SATYRS and SILENI (Σάτυροι, Σάλυοι), — Mythological figures of secondary importance, but among the most widespread in the art, literature, and popular beliefs of Greece. Already among the ancients, in the later period, no clear distinction was made between Satyrs and Sileni; and some modern scholars, besides often using one term for the other, derive both from a single original type. But it seems impossible not to maintain the contrary view (as Pausanias, I, 23, 5, already did), since, in addition to the difference between the two names (whose etymology is moreover uncertain), they correspond to two clearly distinct animal types.
The Sileni, in fact, commonly considered to be of Thracian origin, are the first to appear in art (François Vase, mid-sixth century B.C.) and perhaps in literature (Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, 265); they are theromorphic genii of equine nature: a broad face completely covered with a beard, long, dishevelled hair from which horse’s ears protrude, a snub nose, a long and thick horse’s tail, and an undivided hoof. All this justifies the appellation ἵπνοι = horses, given to them by the ancients (Orphic Hymn, 48, 4), and their assimilation to the Centaurs (also of Thracian origin). Lustful and ithyphallic by nature, they live pursuing the nymphs “with whom they unite amorously in the depths of wondrous caves” (Homeric Hymn, loc. cit.), and, like them, were regarded as genii of the water. As early as the aforementioned François Vase, the Sileni appear in the retinue of Dionysus, and later, together with Satyrs, Maenads, Bacchantes, etc., they would always take part in the orgiastic processions of this god. In relation to Dionysus, myth knew, one might say, an archetype: Silenus, the kindly old man and father of the Satyrs, who had raised Dionysus in Attica; unlike the other Sileni, he was a friend of men, learned, and endowed with prophetic powers, which, however, he exercised only in a state of drunkenness. Subsequently the Sileni were represented as bald and became increasingly humanized, while their animal characteristics remained barely indicated.
The Satyrs appear in art around the middle of the fifth century B.C., but were already known in literature (Hesiod, cited by Strabo, X, 471, has them descend from the Argolic Phoroneus together with the Nymphs and the Curetes). They too are theromorphic genii, but of caprine nature, and originate in the Peloponnese, perhaps Arcadia, the homeland of the ancient god Pan, who had goat-like forms and from whom they most probably derived their characteristics: horns, cloven hooves, a small tail, habitation in the woods, a markedly lustful nature, and hostility toward men and their herds; the ancients called them τράγοι = goats, and their Doric name τίτυρος has the same meaning. The Satyrs too were associated very early with the cult of Dionysus.
The fusion of Satyrs and Sileni took place in Attic tragedy (fifth century), when the Satyrs too were attributed the equine characteristics of the Sileni; this fusion then passed into art and became universal, making the two terms synonymous (cf. Hesiod: Σάλυοι Σάτυροι). Thus, for example, the celebrated Marsyas is now called a silenus, now a satyr, and even the “satyr play” was at times designated as a “silenic drama” (Plato, Symp., 215 b).