sb. pl. [L., neut. pl. of bacchānālis: see prec. Formerly occas. treated in Eng. as sing., with pl. -as.]
1. The festival held in honor of Bacchus.
1753. Chambers, Cycl. Supp., Tacitus gives an elegant description of the Bacchanalia.
1863. Haydn, Dict. Dates, s.v., In Rome the Bacchanalia were suppressed, 186 B.C.
2. Drunken revelry; a tippling bout, an orgy.
1633. Marmyon, Fine Comp., II. iv. Drinks sack, and keeps his Bacchanalias.
1684. Evelyn, Mem. (1857), II. 210. The squibs and bacchanalia of the Lord Mayor’s Show.
1880. L. Wallace, Ben-Hur, 283. The morning after the bacchanalia.
† 3. A drinking-song: cf. BACCHANAL sb. 5. Obs.
1651. Evelyn, Char. Eng., Wks. (1805), 158. In taverns, chanting their dithrambicks and bestial bacchanalias.
† 4. = BACCHANAL 6. Obs.
1662. J. Bargrave, Pope Alex. VII. (1867), 117. A bachanalia piece, dugg out of the temple of Bacchus.
