Semele

Semele (ˈsɛmɪli; Ancient Greek: Σεμέλη ), or Thyone (ˈsɛmɪli; Ancient Greek: Θυώνη ) in Greek mythology, was the youngest daughter of Cadmus and Harmonia, and the mother of Dionysus by Zeus in one of his many origin myths. Certain elements of the cult of Dionysus and Semele came from the Phrygians. These were modified, expanded, and elaborated by the Ionian Greek invaders and colonists. Doric Greek historian Herodotus (c. 484–425 BC), born in the city of Halicarnassus under the Achaemenid Empire, who gives the account of Cadmus, estimates that Semele lived either 1,000 or 1,600 years prior to his visit to Tyre in 450 BC at the end of the Greco-Persian Wars (499–449 BC) or around 2050 or 1450 BC. In Rome, the goddess Stimula was identified as Semele. According to some linguists the name Semele is Thraco-Phrygian, derived from a PIE root meaning 'earth' (*Dhéǵhōm). Julius Pokorny reconstructs her name from the PIE root *dgem- meaning 'earth' and relates it with Thracian Zemele, 'mother earth'. However, Burkert says that while Semele is "manifestly non-Greek", he also says that "it is no more possible to confirm that Semele is a Thraco-Phrygian word for earth than it is to prove the priority of the Lydian baki- over Bacchus as a name for Dionysos". Etymological connections of Thraco-Phrygian Semele with Balto-Slavic earth deities have been noted, since an alternate name for Baltic Zemyna is Žemelė, and in Slavic languages, the word seme (Semele) means 'seed', and zemlja (Zemele) means 'earth'. Thus, according to Borissoff, "she could be an important link bridging the ancient Thracian and Slavonic cults (...)". In one version of the myth, Semele was a priestess of Zeus, and on one occasion was observed by Zeus as she slaughtered a bull at his altar and afterwards swam in the river Asopus to cleanse herself of the blood. Flying over the scene in the guise of an eagle, Zeus fell in love with Semele and repeatedly visited her secretly. Zeus's wife, Hera, a goddess jealous of usurpers, discovered his affair with Semele when she later became pregnant.