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 wordῥόμβος belongs to the vocabulary of whirling and revolving movement.
- In the Orphic HymnsOuranos journeys in the whirlings of a rhombos at IV.4, immediately after being described as rolling spherewise about earth.
- TranslationThe English transliterates “rhombos,” preserving the Greek term but leaving its local force to explanation.
- A place to readOuranos’s revolution within a spherewise and encompassing description.
- English renderings
- whirl; revolving motion; rhombos
Meaning
ῥόμβος belongs to the vocabulary of whirling and revolving movement. The wider word can be associated with revolving objects or instruments, but a concrete instrument must be established by its local construction. In the two supplied occurrences, the immediate subjects are cosmic powers travelling in circuits.
Use in the book
Ouranos journeys in the whirlings of a rhombos at IV.4, immediately after being described as rolling spherewise about earth. The next line makes him an encompassing guardian. Helios drives his track in the whirlings of an endless rhombos at VIII.7, after seasonal dance, rushing motion and chariot imagery. The genitive ῥόμβου therefore participates in a description of celestial revolution in both passages. Its relationship to δίνη and δίνευμα intensifies circular movement rather than introducing a named human operator. One can retain the possibility of an object-image behind the language without turning that possibility into an event enacted by the worshippers.
Places to read
- Hymn IV · Line 4Ouranos’s revolution within a spherewise and encompassing description.
- Hymn VIII · Line 7Helios’s course in endless whirling motion.
Translation
The English transliterates “rhombos,” preserving the Greek term but leaving its local force to explanation. “Revolving motion” is a useful orientation here, not an instruction to replace every wider sense of the word. The Kouretes’ ῥομβηταί, “whirlers,” belongs to a dance-setting and merits comparison; neither that agent noun nor these two cosmic passages explicitly attests the handling of a bull-roarer.
Attested forms
ῥόμβου
Occurrence inventory
2 in total. IV.4; VIII.7