dithyramb

dithyramb, in ancient Greece, hymn to the god Dionysus, choral lyric with exchanges between the leader and the chorus. It arose, probably, in the extemporaneous songs of the Dionysiac festivals and was developed (according to tradition, by Arion) into the literary form to be found, for example, in the dithyrambs of Bacchylides. In its later development by such poets as Philoxenus and Timotheus it became freer in its meter and more musical. The tragedy seems to have come out of the dithyramb, but the dithyramb was also cultivated after tragedy was invented.

Choric poem, chant, or hymn of ancient Greece. Dithyrambs were sung by revelers at the festival in honour of Dionysus. The form originated about the 7th century BC in extemporaneous songs of banqueters; it was a recognized literary genre by the end of the 6th century BC. Dithyrambs were composed by Arion and Pindar, among others. By circa 450 BC the form was in decline; most dithyrambs were bombastic and turgid.

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The dithyramb was originally an ancient Greek hymn sung to the god Dionysus. Its wild and ecstatic character was contrasted by Plutarch with that of the paean. Dithyrambos seems to have arisen out of this song: just as paean was both a hymn to and a title of Apollo, Dithyrambos was an epithet of Dionysus as well as a song in his honor. Greeks recognized in the epithet "he of the miraculous birth" and constructed an etymology to confirm this. According to Aristotle, the dithyramb was the origin of the Ancient Greek theatre, and one may recognize as a dithyramb the chorus invoking Dionysus in Euripides' The Bacchae. Plato, in The Laws, discussing various kinds of music, mentions "the birth of Dionysos, called, I think, the dithyramb".

Form

In Athens dithyrambs were sung by a Greek chorus of up to fifty men or boys dancing in circular formation (there is no certain evidence that they may have originally been dressed as satyrs) and probably accompanied by the aulos. They would normally relate some incident in the life of Dionysus. The leader of the chorus later became the solo protagonist, with lyrical interchanges taking place between him and the rest of the chorus.

Competitions between groups singing dithyrambs were an important part of festivals such as the Dionysia and Lenaia. Each tribe would enter two choruses, one of men and one of boys, each under the leadership of a choragos. The results of dithyrambic contests in Athens were recorded with the names of the winning teams and choregoi recorded but not the poets, most of whom remain unknown. The successful choregos would receive a statue which would be erected - at his own expense - on a public monument to commemorate his group's victory.

History

The first dithyrambs were composed in Athens around the seventh century BC. Their inspiration is unknown, although it was possibly non-Greek, as the word is of unknown but probably non-Greek derivation. The form soon spread to other Greek city-states, and dithyrambs were composed by the poets Simonides and Bacchylides, as well as Pindar, the only one whose works have survived in anything like their original form).

Later examples were dedicated to other gods but the dithyramb subsequently was developed (traditionally by Arion) into a literary form. According to Aristotle, it evolved into the Greek tragedy, and dithyrambs continued to be developed alongside tragedies for some time. The clearest sense of dithyramb as proto-tragedy comes from a surviving dithyramb by Bacchylides 1 2, though it was composed after tragedy had already developed more fully. As a dialogue between a single actor and a chorus, it is suggestive of what tragedy may have resembled before Aeschylus added a second actor. By the 4th century BC the genre was in decline, although the dithyrambic competitions did not come to an end until well after the Roman takeover of Greece.

Dithyrambic compositions are rare in English; one notable exception is Alexander's Feast by John Dryden, written in 1697. Franz Schubert wrote a song for bass voice called Dithyrambe, D801, published in 1826. Wolfgang Rihm composed a 30-minute work, Concerto, in 2000, with the subtitle Dithyrambe and a scoring for string quartet and orchestra.

A wildly enthusiastic speech or piece of writing is still occasionally described as dithyrambic. Contemporary American poet David Wojahn's poem "Dithyramb and Lamentation," from his 2006 collection Interrogation Palace, is an innovative take on the form, featuring sections with such titles as "Email" and "George W. Bush in Hell."

Footnotes

References

Aristotle, Poetics

Francis, Eric David, and Vickers, Michael J., Image and Idea in Fifth Century Greece, Routledge, 1990, ISBN 0415019141. See Chapter 3, "Word and Ceremony", pp.43-66.

Pickard-Cambridge, Sir Arthur Wallace

• Dithyramb, Tragedy, and Comedy , 1927.
• The Theatre of Dionysus in Athens, 1946.
• The Dramatic Festivals of Athens, 1953.

Sourvinou-Inwood, Christiane, Tragedy and Athenian Religion, Oxford University Press, 2003.

Wiles, David, The Masked Menander: Sign and Meaning in Greek and Roman Performance, 1991.

See also

• Iambus
• Thriambus

External links

• Bacchylides, "The Theseus Dithyramb" - composed c. 500 BC