Maenadism is, in a sense, a mimesis or imitation of the mythic past:
And the Boeotians and other Greeks and the Thracians, in memory of the campaign in India, have established sacrifices every other year to Dionysos, and believe that at that time the god reveals himself to human beings. Consequently in many Greek cities every other year Bacchic bands of women gather, and it is lawful for the maidens to carry the thyrsos and to join in the frenzied revelry, crying out ‘Euai!’ and honouring the god; while the matrons, forming in groups, offer sacrifices to the god and celebrate his mysteries and, in general, extol with hymns the presence of Dionysos, in this manner acting the parts of maenads who, as history records, were of old the companions of the god. (Diodoros Sikeliotes, Library of History 4.3.2-5)
Continuity is preserved through lineage, which is why Ptolemy Philopator required that anyone performing Dionysian initiations within his kingdom had to be able to explain where they had received their rites from going back three generations:
By the Order of the King. Those in the country districts who impart initiation into the mysteries of Dionysos are to come down by river to Alexandria, those residing not farther than Naucratis within 10 days after the promulgation of this decree, those beyond Naucratis within 20 days, and register themselves before Aristoboulos at the registry office within 3 days of the day of their arrival, and they shall immediately declare from whom they have received the rites for three generations back and turn in the hieroi logoi sealed, each man writing upon his copy his own name. (BGU 6.121)
The founders of traditions often received cults of their own:
According to the oracle, by way of the oracular messengers, the three maenads, Kosko, Baubo, and Thettale, were brought from Thebes: Kosko gathered together the thiasos of the plane tree, Baubo the thiasos before the city, and Thettale the thiasos of Kataibatai. They died and were buried by the Magnesians: Kosko lies buried in the area called Hillock of Kosko, Baubo in the area called Tabarnis, and Thettale near the theater. (I.Magn. 215a)
Which is not to say that we are averse to innovation:
Then Hispala gave an account of the origin of these rites. At first they were confined to women; no male was admitted, and they had three stated days in the year on which persons were initiated during the daytime, and matrons were chosen to act as priestesses. Paculla Annia, a Campanian, when she was priestess, made a complete change, as though by divine monition, for she was the first to admit men, and she initiated her own sons, Minius Cerinnius and Herennius Cerinnius. At the same time she made the rite a nocturnal one, and instead of three days in the year celebrated it five times a month. When once the mysteries had assumed this promiscuous character, and men were mingled with women with all the licence of nocturnal orgies, there was no crime, no deed of shame, wanting. More uncleanness was wrought by men with men than with women. Whoever would not submit to defilement, or shrank from violating others, was sacrificed as a victim. To regard nothing as impious or criminal was the very sum of their religion. The men, as though seized with madness and with frenzied distortions of their bodies, shrieked out prophecies; the matrons, dressed as Bacchae, their hair dishevelled, rushed down to the Tiber with burning torches, plunged them into the water, and drew them out again, the flame undiminished, as they were made of sulphur mixed with lime. Men were fastened to a machine and hurried off to hidden caves, and they were said to have been rapt away by the gods; these were the men who refused to join their conspiracy or take a part in their crimes or submit to pollution. They formed an immense multitude, almost equal to the population of Rome; amongst them were members of noble families both men and women. It had been made a rule for the last two years that no one more than twenty years old should be initiated; they captured those to be deceived and polluted. (Livy, History of Rome 39.13-16)
Such change simply has to be consistent with our values and the way that we do things. It is that tension between the old and the new that produces all great art.
Tagged: dionysos
