slug: "hymns/apollon"
lang: en
title: "Orphic Hymn to Apollon"
pageCreated: "2026-04-29"
extends ../../../views/hymns/hymnsheet.pug
block navbar
ul
li.nav-arrow.nav-arrow-left: a(href="/hymns/nike") #[span.dingbat ☙] #[b(lang="grc") Νικης] #[i To Nike]
li.nav-current ΛΔʹ · XXXIV
li.nav-arrow.nav-arrow-right: a(href="/hymns/leto") #[i To Leto] #[b(lang="grc") Λητους] #[span.dingbat ❧]
block ancient-pic
img(src="/hymns/thumbnails/apollon-ancient.jpg" alt="Ancient fresco of Apollon")
block modern-pic
img(src="/hymns/thumbnails/apollon-modern.jpg" alt="Modern painting of Apollon")
block greek
h1 Ἀπόλλωνος
div.offering Θυμίαμα μάνναν
p.hymn-greek
:format-hymn
Ἐλθέ, μάκαρ Παιάν, Τιτυοκτόνε, Φοῖβε Λυκωρεῦ,
Μεμφῖτ’, ἀγλαότιμος, ἰήιος, ὀλβιοδῶτα,
χρυσολύρη, σπερμεῖος, ἀρότριε, Πύθιε, Τιτάν.
Γρυνεῖε, Σμινθεῦ, Πυθοκτόνε, Δελφικέ, μάντι,
ἄγριε, φωσφόρε Δαῖμον, ἐράσμιε, κύδιμε κοῦρε,
κρουσιλύρη, χαροποιός, ἑκηβόλε, τοξοβέλεμνε,
Βράγχιε καὶ Διδυμεῦ, Παταρήιε, Λοξία, ἁγνέ·
Δήλι’ ἄναξ, πανδερκὲς ἔχων φαεσίμβροτον ὄμμα,
χρυσοκόμη, καθαρὰς φήμας χρησμούς τ’ ἀναφαίνων·
κλῦθί μευ εὐχομένου λαῶν ὕπερ εὔφρονι θυμῷ·
τόνδε Σὺ γὰρ λεύσσεις τὸν ἀπείριτον αἰθέρα πάντα
γαῖαν τ’ ὀλβιόμοιρον ὕπερθέν καὶ δι’ ἀμολγοῦ,
νυκτὸς ἐν ἡσυχίῃσιν ὑπ’ ἀστεροόμματου ὄρφνης
ῥίζας νέρθε δέδορκας, ἔχεις δέ τε πείρατα κόσμου
παντός· Σοὶ δ’ ἀρχή τε τελευτή τ’ ἐστὶ μέλουσα.
παντοθαλές, Σὺ δὲ πάντα πόλον κιθάρῃ πολυκρέκτῳ
ἁρμόζεις, ὁτὲ μὲν νεάτης ἐπὶ τέρματα βαίνων,
ἄλλοτε δ’ αὖθ’ ὑπάτην, ποτὲ Δώριον ἐς διάκοσμον
πάντα πόλον κιρνὰς κρίνεις βιοθρέμμονα φῦλα,
ἁρμονίῃ κεράσας παγκόσμιον ἀνδράσι μοῖραν·
μίξας χειμῶνα, θέρος τ’ ἴσον ἀμφοτέροισιν,
ταῖς ὑπάτας χειμῶνα, θέρος νεάταις διακρίνας,
Δώριον εἰς ἔαρος πολυηράτου ὥριον ἄνθος.
ἔνθεν ἐπωνυμίην Σε βροτοὶ κλῄζουσιν ἄνακτα,
Πᾶνα, Θεὸν δικέρωτ’, ἀνέμων συρίγμαθ’ ἱέντα·
οὕνεκα παντὸς ἔχεις κόσμου σφρηγῖδα τυπῶτιν.
κλῦθι, μάκαρ, σώζων μύστας ἱκετηρίδι φωνῇ.
block english
h1 To Apollon
div.offering The fumigation from manna
p.hymn-english Blest Pæan, come, propitious to my pray’r,#[br]illustrious pow’r, whom Memphian tribes revere,#[br]slayer of #[span.theonym(greek="Tityos") Tityus], and the God of health,#[br]Lycorian #[span.theonym(greek="Phœbos") Phœbus], fruitful source of wealth.#[br]Spermatic, golden-lyr’d, the field from Thee#[br]receives it’s constant, rich fertility.#[br]Titanic, Grunian#[+sn(1)], Smynthian, Thee i sing,#[br]Python-destroying, hallow’d, Delphian king:#[br]rural, light-bearer, and the Muse’s head,#[br]noble and lovely, arm’d with arrows dread:#[br]far-darting#[+sn(2)], Bacchian, two-fold, and divine,#[br]pow’r far diffused, and course oblique is Thine.#[br]O, Delian king, whose light-producing eye#[br]views all within, and all beneath the sky:#[br]whose locks are gold, whose oracles are sure,#[br]who, omens good reveal’st, and precepts pure:#[br]hear me entreating for the human kind,#[br]hear, and be present with benignant mind;#[br]for Thou survey’st this boundless æther all,#[br]and ev’ry part of this terrestrial ball#[br]abundant, blessed; and Thy piercing sight,#[br]extends beneath the gloomy, silent night;#[br]beyond the darkness, starry-ey’d, profound,#[br]the stable roots, deep fix’d by Thee are found.#[br]The world’s wide bounds, all-flourishing are Thine,#[br]Thyself all the source and end divine:#[br]’tis Thine all Nature’s music to inspire,#[br]with various-sounding, harmonising lyre;#[br]now the last string Thou tun’st to sweet accord,#[+sn(3)]#[br]divinely warbling now the highest chord;#[br]th’ immortal golden lyre, now touch’d by Thee,#[br]responsive yields a Dorian melody.#[br]All Nature’s tribes to Thee their diff’rence owe,#[br]and changing seasons from Thy music flow#[br]hence, mix’d by Thee in equal parts, advance#[br]Summer and Winter in alternate dance;#[br]this claims the highest, that the lowest string,#[br]the Dorian measure tunes the lovely spring.#[br]Hence by mankind, Pan-royal#[+sn(4)], two-horn’d nam’d,#[br]emitting whistling winds#[+sn(5)] thro’ Syrinx fam’d;#[br]since to Thy care, the figur’d seal’s#[+sn(6)] consign’d,#[br]which stamps the world with forms of ev’ry kind.#[br]hear me, blest pow’r, and in these rites rejoice,#[br]and save Thy mystics with a suppliant voice.
+sn(1)
p According to #[a.cite(href="https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Strabo/13C*.html" title="Strabo’s Geography, book thirteen") Strabo, lib. xiii.] Grynæus is a town of Myrinæus: likewise, a temple of #[span.theonym(greek="Apollon") Apollo], and a most ancient oracle and temple, sumptuously built of white stone. #[abbr.cite(title="Gyraldus, Syntagma de musis, page 237") Gyrald. Syntag. p. 237.]
+sn(2)
p #[i(lang="grc") Ἑκατηβελετης] — Proclus, on Plato’s #[i Cratylus], informs us He is so called, #[i(lang="grc") ὅτι χορηγὸς ὤς, καὶ εξερομενος ἐπὶ παντας ποιεῖ τας ενεργείας], #[i i.e.], “because since He is the choragus or leader of the choir of the Muses, He produces energies in all things.”
+sn(3)
p Gesner well observes, in his notes to this Hymn, that the comparison and conjunction of the musical and astronomical elements are most ancient; being derived from Orpheus and Pythagoras, to Plato. Now, according to the Orphic and Pythagoric doctrine, the lyre of #[span.theonym(greek="Apollon") Apollo] is an image of the celestial harmony, or the melody caused by the orderly revolutions of thc celestial spheres. But I cannot believe that Orpheus and Pythagoras considered this harmony as attended with sensible sounds, according to the vulgar acceptation of the word: for it is surely more rational to suppose, that they meant nothing more by the music of the spheres, than their harmonical proportions to each other. Indeed these wise men, to whom metaphors were familiar, may be easily conceived by vulgar sound and vulgar harmony to insinuate internal sound, and harmony subsisting in its origin and cause.
p Hence we may consider the souls of the celestial spheres, together with the soul of the world, as composing the choir of the nine Muses; (who are called by the Platonists nine Syrens) and dancing in numerical order round #[span.theonym(greek="Apollon") Apollo] the sun of the intellectual world. But these nine Muses are far different from the marine Syrens of the poets who, resident as it were in the sea of material delights, draw us aside by their alluring melody, from the paths of rectitude. For these are divine Syrens inviting us to the proper end of our nature; and forming from the eight tones of the eight spheres, one perfect and everlasting harmony.
p The following quotation from the Platonic Nichomachus, #[abbr.cite(title="Manual of Harmonics, chapter one, page 6") Harm. i. p. 6], illustrates the meaning of the Hypate and Nete, or the highest and lowest string. From the motion of Saturn, (says he) “The most remote of the planets, the appellation of the gravest sound, Hypate, is derived: but from the lunar motion, which is the lowest of all, the most acute sound is called #[i(lang="grc") νεάτη], Nete, or the lowest.”
p But Gesner observes, that a more ancient, and as it were archetypal appellation, is derived from the ancient triangular lyre, a copy of which was found among the pictures lately dug out of the ruins of Herculaneum; where the highest chord next to the chin of the musicians is the longest, and consequently (says he) the sound is the most grave. Gesner proceeds in observing, that the three seasons of the year are so compared together in a musical ratio, that Hypate signifies the Winter, Nete the Summer, and the Dorian measure represents the intermediate seasons, Spring and Autumn. Now the reason why the Dorian melody is assigned to the Spring, is because that measure wholly consists in temperament and moderation, as we learn from #[a.cite(href="https://www.loebclassics.com/view/plutarch-moralia_music/1967/pb_LCL428.387.xml" title="(Pseudo-)Plutarch, De Musica, page 1136-E") Plut. de Mus. p. 1136. #[+sc("E.")]] and consequently is with great propriety attributed to the Spring, considered as placed between Summer and Winter; and gratefully tempering the fervent heat of the one, and the intense cold of the other.
+sn(4)
p See the notes to the #[a(href="/hymns/pan") Hymn to Pan], #[a(href="/hymns/heracles") to #[span.theonym(greek="Heracles") Hercules]], and #[a(href="/hymns/helios") #[span.theonym(greek="Helios") the Sun]].
+sn(5)
p Johannes Diaconus, in #[i(lang="la") Allegorcis Theogoniæ Hesiodi], quotes the following lines from Orpheus.
blockquote: p: i(lang="grc") Ζεὺς δέ τε πάντων ἐςὶ ϑεὸς, πάντων τε κεραςὴς, / Πνέυμασι συριζων, φωναῖσι τε ἀερομικτοις·
p That is, “But #[span.theonym(greek="Zeus") Jupiter] is the God of all, and the mingler of all things; whistling with the breathing winds and aerial voices.” And this perfectly agrees with #[span.theonym(greek="Apollon") Apollo], considered as #[span.theonym(greek="Zeus") Jupiter], or the sun of the intelligible world.
+sn(6)
p Since #[span.theonym(greek="Apollon") Apollo] in the intelligible world is the demiurgus of the universe, and consequently comprehends in His essence the archetypal ideas of all sensible forms, He may with great propriety be said to posses the figured seal, of which every visible species is nothing more than an impression. It is however necessary to observe, that in the great seal of ideas, all forms subsist in indivisible union and immaterial perfection: but in their imitative impressions in bodies, they are found full of boundless multitude, and material imperfection.