The Bacchae.

The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me, / Those [Pans](/source/Pan_(god)) and [nymphs](/source/Nymph) ye wot of, and perchance / Some [tripod](/source/Sacrificial_tripod), *thyrsus*, with a vase or so.[17]

## Gallery

		- A Maenad using her *thyrsos* to ward off a Satyr, [Attic red-figure](/source/Red-figure_pottery) *[kylix](/source/Kylix)*, c. 480 BC

		- Roman relief showing a Maenad holding a *thyrsus*, 120–140 AD. [Prado Museum](/source/Museo_del_Prado), [Madrid](/source/Madrid).

		- A [mural](/source/Fresco) of a striding Satyr carrying the *thyrsus* painted in the 1st century AD. Archaeological park of [Baiae](/source/Baiae).

		- *Bacchus Triumphant* by [John Reinhard Weguelin](/source/John_Reinhard_Weguelin) (1882)

		- A Bacchant holding a *thyrsus*: *Malice* by [William-Adolphe Bouguereau](/source/William-Adolphe_Bouguereau) (1899)

## See also

- [Cult of Dionysus](/source/Cult_of_Dionysus)

## Notes

1. **[^](#cite_ref-1)** ["A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890), THYRSUS"](https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=thyrsus-cn). *www.perseus.tufts.edu*. Retrieved 2021-05-13.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-2)** Olszewski, Edward (2019). ["Dionysus's Enigmatic Thyrsus"](https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/56/article/915077). *Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society*. **163** (2): 153–173. [doi](/source/Doi_(identifier)):[10.1353/pro.2019.a915077](https://doi.org/10.1353%2Fpro.2019.a915077). [ISSN](/source/ISSN_(identifier)) [2326-9243](https://search.worldcat.org/issn/2326-9243). [Dionysus's Enigmatic Thyrsus](https://www.amphilsoc.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/attachments/Olszewski.pdf)

1. **[^](#cite_ref-3)** Moulton, Carroll (1998). *Ancient Greece and Rome: An Encyclopedia for Students*. Vol. 2. New York, NY: Gale. pp. 7–9. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [9780684805030](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/9780684805030).

1. **[^](#cite_ref-4)** Euripides, *[Bacchae](/source/Bacchae)*, 711.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-5)** [Diodorus](/source/Diodorus). iii. 64, iv. 4; [Macrobius](/source/Macrobius). *Sat.* i. 19.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-6)** [Ovid](/source/Ovid). *Met.* iii, 667

1. **[^](#cite_ref-7)** Hor. *Carm*. ii. 19. 8; Ovid. *Amor*. iii 1. 23, iii. 15. 17, *Trist.* iv. 1. 43.; Brunk, *Anal*. iii. 201; Orph. *Hymn*. xlv. 5, 1. 8.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-8)** [Ioannis Kakridis](/source/Ioannis_Kakridis), Ελληνική μυθολογία Εκδοτική Αθηνών 1987 (in Greek)

1. **[^](#cite_ref-9)** *[The Bacchae](/source/The_Bacchae)*

1. **[^](#cite_ref-10)** Homer. ["The Iliad"](http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.6.vi.html). *The Internet Classics Archive*. VI. 132–137. Retrieved 2021-05-21.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-11)** Euripides (1972). *The Bacchae and Other Plays*. Translated by Philip Vellacott (rev. ed.). [Harmondsworth](/source/Harmondsworth): Penguin Books. p. 192. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [0-14-044044-5](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0-14-044044-5). [OCLC](/source/OCLC_(identifier)) [618722](https://search.worldcat.org/oclc/618722).

1. **[^](#cite_ref-12)** Samuel Angus (1975) [1928]. [*The Mystery-Religions*](https://archive.org/details/mysteryreligions0000angu_r8y0/page/236) (2nd ed.). New York: Dover. p. 236. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [0-486-23124-0](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0-486-23124-0). [LCCN](/source/LCCN_(identifier)) [74-12657](https://lccn.loc.gov/74-12657). An Orphic verse, 'Many are the thyrsus-bearers, but few the *mystae*,' shows that the Orphics, of the nobler side of whose system Plato had a high opinion, recognized the presence of hypocrites in their numbers.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-13)** For example, Samuel Angus (1975) [1928]. [*The Mystery-Religions*](https://archive.org/details/mysteryreligions0000angu_r8y0/page/n8) (2nd ed.). New York: Dover. p. viii. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [0-486-23124-0](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/0-486-23124-0). [LCCN](/source/LCCN_(identifier)) [74-12657](https://lccn.loc.gov/74-12657). It is an historic injustice to compare the Bacchi of one religion with the thyrsus-bearers of another.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-14)** For example, [Arthur Schopenhauer](/source/Arthur_Schopenhauer) (2010) [1859]. Christopher Janaway (ed.). *The World as Will and Representation*. Vol. 1. Translated by Judith Norman (3rd ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 196. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [978-0-521-87184-6](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/978-0-521-87184-6). ...even students who can comprehend are meted out sparingly by the centuries.—'Many carry the *thyrsos*, but few become bacchants.'

1. **[^](#cite_ref-15)** Plato. ["Phaedo"](http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/phaedo.html). *The Internet Classics Archive*. Retrieved 2021-05-21.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-16)** Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. *Faust*. II. pp. 7775–7777.

1. **[^](#cite_ref-17)** Robert Browning (2010). John Woolford; Daniel Karlin; Joseph Phelan (eds.). *Selected Poems*. [Harlow](/source/Harlow). pp. 56–58. [ISBN](/source/ISBN_(identifier)) [978-1-317-86491-2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/978-1-317-86491-2). [OCLC](/source/OCLC_(identifier)) [869374843](https://search.worldcat.org/oclc/869374843).{{[cite book](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_book)}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher ([link](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:CS1_maint:_location_missing_publisher))

## References

- Casadio, Giovanni; Johnston, Patricia A., *[Mystic Cults in Magna Graecia](https://books.google.com/books?id=RgL21NPlQQQC&q=thyrsus)*, University of Texas Press, 2009

- Ferdinand Joseph M. de Waele, *[The magic staff or rod in Græco-Italian antiquity](https://books.google.com/books?id=837NAAAAMAAJ&q=thyrsos)*, Drukkerij Erasmus, 1927

**Attribution**

- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the [public domain](/source/Public_domain): [Chisholm, Hugh](/source/Hugh_Chisholm), ed. (1911). "[Thyrsus](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica/Thyrsus)". *[Encyclopædia Britannica](/source/Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica_Eleventh_Edition)* (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

## External links

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- [Thyrsus](http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/594724/thyrsus) at [Encyclopædia Britannica Online](/source/Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica_Online)

- [Thyrsus](https://web.archive.org/web/20121022052657/http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-dgra/1136.html) at [The Ancient Library](https://web.archive.org/web/20050326084508/http://ancientlibrary.com/)

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