ORPHEUS, a celebrated poet and musician, who lived at such an early period that his history is involved in fable, and many doubt if we have any facts respecting him on which dependence can be placed. According to the common mythology, he was a native of Thrace, being born in a cave at Pimpleia, a city of Pieria, which was then included in Thrace (Schol. Apollon, i. 25; Strab. vii. 330, x. 471). He is said to have been son of Apollo, or of Oeagrus, king of Thrace, and of the muse Calliope (Diodor. iii. 64). He was the brother of Linus ( Apollodor. ii. 4, 9), and the pupil of Musaeus (Clemens. Strom, i. p. 332), or his master (Syncel., p. 156; Paus. x. 7,1; Suid.). He is placed by Eusebius eighty-five years before the fall of Troy. He visited Egypt, and was there initiated in all the learning of the priests. When he returned to Thrace, he instituted the mysteries of Bacchus, which, according to Herodotus (ii. 81), included opinions which were afterwards promulgated by Pythagoras. He studied also under the Dactyli Idaei of Crete (Diodor. v. 64), and was the friend and companion of Cadmus, the founder of Thebes. He took a distinguished part in the Argonautic expedition, and saved his companions from the fascination of the Sirens (Apollodor. i. 9, 25). On the death of his wife Eurydice, he is said to have visited the infernal regions, and, through the intercession of Proserpine, obtained permission from Pluto that Eurydice should return with him to earth, provided he would engage not to look on her till he reached the earth. He broke his promise, and Eurydice instantly disappeared (i. 3, 2). How and where he died is variously stated. Some say that he died of grief for the loss of Eurydice; others allege that he was killed by lightning, because he revealed to man what the gods intended should be concealed from them; or that he was torn to pieces by the Maenades of Thrace, for some disrepect shown to Bacchus. Olympus, Pangaeus, and Haemus, are all named as the place of his catastrophe. The poets indicated the sweetness of his music by feigning that it was capable of moving the very stones and trees. Lucian tells a story of the head and lyre of Orpheus being thrown by the Thracian women into the Hebrus, and, as it floated down, the head was heaved by the water on the lyre, and sent forth, as it glided along, doleful strains. The head and lyre having reached the island of Lesbos, the former was buried on the spot where the temple of Bacchus afterwards stood, and the lyre was long preserved in the temple of Apollo. According to Eratosthenes (Catast. 24), it was placed by Jupiter in the heavens, and formed the constellation called Lyra.

There can be no doubt that there was an early poet of this name, but Aristotle considered all the works which were circulated under his name as spurious (Cic. De Nat. Deor. i. 38); and Cicero ascribes them to Cercops, a Pythagorean, or to Onomacritus (Clemens, l. c.). The hymn to Jupiter, quoted by Stobaeus (p. 40), is certainly very ancient, as it is alluded to by Aristotle (De Mund. Op. t. i. p. 475), and is not to be confounded with the productions of the later Platonic school, which we have under the title of the Orphic hymns. These hymns present a mixture of the theological ideas of the Greeks, Jews, and pven Christians, so that there can be no doubt of the period in which they were written.