ORPHIC CRITICAL TESTIMONY 63
OTTO KERN
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SUMMARY: This testimony says it was Eurydice who died and went to Hades, and the passage calls her his wife.
ORPHIC CRITICAL TESTIMONY 63.
Βιβλιοθήκη Ἀπολλοδώρου I 14-15 (Frazer numbering 1.3.2):
Καλλιόπης μὲν οὖν καὶ Οἰάγρου, κατ᾽ ἐπίκλησιν δὲ Ἀπόλλωνος (nr. 22), Λίνος, ὃν Ἡρακλῆς ἀπέκτεινε (nr. 27), καὶ Ὀρφεὺς ὁ ἀσκήσας κιθαρωιδίαν, ὃς ἄιδων ἐκίνει λίθους τε καὶ δένδρα. ἀποθανούσης δὲ Εὐρυδίκης τῆς γυναικὸς αὐτοῦ, δηχθείσης ὑπὸ ὄφεως, κατῆλθεν εἰς Ἅιδου θέλων ἀνάγειν (corr. Heyn.] ἀγαγεῖν A, ἀναγαγεῖν vulgo) αὐτήν, καὶ Πλούτωνα ἔπεισεν (ἔπειθεν Herch.) ἀναπέμψαι. ὁ δὲ ὑπέσχετο τοῦτο ποιήσειν, ἂν μὴ πορευόμενος Ὀρφεὺς ἐπιστραφῆι πρὶν εἰς τὴν οἰκίαν αὑτοῦ (corr. Faber, αὐτοῦ A) παραγενέσθαι· ὁ δὲ ἀπιστῶν ἐπιστραφεὶς ἐθεάσατο τὴν γυναῖκα, ἡ δὲ πάλιν ὑπέστρεψεν. εὗρε δὲ Ὀρφεὺς καὶ τὰ Διονύσου μυστήρια, καὶ τέθαπται περὶ τὴν Πιερίαν διασπασθεὶς ὑπὸ τῶν Μαινάδων.
“Now Calliope bore to Oeagrus or, nominally, to Apollo, a son Linus, whom Hercules slew; and another son, Orpheus, who practised minstrelsy and by his songs moved stones and trees. And when his wife Eurydice died, bitten by a snake, he went down to Hades, being fain to bring her up, and he persuaded Pluto to send her up. The God promised to do so, if on the way Orpheus would not turn round until he should be come to his own house. But he disobeyed and turning round beheld his wife; so she turned back. Orpheus also invented the mysteries of Dionysus, and having been torn in pieces by the Maenads he is buried in Pieria.”
(trans. Sir James George Frazer, 1921)
Βιβλιοθήκη ἱστορικὴ Διοδώρου Σικελιώτου IV 25, 4 (nr. 97); Κόνων f. 45 (nr. 39); Ἑλλάδος Περιήγησις Παυσανίου, Book 9.30.4 (Βοιωτία); Ἠθικὰ Πλουτάρχου· 44. Περὶ τῶν ὑπὸ τοῦ θείου βραδέως τιμωρουμένων 22 p. 466 c (Loeb edition 557 d): οὐδὲ γὰρ Θρᾶικας ἐπαινοῦμεν, ὅτι στίζουσιν ἄχρι νῦν, τιμωροῦντες Ὀρφεῖ “For we do not applaud the Thracians in tattooing their wives even now, in revenge for Orpheus”; v. Gruppe as found in Rosch. III 1160; Kern RE2 VI 1322; Orpheus 12. 24; Robert Heldens. I 400.
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