From the book
The Orphic Collection, Volume I: The Hymns
Attributed to Orpheus · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordὨκυλόχεια is the feminine epithet printed in all three occurrences.
- In the Orphic HymnsProthyraia receives the epithet while present in mortals’ pains (II.4).
- TranslationThe translation varies between “swift in delivery” and “bringer of swift delivery,” making explicit a helpful agency warranted by context.
- A place to readSwift delivery is coupled with presence in human pain.
- English renderings
- swift in delivery, bringing swift childbirth
Meaning
Ὠκυλόχεια is the feminine epithet printed in all three occurrences. Its force concerns swift childbirth or delivery. The local subject determines whether emphasis falls on a goddess’s assistance in birth or on the rapid productive activity associated with her; the form need not be converted into an unattested masculine headword for lookup.
Use in the book
Prothyraia receives the epithet while present in mortals’ pains (II.4). The surrounding hymn calls her a helper of women in labour and emphasizes relief and successful delivery. “Swift in delivery” thus describes help with a process humans are undergoing, not an isolated claim about the goddess’s own pregnancies.
Artemis is ὠκυλόχεια beside nurse of mortal young (XXXVI.8). Earlier the same hymn calls her helper in birth-pangs while uninitiated in them (XXXVI.4), making the distinction between enabling birth and experiencing it particularly clear. The two childbirth epithets should be allowed to illuminate one another rather than be forced into a literal account of Artemis giving birth.
Nature’s use belongs to a larger field of generation (X.18–20). She is father, mother and nurse of all, then swift in delivery, many-seeded and associated with seasonal impulse. Here the word extends the childbirth image across universal production. This broad setting differs from the specific presence beside labouring mortals in Prothyraia’s hymn without erasing their shared concern with successful bringing-forth.
Places to read
- Hymn II · Line 4Swift delivery is coupled with presence in human pain.
- Hymn X · Line 19The epithet enters Nature’s universal generative description.
- Hymn XXXVI · Line 8Artemis brings swift delivery and nurses mortal young.
Translation
The translation varies between “swift in delivery” and “bringer of swift delivery,” making explicit a helpful agency warranted by context. At XXXVI.8 the apparatus identifies ὠκυλόγεια as a printing error for ὠκυλόχεια. It should not generate a separate swift-speaking epithet or a second lexical interpretation of the passage.
Attested forms
ὠκυλόχεια
Occurrence inventory
3 in total. II.4; X.19; XXXVI.8