Dionysiaques

Dionysiaques (in Greek old Διονυσιακά / Dionysiaká ) of the Égyptien Nonnos de Panopolis is a Poème in hexameters dactylic, probably made up between 450 and 470, speaking in praise of the god Dionysos.

Composition

Dionysiaques twice include/understand 24 songs, allusion obvious to Homère since Iliade and the Odyssey comprise 24 songs since the hellenistic time.

The composition of the poem follows the rules enacted by the rhetor Ménandre de Laodicée (fine of the 3rd century) for the praise of a sovereign:

songs I to IV: evocation of the fatherland of Dionysos and its ancestors (legend of Cadmos);
song V: caption Zagreus, first mystical Dionysos, whose Bacchus is the reincarnation (Egyptian legend inspired by the myth of Osiris);
songs VI to VIII: birth of Dionysos;
songs IX to XII: childhood of the god;
songs XIII with XL: war of the Indies;
songs XLI with XLVIII: return of the god, union with Will have from which is born Iacchos, third Dionysos.

Style

While taking again the hexameter dactylic, towards traditional of the Homeric epopee , Nonnos obeys the rules of versification enacted by the poet Callimaque de Cyrène (third century BC). Moreover, it is based on the contemporary pronunciation of the Greek: the tonic stress was susbstitué with the pitch.

Like Quintus of Smyrna in its Continuation of Homère , Nonnos does not hesitate to introduce worms, even whole episodes several times in its work. In the same way, it enjoys to vary the reasons and the styles, being justified by the protean nature of the god whom it sings: addressing itself to the Muses in preamble, he exclaims:

“Make emerge for me Protée to the hundred faces: that it appears in the diversity of its aspects, because various is the anthem that I entonne. ”
(Translation of V. Giraudet, COp cit. , founded on the text established by R. Keydell (1959), Berlin)

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