The Landscape and the Theban Women in Euripides’ Bacchae

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to study how the landscape features affect the characterization of the group of Theban women in Euripides’ Bacchae. For this purpose, the references to the Theban plain and the Citeron are discussed, with special attention to the landscape in which Pentheus’ murder takes place. In this regard, it is evidenced that the data concerning these two environments emphasize the supernatural power and agility that Dionysus gives to the Theban women in this tragedy. Moreover, the study of νάπος and its peculiar physiognomy in the episode of Pentheus’ murder makes possible to recognize the similarity between this environment and the ones which are characteristic of stories of transit between life and death. Among these stories, those related to the Dionysian myth and cult have a determining relevance. From this point of view, an interpretation of the landscape described in verses 1048-1052 as a mark of the chthonic domain of Dionysus in this tragedy is proposed, a scenery that emphasizes the prodigious and scary character associated to the Theban maenads in this play.