Dictionary:

dithyramb

  (dĭth'ĭ-răm', -rămb')

1. A frenzied, impassioned choric hymn and dance of ancient Greece in honor of Dionysus.
2. An irregular poetic expression suggestive of the ancient Greek dithyramb.
3. A wildly enthusiastic speech or piece of writing.

[Latin dīthyrambus, from Greek dīthurambos.]

Name for Dionysus and a song in his honour. Greek dithyrambs were written between about 700bc and ad 200. The term was revived in the 19th century for pieces intended to evoke the wild and vehement qualities of Dionysus (Bacchus); there are examples this century by Medtner and Stravinsky.

dithyramb [dith‐i‐ram], a form of hymn or choral lyric in which the god Dionysus was honoured in Greek religious festivities from about the 7th century BC onwards. Later in Athenian competitions, dithyrambs were composed—by Pindar among others—on episodes from myths of other gods, and the arrangement in matched strophes came to be relaxed. Dithyrambs seem to have been performed by a large chorus of singers, possibly dressed as satyrs, to flute accompaniment. A rare English imitation is Dryden's Alexander's Feast (1697). The adjective dithyrambic is sometimes applied to rhapsodies, or wildly impassioned chants.

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Dithyramb (dithyrambos), in Greek, form of choral lyric sung to the god Dionysus; the word is of unknown origin, almost certainly not Greek. Its development into a literary genre was the work of the poet Arion in Corinth in the last quarter of the seventh century BC. From Corinth it was brought to Athens by Lasus of Hermione, and in 509 BC it became a subject for competition at the festivals of Dionysus (see DIONYSIA). Simonides, Pindar, and Bacchylides all wrote dithyrambs; of the first two only fragments exist, but several of Bacchylides' survive almost entire. The dithyrambic chorus did not wear masks; they danced and sang in a circle in the orchestra (see DIONYSUS, THEATRE OF). Narrative plays a large part in these poems, but its subject-matter is not particularly connected with Dionysus. At the Great Dionysia at Athens each tribe entered two choruses for the dithyrambic competitions, one of boys and one of men, each under the charge of a choregos (see CHOREGIA) chosen from the tribe. Lots were drawn to determine the order for selecting poets and flute-players; the choregos also needed the services of a good chorus-trainer. The inscriptions preserving the lists of victors in the dithyrambic contests at Athens (see DIDASCALIA) preserve the names of the victorious tribes and their choregoi but not the names of the poets, no matter how famous. The successful choregos received, as the representative of his tribe, a tripod, which he erected at his own expense upon a monument, with an inscription. After Bacchylides the musical component of the dithyramb seems to have increased in importance at the expense of the words, but since no music has survived it is hard to discern what happened. Up to this time the dithyramb had been composed in regular form in strophes and antistrophes, but now this correspondence was abandoned in favour of a freer style of composition, with solo songs, and the language became farfetched and artificial. The names chiefly associated with these changes are Melanippides of Melos (flourished c.480 BC) who introduced lyric solos, Philoxenus of Cythera (c.436–380) who introduced in his Cyclops a solo sung to the lyre, Cinesias of Athens, and Timotheus of Miletus. After the fourth century BC it seems that the dithyramb was no longer an important form of literary composition, although the competitions survived into the time of the Roman emperors.

In classic poetry, a type of melic verse associated with drunken revelry and performed to honor of Dionysus (Bacchus), the Greek god of wine and ecstacy. In modern usage, the term has come to mean a poem of impassioned frenzy and irregular character.

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