How do you use Maenad in a sentence?

Answer 1

Maenad is a noun. A maenad was a female follower of Dionysus, one which was granted several special powers by the god for their following, despite the fact that they were not always necessarily willing followers. They were often depicted wearing a fawnskin and carrying a Thyrsus in their right hand, the Thyrsus being akin to an enormous wand that could do things such as make wine spout from the earth where it struck (on account of Dionysus being the God of Wine). They were also often naked, and always in a sort of divine trance that would appear to any normal person as some sort of insanity. They demonstrated incredible feats of strength while in this "insanity", such as ripping both beast and human alike apart with their bare hands, for raw consumption and as sacrifice to their god. During such instances, their hands were often described as "sharp" or "clawed" or "taloned", though it's not entirely clear whether this indicated that they actually had some sort of divine transformation going on or whether it just referred to this unnatural strength, that they could rip apart a living creature with bare hands as easily as a clawed/taloned creature.

So, you would use it for instance by saying "She was a maenad" or "the maenads descended upon the beast, ripping it apart within moments". I'm unsure whether maenad is supposed to be capitalized or not though, as it is somewhat of a title. I found your question in search of an answer to my own on capitalization.

Additionally, you can use the stem in other forms, by saying something such as "They performed their maenadic rites", in which case it would be an adverb, though I can't think of a way to form it in a proper way to make it take the place of an adjective (this may be possible, but I'm having difficulty coming up with one) or as a verb (don't believe this would ever be correct).