Extract

Orphic literature, the pseudepigraphical literature ascribed to *Orpheus. Neoplatonist authors especially cite hexameters from different poems attributed to Orpheus ‘the theologian’, and an entire corpus of hymns is preserved. The fragments of his poetry have often been collected (Gesner1764. Hermann1805. Lobeck1829. O. Kern1922; Bernabé2004–2007). A fragmentary papyrus scroll from the late 4th cent. bce from a grave in Derveni (Macedonia), found in 1962, has considerably expanded our knowledge; the preserved part of the scroll contained mainly an allegorical explanation of a theogony of Orpheus. The main texts attributed to Orpheus are theogonical poems. The Neoplatonists (see neoplatonism) relied chiefly on the ‘Rhapsodic Theogony’, a late Hellenistic work incorporating earlier theogonies. At least four earlier poems are known, two of which are reflected in the Derveni commentary on the one hand, in *Plato (1) on the other, and must go back at least to the early 5th cent. bce.