Etruscans Now
Mythology
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Dr. Dimitris Paleothodoros - University of Thessaly, Department of History, Archaeology and Folklore Studies
Dionysiac Imagery in Archaic Etruria
Fufluns Pachie, the Etruscan Dionysus, and his thiasos, appear in Etruscan art during the 3rd quarter of the 6th century B.C. His early iconography (540-450 B.C.) is a combination of themes adopted from the Greek dionysiac repertory and from local ideas. Mythological and generic images are similar in Greece and Etruria, but cultic ones differ noticably. The study of etruscan dionysiac iconography, neglected in previous studies on Etruscan religion, gives a key for the reconstruction of original etruscan rituals and offers a new and unexpected image of Fufluns.