A group of figures dance to the tune of a flute played by a man perched on an oak tree, and to the bells that some dancers have attached to their lower legs. The scene evokes the dances that are part of Ancient Greek history and myths and the tradition that followed - the book Hypnerotomachia Poliphili includes a description and a woodcut of a similar dance. The painting also evokes the arcadian settings of pastoral lyric and drama inspired by Theocritus’s Idylls. In that tradition, and in Rubens’s interpretation of it in numerous paintings, the countryside is considered as an ideal place of plenitude, romance, and sexual fantasy for men. The setting is enlivened by the handling of brown, green, and blue paint. The texture builds on the panel support defining the folds of draperies, head buns and ornaments, and the areas where the light hits the trees. In the middle distance is a farm building with a Palladian motif of arch and lintel - if we were to take this literally, we would place the scene in the Veneto. Rubens favoured this style of sixteenth-century Italian architecture, as witnessed by his designs for his own palatial house and garden in Antwerp.

The dancing figures move their limbs and contort their bodies, an expression of the passionate feelings involved in dancing as it is described in Greek literature. Two dogs positioned as mirror images of each other emphasise the circular movement, and the flowing draperies also contribute to the sense of motion. Many of the figures seem concentrated on the mechanics of the complicated dance, as they try not to lose the hands of the others. In the centre foreground, one of the women appears to be upset by the proximity between a woman with a bare breast and a large bearded man with an ivy wreath; his lascivious attitude is intimidating. To the right another couple come close to kissing. Dionysius, ressed in his tiger skin and crowned with a wreath of leaves, looks back apparently pleased by what he sees.

Only the young Dionysius is clad in attributes that allow us to identify him; the exotic tiger skin alludes to his exploits in the Orient. The epic poem Dionysiaca by Nonnos is full of references to such animals. It also mentions a dance that was part of a celebration of Dionysius’s conquest of India: "The foot-soldiers of Bromios danced round with their oxhides and mimicked the pattern of the shieldbearing Corybants, wildly circling in the quick dance under arms". This is not to imply that Rubens is depicting that specific dance, but a reminder of the very frequent descriptions of such activity in Ancient Greek texts, including whirlwind-like ones similar to the one Rubens painted. The most famous is perhaps one of the scenes that Hephaestus designed on the shield he made for Achilles, as described by Homer in the Iliad: "And young men were whirling in the dance, and with them flutes and lyres sounded continually".

Other than Dionysius, the identity of the figures in this painting is ambiguous. I see them as timeless, generic characters inspired by ancient texts. The flute player takes on the role of Pan, the sex driven, pipe playing shepherd god, but he has no animal features. The other dancers bring to my mind the satyrs, frequent companions of Dionysius (but none bear their animal features). Silenus usually formed part of Dionysius’s train as well; perhaps he inspired the large bearded man between the two women in blue in the foreground.

Some women wear high end outfit and sandals, others are barefoot and seem more peasant like. In fact, none of the figures in the scene dress the way high class or countrywomen did during Rubens’s time (as they are shown in his own paintings and in those by Jan Brueghel, David Teniers, or other roughly contemporary Flemish artists). Necks, breasts, and shoulders are more exposed here than they would have been in contemporary society and their uncovered hair and bare feet are also evocative of a different time and place. What the women dancers resemble is a host of timeless allegorical and mythological female figures painted by Rubens throughout his life. They also remind me of some of the bacchantes and nymphs that Titian painted in his Bachanals, following descriptions by Philostratus the Elder - dancing was a favourite activity of both types of creatures, which had the form of beautiful women (Vergara, Alejandro, in Mythological Passions, Museo Nacional del Prado, 2021, pp. 110-113).