#proitides

In Argolis, the story of the madness of the Proitides is proof that Maenad-ecstasy belonged to the primitive phase of the religion in this country; whether it survived in the later service the records leave us in doubt ; but it is probable that the Argive festival of the Agriania was orgiastic and conducted partly by Bacchai. We also hear of a festival called Turbe, celebrated near the source of the Erasinos, on the road from Argos to Tegea, and of sacrifices offered here to Dionysos and Pan; the name of the festival leaves no doubt as to its ecstatic and violent character.

All-powerful Hera drove these daughters in fear from the lovely halls of Proetus; she yoked their minds to a violent maddening compulsion. For, while still virgins, they entered the sanctuary of the purple-belted goddess, and said that their father far surpassed in wealth the golden-haired consort of holy, widely powerful Zeus. In anger at them, she put a twisted thought into their minds, and they fled to the wooded mountain with terrible screams, leaving behind the city of Tiryns and its god-built streets. … But when their father came to the beautiful stream of Lusus, he washed his skin with its water and called on Leto's daughter with her crimson headdress, the ox-eyed goddess, stretching his hands to the rays of the steed-swift sun, and asked her to deliver his children from their deranged miserable madness. “I will sacrifice to you twenty unyoked red oxen.” And the huntress, whose father is the highest god, heard him praying. She persuaded Hera, and stopped the godless mania of the bud-garlanded girls. They built her a sanctuary and an altar right away, and stained it with the blood of sheep, and set up choruses of women. - Bacchylides, Epinicians, Ode 11