Aristophanes presented The Birds in the Great Dionysia of 414 BCE διὰ Καλλιστράτου, i.e., with the help of Callistratus, the same director he had used for the Acharnians (Lenaia 425 BCE, first prize) and used later for Lysistrata (Lenaia 411 BCE). Τhe Birds, so popular today, was awarded, as it is known, second prize, after Ameipsias’ Κωμασταί (Revellers) and before Phrynicus’ Μονότροπος. It should also be remembered that, being a comedy with an animal chorus, the Aristophanic Birds had the same title as a comedy by Magnes, while being an ‘escapist’ drama it took a precedent from Pherecrates’ Ἄγριοι (=Savages), a play with two heroes who set out in search of primitive life.
These antecedent thematic patterns are to be borne in mind when studying the parabasis of The Birds and, in particular, the cosmogonic data—parodied or not—that Aristophanes presents in the Anapaests (especially in verses 693–703). The mythographic and religious material included—or alluded to—in these verses will be presented in six short chapters and analysed in turn. The first of these chapters deals with the nature of Nyx, the second with the significance of the egg in this context, the third chapter studies the unexpected function of the wind in the cosmogonic procedure described, the fourth chapter studies the idea of the sprout, the fifth chapter tries to establish a more precise relationship between the Αristophanic passage in question and the relevant ideas of the Orphics in general while the sixth chapter explores some distant echoes of the passage in Plato’s Sympo- sium (189c–193e).1
In the cosmogonic succession that Aristophanes presents,2 Nyx appears in the forefront from the beginning (together with Chaos, Erebos and Tartarus) and lays the famous egg from which Eros will emerge. Aristophanes (in all probability like his ‘orphic’ models) differs in this way from Hesiod,3 nevertheless through this differentiation he demonstrates how closely he follows him; as we know, in Hesiod Nyx is born out of Chaos, is the sister of Erebus and by Erebus gives birth to Aether and Hemere: from a dark generation (Nyx, Erebus) arises a luminous one (Hemere, Aether). Initially, however, the emphasis is not placed on the contrast between light and darkness. This is because the first beings mentioned in the Hesiodic cosmogony (Chaos, Gaia, Tartarus) do not conform to such a contrasting pattern but rather are used to ensure—in a horizontal structure of the world—the stable ground of the earth. Given the rural priorities of the Boetian poet, such a structure is not entirely surprising. On the other hand, Aristophanes’ priority, no matter how ‘orphic’ it may be—or because it wants to be ‘orphic’—most clearly underlines the dark elements of the first beings of creation which are arrayed temporally: they are defined in terms of time rather than in terms of space. All four of them are hesiodean (Chaos, Nyx, Erebus, Tartarus) but in Hesiod they belong to different generations. Those who have in mind the fecundity of the Hesiodic Gaia (Theogony 126ff) should now discard it and, with it, Ouranos and Aer. Verse 694 makes it explicitly clear. From the beginning, only Nyx can enable the birth of the world. One reason possibly explaining the importance of such a dark element as Nyx in the orphic cosmologic succession is perhaps the fact that Orpheus’ name itself is associated with darkness (ὄρφνη), as Maass previously indicated in 1895,4 and this association, although etymologically contested,5 would have validity in the ears of a poet or his audience.
The birth of the world will arise from the egg laid by Nyx in the bosom of Erebos. It is generally accepted that in promoting Nyx’ role, Aristophanes uses a basic theme of the Orphic cosmogonic tradition,6 something more or less confirmed with the recently published official edition of the Derveni cosmogony (col. 11 and col. 13 are eloquent examples). In many of the salvaged fragments outlining the Orphic perceptions it is Chronos (often identified with Kronos)—and not Nyx—who produces the egg of creation. In fragment 70 (Kern=114 I–V Bernabé) it is mentioned that Chronos created in divine Aether a silver egg: ἔπειτα δ’ἔτευξε μέγας Χρόνος Αἰθέρι δίῳ ὠιὸν ἀργύφεον. Damascius,7 who preserves the fragment, comments that the verb ἔτευξε signifies something that was made and not born and that this product is full of at least two things: ὕλη and εἶδος.8 Damascius himself9 wonders in what way the egg is connected with ontological birth and also in what way the god who emerges from this process is praised. The most comprehensive answer is, perhaps, that the egg is used in these cosmologic narrations as a depiction of the world. In such a depiction the shell of the egg corresponds to the sky, the membrane on the inside of the shell corresponds to aether, while the whole shape of the world is perceived by some as conical, by some others as spherical and by others—the Orphics—as ovoid,10 In the Aristophanic version of the Orphic cosmogony, though, the egg, which is called upon to play such a pivotal role in the birth of beings, has a surprising peculiarity: it is not fertilized.
In Aristophanes’ text the egg laid by Nyx is characterized as ὑπηνέμιον. The word means: something which is windblown, something which is full of wind and, metaphorically, something or someone that is empty, futile, false.11 ’Ωιόν ὑπηνέμιον is an egg produced without intercourse and, consequently, is not expected to produce offspring. An ancient scholion on verse 695 explains that ὑπηνέμια καλεῖται τα δίχα συνουσίας καὶ μίξεως. The same scholion attributes this name to the story of the Dioscouroi, who were also born from an egg and tend to say unsubstantiated things.12 Aristotle13 analytically refers to the categories of ὑπηνέμια ὠιά and describes on which occasions these eggs become fertile. Aristotle’s natural explanation (that the ὑπηνέμιον egg becomes fertile if the hen copulates with a rooster before the egg turns from yellow to white) fits, as to the basic semantic field of the word ὑπηνέμιον, the perception that ascribes fertilizing power to the wind.14 Aristotle explains15 that these unfertilized eggs are also named ζεφύρια, because in spring the female birds seem as if they are receiving the winds—τὰ πνεύματα. At this point we will once again allude to verses of later Orphic literature. A verse which is preserved in a scholion on Apollonius Rhodius16 describes Eros and the winds being born together from Chronos. Some other verses of Orphic poetry, unexpectedly sensitive, preserved by Proclus in his commentary on Plato’s Republic, suggest another link between coming into being and the wind by telling us what will become of the birds’ souls when the birds die. When the animals and the birds die and their soul departs their body, there is no one to lead them to Hades, as happens with humans, so their soul flies here and there aimlessly, without destination, until another bird (or animal) seizes it, mixed as it is with the eddies of wind.17
Verse 694 of the text mentions that, with the turning of the seasons, from the egg laid by Nyx in the bosom of Erebos, Eros ‘sprouted.’ His characteristics are stated clearly, yet they are not justified clearly. Eros is: 1) desired by all (ποθεινός); 2) he has on his back two golden wings that make him shine (στίλβων νῶτον πτερύγοιν χρυσαῖν); 3) he looks like a swirling wind, a maelstrom, (εἰκὼς ἀνεμώκεσι δίναις). That Eros is desirable need not be justified, at a first level of reading, but it must be stated that Eros here substitutes for Protogonos/Phanes of the Orphic cosmogonic tradition, who cannot be automatically presumed equally ποθεινός..18 At any rate, he is considered equally winged. Thus, Eros’ second characteristic, the two golden wings, are justified both by the traditional image of the substitute (Eros) but also by the Orphic concept of the original (Phanes). These wings are also justified—within the text—by the (black) wings of Nyx (Νὺξ ἡ μελανόπτερος, 695) and here we have a significant shift from dark wings to bright wings. At this point it should be noted that the glow emanating from Eros’ wings is the first notion of light in this cosmogony leading to the birth of the birds and thus indirectly yet most explicitly connecting wings with the birth of light.19 Eros’ third characteristic, his resemblance to a whirlwind, should, I believe, be connected with the wind, and more especially with the word ὑπηνέμιον of verse 695, namely with a notion that refers to the initial state and the initial word defining the egg Eros comes from. It should also be linked with the idea of speed which characterizes the whirlwind and which the word ἀνεμώκης itself contains (ἄνεμος + ὠκύς). And, finally, it should be associated with the idea of circularity that characterizes the whirlwind, the recycling of the seasons (περιτελλομέναις ὥραις) and the very shape of the egg. In the image of the whirlwind many scholars try, justifiably so, to also see the influence of philosophical cosmogonic ideas that ascribe to the circular motion the ability to give birth, and such is the case of the whirlwind in Anaxagoras’ νοῦς.20 The verbal combination of the elements that are included in this Aristophanic cosmogony goes, perhaps, even further. Of the four initial beings (Chaos, Nyx, Erebos, Tartarus) Nyx, being the only female entity,21 gives birth (to the egg), not with the sexual participation of Erebos, as in Hesiod, but still using Erebos as an environment (Ἐρέβους ἐν ἀπείροσι κόλποις). Also as an environment, Tartarus will be used by Eros in the creation of the bird species (γένος), while Chaos will be the only one of the four primary beings that appears in a sexual relationship (with Eros), from which the bird species will arise. Aristophanes strangely insists on using all four of the primary beings we know from Hesiod, even if this is not necessary. We saw, when talking about Eros’ wings and the sense of the swirl of the wind, that in this Aristophanic cosmogony some verbal or conceptual reminder always evokes the earlier situation or the parents of the beings that are created. Since the egg whence Eros will emerge is laid in the bosom of Erebos, one tends to see a verbal, paretymological game with the stem—er (ἐρ-), that characterizes both Erebos and Eros.
It remains now to observe the actual process through which Eros emerges into the world. The verb used is ἔβλαστεν, a verb which, metaphorically, often denotes birth. At any rate, its use here is surprising, since there is not a proper birth, but a hatching. Another verb Aristophanes uses to signify the creation of the generation that will come from Eros is the verb ἐνεόττευσεν which refers directly to the image of the chick, the young bird. The time for the birds to be born has come, since the elements directly connected with them have been cosmologically stored; namely, the wings with which they fly, the wind which bears them aloft and which is the basic component of life. For what reason then should we find ourselves on earth again with the verb ἔβλαστεν? In a text such as this, where the words are very carefully selected, one seeks special denotations22 which are most likely to be found in an ‘Orphic’ context. In later Orphic literature as in the ‘Orphic’ Argonautics we have the verb ἐλόχευσε23 that is directly connected with parturition, while in Damascius24 we have the verb ἐκθρώσκει (spring out). Why ἔβλαστεν here? Most likely, to signify the sense of seed, of sperm, that is emphatically presented in most Orphic texts.25 Eros as an offshoot consequently acquires a spermatic ability which he would not possess had he been a mere newborn infant. The importance of this spermatic ability is clearly stated in all Orphic cosmologic poems and, in particular, by the text of the Derveni papyrus, where Zeus, by swallowing Protogonos or Protogonos’ genitals, acquires the genetic power allowing him to rule over a newly born world.26 In most texts of Orphic literature this spermatic ability is also supplemented by a characteristic faculty that is attributed to Protogonos/Phanes: he is considered dual (διφυής), endowed with both male and female genital characteristics and even so with the feminine vulva placed on the buttocks, in the πυγή.27 The Eros of the Aristophanic cosmogony, however, has only two golden wings that shine at the back of his body: στίλβων νῶτον πτερύγων χρυσαῖν.28 Nothing more is stated about his nature, either single or double. But if the bird-metaphor of Eros is pursued a little bit further, then one realizes that it would be easy to associate the κατάποσις of Protogonos/Phanes by Zeus, an important orphic cosmologic instance as we have seen, with a comically analogous swallowing of Protogonos’ birdlike winged substitute (=Eros), since the idea of eating winged birds is invoked several times in the play (387–92, 522–38, 1072–87, 1579–1892).
When one reads not only the Parabasis but the whole play and takes into account the wider social and religious environment of Athenian contemporary life, the thought arises that the ‘Orphic’ ideas may not be limited to these verses of the Parabasis, but they generally meet other dimensions of this comedy. We know, for example, the Orphic religious perceptions, apart from the belief in the posthumous wandering of the soul—the idea of wandering is, anyway, totally congruous with the central theme of the play—discourage the eating of meat and the animal sacrifice,29 something that Aristophanes reminds us of in the Frogs.30 At any rate, eating meat and the act of sacrifice preoccupy Aristophanes in The Birds. The seeds mentioned in verses 159–60 (λευκὰ σήσαμα καὶ μύρτα καὶ μήκωνα καὶ σισύμβρια) are, naturally, seeds that normally constitute birdfeed, yet at the same time they state a category of food that is removed from meat-eating. The same is implied by the dietary habits of the various birds mentioned in Epops’ calling (228–62), while the attack of the birds on the two Athenians in a parody of battle and the Athenians’ defense (336–50) by using a meat spit instead of a lance (387–92), are based on the fact that birds feed people with their meat. This is exactly what Pisthetairos will remind the birds (522–38) in order to persuade them to found their city and lay claims to power. In the second Parabasis, the advice of the chorus to the audience condemns certain tortures the humans inflict on birds (1072–87) in order to eat them. Finally, the famous scene where the birds that wanted to overthrow the democratic order of Nephelokokkygia are roasted by Pisthetairos as an exemplary form of punishment (1579–1692), underlines the elements of meat eating that will trigger Hercules’ gluttony, while at the same time signifying the self-negation of the utopia and the return to the subject of the final revelry, with which the play will end.31 In this delicate subject of eating meat is probably also included one more element supporting the fundamental objection of the Orphics to meat eating: it is the idea of cannibalism, connected in Orphic mythical tradition with the consumption of Dionysus’ body by the Titans. In the Aristophanic Birds, the allusion to this issue is made through the person of Tereus, an involuntary perpetrator, as we know, of a cannibalistic act, namely the consumption of his son’s flesh (Itys), whom Procne had killed to avenge her sister’s rape by Tereus. The choice of the character of Tereus by Aristophanes is based on this precise mythical precedent, since Tereus was transformed by the gods into a hoopoe after committing this act (as Procne was transformed into a swallow). The mythical prehistory of Tereus is, perhaps, implied in verses 75–78, when his servant states that his master’s previous human nature makes him want fish from Phaleron, which the slave is called upon to provide him with.
Another element that we should note, always in relation to the Orphics, is, as mentioned, the issue of sacrifice. In verse 848 of the play preparation begins for a sacrifice which will not be completed. This sacrifice involves blood (προβάτιον, 854; τράγου, 959) and will be repeatedly interrupted before being finally cancelled, the priest and the χρησμολόγος—namely the most suitable ones to handle a sacrifice—being responsible for this. The priest’s inability to perform the sacrifice is precisely due to the nature of the divine beings to which the sacrifice itself is directed, namely, the birds (863–90). What has been noted32 is the relationship of the invocation in the sacrifice of The Birds with invocations that we know of from other ritual contexts, comic or not, and especially with verses 295 et sq. from the Thes- mophoriazusae. Let it be remembered that the Thesmophoria are an example of a ceremony where blood sacrifice and meat eating are for the most part avoided. Prometheus refers to it to emphasize the absence of the sacrifices of live victims that Zeus was deprived of, due to the city of the birds.33 The refusal to eat meat and the abolition of sacrifice are, therefore, elements that pervade in various ways the whole play and, to the extent that this is possible within the frameworks of a comedy, respond to the priorities that would be recognized and appreciated by those in Aristophanes’ audience who are accustomed to the Orphic ideas.
One comes to suspect that the allusion to many issues that echo Orphic ideas in The Birds may be connected with an effort by Aristophanes to win over a section of the audience—and perhaps of the judges—who are either maintained or are called upon to abide by the austere self-restraint stemming from these ideas. But some of these issues might equally be due to a more general questioning or speculation of Aristophanes reflecting the intellectual and social milieu, ‘Orphic’ or not ‘Orphic,’ from which he draws on selectively. One tends then to look for instances of influence received from or exercised on other works connected to The Birds; these influences should, in this case, be sought in facts and events which are chronologically close to The Birds.
The dramatic poet Agathon won first tragedy prize in the Lenaia34 festival of 416 BCE. The event was celebrated at Agathon’s house with the participation of distinguished guests (Socrates, Agathon, Aristophanes, Eryximachus, Phaedros, Alcibiades among others) and it was recorded by Plato in about 385 BCE (perhaps after Aristophanes’ death) as an indirect narrative related by Apollodorus and deliberately placed around 400 BCE. The historical, then, event of the Platonic Symposium is placed in 416 BCE, approximately a year before the creation of The Birds, and includes among the guests—if we are to trust Plato—Aristophanes, who was called to participate in a discussion regarding Eros. This Eros is understood, according to Aristophanes’ speech in the Platonic Symposium (189c–193e), as a desire from and a memory of an earlier human biological status defined by the dual character (189e) of human beings, as well as by the placement of the genitalia on the external (= back) part of the body (191b–191d), a state that alludes, as to its two defining elements, to the Orphic image of Phanes/Eros. These thematic choices most likely meet with some other dimensions that appear in common in the Parabasis of The Birds and Aristophanes’ speech in the Symposium and are to do with: (a) the general thematic attitude of both passages toward the issue of Eros, (b) the cosmogonic elements that are connected with Prodicus35 and (c) the ancientness of Eros as a god, something which is assessed as a positive condition in both The Birds and the Symposium. The myth of hermaphrodite beings able to reproduce on their own, the image of dual creatures that reproduce, and the request to acknowledge Eros as the most ancient god (Symp. 178b) constitute ideas that seem to correspond to a common ground of inspiration in the Platonic Symposium and Aristophanes’ Birds. Aristophanes’ speech in the Symposium is peopled—or haunted—by a ‘species’ of human being bearing many similarities to the Orphic image of Phanes/Eros. This concept, which we find in the cosmogony of The Birds, denotes a possible relation of this comedy to the Platonic Symposium: in many ways, the images that are presented in these two works interpretatively refer to the same areas of inspiration as to the first ὄν of the Aristophanic ‘Orphic’ cosmogony and as to the being that expresses the ‘protogonic,’ dual existence of a human with genitalia on the back part of the body in the Platonic Symposium. This description is attributed to the same person—Aristophanes—and pertains to the same subject of questioning: Eros. Could then the platonic description of this ‘protogonic’ human creature have some ‘Orphic’ soundings? The correlation which is here suggested between the Platonic Symposium and the Aristophanic Birds, based on the evidence mentioned above, appears plausible from an historical and chronological point of view, and likely enough from a thematic and philological point of view. All things considered then, a surprising suggestion, and an attractive one too, is conveyed through these two texts, when read in parallel, and seems to be gradually inserted into the reader’s consideration: that if, in the early fourth century BCE, an author like Plato was looking for a virtual historical figure to evoke some ideas on the birth of Eros and the beginning of human life strongly or vaguely reminiscent of Orphic cosmologic doctrines, he might find it natural to choose, of all Athenian people, Aristophanes as the most suitable herald for these ideas.
1. I attempted a first approach to this passage in 1994, on the occasion of a conference on the Birds organized at the University of Cyprus [Acts in A. Tsakmakis (Τσακμάκης)-M. Christopoulos (Χριστόπουλος), eds., Όρνιθες. Όψεις και αναγνώ- σεις μιας αριστοφανικής κωμωδίας (Athens, 1997)]. Since then, several contributions on this subject have seen the light including N. Dunbar’s extensive commentary on Aritophanes’ Birds (Oxford, 1995) followed by Halliwell’s (Oxford, 1997) and Henderson’s (Oxford, 2003) shorter commentaries, B. Zimmermann’s general survey on Die griechische Komödie (Frankfurt, 2006), A. Bernabé’s “La théogonie orphique et le papyrus de Derveni,” Kernos 15 (2002): 91–127, G. Betegh’s The Derveni Papyrus. Theology, Cosmology and Interpretation (Cambridge, 2004), the edition of the Derveni Papyrus by Th. Kouremenos, K. Tsantsanoglou and G. Parasoglou, The Derveni Papyrus (Firenze, 2006), J. Jouanna’s “L’oeuf, le vent et éros. Sens de “ὑπηνέμιον ὠιόν (Aristophane, Oiseaux, 695)” in Φιλολογία. Mélanges offerts à Michel Casewitz, ed. P. Brillet-Dubois - É. Parmentier (Lyon, 2006), 99–108. Under the light of these and other publications a second approach seemed necessary. I thank P. Brillet-Dubois, R. Buxton, R. Edmonds, Th. I. Kakridis, S. Rangos, I. Ratinaud, A. Tsakmakis for discussing with me several aspects of this paper and J. Smith for his valuable suggestions on my text.
2. Aristophanes, Birds 693–703
Χάος ἦν καὶ Νύξ Ἔρεβός τε μέλαν πρῶτον καὶ Τάρταρος εὐρύς
Γῆ δ’ οὐδ’ Ἀὴρ δ’ οὐδ’ Οὐρανὸς ἦν. Ἐρέβους δ’ ἐν ἀπείροσι κόλποις
τίκτει πρώτιστον ὑπηνέμιον Νύξ ἡ μελανόπτερος ὠιόν,
ἐξ οὗ περιτελλομέναις ὥραις ἔβλαστεν Ἔρως ὁ ποθεινός,
στίλβων νῶτον πτερύγοιν χρυσαῖν, εἰκὼς ἀνεμώκεσι δίναις.
Οὗτος δὲ Χάει πτερόεντι μιγεὶς κατὰ Τἀρταρον εὐρὺ
ἐνεόττευσεν γένος ἡμέτερον καὶ πρῶτον ἀνήγαγεν εῖς φῶς.
Πρότερον δ’ οὐκ ἦν γένος ἀθανάτων, πρὶν Ἔρως ξυνέμειξεν ἅπαντα
Ξυμμειγνυμένων δ’ ἑτέρων ἑτέροις γένετ’ Οὐρανὸς Ὠκεανός τε
καὶ Γῆ πάντων τε θεῶν μακάρων γένος ἄφθιτον. Ὦδε μέν ἐσμεν
πολὺ πρεσβύτατοι πάντων μακάρων ημεῖς. Ὡς δ’ἐσμὲν Ἔρωτος
πολλοῖς δῆλον.
3. Theogony 116–28.
Ἤτοι μὲν πρώτιστα Χάος ἐγένετ᾿ αὐτὰρ ἔπειτα
Γαῖ’ εὐρύστερνος πάντων ἔδος ἀσφαλὲς αἰεὶ
ἀθανάτων οἳ ἔχουσι κάρη νιφόεντος Όλύμπου,
Τάρταρα τ’ ἠερόεντα μυχῶι χθονὸς εὐρυοδείης,
ἠδ’ Ἔρος, ὃς κάλλιστος έν ἀθανάτοισι θεοῖσι,
λυσιμελής, πάντων τε θεῶν πάντων τ’ ἀνθρώπων
δάμναται ἐν στήθεσσι νόον καὶ ἐπίφρονα βουλήν.
Ἐκ δὲ Χάεος δ’Ἔρεβός τε μέλαινἀ τε Νὺξ ἐγένοντο.
Νυκτός δ’αὖτ’Αἰθήρ τε καὶ Ἡμέρη έξεγένοντο,
οὓς τέκε κυσαμένη Έρέβει φιλότητι μιγεῖσα.
Γαῖα δε τοι πρῶτον μὲν ἐγείνατο ἴσον ἑωυτῆι
Οὐρανὸν ἀστερόενθ,’ ἵνα μιν περὶ πάντα καλύπτοι,
ὄφρ’ εἴη μακάρεσσι θεοῖς ἔδος ἀσφαλὲς αἰεί.
4. E. Maass, Orpheus. Untersuchungen zur griechischen, römischen, altchristli- chen Jenseitsdichtung (München, 1895).
5. Among others by W. K. C. Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion (London, 1935), 44.
6. See L. Brisson, “La figure de Chronos dans la théogonie orphique et ses antécédants iraniens” in Mythe et représentations du temps, ed. D. Tiffeneau (Paris, 1985), 37–55 and “Orphée et Orphisme à l’époque impériale. Témoignages et interprétations philosophiques, de Plutarque jusqu’à Jamblique,” ANRW II 36.4 (1990): 2867–3933; M. L. West, “Ab Ovo. Orpheus, Sanchuniathon and the Origins of the Ionian World Model,” CQ 44 (1994): 289–307.
7. Περὶ τῶν πρώτων ἀρχῶν 55: τὸ γὰρ ἔτευξε δηλοῖ τι τεχνητόν, ἀλλ’ οὐ γέννημα. Τὸ δὲ τεχνητὸν ἀλλ’ οὐ γέννημα πάμμικτόν ἐστι ἐκ δυοῖν τοὐλάχιστον, ὕλης καὶ εἴδους ἢ τῶν τούτοις ἀναλογούντων.
8. See M. L. West, The Orphic Poems (Oxford, 1983), 199–200.
9. West, The Orphic Poems, 111: εἰ δὲ παρ’ Ὀρφεῖ πρωτόγονος θεὸς ὁ πάντων σπέρμα φέρων τῶν θεῶν ἀπὸ τοῦ ὠιοῦ πρῶτος ἐξέθορε καὶ άνέδραμε, τίς μηχανὴ τὸ μὲν ὠιὸν ἐξηγεῖσθαι τὸ ὄν, τὸν δὲ ἀπὸ τοῦ ὄντος έκθορόντα πρωτόγονον θεὸν ἀνυμνεῖν; (Kern 85, Bernabé 140 I–240 II).
10. This interpretation is found in the commentary of Achilles (3d century AD) on Aratus’ Phaenomena 4.33, 17 (Maass): τὴν δὲ τάξιν ἣν έδώκαμεν τῶι σφαιρώματι, οἱ Ὀρφικοὶ λέγουσι παραπλησίαν εἶναι τῆι ἐν τοῖς ὠιοῖς. ὃν γὰρ ἔχει λόγον τὸ λέπυρον ἐν τῶι ὠιῶι, τοῦτον ἐν τῶι παντὶ ὁ οὐρανός, καὶ ὡς ἐξήρτηται τοῦ οὐρανοῦ κυκλοτερῶς ὁ αἰθήρ, οὕτω τοῦ λεπύρου ὁ ὑμήν. 6.37,8: σχῆμα δὲ κόσμου οἱ μὲν κωνοειδές, οἱ δὲ σφαιροειδές, οἱ δὲ ὠιοειδές, ἧς δόξης ἔχονται οἱ τὰ Ὀρφικὰ μυστήρια τελοῦντες. Σαφηνείας δὲ ἕνεκα πιθανῆς παρελήφθη τοῦ ωιοῦ ἡ εἰκών. (Kern 70, Bernabé 114 I–V). On the aristophanic perception of the egg, the possibility of Epimenides’ influence on Aristophanes’ passage and the oriental origin of the egg-theme, see Dunbar, Aristophanes’ Birds, 441–443 and West, The Orphic Poems, 201.
11. Cf. Plat. Theaetetus 151e: γόνιμον ἀνεμιαῖον τυγχάνει, 160e: …μὴ λάθῃ ἡμᾶς οὐκ ἄξιον ὂν τροφῆς τὸ γιγνόμενον, ἀλλὰ ἀνεμιαῖον τε καὶ ψεῦδος, always in relation with the concept of fertility, though not of an egg but of the fertility that is to do with the birth of a child. Cf also, Aristophanes Daedalus, 194 (Kassel-Austin) and Araros, Kaineus, II (Meineke): ἀνεμιαῖον ὠιόν, in unknown context. For an analysis see Jouanna, “L’oeuf,” in particular 99–101, 104–8, Dunbar, Aristophanes’ Birds, 441–42, cf. also F. Montanari, Vocabolario de la lingua greca (Torino, 2004 [1995]), s.v. ὑπηνέμιον.
12. Καὶ τοῦτο δὲ οὐχ ὡς ἔτυχεν αυτῶι προσέρριπται, ἀλλὰ ἀπὸ τῆς ἱστορίας τῆς κατὰ τοὺς Διοσκούρους. Φασί γὰρ ἐξ ὠιοῦ αυτοὺς γεγονέναι. Καὶ ὅτι σύνηθες αὐτοῖς μᾶλλον ἀνεμιαῖον λέγειν. Aristophanes uses the word again in Daedalus (IV, V Meineke, 194 Kassel-Austin: Ὠιόν μέγιστον τέτοκεν ὡς ἀλεκτρυὠν. {Ἕν ἴστε: (Meineke) or} Ένίοτε (Kassel-Austin) πολλαὶ τῶν ἀλεκτρυόνων βίᾳ ὑπηνέμια τίκτουσιν ὠὶὰ πολλάκις.
13. Hist. anim. 560a and De generat. anim. 750b.
14. On this fertilizing power of the wind in the birth of Eros see also, long before Aristophanes, Alcaeus, 327 (Lobel-Page) where the love-god is said to be born by Iris and Zephyros. Dunbar (Aristophanes’ Birds, 441) observes that Iris, Zephyros and Eros are, all the three, winged creatures, which might offer an explanation for Alcaeus’ unique genealogy. On Hera begetting Hephaistos as a ὑπηνέμιον child, without union to a male consort, cf Lucian, De sacrif., 6. On the relation of the wind to dark entities such as Tartarus see again Dunbar, Aristophanes’ Birds, 441–443 and G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven, M. Schofield, The Presocratic Philosophers (Cambridge, 1983), 28.
15. 560a: ζεφύρια δὲ καλεῖται τὰ ὑπηνέμια ὑπό τινων, ὅτι ὑπὸ τὴν ἐαρινὴν ὥραν φαίνονται δεχόμεναι τὰ πνεύματα αἱ ὄρνιθες.
16. Sch. 3.26: αὐτὰρ Ἔρωτα Χρόνος καὶ πνεύματα πάντ’ ἐτέκνωσε.
17. Kern 223, Bernabé 339:
αἱ μὲν δὴ θηρῶν τε καὶ οἰωνῶν πτεροέντων
ψυχαὶ ὅτ’ ἀίξωσι, λίπῃ δε μιν ἱερὸς αἰών,
τῶν οὔ τις ψυχὴν παράγει δόμον εἰς Ἀϊδαο,
ἀλλ’ αυτοῦ πεπότηται ἐτώσιον, εἰς ὅ κεν
αὐτὴν ἄλλο άφαρπάζῃ μίγδην άνέμοιο πνοῆισιν.
18. See Brisson, “Chronos,” 38 and “Orphée et Orphisme,” 2876–2877; J. S. Rusten, “Phanes-Eros in the Theogony of ‘Orpheus’ in P. Derveni,” in Atti del XVII Convegno di Papirologia (Napoli, 1983), 333–35, (vol. 2); Betegh, The Derveni Pa- pyrus, 148–49. In the Greek mythographic tradition preceding Aristophanes, the only person who is born by an egg and could reasonably claim to the property of ποθεινή would be Helen.
19. On the relation of the wings with phallic fertility and the political dimension of Eros in Aristophanes’ Birds, see W. Arrowsmith, “Aristophanes’ Birds: The Fantasy Politics of Eros,” Arion NS 1 (1973): 119–67.
20. See Dunbar, Aristophanes’ Birds, 438–445; Jouanna, “L’oeuf,” 106–8.
21. The female factor seems, however, drastically underrated in the Orphic cosmologic tradition in comparison to other Greek mythological narratives; even the theme of the κατάποσις according to which Zeus swallows a female entity (Metis) in the hesiodean cosmogony, when it appears in the Orphic cosmologic context it enacts exclusively male agents (Protogonos/Phanes/Ouranos). Whether this male predominance should be associated with the pederastic dimensions often spotted in the Orpheus myth or with a more general ‘misogynistic element’ as detected by W. K. C. Guthrie in Orpheus and Greek Religion (London, 1935), 49, is a subject of further specific research which cannot be undertaken here in details. See F. Graf, “A Poet among Men” in Interpretations of Greek Mythology, ed. J. Bremmer (London, 1987), 80–106; J. Bremmer, “Greek Pederasty and Modern Homosexuality” in From Sappho to De Sade, ed. J. Bremmer (London, 1989), 1–14; J. Bremmer “Orpheus: From Guru to Gay,” in Orphisme et Orphée, ed. Ph. Borgeaud (Genève, 1991), 13–30.
22. See West, The Orphic Poems, 110 – 11.
23. 13 – 15 : Χρόνον ὡς ἐλόχευσε ἀπειρεσίοις ὑπὸ κόλποις Αἰθέρα καὶ διφυῆ περιωπέα κυδρὸν Ἔρωτα Νυκτὸς ἀειγνήτης πατέρα κλυτόν, ὅν ῥα Φάνητα ὁπλότεροι καλέουσι βροτοί (Kern, 224).
24. West, The Orphic Poems, 123 (=Kern 60, Bernabé 90, 96, 109 VIII, 111 V, 114 VIII, 120 III, 121 I, 139 I, 677 I): τὸ κύον ὠιὸν τὸν θεὸν, ἢ τὸν ἀργῆτα χιτῶνα, ἢ τὴν νεφέλην, ὅτι ἐκ τούτων ἐκθρώσκει ὁ Φάνης.
25. Indicatively I mention the verses: δαίμονα σεμνόν, Μῆτιν σπέρμα φέροντα θεῶν κλυτόν, ὅν τε Φάνητα πρωτόγονον μάκαρες κάλεον κατἀ μακρὸν Ὄλυμπον (Kern, 85, Bernabé 140 I–XI, 240 II) and σὲ Φάνητα κικλήσκω ... μάκαρ, πολύμητι, πολυσπόρε, βαῖνε γεγηθώς (Kern 87, Bernabé 143), where Phanes’ action in producing offspring is stressed.
26. According to whether one takes the genitive αἰδοίου (col. XVI) and the accusative αἰδοῖον (col. XIII) as an adjective or as a noun in the Derveni papyrus, the meaning becomes consequently ‘the reverend one’ or ‘the genitals.’ W. Burkert (Die Griechen und der Orient (München, 2003), 98) and G. Betegh (The Derveni Papyrus, 163) read it as a noun, L. Brisson (“Sky, Sex and Sun. The meaning of αἰδοῖος/αἰδοῖον in the Derveni Papyrus,” ZPE 144 (2003): 19–29) takes it to be an adjective. For the discussion, see Th. Kouremenos, G. Parasoglou, K. Tsantsanoglou, The Derveni Pa- pyrus, 26–28. In both readings, however, the aim of the κατάποσις remains the acquisition of Protogonos’ genetic force.
27. Indicatively see Proclus’ comment on Plato’s Timaeus 30c – 31a: ... ὡς τὸ ζῶιον ἤδη διηιρημένως ἔχει ὅσα ἦν ἐν τῶι ωιῶι σπερματικῶς, οὕτω δὴ καὶ ὁ θεὸς ὅδε προάγει το ἄρρητον καὶ ἄληπτον τῶν πρώτων αἰτίων εἰς τὸ ἐμφανές. Θῆλυς καὶ γενέτωρ ὁ Φάνης ἀνυμνεῖται (Kern, 81); also, Hymn 6: Πρωτόγονον καλέω, διφυῆ, μέγαν, αίθερόπλαγκτον ... αφ’οὗ σε Φάνητα κικλήσκω (Kern, 87); cf also the Suda, s.v. Φάνης: ... τὸν Φάνητα εἰσφέρει αἰδοῖον ἔχοντα ὀπίσω περὶ τὴν πυγήν (Kern, 80).
28. The verb στίλβω denotes the shine of a surface which is polished or bright. In the Birds, Aristophanes has already used it in verse 139 to make the name (appellative or main) Στιλβωνίδης. Sommerstein, in his edition of the Birds ([1991], 208) considers that the audience did not perceive the name as main, because the hero’s name (Εὐελπίδης) is stated and confusion would be created. On this, though, one would note that the form Στιλβωνίδης follows the form of the patronymic names and as such it would not create confusion. It is difficult for one to decide whether Aristophanes extends some particular meaning to the word Στιλβωνίδης and even more difficult for one to assume some correlation between verse 139 and 697. On a pederastic allusion that the use of the verb στίλβω (>Στιλβωνίδης) may acquire in the particular context of verse 139, see the edition of the Birds by I. F. Kakridis (Ι. Θ. Κακριδής, Αριστοφά- νους Όρνιθες (Αθήνα-Ιωάννινα, 1987), 48. Στίλβω is used of Phanes in other Orphic fragments (78 Kern = 136 I, 172 I–II Bernabé, 86 Kern = 123 I–VI Bernabé); Dunbar, Aristophanes’ Birds, 444) believes that these fragments may have been composed under the influence of Aristopanes’ Birds 697.
29. Indicatively see Kern, t. 212, t. 215, t. 216 (=Bernabé 625 I, 629, 43, 45, 650).
30. 1042: Ὀρφεὺς μὲν γὰρ τελετάς θ’ ἡμῖν κατέδειξεν, φόνων τ’ ἀπέχεσθαι.
31. On the use of these elements as to the idea of founding a city and the belying of the initial aims that are stated with the establishment of the city of the birds, as well as on the subject of the cannibalism of Tereus, see A. M. Bowie, Aristophanes, Myth, Ritual and Comedy (Cambridge, 1993), 151–77.
32. See Kakridis, Αριστοφάνους Όρνιθες, 168–69.
33. Birds, 1515–20.
34. Athenaeus 217a.
35. Aristoph. Birds, 692, Pl. Symp. 177b. See also Th. K. Hubbard, The Mask of Comedy (Ithaca and London, 1991), 166; H. Hoffmann, Mythos und Komödie: Unter- suchungen zu den Vögeln des Aristophanes (Hildesheim, 1976), 181.
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