to have been used as a mask, or vizor, at some sacred festival, on a day of procession, when the rites and orgies of the divinity represented by it were celebrated. Masks were worn on the stage, at feasts, at funerals, in battle, and in pageants. In Callixenus's account of the procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus[1] in honour of Bacchus at Alexandria, the statue of the god was adorned with masks, chaplets, and mitres. The mitre[2], which is a female attire, points out the twofold nature of Bacchus, who is called διφίης and δίμορφος[3], partaking of both sexes, the delicacy of the female, and the courage of the male. Aristides[4] calls him male and female, and Lucian[5] dresses him like a woman in his Indian expedition. The mitre we know from Virgil patted under the chin, and we learn from Nonnus[6] that Ampelus adorned himself with a mitred fillet in imitation of Bacchus, terminating in snakes-heads, and twisted with braids of serpents. According to [7]Macrobius Bacchus first invented triumphs, primus fuit auctor triumphi, for which on his statues[8] he wore a royal diadem.
When we come to apply these observations to the mask under our inspection, we shall recognise the double character of the figure, and see the personage in his twofold nature, in one point of view passing for a female, in another for the head of a male. The headband which goes under the chin is the ἅνδεμα μί?ρασ of the Anthologia, and corresponds minutely with the bandeau of Ampelus, which he assumed on conquering Bacchus.
