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This page is part of the "tools" section of a site, Plato and his dialogues, dedicated to developing a new interpretation of Plato's dialogues. The "tools" section provides historical and geographical context (chronology, maps, entries on characters and locations) for Socrates, Plato and their time. For more information on the structure of entries and links available from them, read the notice at the beginning of the index of persons and locations.
Orpheus was the son of the river-god Oeagrus and the Muse
Calliope (some traditions mention another Muse as his mother). He was born in
Thracia, not far from Mount Olympus where the
Muses too were born. He was the most gifted of musicians, and was said to be
the inventor of the 9-string cithara (a number derived from that of the Muses).
His songs were so sweet that they would tame wild beasts and rugged men and
bend branches from trees.
Orpheus took part in the expedition of the Argonauts. Being too soft to row, he would keep the rowers in rythm with his songs and, because they were even sweeter than those of the Sirens, he saved his companions from them. He also managed, during an early stop in that island, to have them all initiated to the mysteries of Samothrace, of which he was already himself an initiate.
Orpheus' wife was Eurydice, a Dryad. One day she was wandering along a creek in Thracia, she was bitten by a snake hiding in the grass and died. So aggrieved was Orpheus that he descended into Hades to try and recover his beloved wife. With his music, he managed to subdue the monsters at the gates and the gods within. Hades and Persephone agreed to let Eurydice go provided she walked behind Orpheus and he didn't try to look at her till he had returned to the world above. Unfortunately, just before reaching the light of day, Orpheus, tortured by doudt, looked behind, and instantly, Eurydice died for the second time, this time forever and there was nothing Orpheus could do to help it.
Back on earth, Orpheus was so sad that he didn't want to have anything to do with women again. This is why Thracian women, angered at being so despised, decided one day to kill him, teared his body apart and threw the pieces into a river that brought them to the sea. And, so the story goes, his head and lyre eventually landed into the island of Lesbos, where the residents buried them with great honor. And it was said that, from the tomb, the song of a lyre could sometime be heard. This explains why the island of Lesbos was the center of lyric poetry (Mytilene, the main city on that island, was the birthplace of the poets Alceus and Sappho, among others). After Orpheus' death, his lyre became the constellation by that name in heaven, and his soul was transported to the Elysium where he keeps singing for the Blessed.
The legend of Orpheus gave birth, in the VIth century B. C., to mystery cults supposed to transmit the revelations that Orpheus himself was supposed to have brought back from his descent into Hades. Orphism later became mingled with the Eleusinian Mysteries and with Pythagoreanism, and it is in this state that he was known to Plato.
Attic traditions talk of a Musæus which is variously described as a friend or a pupil of Orpheus and, like him, a wonderful musician, capable of healing the sick with his songs. He was presented as the son of Selene (the Moon ; see Republic, II, 364e, where Adeimantus, in his introductory speech, refers to people presenting "books by Musæus and Orpheus, offspring of Selene and the Muses"). His father was sometimes said to be Eumolpus (whose name in Greek means "good singer"), a king of Thracia, son of Poseidon who was for a while exiled in Eleusis and returned there after having regained his Thracian crown, to help the Eleusinians in a war against Athens in the time of king Erechtheus. Some traditions ascribed to Musæus (or to his father Eumolpus) the institution of the Eleusinian mysteries.
References to Orpheus and Orphism by name (and to Musæus, who is never mentioned alone, but always, when mentioned, associated with Orpheus) in the dialogues are at :