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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

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The HymnsXLII. To Mise · Lines 1–11

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XLII. To Mise · Lines 1–11

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Ancient Greek

p. 150

XLII. ΜΙΣΗΣ

θυμίαμα στύρακα

Θεσμοφόρον καλέω ναρθηκοφόρον Διόνυσον,

σπέρμα πολύμνηστον, πολυώνυμον Εὐβουλῆος,

ἁγνήν τ’ εὐίερόν τε Μίσην, ἄρρητον ἄνασσαν,

ἄρσενα καὶ θῆλυν, διφυῆ, λύσειον Ἴακχον·

εἴτ’ ἐν Ἐλευσῖνος τέρπῃ νηῷ θυόεντι,

εἴτε καὶ ἐν Φρυγίῃ σὺν μητέρι μυστιπολεύεις,

ἢ Κύπρῳ τέρπῃ σὺν ἐυστεφάνῳ Κυθερείῃ,

ἢ καὶ πυροφόροις πεδίοις ἐπαγάλλεαι ἁγνοῖς

σὺν σῇ μητρὶ θεᾷ μελανηφόρῳ Ἴσιδι σεμνῇ,

Αἰγύπτου παρὰ χεῦμα σὺν ἀμφιπόλοισι τιθήναις·

εὐμενέουσ’ ἔλθοις ἀγάθ’ ἐκτελέουσ’ ἐπ’ ἀέθλοις.

The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns: XLII. To Mise

p. 151

XLII. To Mise

fumigation from storax

The law-bringing, fennel-bearing Dionysos I call,

much-remembered seed, of many names, of Eubouleus,

and holy, well-hallowed Mise, the unspeakable queen,

male and female, twofold, Iakchos the loosener;

whether you take your delight in the smoking temple at Eleusis,

or keep the mysteries in Phrygia with the Mother,

or delight in Cyprus with fair-crowned Kythereia,

or glory in the holy wheat-bearing plains

with your mother the goddess, august black-robed Isis,

beside the stream of Egypt, with your attendant foster-mothers;

may you come with favour, bringing good things to pass upon these contests.

5–10.Eleusis, Phrygia, Cyprus, Egypt — four cult centres in six lines, offered as alternatives. Nothing else in the collection does this. The εἴτε … εἴτε … ἤ … ἤ construction is the ordinary hymnic device for not knowing where a god is; here it produces a deliberate syncretism, and the fourth term puts the addressee beside Isis on the Nile. Whether Mise is being identified with Persephone, with Kore, or with a Phrygian goddess is not said.

9–10.Ἰσιδι, Αἰγύπτου. The only named Egyptian deity in the collection, and the second time Egypt is named: Memphis was one of Apollo’s epithets at XXXIV.2. There it was a place-name in a list; here it is a cult home with a goddess and a river in it. μελανηφόρος is attested only of Isis’s servants — the μελανηφόροι who appear as an organised body in Delian and Eretrian inscriptions — and the hymn gives the attendants’ word to the goddess herself. That she wore black is separately attested (Apuleius, Met. 11.3, palla nigerrima); that this word was used of her is, so far as the lexica go, this line’s own move.

1–4.The hymn opens by calling Dionysos and then, in its third line, calls Mise as well, and treats the two as one addressee for the rest of its length — the participles at 11 are feminine. θεσμοφόρος is Demeter’s own title, given here to Dionysos; Ἴακχος is the Eleusinian cry made a name; ναρθηκοφόρος is the fennel-stalk of the Bacchic procession. Three cults are being joined in four lines before the geography of 5–10 joins four more.

4.ἄρσενα καὶ θῆλυν, διφυῆ. The sixth double nature in the collection — VI.1, IX.4, XXX.2, XXXII.10, XXXIX.5 are the others — and the only one that uses both expressions in the same line, the two words and then the compound that sums them.

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.