Who was dionysus's family?

Answer 1

The most popular myth holds that Dionysus was the son of Zeus by Semele - who would become the goddess Thyone.

Zeus was the youngest son of Kronos (Time) and Rhea (Flow), who was the the youngest Titan son of Ouranos (Sky Dome) and Gaea (Earth); Ouranos was the son of Gaea, and Gaea either emerged from creation second, or was the offspring of Aither (Bright Upper Air) and Hemera (Day) who were born of Erebus (Darkness) and Nyx (Night) the children of Chaos (Air) who was the first being to emerge from creation.

Now for Semele, her father was Kadmos, and her mother the goddess Harmonia - the daughter of Aphrodite and Ares.

Ares was the son of Hera (and Zeus), the sister-wife of Zeus, so his line follows that of Zeus.

Aphrodite is either the daughter of Zeus and Dione - a Titan sister of Kronos, or she was born of the sea foam caused by the blood of Ouranos at his castration.

Kadmos *(Cadmus), was a Phoenician prince, the son of King Agenor and queen Telephassa of Tyre.

Telephassa is either the daughter of Nilus the god of the Nile and Nephele - either a cloud nymph that Zeus created; or a daughter of Oceanus, the Titan son of Gaea and Ouranus. Nilus also being the son of the Titans Oceanus and Tethys.

Agenor is the son of either Poseidon (brother of Zeus) and Libya, the daughter of Epaphus the King of Egypt, a son of Zeus and Io - Io being the daughter of the river god Inakhos, a son of the Titans Oceanus and Tethys. Melia/Argia, Io's mother, was a daughter of Oceanus.

Agenor's other set of parents are Belus (said to be his brother in the other myth of his parentage) and Achiroë/Anchirrhoë/Anchinoë his mother, a naiad daughter of Nilus, the river god of the Nile.

Answer 2

Dionysus is most popularly given as a son of Zeus and Semele.

Zeus was the youngest son of Cronus (Time) and Rhea (Ease).

Semele was a daughter of Cadmus and the goddess Harmonia (Harmony) who was daughter of Aphrodite and Ares. After Semele's death, she became the goddess Thyone (Frenzy).

Other children of Cadmus and Harmonia include, Autonoe who married Aristaeus, son of Apollo. Actaeon was her son, who was devoured by his dogs for seeing Artemis bathing.

Ino and her husband Athamas incurred the wrath of Hera by raising Dionysus, Hera drove Athamas into a murderous rage and he slew Learchus his oldest son by Ino - some say nay, that Athamas found out about a plot of Ino who wanted Phrixus and Helle the son and daughter of Nephele killed so Learchus would inherit - and so Athamas planned to execute them, but Dionysus protected them after he had killed Learchus: and Ino and Melicertes became sea gods Leucothea and Palaemon.

Agave was married to Ekhion (a Sparti warrior sown by the teeth of the Dragon sacred to Ares) her son Pentheus A King of Thebes, offended Dionysus by denying his divinity: tried to prevent his subjects from honoring him, and even went so far as to try to have him apprehended. But when he sought to spy upon the orgies/rites on Mt Kithairon, Dionysos drove the king's mother and aunts to tear him limb from limb.

Polydorus became king of Thebes, married Nicteis and fathered Labdacus, father of Laius who with Jocasta/ Epicasta, was father of Oedipus who married Jocasta (his mother, after killing his father) and had Polynices and Eteocles and Ismene and Antigone who all died for the Seven Against Thebes.

Illyrius was sometimes said to be the youngest son of Cadmus.