Quantcast
  We apologize for any slow response. This will be fixed before October 31st Portal logo
Login/Register
Bactrian Gold Treasure from Afghanistan, coming soon....
/gemstones/king-natural-history/page_406 - 2
 

Orpheus on Gems

Orpheus on Gems Page of 453 Jewelry of the Ancients Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
398
ORPHEUS ON GEMS.
besides being narrated in a much more primitive form ; indeed it is hardly conceivable that any one coming after Apollonius should have attempted to compete with an epic of such established reputation ; or that having such audacity he should have deviated so far from his prototype. But the question of the antiquity of the Λιβικά is set at rest, if we accept the authority of the scholiast " Demetrius son of Moschus," who states positively that it gave Nicander the idea of his Theriaca. Now Nicander flourished under Attalus III., or b.c. 135, which circumstance supposes a much higher antiquity in the work selected for a model by a writer of no mean order.
There are many expressions in Pliny when he is laughing at the mystic powers ascribed to stones by the magicians of his own times which seem direct allusions to certain passages in this very poem. In addition to what has been said above upon the internal evidence of the work itself, the poetry is certainly of a better kind than could have been produced by a Greek of the Lower Em­pire, especially when treating of religious topics, as will appear from comparing it with the Sibylline Oracles, the forgeries of that period.
Who the narrator is does not appear. The precepts are given in the first place by a certain diviner, Theodamas, who subsequently quotes to the end the speech of Helenus to Philoctetes. The tale of Troy and the events of the siege being frequently referred to by the first narrator, the absurdity of supposing him to be Orpheus becomes still more apparent : for that worthy was the comrade of the Argonauts in the preceding generation. The text being extremely cor­rupt, I have not scrupled to adopt the emendations of Gesner and Tyrwhit in this translation wherever it was impossible otherwise to extract any sense from the reading of the MSS.
Orpheus on Gems Page of 453 Jewelry of the Ancients
Suggested Illustrations
Other Chapters you may find useful
Other Books on this topic
bullet Tag
This Page