BACCHAE

The Greek tragedy Bacchae was written by Athenian playwright Euripides, one of the three great playwrights of classical Greek tragedy. Bacchae was initially shown in 405 BC, one year after his death, and is considered by many as his masterpiece. In Bacchae, the god Dionysus arrives in Greece from Asia intending to introduce his orgiastic worship there. He is disguised as a young Asian holy man and is accompanied by his women votaries, who make up the play’s chorus. He expects to be accepted first in Thebes, but the Thebans reject his divinity and refuse to worship him, and Pentheus, the city’s young king, tries to arrest him. In the end Dionysus drives Pentheus insane and leads him to the mountains, where Agave, Pentheus’s mother, and the women of Thebes in a bacchic frenzy tear him to pieces.