Orpheus

Orpheus is a legendary poet, musician, and prophet in ancient Greek religion. The major stories about him are centred on his ability to charm all living things, even stones, with his music (the usual scene in Orpheus mosaics), his travels with Jason and the Argonauts in search of the Golden Fleece, his attempt to retrieve his wife Eurydice from the underworld, and his death at the hands of the maenads of Dionysos, who tired of his mourning for his late wife Eurydice. For the Greeks, Orpheus was also a founder and prophet of the so-called "Orphic" mysteries. It has been speculated that the Orphic mystery cult regarded Orpheus as a parallel figure to or even an incarnation of Dionysos. Both made similar journeys into Hades, and Dionysos-Zagreus suffered an identical death. Orpheus was credited with the composition of the Orphic Hymns and the Orphic Argonautica. Shrines containing purported relics of Orpheus were regarded as oracles.

Greeks of the Classical age venerated Orpheus as the greatest of all poets and musicians; it was said that while Hermes had invented the lyre, Orpheus had perfected it. Poets such as Simonides of Ceos said that Orpheus' music and singing could charm the birds, fish and wild beasts, coax the trees and rocks into dance, and divert the course of rivers. He is claimed by Horace to have made lions and tigers obedient to him. Earlier than the literary references is a sculptured representation of Orpheus with the ship Argo, found at Delphi, said to be of the sixth century BC.

It was believed by Aristotle that Orpheus never existed, but to all other ancient writers, he was a real person, though living in remote antiquity. Most of them believed that he lived several generations before Homer. The earliest literary reference to Orpheus is a two-word fragment of the 6th century BC lyric poet Ibycus: onomaklyton Orphēn ('Orpheus famous-of-name'). He is not mentioned in Homer or Hesiod.

Ancient Greek authors Strabo and Plutarch note Orpheus' Thracian origins. In ancient times, Thrace’s peoples were renowned as being among the most musically accomplished in the Greek world. Strabo (64 BC – c. AD 24) presents Orpheus as a mortal, who lived and died in a village close to Olympus. "Some, of course, received him willingly, but others, since they suspected a plot and violence, combined against him and killed him." He made money as a musician and "wizard" – Strabo uses αγυρτεύοντα (agurteúonta), which most often meant charlatan and always had a negative connotation. Pausanias writes of an unnamed Egyptian who considered Orpheus a μάγευσε (mágeuse), i. e., magician.

According to Apollodorus and a fragment of Pindar, Orpheus' father was Oeagrus, a Thracian king, or, according to another version of the story, the god Apollo. His mother was possibly the muse Calliope, her sister Polymnia, a daughter of Pierus, son of Makednos or lastly of Menippe, daughter of Thamyris. According to Tzetzes, he was from Bisaltia. His birthplace and place of residence Pimpleia was close to Olympus. Strabo also mentions that Orpheus lived in Pimpleia. According to the epic poem Argonautica, Pimpleia was the location of Oeagrus' and Calliope's wedding. While living with his mother and her eight beautiful sisters in Parnassus, Orpheus met Apollo, who was courting the laughing muse Thalia. Apollo, as the god of music, gave Orpheus a golden lyre and taught him to play it. Orpheus' mother taught him to make verses for singing. He is also said to have studied in Egypt.

Pindar and Apollonius of Rhodes place Orpheus as the harpist and companion of Jason and the Argonauts. Orpheus took part in this adventure and used his skills to aid his companions. Chiron told Jason that without the aid of Orpheus, the Argonauts would never be able to pass the Sirens—the same Sirens encountered by Odysseus in Homer's epic poem the Odyssey. The Sirens lived on three small, rocky islands called Sirenum scopuli and sang beautiful songs that enticed sailors to come to them, which resulted in the crashing of their ships into the islands. When Orpheus heard their voices, he drew his lyre and played music that was louder and more beautiful, drowning out the Sirens' bewitching songs. Orpheus loved the young Argonaut Calais, the son of Boreas, with all his heart, and went often in shaded groves still singing of his desire, nor was his heart at rest. But always, sleepless cares wasted his spirits as he looked at fresh Calais.

Orpheus was one of the handful of Greek heroes to visit the Underworld and return; his music and song even had power over the gods of Hades. The earliest known reference to this descent to the underworld is the painting by Polygnotus (5th century BC) described by Pausanias (2nd century AD), where no mention is made of Eurydice. Euripides and Plato both refer to the story of his descent to recover his wife, but do not mention her name; a contemporary relief (about 400 BC) shows Orpheus and his wife with Hermes. The elegiac poet Hermesianax called her Agriope. The story of Eurydice may actually be a late addition to the Orpheus myths. In particular, the name Eurudike ("she whose justice extends widely") recalls cult titles attached to Persephone. According to the theories of poet Robert Graves, the myth may have been derived from another Orpheus legend, in which he travels to Tartarus and charms the goddess Hecate.

The first mention of the name Eurydice in literature is in the Lament for Bion (1st century BC). While walking among her people, the Cicones, in tall grass at her wedding, Eurydice was set upon by the satyr Aristaeus. In her efforts to escape him, Eurydice fell into a nest of vipers and suffered a fatal bite on her heel. In Ovid's account, however, Eurydice's death by a snake bite is incurred while she was dancing with naiads on her wedding day. Her body was discovered by Orpheus who, overcome with grief, played such sad and mournful songs that all the nymphs and gods wept. On their advice, Orpheus travelled to Acherousia, a strip of land bordering the southern edge of the Black Sea to enter the underworld. It was said Orpheus was the only one who could soothe Pontos' turmoil and calm the raging waves.

Orpheus’s journey to Hades dramatizes his immense talent as a poet, as he soothes the tortures of the damned, the terrible, and the dead. His music even softened the hearts of Hades and Persephone, who agreed to allow Eurydice to return with him to earth on one condition: he should walk in front of her and not look back until they both had reached the upper world. Orpheus set off with Eurydice following; however, as soon as he had reached the upper world, he immediately turned to look at her, forgetting in his eagerness that both of them needed to be in the upper world for the condition to be met. As Eurydice had not yet crossed into the upper world, she vanished for the second time, this time forever.

The myth theme of not looking back, an essential precaution in Jason's raising of chthonic Brimo Hekate under Medea's guidance, is reflected in the Biblical story of Lot's wife when escaping from Sodom. More directly, the story of Orpheus is similar to the ancient Greek tales of Persephone captured by Hades and similar stories of Adonis captive in the underworld. However, the developed form of the Orpheus myth was entwined with the Orphic mystery cults and, later in Rome, with the development of Mithraism and the cult of Sol Invictus.

Virgil wrote in his poem that upon Orpheus' return alone, Dryads wept from Epirus and Hebrus up to the land of the Getae (north east Danube valley) and Orpheus even wandered into Hyperborea and Tanais (ancient Greek city in the Don river delta) due to his grief. During his travels, he shares with his followers his newfound knowledge of the dead, and of the salve that poetry and song can bring to the deep wounds memory or “looking back” can cause.

Some sources credit Orpheus with further gifts to mankind: medicine, which is more usually under the auspices of Asclepius or Apollo; writing, which is usually credited to Cadmus; and agriculture, where Orpheus assumes the Eleusinian role of Triptolemus as the giver of Demeter's knowledge to mankind. Orpheus was an augur and seer; he practiced magical arts and astrology, founded various cults, and prescribed the mystery rites preserved in Orphic texts.

In addition to cults of Apollo and Dionysos, Orpheus is said to have established the worship of Hecate in Aegina; in Laconia, Orpheus is said to have brought the worship of Demeter Chthonia and that of the Κόρες Σωτείρας (Kóres Sōteíras; 'Saviour Maidens'); and in Taygetos a wooden image of Orpheus was said to have been kept by Pelasgians in the sanctuary of the Eleusinian Demeter.

Orpheus is repeatedly referred to by Euripides, in whom we find the first allusion to the connection of Orpheus with Dionysos and the infernal regions: he speaks of him as related to the Muses; mentions the power of his song over rocks, trees, and wild beasts; refers to his charming the infernal powers; connects him with Bacchanalian orgies; ascribes to him the origin of sacred mysteries, and places the scene of his activity among the forests of Olympus. Euripides also brought Orpheus into his play Hypsipyle, which dealt with the Lemnian episode of the Argonautic voyage; Orpheus there acts as coxswain, and later as guardian in Thrace of Jason’s children by Hypsipyle.

According to a Late Antique summary of Aeschylus' lost play Bassarids, Orpheus, towards the end of his life, disdained the worship of all gods except the sun, whom he called Apollo. One early morning he went to the oracle of Dionysos at Mount Pangaion to salute his god at dawn, but was ripped to shreds by Thracian Maenads for not honouring his previous patron (Dionysos) and was buried in Pieria, the home of the Muses. Pausanias writes that Orpheus was buried in Dion and that he met his death there. He writes that the river Helicon sank underground when the women that killed Orpheus tried to wash off their blood-stained hands in its waters. Other legends claim that Orpheus became a follower of Dionysos and spread his cult across the land. In this version of the legend, it is said that Orpheus was torn to shreds by the women of Thrace for his inattention.

Ovid, however, recounts that Orpheus had abstained from the love of women, either because things ended badly for him, or because he had sworn to do so. Yet, many felt a desire to be joined with the poet, and many grieved at rejection. Indeed, he was the first of the Thracian people to transfer his affection to young boys and enjoy their brief springtime, and early flowering this side of manhood. Feeling spurned by Orpheus for taking only male lovers (eromenoi), the Ciconian women of Ismarios, followers of Dionysos, first threw sticks and stones at him as he played, but his music was so beautiful even the rocks and branches refused to hit him. Nearby trees began to dance and grow in unusual formation after hearing his song. Enraged, the women tore Orpheus to pieces during the frenzy of their Bacchic orgies. His head and lyre, still singing mournful songs, floated down the River Hebrus into the sea, after which the winds and waves carried them to the island of Lesbos, at the city of Methymna; there, the inhabitants buried his head and a shrine was built in his honour near Antissa; there his oracle prophesied until it was silenced by Apollo. In addition to the people of Lesbos, Greeks from Ionia and Aetolia consulted the oracle, and his reputation spread as far as Babylon.

After his death, Orpheus' lyre was carried to heaven by the Muses, and was placed among the stars. The Muses also gathered up the fragments of his body and buried them at Leibethra below Mount Olympus, where the nightingales sang over his grave. After the river Sys flooded Leibethra, the Macedonians took his bones to Dion. Orpheus' soul returned to the underworld, to the fields of the Blessed, where he was reunited at last with his beloved Eurydice.

The sacred Pierian spring, near ancient Leivithra in Pieria, a region of ancient Macedonia, also the location of Mount Olympus, was believed to be the home and the seat of worship of Orpheus. The Muses "were said to have frolicked about the Pierian springs soon after their birth". The spring was believed to be a fountain of knowledge that inspires whoever drinks from it.

In the fifth and fourth centuries BC, there existed a collection of hexametric poems known as Orphic, which were the accepted authority of those who followed the Orphic way of life and were by them attributed to Orpheus himself. Plato several times quotes lines from this collection; he refers in the Republic to a ‘mass of books of Musaeus and Orpheus’, and in the Laws to the hymns of Thamyris and Orpheus, while in the Ion he groups Orpheus with Musaeus and Homer as the source of inspiration of epic poets and elocutionists. Euripides in the Hippolytus makes Theseus speak of the ‘turgid outpourings of many treatises’, which have led his son to follow Orpheus and adopt the Bacchic religion. Alexis, the fourth-century comic poet, depicting Linus offering a choice of books to Heracles, mentions ‘Orpheus, Hesiod, tragedies, Choerilus, Homer, Epicharmus’. Aristotle did not believe that the poems were by Orpheus; he speaks of the ‘so-called Orphic epic’, and Philoponus (seventh century AD) commenting on this expression, says that in the De Philosophia (now lost) Aristotle directly stated his opinion that the poems were not by Orpheus. Philoponus adds his own view that the doctrines were put into epic verse by Onomacritus. Aristotle when quoting the Orphic cosmological doctrines attributes them to ‘the theologoi’ ‘the ancient poets’, ‘those who first theorized about the gods ’.

Nothing is known of any ancient Orphic writings except a reference in the Alcestis of Euripides to certain ‘Thracian tablets’ which ‘the voice of Orpheus had inscribed’ with pharmaceutical lore. The Scholiast, commenting on the passage, says that there exist on Mt. Haemus certain writings of Orpheus on tablets. There is also a reference, not mentioning Orpheus by name, in the pseudo-Platonic Axiochus, where it is said that the fate of the soul in Hades is described on certain bronze tablets which two seers had brought to Delos from the land of the Hyperboreans. This is the only evidence for any ancient Orphic writings. Aelian (second century AD) gave the chief reason against believing in them: at the time when Orpheus is said to have lived, the Thracians knew nothing about writing.

It came therefore to be believed that Orpheus taught, but left no writings and that the epic poetry attributed to him was written in the sixth century BC by Onomacritus. Onomacritus was banished from Athens by Hipparchus for inserting something of his own into an oracle of Musaeus when entrusted with the editing of his poems. It may have been Aristotle who first suggested, in the lost De Philosophia, that Onomacritus also wrote the so-called Orphic epic poems. By the time the Orphic writings began to be freely quoted by Christian and Neo-Platonist writers, the theory of the authorship of Onomacritus was accepted by many.

It is believed, however, that the Orphic literature current in the time of the Neo-Platonists (third century AD), and quoted by them as the authority for Orphic doctrines, was a collection of writings of different periods and varying outlook, something like that of the Bible. The earliest of these were composed in the sixth century by Onomacritus from genuine Orphic tradition; the latest which have survived, namely the Voyage of the Argonauts, and the Hymns to various deities, cannot have been put together in their present form until the beginning of the Christian era, and are probably to be dated sometime between the second and fourth centuries AD.

As an archetype of the inspired singer, Orpheus is one of the most significant figures in the reception of classical mythology in Western culture, portrayed or alluded to in countless forms of art and popular culture including poetry, film, opera, music, and painting.

Several etymologies for the name Orpheus have been proposed. A probable suggestion is that it is derived from a hypothetical PIE root *h₃órbʰos 'orphan' and ultimately the verb root *h₃erbʰ- 'to change allegiance, status.' Cognates could include Greek: ὄρφνη (órphnē; 'darkness') and ὀρφανός (orphanós; 'fatherless, orphan') from which comes English 'orphan' by way of Latin.