A downright bacchanalian frieze has just been unearthed in Pompeii, one so large it spans three walls of a massive banquet room.
Known as a “megalography,” a Greek term for grand painting, the frescos unfurl a Dionysian procession in life-sized proportions. In it are bacchantes— female followers of the god of hedonism—depicted as hunters and dancers; playful satyrs playing flutes and imbibing wine; as well as a woman, flanked by Dionysus’s mentor Silenus and bearing a torch that marks her out as an initiate. Images of snakes and sea creatures are scattered among the figures.
The frieze at the House of Thiasus in Pompeii. Photo courtesy of the Pompeii Archaeological Park.
The frieze has been dated to the 1st century B.C.E.—specifically 40s–30s B.C.E., about a century before it was entombed by ash and pumice following the Mount Vesuvius eruption in 79 C.E.
The composition recalls the ancient Greek play The Bacchae, written by Euripides in 405 B.C.E., noted Gabriel Zuchtriegel, director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii. The tragedy sees Dionysus descend on Thebes in a fury, before whipping up its inhabitants into an ecstatic frenzy as revenge for some slander against him. It fixed the view of bacchantes as wild women who abandoned their families to hunt the woods, in contrast to the feminine ideal epitomized by Venus.
Detail of the frieze at the House of Thiasus in Pompeii. Photo courtesy of the Pompeii Archaeological Park.
The newly discovered frescoes, said Zuchtriegel, “show a woman as suspended, as oscillating between these two extremes, two forms of the female being at the time.”
Located in Regio IX of Pompeii, the residence housing the frieze has been named Casa del Tiaso, or House of Thiasus—the “thiasus” regularly being associated with Dionysus’s retinue and followers. The ancient cult of Dionysus, the park noted, required initiates to undergo a ritual to be allowed entry; the sect’s secrets were also closely guarded by its members.
Detail of the frieze at the House of Thiasus in Pompeii. Photo courtesy of the Pompeii Archaeological Park.
Accordingly, Zuchtriegel said, the frescoes hold “a profoundly religious meaning,” even if they were “also designed to decorate areas for holding banquets and feasts.”
The megalography joins the frieze in Pompeii’s Villa of the Mysteries in its depiction of a Dionysian ritual. Discovered in 1909, the Mysteries frescos feature Dionysus and his bride Ariadne surrounded by an entourage of bacchantes, fauns, and winged figures who are engaged in various rites. Like the Thiasus composition, it was created in the Second Style of Pompeian painting, which was dominated by relative perspective.
The frieze at the House of Thiasus in Pompeii. Photo courtesy of the Pompeii Archaeological Park.
“The megalography found in insula 10 of Regio IX provides another glimpse into the rituals of the mysteries of Dionysus,” said Alessandro Giuli, Italy’s Minister of Culture in a statement. “It is an exceptional historical document and, together with the fresco of the Villa of the Mysteries, is one-of-a-kind, making Pompeii an extraordinary testimony to an aspect of life in classical Mediterranean life that is largely unknown.”
Excavations at the 3,200 square-meter Regio IX have been ongoing since February 2023. The dig has so far unearthed 50 new rooms, a bakery, a laundry, and most recently, a luxury bath complex.
