Claudia, Bacchantes Perpetua

I'd like to meet:

upon a newer more nicer note.. It seems that while my travels I came across a most loving God and his Followers.. They decided to take me in.. My love Dionysus found me.. and here is some of my observations on his followers the Maenads. The Maenads (pronounced Maynads) were female revelors in the cult of Dionysus. The god's frenzied Thracian worshippers, the Maenads, accompanied Dionysus on his travels crowned with wreaths of ivy, oak or fir and draped in the skins of animals. From early times in Greece the vintage festivals were occasions for joyful processions in which priests and the faithful, men and women, of the cult of Dionysus took part. These devotees were called Bacchants and Bacchantes or Maenads. It was the habit to provide the god with a cortege or thiasus composed of secondary divinities associated with the cult: Satyrs, Sileni, Pans, Centaurs, and Nymphs. Under a more peaceful aspect, the maenads gathered grapes and prepared wine. In origin Dionysus was simply the god of wine; afterwards he became god of vegetation and warm moisture; then he appeared as the god of pleasures and the god of civilization; and finally, according to Orphic conceptions, as a kind of supreme god.More on MaenadsCalled bacchantes by the Romans. Dionysus' worship is tied closely to his role as god of wine. Although as Bacchus he's sometimes corpulent and jolly, in his purest form he's a horned, heroic, effeminate youth, with great beauty and many macabre and sinister aspects. Dionysus traveled the world with an army of satyrs and wild women called Maenads who rode war -trained bulls and fought with swords, serpentes and the "thyrsi" staffs.... The Maenads predate Dionysus' use of them as soldiers.... They worshipped sundry godesses of moon and forest, of fertility and hunt, such as Daphoene and Semele.... Pan's mother, the orgiastic mountain-godess Penelope, indicates the link to ancient fertility cults and to godess worship. Much as the Amazons valued virginity [...], the Maenads valued promiscuity, and both groups strove in their own ways for women's liberty and religiopolitical power, explaining why the Maenads are repeatedly portrayed as slayers of kings.... Much as the Maenads valued promiscuity (???), both groups (Amazons also) strove in their own ways for women’s liberty and religiopolitical power, explaining why the Maenads are repeatedly portrayed as slayers of kings.