Dionysius (Bacchus) & the Dionysius Crater - Versailles, France
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Metro2
N 48° 48.402 E 002° 06.635
31U E 434694 N 5406349
Bacchus makes several appearances at Versailles.
Waymark Code: WMD055
Location: Île-de-France, France
Date Posted: 11/01/2011
Views: 15
This undated marble sculpture depicts the God of decadent living standing naked but for a fig leaf. He holds a cup in his right hand and grapes in his left. More grapes appear in his hair and at the column near his leg.
The artist is anonymous.
Bacchus is known as Dionysius by the Greeks..and Wikipedia's article about him is under that name: (
visit link)
That website adds:
"He is also the Liberator (Eleutherios), whose wine, music and ecstatic dance frees his followers from self-conscious fear and care, and subverts the oppressive restraints of the powerful. Those who partake in his mysteries are possessed and empowered by the god himself.[9] His cult is also a "cult of the souls"; his maenads feed the dead through blood-offerings, and he acts as a divine communicant between the living and the dead."
Wikipedia (
visit link) has this to say about the lunar crater:
"Dionysius is a lunar impact crater that lies on the western edge of the Mare Tranquillitatis. To the southeast is the crater pair of Ritter and Sabine. Just to the northwest is the system of rilles designated Rimae Ritter. These clefts follow a generally northwest direction.
The rim of Dionysius is generally circular and shows little sign of wear. The crater possesses a small ray system with a radius of over 130 kilometers. The formation has a high albedo and appears bright when the Sun is nearly overhead during a full Moon. It is surrounded by a bright halo, with darker material farther out. Some darker deposits are in the form of relatively rare dark rays."