Dionysos | Bacchus

Bacchus, or Dionysos, is well known as the god of wine, but was originally a god of fertility, worshipped in the guise of a bull or goat. The rituals went by with delirious orgys, where the animal was teared to pieces and eaten.	Velazquez The Drunkards or The Triumph of Bacchus, ca. 1629 Prado, Madrid
Caravaggio Young Sick Bacchus, ca. 1593-94 Galleria Borghese, Rome	Bacchus is usually portrayed as a nude young man, crowned with vine leaf and grapes. In his hand is a thyrsus, sometimes covered with ivy. Often he is drunk. He is accompanied by Bacchantes, his female worshippers.
Caravaggio Bacchus, ca. 1595 Uffizi, Florence	Caravaggio portayes Bacchus around 1593 as a boy who has already enjoyed the wine. Two years later he depicts the god as a boy who has just poured himself a glass of wine.
Somewhat later, Bacchus is often seen as a fat boozer, sometimes difficult to distinguish from the drunken Silenos.	Rubens Bacchus, 1638-40 Hermitage, St. Petersburg
In the literature as well as in the art of the Middle Aages, Bacchus is seen as a prefiguration of Christ, while he is the son of a godly father and a mortal mother, and he promises a better life in heaven.	At the same time, he is a personification of intemperance. In Duth literature of the 17th century, Heinsius sees him as a symbol of controlling the fear for ones death in Hymnus of Lof-sanck van Bacchus (1614).