hich were popular were the nobility, priests, friars, postillions, and brigands, and also the slaves themselves. White women wore the mulatress dress, which was considered the "good" garment of colored women at that time; the men emulated the field hands in their dress. Once so disguised, they would attend parties, banquets, balls, and country fetes. The slaves were celebrating as well and did so by playing the part of their white owners at every opportunity, thus poking fun at their masters. Today, it is the African influence that is predominant in Carnival, although each successive wave of immigrants to the region has lent its own particular stamp to carnival. A number of ethnic contributions to Carnival are evident in each year's celebration, such as the inclusion of tassa drumming in modern Carnival observance, an excellent example of cross cultural fertilization. Tassa drumming is of Indian extraction and in Carnival was ironically introduced by a first generation Chinese immigrant who was a well known bandleader in the 1950s ("Carnival 1996").
The origins of this sort of celebration in ancient Greece has been noted. Bacchus, or Dionysus, was the central figure in a major cult of the Greco-Roman world, a cult that would have a long-term influence in mythology, religion, literature, and art. Dionysus was a pan-Hellenic god who was widely celebrated throughout the Archaic period and honored at dramatic contests with tragedies and comedies. His was also an orgiastic cult. Dionysus is the god of ecstasy and possession and might be called the patron saint of the drama as well as of various festivals and celebrations. Bacchus is the Roman name for the same god. The iconography of Bacchus makes him easily recognizable in artworks and evokes images of wine and revelry along with specific symbols of the god and his cult. In Greek mythology, Dionysus was a bastard son of Zeus. The mother of Dionysus is variously named depen...