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Cook, Arthur B.
Zeus: a study in ancient religion (Band 3,1): Zeus god of the dark sky (earthquake, clouds, wind, dew, rain, meteorits): Text and notes — Cambridge, 1940

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https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14698#0151

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ioo The Clouds personified in Cult and Myth

chanting an oracle from the ground1. Behind Orpheus stands a
young woman, presumably the Pythia. She too looks down, and
holds her right hand with a deprecatory gesture above the head.
She has a beaded fillet and upright bay-leaves in her hair, and she
is clad in a peplos with long overfold and girdle. Behind Apollon
stands another woman, closely swathed in chiton and Mutation.
She also gazes at the head of Orpheus, but with loosened hair and
a look of such obvious distress that we must surely identify her
with Eurydike2. I take the whole design to portray the visit of
Apollon to the Lesbian oracle of Orpheus—a scene graphically
described by Philostratos3 the Athenian early in s. iii A.D.:

'He (sc. Apollonios of Tyana) put in at Lesbos and made his way to the
ddyton of Orpheus. The story goes that once on a time Orpheus here practised
seercraft with pleasure, until Apollon took notice of him. For men no longer
resorted to Gryneion for oracles, nor to Klaros, nor yet to the Apolline tripod4;
but Orpheus alone gave oracles, his head having lately arrived from Thrace.
Wherefore the god came upon him as he was chanting an oracular strain and
said: "Leave my business to me: I have borne long enough with your
singing".'6

Hitherto the only available illustration of this narrative was the
design on a red-figured kylix now in the Lewis collection at Cam-
bridge, published many years ago by G. Minervini (fig. 35) and noted
by A. Furtwangler as Attic work referable to the time of the
Peloponnesian War6. The obverse of this vase shows Apollon's

1 Philostr. her. 6. 4 V Ke<pa\v yap [lerd to tSiv yvvaiK&v Zpyov is Aiapov KaraaxoSaa
pijypa rijs Mafiov wKTjae Kav koCKt) tjJ 77; ixpr)ap.tpSei. S6ei> ixp&vrb r airy ™ fiavrLKa
Aeafiiot re fecti rb SXKo irav Aio\ikov Kai'laves AioXevai irpbaoiKoi, xpycuoi 5e rod p.avrelov
rovrov Kal is ~Bapv\wva dveirip-irovro. voWd yap Kal is tov avoj paaiXia .1] Ke<pa\i] ybe,
Ktpifi re t(f apxaly XPW'"' ivrevOev iKdodijvai 'Xiyerat, "rapid, w Kvpe, ad," k.t.X.

2 The only other possibility would be to regard her as ' the Muse herself that Orpheus
bore,' whether Kalliope or another (O. Gruppe in Roscher Lex. Myth. iii. 1073 f.). But
this is not the type of any known or recognisable Muse.

3 Philostr. v. Apoll. 4. 14 p. 133 f. Kayser. * Sc. Delphoi.

5 The concluding words are itplaraTai ol XfiVP-ipSovvri 6 debs Kal "iriirav<ro" f?0>j
"t<2c ipS>v, Kal yap 5ff {Kal) q.oovra ere kctj/eSs rjveyKa." Possibly the original source of the
story (Damis of Nineveh? Maximus of Aigai? see Philostr. v. Apoll. 1. 3 p. 3 f. Kayser)
had a hexameter passage such as xPVIJ-Vs<>"',Ti #ei5s ttot iiplararo Kal irpoatenre \ ' 7raC<rae
ip&v, Kal yip cr Uavas qSovr ijveyKa' or 'rSiv 8' Hp' i/j.wi/—Kal yap er ifeaceis r\veyKa—
iriiravao.' But the later oracles of Apollon tend to drop verse for prose (Frazer Pausanias
v. 238). It is curious, if no more, that the words t& e>ct occur again in the oracle
spoken by Orpheus' head to Kyros the Elder (Philostr. her. 6. 4 rdp.d, a KOpe, ad.)

6 G. Minervini 'Oracolo di Orfeo e dell' Apollo Napeo in Lesbo: vaso dipinto di
fabbrica nolana' in the Bull. Arch. Nap. 1858 vi. 33—39 pi. 4, 1 (= my fig. 35) held
that on one side Pelops is taking down an oracle pronounced by the head of Orpheus
under the protection of Apollon NeMraZos (schol. Aristoph. nub. i44), and that on the other
Kalliope has picked up her son's lyre and a second Muse the strap from which it was hung.
Reinach Rip. Vases i. 493, 1 is more cautious: ' (A) La tete coupee d'Orphee rend des
 
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