COMUS, the spirit of revelry (Gr. • s(Wµps, band of revellers) ; in art, occasionally shown as attendant on Dionysus (q.v.) ; described by Philostratus in Imagines i. 2. From this source, presumably, Ben Jonson got the name (Pleasure reconciled to Virtue, 1619). Milton's Comus is his own creation, only the name being classical.
See Roscher's Lexikon, art. "Komos," and cf. JoNsoN ; MILTON.