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Attributed to Orpheus

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 HymnsLXXII. To Tyche · Lines 1–10

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LXXII. To Tyche · Lines 1–10

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Ancient Greek

p. 238

LXXII. ΤΥΧΗΣ

θυμίαμα λίβανον

Δεῦρο, Τύχη· καλέω σ’, ἀγαθὴν κράντειραν ἐπ’ εὐχαῖς,

μειλιχίην, ἐνοδῖτιν, ἐπ’ εὐόλβοις κτεάτεσσιν,

Ἄρτεμιν ἡγεμόνην, μεγαλώνυμον, Εὐβουλῆος

αἵματος ἐκγεγαῶσαν, ἀπρόσμαχον εἶδος ἔχουσαν,

τυμβιδίην, πολύπλαγκτον, ἀοίδιμον ἀνθρώποισιν.

ἐν σοὶ γὰρ βίοτος θνητῶν παμποίκιλός ἐστιν·

οἷς μὲν γὰρ τεύχεις κτεάνων πλῆθος πολύολβον,

οἷς δὲ κακὴν πενίην θυμῷ χόλον ὁρμαίνουσα.

ἀλλά, θεά, λίτομαί σε μολεῖν βίῳ εὐμενέουσαν,

ὄλβοισι πλήθουσαν ἐπ’ εὐόλβοις κτεάτεσσιν.

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: LXXII. To Tyche

p. 239

LXXII. To Tyche

fumigation from frankincense

Come, Tyche — I call you, good accomplisher at our prayers,

gentle, of the wayside, over possessions of good fortune,

Artemis the leader, of great renown, sprung from the blood

of Eubouleus, having a form none can assail,

of the tomb, much-wandering, sung of among men.

For in you the livelihood of mortals is all-various;

to some you fashion an abundance of goods, rich in blessing,

to others evil poverty, stirring anger in your heart.

But, goddess, I beseech you to come kindly to my life,

abounding in blessings, over possessions of good fortune.

1.κράντειραν ἐπ’ εὐχαῖς. XXVII.2 reads τῇδε μόλοις, κράντειρα θεά, σέο, πότνι’, ἐπ’ εὐχαῖς — the same noun and the same prepositional phrase, of the Mother of the Gods; and X.12 gives κράντειρα to Physis. Neither of those lines carries an apparatus entry, nor does this one. κράντειρα is she who brings to pass, the feminine of the agent noun from κραίνω, and the collection uses it of three powers whose business is accomplishment rather than character. The English does not keep one word for it: X.12 has ruler, XXVII.2 ruling goddess, and only here accomplisher. LSJ glosses κράντειρα as the feminine of κραντήρ, she who rules, which is what the two earlier lines print; accomplisher is the etymological sense from κραίνω. One of the three must go, and the choice belongs to the final run.

3.Εὐβουλῆος, and the tally changes. The register records the Εὔβουλος / Εὐβουλεύς distinction as holding one to six in Abel's printed text and four to three the other way in the codices, because three of the six Εὐβουλεύς are conjectures. This occurrence carries no apparatus entry, so it is transmitted, and the counts become one to seven in the printed text and four to four in the codices. The seven places are XXIX.8, XXX.6, XLI.8, XLII.2, LII.4, LVI.3 and here: Phersephone's son, the figure begotten of Zeus and Phersephone, the child Antaia bore, Mise's parent, Dionysos in the Bacchic chain, the nursing god of LVI.3 — and here Tyche's father, by way of his blood. Nothing in the collection identifies these with one another.

3–5.Tyche is called Artemis outright, then given three epithets that are not Artemis's: τυμβιδίη, of the tomb, πολύπλαγκτος, much-wandering, and ἐνοδῖτις at line 2, of the wayside. The last two belong to the roadside goddess of crossroads and the first to the grave; taken together they are Hekate's furniture, and Hekate opens the collection. The identification is asserted and not argued, as Night is called Kypris at III.2 and Physis is called Dike at X.13. The edition does not reconcile them.

4.One word of this line is Abel's: εἶδος, for the codices' εὖχος. The manuscripts give having a glory none can fight against, a claim about her standing; Abel's word makes it a form none can fight against, a claim about her appearance. His reason is almost certainly on the collection's own first page: I.6 reads θηρόβρομον, ἄζωστον, ἀπρόσμαχον εἶδος ἔχουσαν of Hekate, with no apparatus entry, so the exact phrase he prints here is transmitted five hymns into the book. That makes the conjecture a good one and the line a second identification of Tyche with Hekate, in the same three lines that call her Artemis. The English follows the printed text.

2, 10.ἐπ’ εὐόλβοις κτεάτεσσιν closes the second line and the last, and the two are the whole frame of the hymn: what is asked for at the end is what she was named for at the beginning. Abel records nothing against the phrase at either place; line 2 does carry an entry, but on μειλιχίην. The English is identical in both, as the register requires.

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.