Nonnus of Panopolis, Dionysiaca 27.144–240: Book 27: The armies meet at the Indus; Dionysos arms his host

So they rushed forth into the plain, and opened the fray near the mouth of the Indus. But from the trees of the forest Dionysos, thyrsus in hand, armed his warriors with shields and swords and invincible leafage. He divided his army of Bacchants into four parts, and posted them facing the dawn in the direction of the four winds. The first was among the thick trees by the feet of the circling Bear, where the skyfallen water of many scattered rivers comes pouring down from the Caucasos mountains, in that very place where heavyrumbling Hydaspes brings his flood eddying in his endless course. The second battalion he placed where twimouth Indus bends his flood, curving through the mountains towards the western district of the land between, and surrounds Patalene with his waters. The third he drew up where in the southern gulf the southern sea rolls with ruddy waves. The fourth mailed army the king posted towards the land of sunrise, whence Ganges moves watering the reedbeds with his fragrant waves. The host thus divided and under arms, he appointed four helmeted leaders, and addressed a rousing oration to them all :

“Dance here also, you Bassarids! Slay the barbarian tribes of your enemies, match thyrsus against spear, against sword also; let my harp become a trumpet which stirs war for the Satyrs, instead of its familiar banqueting-table. May the green leafy vintage strike down the steel, may it conquer the sharpened spear! Instead of the nightly dancings of Dionysos, let my pipes take another tune and sing the battle-hymn—let them leave the supper-tune of mindcharming Bromios.

“‘If Hydaspes would bend a submissive knee to me, and never again arm his rebellious flood against the Bacchoi, I will treat him kindly ; I will change all his glorious water into Euian wine with streams from the winepress, making his waters strong, I will crown the peaks of his wild forest with my leaves and make it all vine: but if ever again he shall help with his protecting flood the falling Indians and his son Deriades, taking the horned river-shape in a man’s body, then make a dam over the presumptuous river, and cross the thirsty water as on a highroad with unwetted feet, and let the hoof of fine horses tread on a dry Hydaspes with bare sand and scrape the dust there.

“‘If the terrified chief of warmad Indians is sprung from Phaéthon’s heavenly race, and if Phaéthon should set up fiery war against me to honour his daughter’s horned offspring, I will arm once more my Cronion’s brother against Phaéthon’s attack, a quencher for his fire from the watery sea. I will go to the island of Thrinacia, where are the sheep and oxen of the fireflashing heavenly Charioteer, and drag the sun’s daughter Lampetié under the yoke of slavery, to bow the knee like a girl captured by the spear. Then let Astris wander away to the mountains, to bewail her son Deriades a slave in heavy chains : let her go, if she likes, to settle in the Celtic land, that she also may turn into a tree with the Heliads and weep often in floods of sorrowful tears.

“Make haste, I pray, and whiten the round blackskin faces of the captive Indians with the initiate’s chalk; and bring me the bold king swathed in clusters of vine ; throw a fawnskin about Deriades in his coat of mail. Let the Indian king bend a slave’s knee to Bromios after my victory, and throw his corselet to the winds, covering his body in a better corselet of fur. Let him press his foot into purple buskins, and leave his silver greaves to the breezes. After his deadly arrows and the deeds of battle which he knows, let him learn the nightdancing rites of Dionysos, and shake his curls of barbarian hair over the winepress. Bring enemy heads as trophies of victory to breezy Tmolos, pierced with the witnessing thyrsus. Many long lines of Indians I will bring away from the war alive after fighting is done, and will fix on a Lydian gatehouse the horns of mad Deriades.”’

With this speech he gave them courage. The Bacchant women made haste, the Seilenoi shouted the tune of the battle-hymn, the Satyrs opened their throats and shouted in accord; the sound of the beating drum rang out, beating time with its terrifying boom, the rattling women clanged their double strokes with alternate hands ; the shepherd’s syrinx piped out its Phrygian notes to summon the host.

In front of the army, pushing to the fray, the Mygdonian torch shone leaping through the air, proclaiming the fiery birth of Bacchos. The horned brow of old Seilenos sparkled with light; snakes were twined in the unplaited hair of the hillranging Bacchant women. The Satyrs also fought; they were whitened with mystic chalk, and on their cheeks hung the terrifying false mask of a sham voiceless face. One lashing a maddened tiger against his foes scattered the cars of linked elephants. Hoary Maron was armed with a clustering shoot, and pierced the bodies of fighting Indians with a branch of gardenvine.