Abstract

In the course of the preparation of the introductory article on ‘Drama’ for Hastings Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, my attention was directed, not only to the problem of the origin of this type of drama, but also to the basal meaning of the Greek term S0009838800017535_inline1. It need scarcely be said that the rise of tragedy is almost universally connected with the cult of Dionysos . On the other hand, the theory has been advanced by Crusius , Hirt , and especially Ridgeway , that tragedy arose not from the Dionysos-cult, but from the desire to honour and appease the dead. It is to this latter theory that I strongly incline, and I feel that tragedy can be connected with the cult of Dionysos only through this deity's aspect of a chthonic god who gave release from the lower world and who was later identified with Attis, Adonis, and Osiris