The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns

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

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The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The HymnsLXXI. To Meilinoe · Lines 7–12

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LXXI. To Meilinoe · Lines 7–12

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Ancient Greek

p. 236

LXXI. ΜΕΙΛΙΝΟΗΣ

θυμίαμα ἀρώματα

ἀλλοκότοις ἰδέαις μορφῆς τύπον ἐκπροφανοῦσα,

ἄλλοτε μὲν προφανής, ποτὲ δὲ σκοτόεσσα, νυχαυγής,

ἀνταίαις ἐφόδοισι κατὰ ζοφοειδέα νύκτα.

ἀλλά, θεά, λίτομαί σε, καταχθονίων βασίλεια,

ψυχῆς ἐκπέμποις οἶστρον ἐπὶ τέρματα γαίης,

εὐμενὲς εὐίερον μύσταις φαίνουσα πρόσωπον.

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: LXXI. To Meilinoe

p. 237

LXXI. To Meilinoe

fumigation from aromatics

showing forth the stamp of her shape in outlandish forms,

now plain to see, now darkened, gleaming by night,

in hostile assaults through the gloom-shaped night.

But, goddess, I beseech you, queen of those beneath the earth,

may you send the soul's frenzy out to the ends of the earth,

showing to the initiates a kindly and well-hallowed face.

Heading.The heading itself is emended. Abel's first entry is not on a verse but on the title: In inscriptione Μειλινόης Lobeck pro μηλινόης — the manuscripts head the hymn ΜΗΛΙΝΟΗΣ and Lobeck wrote ΜΕΙΛΙΝΟΗΣ. This is the second emended heading in the volume and the first that is not Abel's own: at XX the entry reads In inscriptione ἀστραπίου Abel pro ἀστραπέως, and XVIII and XIX record codex variants in their headings without changing them. Lobeck's spelling then governs line 1 as well. The edition prints Meilinoe, transliterating what Abel prints; the familiar modern form Melinoe is in fact nearer the manuscripts' μηλινόη. The goddess is one of the three names — with Hipta (XLVIII, XLIX) and Mise (XLII) — on which the localisation of this collection to western Asia Minor rests.

7.The apparatus entry here is of a shape not previously recorded: the lemma reads ἐκπροφανοῦς where the verse prints ἐκπροφανοῦσα, and the parenthesis gives the manuscripts' own broken reading, ἐκπροφαι… with Abel's ellipsis. No editor is named and there is no sic. The register records three shapes of the divergence between Abel's lemma and his text — a different spelling, a different inflection, a dropped elision mark. This block adds two more: the nu-movable at LXXI.4, where the lemma reads ἀπάτῃσιν and the verse ἀπάτῃσι, and the truncated lemma here. Five in all, and the register is brought up to date with this block. On the standing rule the divergence is recorded, not adopted, and not counted among the misprints.

11.ψυχῆς ἐκπέμποις οἶστρον ἐπὶ τέρματα γαίης. XI.23 reads Πανικὸν ἐκπέμπων οἶστρον ἐπὶ τέρματα γαίης — the same verb, the same noun and the same four-word close, in the hymn to Pan, and neither line carries an apparatus entry on any of them. The frenzy is Pan's in one place and the soul's in the other, and in both it is to be sent to the same address. ἐπὶ τέρματα γαίης is a line-end formula of the collection, standing also at XIV.14, where it is filth and the κῆρες that are sent there. The only editorial hand in this line is the mood: Hermann's optative ἐκπέμποις for the codices' infinitive ἐκπέμπειν.

10, 12.καταχθονίων βασίλεια is XXIX.6 verbatim, where it is Phersephone's — Meilinoe's mother, in the line that also calls her mother of the Eumenides. Neither place carries an apparatus entry. The English is the same in both, queen of those beneath the earth. At 12 Abel prints εὐίερον, agreeing with πρόσωπον, and adds a bare interrogative entry, εὐιέροις? — his own suggestion, offered and not adopted, that the word should be dative plural with μύσταις. The parallel he is reaching for is in this block: LXXV.3 has ἐπ’ εὐιέροις τελετῇσιν and LXXVII.10 εὐιέρου τελετῆς, and the collection has the adjective in ten places before this hymn.

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.