by Kay Broome

Green Grapes (photo: Julia Zyablova)

Harvestide, at autumn equinox, is is our second harvest of the year. At Lammas, on the 1st of August, we are blessed with the grain crops, including corn and soft fruits such as peaches, plums, raspberries and currants.  The wealth of Harvestide consists mostly of hard fleshed, long lasting fruit such as squash, pumpkins and apples. There are exceptions to this: luscious pears and figs and one fruit that is immediately associated with the early fall harvest: the grape.

Blue Grapes (photo: Max Harlynking)

Grapes were most likely cultivated as early as 6,000 years ago, during the Neolithic period. While many types such as concord, red globe and green Niagara grapes are grown for eating and/or juice, most grape varieties are used to make wine.

As we can see from the photos above, grapes come in myriad colours: from pallid greens and yellows to the darkest navy. Wine from grapes are any colour from the pale straw yellow of white grapes, to the sunset pinks of rosés and the black crimson of red wines.

Most wine grapes grow best in regions that are blessed with plenty of sunshine, dry summer heat, and well-drained soils. But it is the soil, and I would even argue, the human history that gives a region or terroir's wines their distinctiveness. Take for example, France, the country most famed for its wines. There are the famously bubbly light wines of Champagne's dry, sandy and chalky soils. Just to the south of that region are featured the famously complex reds and whites of Burgundy, with its mix of pebbly limestone and rich clay. Languedoc-Roussillon, in the south of France, has acidic, calcareous soil. The resultant rough, tannic red wines are nourished in a land well-bloodied with the region's turbulent history. And this all is without even considering the icy, clean elegance of Germany’s Rhine wines, Italy’s extraverted moscatos and Australia’s quirky shirazes!

Obviously, in pagan times, such an important tradition would require an obligatory god. Many ancient cultures did have deities who presided over the wine making process: from the Roman Liber, to Egypt’s Hathor and Inari, Japan’s goddess of Saki. When we think of wine and divinity, however, we usually envision Dionysus, also called Bacchus.

 Dionysus – God of Wine and Civilization

Dionysus Holding out a Kantharos,  Attic plate from Vulci ca. 500 BC, from British Museum (photo: Jastrow)

Like many other Greek gods, Dionysus has a shadowy past. As with Demeter, Poseidon and other Olympians, there are archaeological traces indicating he was worshipped in pre-Hellenic Mycenae, and perhaps even in Minoan Crete. Dionysus was believed to be the son of the sky god Zeus. In the Eleusinian mysteries of Demeter and her daughter, Persephone, it is believed that Dionysus, under the name of Iacchus, was either a son or husband of Demeter. Iacchus, a word that is echoed in the name Bacchus, was the cry given by worshippers during the procession from Athens to Eleusis. According to another version of the myth, Dionysus was born of Demeter’s daughter Persephone. Hera, queen of Olympus and Zeus' wife, was jealous of her philandering husband’s attention to another goddess, and plotted his infant son’s demise.  She sent the Titans, cruel primal gods, to murder the child while he was playing in his cradle. They distracted Dionysus with various toys and then tore him to pieces. Athena, goddess of wisdom, found the beating heart of Dionysus and gave it to his grieving father, who swallowed it. Zeus then magically impregnated his new lover, Semele with Dionysus.

Although the myths hold Semele to be a mortal woman, her name bears a close resemblance to the word semolina and its root seme – meaning seed or grain. Her name also shares familiarity with various grain goddesses of eastern Europe. Therefore it can be surmised that her association as a mortal princess was likely a usurpation of her earlier immortal status as a result of conquest by peoples of a different pantheon. In the Hellenic myth, the ever jealous Hera tricked Semele into demanding her lover show his true divine form. But as the gods cannot be viewed thus with impunity by mortals, Zeus’ awful majesty immolated Semele as if by lightning. The grief-stricken sky god rescued the unborn infant from his mother’s ashes and sewed him up in his thigh. Thus, Dionysus was called “twice-born.”

Jupiter and Semele, Gustave Moreau, 1894-95. Musée Gustav Moreau, France

All these creation myths of Dionysus hearken to the life-cycle of the wine grape. Needing direct sun and plenty of heat in order to fruit, grapes traditionally ripen in dry, parched earth. Most of the historic wine-growing regions in Europe are dry and scrubby, experiencing frequent thunder storms. The titans tearing the baby to pieces is analogous to grape pickers stomping the fruit to a pulp in order to make wine. Grapes are also usually trellised for ease of harvesting. Thus, a large tree such as the oak or sycamore, with a trunk worthy of being Zeus’ thigh, can take on the task of being a trellis for the vine.

Dionysus was not only the god of wine, but also of conviviality and revelry.  In addition, he presided over the theatre, an institution held sacred in ancient Greece. The theatre as we know it may actually have originated in rituals honouring this god.  Greek theatre was a cathartic event, meant to instruct the audience of how best to live their lives morally and devoutly. Comedy used laughter to deal with various human foibles. Tragedy usually depicted the crises of characters who, although powerful, had an innate personal flaw, or were guilty of hubris, the arrogance of placing oneself above the gods. The ensuing tragedy was to evoke sympathy and fear in the viewer and compel them to ponder their own place in the scheme of things. Many of the great plays from Dionysus’ ancient theatre – both comedy and tragedy – still resonate with us.

Relief of Theatrical Masks, Pushkin Museum, Moscow (Photo by Shakko)

Dionysus, Drunken God of Madness

But if Dionysus was a civilizational god and bestower of the arts, he also presided over ecstasy and madness. Euripides’ immortal play, The Bacchae, tells the tale of Pentheus, king of Thebes, who incurred the wrath of Dionysus by denying the god’s status as an immortal and son of Zeus. The Bacchae were women followers of Dionysus. Also called Maenads, they would frequently get drunk during orgies held in the god’s honour, and would even ingest the juice of ivy, which is poisonous and can cause insanity.  Violent acts were often attributed to the Bacchae while in their frenzies. These included tearing both men and animals to pieces. The horror of Euripides' play stems not only from the fact that Pentheus was torn apart by the Maenads, but that one of them was his own mother, Agave. Coincidentally, she was sister to Semele, and had spread a rumour that Semele had lied about her lover, and was in fact, engaging in taboo pre-marital sex with a mere mortal.  For this slander on his mother, Dionysus drove Agave mad. When she regained her senses, she realized the full impact of her horrid deed as a Maenad.

Plate Showing Maenad with Leopard, Brygos painter, Vulci, ca. 490-480 BC. Munich Museum photo: Bibi Saint Pol)

From this myth, we can see that Dionysus could be cruel and capricious. However, he was able to bring the dead back to life, as with his mother Semele and his lover Ariadne. As god of wine, Dionysus was also seen as a liberator, who bestowed festive joy and transcendence upon his worshippers. But as the overindulgence of alcohol all too often shows, Dionysus can bring madness and violence.

Bacchus with Satyr, Michelangelo 1497.  Museo del Bargello, Florence Italy

The Tenacious Vine

 Like its cousin, woodbine (Parthenocissus) and the unrelated Hedera Ivy, grapevine (Vitus) attaches its clasping tendrils to anything in its path: trees, walls and buildings alike.  The lobed leaves are often five-pointed, somewhat resembling maple or sycamore leaves and turn brilliant orange, pink, red and yellow in the fall. The fruits grow in their familiar hanging clusters.  In parts of southern Ontario and the eastern US, grapevine has become a pest, taking over some of our woodlands. As these plants can reproduce by suckers, they eventually don’t bother to fruit.  Thus the common horticultural practice of cutting vines back ruthlessly in order to enhance fruit production.

Grapes at Spadina House near Casa Loma, Toronto (photo Kay Broome)

“Bacchus Scatters Devouring Cares.” So said Robert Louis Stevenson.  The Talking Forest Vine rune speaks to celebration and hospitality: the time we spend with our friends and loved ones. The upright rune however, may also warn of overindulgence and loss of control, especially if near a toppled Pine, the rune of caution.  Interestingly, Dionysus was often depicted holding a thyrsus, a sceptre composed of a long fennel stalk tipped with a pine cone.

Dionysus with Thyrsus, Roman Relief, Naples Museo (photo: Sailko)