Dionysus and the Balance of Life
​By Mark Storer

Bacchus, or Dionysus, was known as the god of wine. That was not, however, his only job. Bacchus was also god of agriculture, fertility, drama, and revelry. Why those things should have been linked together becomes clearer when the drunken orgy fests known as “Bacchanalia” became de rigueur and, eventually, banned by the Roman senate and the king of Thebes.
    He was known by another name as well. “Liber” was the name the Romans gave him, and it gave birth to words like “libertine” and “libation.” But these points of origin fail to tell the story of one of the twelve Olympian gods who made life what it is today. Bacchus was unique and also decidedly human in his pursuits, and he is now only widely remembered as a party-god who let loose a little bit and permitted others to do the same. It is in that spirit, though, that we should perhaps best remember him. For Bacchus, or Dionysus, or Liber, the act of celebration and partying was serious business.
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