In classical mythology, Dionysus or Dionysos (Greek Διόνυσος or Διώνυσος; ), is the god of wine, the inspirer of ritual madness and ecstasy, and a major figure of Greek mythology, and one of the twelve Olympians, among whom Greek mythology treated Dionysus as a late arrival. The geographical origins of his cult were unknown to the classical Greeks, but almost all myths depicted him as having "foreign" origins: typical of the god of the epiphany, "the god that comes". He was also known as BacchusIn Greek "both votary and god are called Bacchus." (Burkert, Greek Religion 1985:162, noting, for the initiate, Euripides, Bacchantes 491, for the god, who alone is Dionysus, Sophocles Oedipus the King 211 and Euripides Hippolytus 560. and the frenzy he induces, bakkheia. He is the patron deity of agriculture and the theatre. He was also known

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