Christian-Georges Schwentzel /The Conversation Orgies conjure in our imagination the world of Greek and Roman Antiquity, thanks to more or less titillating films portraying debauched emperors, or maybe specifically Fellini’s Satyricon. The term is also used today to signify all sorts of excess. For us, the orgy stands for the ultimate celebration of the pleasures of the flesh, in an ancient world free from moral constraint. But what were they like in reality? From orgia to orgies The word comes to us from the Greek orgia. This denotes rites practiced in honor of gods such as Dionysus, whose cult celebrates the regeneration of nature. It concerns so-called mystery cults – that’s to say, those limited to initiates, men and women
