The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns

Name: The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns
Author: Attributed to Orpheus

Explore the Lexicon

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The HymnsPrayer to Musaeus · Lines 23–33

Swipe or use the arrow keys.

Facing Pages · Branch 10 of 147

Prayer to Musaeus · Lines 23–33

Book Mode

Ancient Greek

p. 14

ΕΥΧΗ ΠΡΟΣ ΜΟΥΣΑΙΟΝ

Ἑρμείαν κήρυκα, Θέμιν θ’, ἱεροσκόπον ἀνδρῶν,

Νύκτα τε πρεσβίστην καλέω καὶ φωσφόρον Ἦμαρ,

Πίστιν τ’ ἠδὲ Δίκην καὶ ἀμύμονα Θεσμοδότειραν,

Ῥείαν τ’ ἠδὲ Κρόνον καὶ Τηθύα κυανόπεπλον

Ὠκεανόν τε μέγαν, σύν τ’ Ὠκεανοῖο θύγατρας

Ἄτλαντός τε καὶ Αἰῶνος μέγ’ ὑπείροχον ἰσχύν

καὶ Χρόνον ἀέναον καὶ τὸ Στυγὸς ἀγλαὸν ὕδωρ

μειλιχίους τε θεούς, ἀγαθὴν τ’ ἐπὶ τοῖσι Πρόνοιαν

Δαίμονά τ’ ἠγάθεον καὶ Δαίμονα πήμονα θνητῶν,

Δαίμονας οὐρανίους τε καὶ ἠερίους καὶ ἐνύδρους

καὶ χθονίους καὶ ὑποχθονίους ἠδ’ ἐμπυριφοίτους,

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: Prayer to Musaeus

p. 15

Prayer to Musaeus

Hermes the herald, and Themis, scanner of men’s offerings,

and Nyx the eldest I call, and light-bearing Day,

and Pistis, and Dike, and the blameless Thesmodoteira,

and Rheia, and Kronos, and Tethys dark-robed,

and Okeanos the great, and with him the daughters of Okeanos,

and the greatly pre-eminent might of Atlas and of Aion,

and ever-flowing Chronos, and the shining water of Styx,

and the gentle gods, and over them all good Pronoia,

and the most divine Daimon, and the Daimon who brings men ruin,

and daimones of heaven, and of the air, and of the waters,

and of earth, and beneath the earth, and those that walk in fire,

25.Θεσμοδότειρα, “Giver of Law”, occurs nowhere else in Greek. Commentators usually take her for Demeter Thesmophoros, but the word is a literary formation, not a cult title, and appears in no inscription; the company she keeps here — Pistis, Dike — may rather make her a personified abstraction. Themis has already been named separately at 23.

28–29.Aion, unending time as a power, is distinguished here from Chronos in the following line. The proem keeps them apart; later theology does not always.

30.Pronoia, Providence: the one abstraction in the catalogue given a place over the rest (ἐπὶ τοῖσι).

31–33.The daimones classified by region — heaven, air, water, earth, beneath the earth, and those that walk in fire. This is the nearest thing in the proem to a system. ἐμπυριφοίτους is Wiel’s reading; the manuscripts give ἠδὲ (or ἰδὲ) πυριφοίτους.

About This Reading Edition

The eighty-eight Orphic Hymns and the Prayer to Musaeus, in Ancient Greek and English, with the supplied critical apparatus, explanatory notes, introduction, glossary and editorial matter.

Historical Text and Translation

Orphic Hymns, attributed to Orpheus. Greek text after Eugenius Abel, Orphica (Leipzig and Prague, 1885), pages 57–102.

About Diotimos Editions

This historical edition credits Diotimos Editions as its English translator.

Rights

The ancient Greek source and the 1885 Abel edition are public-domain material. The supplied new English translation and editorial matter are published with the site owner’s authorization. Both supplied original files remain unchanged.