maenad

noun

mae·​nad ˈmē-ˌnad 

1

: bacchante

2

: an unnaturally excited or distraught woman

maenadic

mē-ˈna-dik 

adjective

Example Sentences

Recent Examples on the Web

Manson’s maenads — dirty, barefoot examples of Dionysian abandon — provide the most fascinating sequences of QT’s career. —Armond White, National Review, 26 July 2019

All across its 375 square feet swarm birds, masks and maenads—the besotted followers of the god Dionysus. —Joshua Levine, Smithsonian, 24 May 2018

The libretto from the premiere has Orpheus being torn to pieces by maenads, the female devotees of Bacchus whose bloodthirsty rampages figure in both the mythology and evidently the historical truth of ancient Greece. —Joshua Kosman, San Francisco Chronicle, 21 Apr. 2018

An actor’s dance becomes a slaughter; a bathing nymph turns out to be one of a cluster of handless maenads. —Douglas Wolk, New York Times, 1 June 2016

Often faces turned up to address the sky, as with the maenads and nymphs whose shapes in Greek sculpture did so much to inspire Duncan. —Alastair Macaulay, New York Times, 20 June 2017

Word History

Etymology

Latin maenad-, maenas, from Greek mainad-, mainas, from mainesthai to be mad; akin to Greek menos spirit — more at mind

First Known Use

1579, in the meaning defined at sense 1