While therefore I acknowledge and appreciate to the full the value of Polites’ researches into the history of the Twelve Days, the inferences which he draws from the material collected seem to me no more sound than the derivations which they are designed to corroborate. My own interpretation of the historical facts which Polites has brought together is as follows.
The superstitions and customs connected by the modern folk with the Twelve Days are undoubtedly an inheritance from ancestors who celebrated the Brumalia and other pagan festivals at the same season of the year. These ancient festivals, though Roman in name, probably differed very little in the manner of their observance from certain old Greek festivals, chief among which was some festival of Dionysus. This is rendered probable both by the date of these festivals and by the manner of their celebration. For the worship of Dionysus was practically confined to the winter-time; at Delphi his cult superseded that of Apollo during the three winter months[609]; and at Athens the four festivals of Dionysus fell within about the same period--the rural Dionysia at the end of November or beginning of December, the Lenaea about a month later, the Anthesteria at the end of January, and the Great Dionysia at the end of February. As for the manner of conducting the Latin-named festivals, Asterios’ description of the Kalándae in the fifth century plainly attests the Dionysiac character of the orgies, and Balsamon, in the twelfth, was so convinced, from what he himself witnessed, of their Bacchanalian origin, that he actually proposed to derive the name _Brumalia_ from Βροῦμος[610] (by which he meant Βρόμιος) a surname of Dionysus.
The mumming then, which is still customary in some parts of Greece during the Twelve Days, is a survival apparently of festivals in honour of Dionysus. Further the mummers dress themselves up to resemble Callicantzari. But the worship of Dionysus presented a similar scene; ‘those who made processions in honour of Dionysus,’ says Ulpian, ‘used to dress themselves up for that purpose to resemble his companions, some in the guise of Satyrs, others as Bacchae, and others as Sileni[611].’ The mummers therefore of the present day have, it appears, inherited the custom of dressing up from the ancient worshippers of Dionysus and are their modern representatives; and from this it follows that the Callicantzari whom the modern mummers strive to resemble are to be identified with those motley companions of Dionysus whom his worshippers imitated of old.