I’ve been working with the Toys, on and off, for about twelve years now. In that time I’ve done a ridiculous amount of research. Then today, after going antiquing with Galina to find representations of the Toys (saw about six of them, but only one I wanted for my new set) I’m chilling and reading about the relationship between Satyr-plays and Comedy when I come across this passage from Aischylos’ Isthmiastai or Theoroi.
To set it up, the Satyrs have abandoned Dionysos and run off to serve Poseidon as temple-slaves. Dionysos finally catches up with them and is less than pleased. He’s having a back-and-forth with one of the Satyrs very similar to his exchange with Pentheus in the Bakchai when our fragment picks up:
Satyr: Don’t confuse us with your verbal wiles and foreign proverbs!
Dionysos: Oh, you’d rather hide behind a shield and utter words against me that are out of order, that I am no good at fighting with iron, that I’m a cowardly, effeminate being who doesn’t belong among males. And now you make these further, fresh accusations, more vile than any of your previous insults, and you slander both me and the choral festival for which I am assembling a multitude. No one, young or old, willingly abandons the two rows of my chorus, yet you are Isthmiizing, garlanding yourselves with pine branches and not paying ivy its due honor at all. For this you’ll shed tears but it won’t be because you’ve got smoke in your eyes!
Satyr: No, I will never depart from the sanctuary! Why do you keep threatening me like this? In response I call on Poseidon of the Isthmus. He will protect me….
Dionysos: Since you are set on learning these new ways, I’ve brought you some new Toys, freshly fashioned on the adze and the anvil. This, here, is the first of the playthings for you.
Satyr: Not me! Give it to one of my friends.
Dionysos: Don’t refuse, my good fellow, just because of a bad vibration. Accept these gifts which I bestow upon you.
Dionysos hands the Toy to the Satyr.
Satyr: What pleasure is to be had of this? What am I even supposed to do with it?
Dionysos: It suits your new profession.
Satyr: But what do I do with it exactly? I don’t like this thing, it confounds me!
Dionysos: You play the game. Everybody’s doing it.
This is pretty fucking cool because it totally confirms that Dionysos has the sort of relationship with the Toys that I’ve postulated all along.
Remember, all the evidence that’s come down to us about them – roughly six or seven texts in all – concerns either their use by the Titans to ensnare Dionysos or else how initiates kept representations of the Toys in their homes as mementos of the mysteries they’d undergone. All the rest is the result of conjecture, random association, personal and shared experience and the like.
It’s nice to have one’s UPGs confirmed, isn’t it?
If you would like to learn more about these tricksy spirits of initiation I’ll be teaching a second round of the Introduction to the Toys of Dionysos class upon my return from Many Gods West. If you would like to reserve your spot in the class you may do so by donating $65 to the Bakcheion communal fundraiser. Tuition will go back to the normal rate of $10 a week after the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist (June 24th) so you’d better act fast if you’re interested and want a good deal!
Tagged: dionysos
