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 HymnsXI. To Pan · Lines 1–8

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XI. To Pan · Lines 1–8

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Ancient Greek

p. 52

XI. ΠΑΝΟΣ

θυμίαμα ποικίλα

Πᾶνα καλῶ κρατερόν, νόμιον, κόσμοιο τὸ σύμπαν,

οὐρανὸν ἠδὲ θάλασσαν ἰδὲ χθόνα παμβασίλειαν

καὶ πῦρ ἀθάνατον· τάδε γὰρ μέλε’ ἐστὶ τὰ Πανός.

ἐλθέ, μάκαρ, σκιρτητά, περίδρομε, σύνθρονος Ὥραις,

αἰγομελές, βακχευτά, φιλένθεος, ἀντροδίαιτε,

ἁρμονίην κόσμοιο κρέκων φιλοπαίγμονι μολπῇ,

φαντασιῶν ἐπαρωγέ φόβων τ’ ἔκπαγλε βροτείων,

αἰγονόμοις χαίρων ἀνὰ πίδακας ἠδέ τε βούταις,

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: XI. To Pan

p. 53

XI. To Pan

fumigation from various substances

Pan I call, strong, pastoral, the whole sum of the kosmos,

heaven and sea and the earth that is queen of all

and undying fire; for these are the limbs of Pan.

Come, blessed one, leaper, runner-about, enthroned with the Horai,

goat-limbed, reveller, filled with the god, dweller in caves,

striking out the harmony of the kosmos in playful song,

helper of imaginings, and dread amid the terrors of mortals,

rejoicing among the goatherds at the springs and among the oxherds,

Rubric.ποικίλα, “various” — a mixed offering, and the only one of its kind so far. The god who is the sum of everything is given a little of everything.

1–3.The etymological play Πάν / πᾶν, made explicit and then anatomised: heaven, sea, earth and fire are called the god’s limbs (μέλεα). This is the allegory of Pan as the universe, worked out by the Stoic Cornutus (Compendium 27), with the etymology itself already at Plato, Cratylus 408b–d. The Renaissance took it up again, though chiefly from Servius and Macrobius rather than from these lines.

6.Pan plays out the harmony of the kosmos in song — μολπή is singing or dance-with-song, never an instrument, and no syrinx is named anywhere in this hymn, proverbial though it is. Compare Helios at VIII.9, χρυσολύρη in the same breath as drawing the kosmos on its harmonious course, where the lyre is likewise named beside the act rather than made its means. The same claim, three hymns apart.

7, 23.φόβων ἔκπαγλε βροτείων at the beginning; Πανικὸν … οἶστρον at the end. The hymn asks the god of panic to send the panic somewhere else — the same move as the Night hymn, which asks the goddess of night to take away the fears that gleam in the night (III.14).

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.