Sexual life in ancient Greece : with thirty-two full-page plates
RELIGION AND EROTIC
a Dionysus Phallen was worshipped, according to Pausanias (x, 19, 3) amd Athenzus (x, 445), mentions wanton phallophoria in Rhodes.
The animals of the Bacchic cult are the bull, panther, ass, and goat—the two last, of course, on account of their lustful nature.
The tenderer elementary spirits of springs and streams, flowers and trees, mountains and forests were named Nymphs. They are the friendly protecting spirits of nature, whose cheerful existence consists in singing and dancing, playing and jumping, hunting and roaming, loving and being loved. Apollo and Hermes are their specially favoured friends, in whose arms they love to cull the sweet gifts of Aphrodite; but this does not, however prevent them from enjoying the amorous caresses of many of the coarser satyrs, from whose ever lustful importunity they are, indeed, often obliged to save themselves by sly cunning and hasty flight. They are also fond of blessing men with their love, especially beautiful boys and youths, amongst them Hylas, who while drawing water was dragged down by the nymphs of the spring into the cold water.
The coarser elements of the spirits of mountain and forest are the Satyrs, who were imagined as possessing animal attributes, with pointed ears elongated upwards, and short little tails. Arch and cunning, sometimes also foolish, winebibbers, and above all ever longing for the flesh of women. Old writers frequently mention (e.g. Plutarch, De Sanitate tuenda, 381) a herb named satyrion, to which a stimulating effect was ascribed. Thus strong sensuality is their original and most peculiar character, as it is represented in the Sicinnis, a dance resembling the jumping of goats, which was danced by the satyrs in especial. How the Greek sense of beauty developed rapidly but with due precision can be recognized in the representation of the satyrs in plastic art. While older times showed them as still bearded, old, ugly, and often repulsive,
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