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 wordστάσις has a range broad enough to include conflict and a standing or accumulated condition.
- In the Orphic HymnsNike’s hymn speaks of painful στάσις amid opposing battles (XXXIII.3).
- TranslationThe aligned English distinguishes “strife” and “stagnation.” In Boreas’s passage the construction with “of air” is as important as the noun: it identifies what stands or gathers.
- A place to readPainful conflict within Nike’s battle-scene.
- English renderings
- strife; standing mass; stagnation
Meaning
στάσις has a range broad enough to include conflict and a standing or accumulated condition. The two occurrences here activate different senses through their objects and settings. A single English gloss, whether political “faction” or meteorological “stagnation,” would misrepresent one of them.
Use in the book
Nike’s hymn speaks of painful στάσις amid opposing battles (XXXIII.3). The adjective and battle-context make contention or strife the appropriate reading. Boreas, by contrast, is asked to break up an all-clouded στάσις of moist-path air (LXXX.3). The surrounding wind, rain-water and eventual clear sky identify an accumulation or stagnation of clouded atmosphere to be dispersed. The latter is not a conflict between named political factions, and the former is not weather. Their common lexical access reflects the word’s range, not a claim that the poet explicitly compares warfare with clouds.
Places to read
- Hymn XXXIII · Line 3Painful conflict within Nike’s battle-scene.
- Hymn LXXX · Line 3A cloud-filled air-mass to be dispersed by Boreas.
Translation
The aligned English distinguishes “strife” and “stagnation.” In Boreas’s passage the construction with “of air” is as important as the noun: it identifies what stands or gathers. The request to loosen it supplies the desired change. Related ἀστασίαστος in ethical praise concerns freedom from faction or instability in its own contexts; it should not force the weather passage into the same sense merely because the stems are related.
Attested forms
στάσιν
Occurrence inventory
2 in total. XXXIII.3; LXXX.3