#orphic asks

[mellorphic]

here’s an ask now welcome to the big leagues :)

Ily /p

[gingermintpepper]

As usual I read your tags always and so you said Apollo did not ask for resurrection of Asclepius and Hyacinthus so i just wanted to share this. About Asclepius death I read it on theoi.com, that earlier authors don't make him resurrect as a god but that's a later development mentioned only by Roman authors like Cicero, Hyginus and Ovid. But still Apollo has a role in Ovid's version

Ovid, Fasti 6. 735 ff (trans.Boyle) (Roman poetry C1st B.C. to C1st A.D.) : Clymenus [Haides] and Clotho resent the threads of life respun and death's royal rights diminished. Jove [Zeus] feared the precedent and aimed his thunderbolt at the man who employed excessive art. Phoebus [Apollon], you whined. He is a god; smile at your father, who, for your sake, undoes his prohibitions [i.e. when he obtains immortality for Asklepios].

So here it is actually because of Apollo the decision was taken to resurrect him as god. And with Hyacinthus, I don't think I've read about Artemis playing the primary role. I know in Sparta there was a picture of Artemis, Athena and Aphrodite carrying Hyacinthus and his sister to heaven.

This is not on theoi.com but I saw on Tumblr it's from Dionysiaca by Nonnus

Second, my lord Oiagros wove a winding lay, as the father of Orpheus who has the Muse his boon companion. Only a couple of verses he sang, a ditty of Phoibos, clearspoken in few words after some Amyclaian style: Apollo brought to life again his longhaired Hyacinthos: Staphylos will be made to live for aye by Dionysos.

So since he is singing inspired by amyclean stories it probably means in that place it was believed Apollo was the one to bring back his lover to life.

Apollo as god of order was very important so i think it shows how special these people (and admetus too) were to him that he decided to go against the order for them 🥺

ANON!! Shakes you like a bottle of ramune!! BELOVED ANON!!!!! I'm littering your face with kisses, I'm anointing you with olive oil and honey - you absolutely made my night with this because, not only did I get the pure serotonin shot of having someone interact with my tags (yippee, wahoo!!) I also got to have that wonderful feeling of "oh wow, have I misunderstood something that was integral to my understanding of this myth/figure this whole time or is this a case of interpretational differences?" which is imo vital for my aims and interests as someone who enjoys mythological content and literature.

I'll preface my response with this: Hyacinthus is by far the hardest of these to get accounts for because his revival itself, as you very astutely point out, is generally accounted for in painting/ritual format which muddies the waters on who interceded for what. I wasn't actually familiar with that passage from the Argonautica - and certainly didn't remember it so thank you very much for bringing it to my attention!

That said, what I've come to understand, both about Hyacinthus and about Asclepius is that in the accounts of their deaths, Apollo's position is startlingly clear.

For Hyacinthus, it is established time and again that Apollo would have sacrificed everything for him - his status, his power, his very own immortality and divinity. Ovid writes that Apollo would have installed him as a god if only he had the time:

(Ovid. Metamorphoses. Book X. trans. Johnston)

Many other writers too speak of how Apollo abandoned his lyre and his seat at Delphi to spend his days with Hyacinthus, but they also all agree that when it came to his death - he was powerless. Ovid gives that graphic account of Apollo's desperation as he tries all his healing arts to save him to no avail:

(Ovid, Metamorphoses Book X. Apollo me boy, methinks him dead. trans Johnston)

Bion, in one of his fragments, writes that Apollo was "dumb" upon seeing Hyacinthus' agony:

(Bion, The Bucolic Poets. Fragment XI. trans Edmonds)

Even Nonnus in the Dionysiaca speaks constantly of Apollo's helplessness in the face of Hyacinthus' fate where he writes that the god still shivers if a westward wind blows upon an iris:

and when Zephyros breathed through the flowery garden, Apollo turned a quick eye upon his young darling, his yearning never satisfied; if he saw the plant beaten by the breezes, he remembered the quoit, and trembled for fear the wind, so jealous once about the boy, might hate him even in a leaf...

(Nonnus, Dionysiaca, Book 3. trans Rouse)

And the point here is just that - Apollo, at least as far as I've read, cannot avert someone's death. He simply can't. Once they're already dead - once Fate has cut their string - all Apollo's power is gone and he can do nothing no matter how much he wants to. And this is, as far as I know, supported with the accounts of Asclepius as well!

Since you specifically brought up Ovid's account, I'll also stick only to Ovid's account but in Metamorphoses when we get Ovid's version of Coronis' demise, he writes that Apollo intensely and immediately regrets slaughtering Coronis. He regrets it so intensely that he, like he does with Hyacinthus, does his best to resuscitate her:

(Ovid, Metamorphoses Book Two. Apollo's regret)

And like Hyacinthus, when it becomes clear that what has happened cannot be undone, Apollo wails:

(Ovid, Metamorphoses Book Two. Apollo wept.)

Unlike his mother, Asclepius in her womb had not yet died and so, with the last of Apollo's strength, he does manage, at least, to save him.

(Ovid, Metamorphoses Book Two. Apollo puts the 'tearing out' in Asclepius.)

But it goes further than even that because Ocyrhoe, Chiron's daughter, a prophetess who unduly gained the ability to directly proclaim the secrets of the Fates, upon seeing the baby Asclepius, immediately prophesies his glory, his inevitable death and then his fated ascension:

(Ovid. Metamorphoses, Book Two. Ocyrhoe's prophecy. trans Johnston)

Before she too succumbs to her hubris and is transformed by the Fates into a horse so she can no longer speak secrets that aren't hers to share.

These things ultimately are important because it establishes two very important things: 1) Apollo can't do anything in the face of the ultimate Fate of mortals, which is, of course, death and 2) even when Apollo is Actively Devastated, regretful, yearning, mournful, guilty or some unholy combination of all of the above, when someone is dead, he accepts that they are gone. Even if he is devastated by it, even if he'll cry all the rest of his days about it - if they're dead? Apollo lets them go. In Fasti, when Zeus brings Asclepius back, he does not say Apollo asked him to - Zeus, or well, in this case Jove, brings Asclepius back because he wants Apollo to stop being mad at him.

(Ovid, Fasti VI. Apollo please come home your father misses you. trans. A.S Kline)

Even Boyle's translation which you used above in your findings hints that Zeus made Asclepius a god because he wanted Apollo to stop grieving. (i.e 'smile at your father', 'for your sake [he] undoes his prohibitions')

And like, Apollo was deeply upset by Asclepius' death - apart from killing the Cyclops in anger, in book 4 of the Argonautica, Apollonius writes that the Celts believe the stream of Eridanus to be the tears Apollo shed over the death of Asclepius when he left for Hyperborea after being chastised by Zeus for killing his Cyclops:

But the Celts have attached this story to them, that these are the tears of Leto's son, Apollo, that are borne along by the eddies, the countless tears that he shed aforetime when he came to the sacred race of the Hyperboreans and left shining heaven at the chiding of his father, being in wrath concerning his son whom divine Coronis bare in bright Lacereia at the mouth of Amyrus.

It all paints a very clear picture to me. Apollo did not ask for either of them to be brought back. Though bringing them back certainly pleased and delighted him, they are actions of other gods who are moved by Apollo's grief and mourning and seek to mollify him. Him not asking doesn't mean he didn't want them back which I think is a very important distinction by the by, but it simply means that Apollo knows the natural order of things and, even if it hurts, he isn't going to press his luck about it.

Which, of course, brings us to Admetus. And I'm really not going to overcomplicate this, Admetus is different because, very vitally, Admetus is not dead. Apollo can't do a thing once Fate has been carried out and Death has claimed a mortal but you know what he absolutely can do? Bargain like hell with the Fates before that point of inevitability. And that's what he does, ultimately for Admetus and Alcestis. He sought to prolong Admetus' life, not revive him from death or absolve him from death altogether and even after getting the Fates drunk, he's still only able to organise a sacrifice - a life for a life - something completely contingent on whether some other mortal would be willing to die in Admetus' place and not at all controllable by Apollo's own power.

All of these things, I think come back to that point you made - that Apollo's place as a god of order is very important and therefore these people are very special to him if it means he's willing to go against that order but, I also wish to challenge that opinion if you'd let me. Apollo's place as a god of order is very important and therefore, I would argue, that it is even more important that it is shown that he does not break the divine order, especially for the people that mean the most to him. The original context of my comments which started this conversation were on this lovely, lovely post by @hyacinthusmemorial which contemplated upon Asclepius from the perspective of an Emergency Medical personnel and included, in their tags, the very poignant lines "there's something about Apollo letting go when Asclepius couldn't that eats my heart away" and "you do what you can, you do your best, but you don't ever reach too far" and I think that's perfectly embodied with the Apollo-Asclepius dichotomy. Apollo grieves. He wails, he cries, he does his best each and every time to save that which is precious to him but he does not curse their nature, he does not resent that they are human and ultimately, he accepts that that which is mortal must inevitably die. There is nothing that so saliently proves that those who uphold rules are also their most staunch followers - if Apollo wants to delight in his place as Fate's mouthpiece, he cannot undo Fate. And, if even the god of healing and order himself cannot undo death, what right does Asclepius, mortal as he is, talented as he is, have to disrespect it?

The beauty of these stories isn't that Apollo loved them enough to bring them back. The beauty is that Apollo loved them enough to let them go.

[genericpuff]

Tbf, aren't there some accounts of Hades being Melinoe's father instead of Zeus?

*I am not a scholar on this so don't quote me on this, always remember to do your own research as well!

IIRC, Melinoe is commonly cited/attributed to being the "daughter of Hades" simply through the affiliation of Persephone who is both her mother and the wife of Hades. However, in the original accounts (I believe Melinoe originally stems from the Orphic Hymns) Zeus impersonated Hades with the intent of bedding Persephone thus leading to the birth of Melinoe.

"...I call, Melinoe, saffron-veiled, terrene, who from Persephone dread venerable queen, mixt with Zeus, arose, near where Kokytos' mournful river flows; when, under Plouton's semblance, Zeus divine deceived with guileful arts dark Persephone. Hence, partly black thy limbs and partly white, from Plouton dark, from Zeus ethereal bright." - Orphic Hymn 71 to Melinoe

(*this has been altered slightly to make it more readable)

TBH I think most of the accounts of Melinoe being Hades' legitimate blood-related child comes more from the attempts to modernize the story over the years (or at least the natural attribution of Hades being her father figure) and remove the very blatant incest between Persephone and Zeus. Because if there's anything worse than getting married off to your uncle, it's getting knocked by your dad 😬

This is making me think of Hades 2 though and I'm so fucking psyched for that game you have no idea-

[corpium]

My idiot paladin Tav was thrilled to meet Minsc and Boo bc “I too have a small space creature I carry around with me who tells me what to do!”

The real reason Emps didn’t want Minsc was because he was like “Oh gods another one”

[11queensupreme11]

Omg I can breathe! Thank you for the new chapter! Loved it even though there wasn't a lot of focus on our main girl! Can I say I don't really like Rhea. Honestly, out of all the characters, she's my least favorite. Mainly bc I'm my opinion she's a bad mom. This chapter kind of cemented it. Like she goes all out for her sons but not her daughters(which I know ancient Greece and everything, but she is the mother of God's! She should have some sway!) Like she just let Zeus rape hera and doesn't even scold him for cheating or anything. Then she invites a woman who her daughter hates to a tea party and just tells her to be fine with it. Then, her other daughter gets no sympathy for her when the one thing she loves most is stolen. She's just happy for her boy hades! Idk how demeter could even still call them family tbh. Honestly, I'm not a Rhea fan at all! (No hate on you, though! This is just my opinion on her as a character!)

to be fair... most of the mothers are no different unfortunately 😔

here's a list of some rape victims in different versions of greek mythology (first is female, second pic are male victims)

found here btw.

as you can see, the names apollo and hermes are also there. i highly doubt their mothers had any issue on what they did

it's really gross, but rape is just so normalized for these gods that they probably couldn't care less unless the victim was someone they actually cared about.

rhea is no different. yes she loves her daughters, and ofc, i like to think she at least scolds or punishes her sons for their actions, but it's more like a light grounding at most 💀 i genuinely see her getting upset at what had happened, but eventually just... "getting over it" as time passed.

like maybe she was just "this is horrible, how DARE you do this to your sisters! *punishes her son*" (several centuries pass) "alright, i'm done being mad at you, but you better not do this again, young man! 😡" and then they do it again and the cycle just repeats 💀

[highway-userboxes]

could you do one for “this system is brainmade-heavy?” referably with grey background black/dark gray text/border and like. a cloud image?

sure thing!

text: This user is Brainmade-Heavy

text 2: This system is Brainmade-Heavy

text 3: This plural is Brainmade-Heavy

text 4: This collective is Brainmade-Heavy

[crime-soncloud]

元気ですか？あなたが元気であることを願っています

(how are you? I hope you are well.)

I'm doing great! Things are quite chill rn

[orphiclovers]

Yoohan vs spyjh which one will win in orphic's heart?

Why are we pitting two bad bitches against each other?

Anyway ORV canon wouldn't have happened without EITHER of these ships. If SP hadn't sent Han Sooyoung to change the 1863rd turn, YJH would never have even had the chance to kick off the 1864th regression we know and love. And if during the 1863rd round Han Sooyoung hadn't driven YJH to a mental breakdown he would never have chosen KDJ (y'all joongdokers better keep her in your prayers for this). They're both equally crucial to the plot

[orphicpoieses]

I have so many drafts on my account…

So many things I wrote over the last year or so and I somehow don’t want to delete them but publishing them don’t feel right either…

What are you doing with drafts that sit on your account for a long time?

[mellorphic]

On your post about c!crimeboys: I completely agree that c!Wilbur cares about c!Tommy a whole lot and it grates on my nerves when people claim there is no care there at all. However, I don't think that means he is incapable of purposefully hurting him. In fact, c!Wilbur has expressed malicious intent towards c!Tommy on a few occasions in canon, the most blatant case of this probably being Ghostbur saying that c!Wilbur wanted to specifically blow up c!Tommy's L'Manburg, which is why he made him president. I think characters are perfectly capable of caring about someone and knowingly hurting them at the same time. In the case of Revivedbur in particular, some of his behaviors around c!Tommy can even be interpreted as him purposefully hurting c!Tommy to scare him off because c!Wilbur is afraid he is inevitably going to hurt him in a more serious way. I think there is a lot of nuance to it

I don’t remember the Ghostbur scene you’re talking about at all so I can’t say much on that. But I would say it could be taken with a grain of salt since it is Ghostbur and not c!Wilbur himself. I say this because of the one scene when Quackity and Tommy were with Wilbur in the button room and were trying to get him not to blow up L’Manberg.

c!Wilbur says “you love it, don’t you, Tommy?” And when he replies with a nod, that was what got Wil to back down. The thing that stopped him that day was the fact that I’d he didn’t he’d hurt c!Tommy and c!Quackity.

There’s also the button room scene itself where he talks about how “even with tubbo in charge, I don’t think it can exist again” about L’Manberg, and I feel like c!Wilbur’s view of ‘Tommy’s L’Manberg’ would be pre-election L’Manberg. (At one point he said smth along the lines of “ to me, it’s you” about L’Manberg to c!Tommy in the early days) and if that can’t exist again, he would see Tommy’s L’Manberg as having already been destroyed.

Your second point though, 100% agree with. But from that point could it not be argued that c!Wilbur is scaring him off so that he doesn’t hurt him more in the long run? That he doesn’t WANT to hurt Tommy at all and thinks that this is the lesser of two evils and in which case means if he felt he had any other options, he wouldn’t be hurting Tommy at all? Sure he’s intentionally hurting him but it’s to stop him from getting hurt more.

Tysm for the ask btw /gen I love love love talking about c!crime

[deathlessathanasia]

while Zeus can be nasty but still why did the Orphics shave him rape his mother and daughter

According to the Derveni commentator: „His poetry is something strange and riddling for people. But Orpheus did not intend to tell them captious riddles, but momentous things in riddles. Indeed, he is telling a holy discourse from the first and up to his last word. As he also makes clear in the well-chosen verse: for having ordered them to put doors to their ears he says that he is [? not legislating] for the many . . . [? but only for] those pure in hearing…”

In short, stories like the ones you mentioned may seem gross and strange, but that is only because we fail to understand their true meaning.

What could be the true meaning of Zeus wanting to get it on with his mama, you might wonder? Well, according to the same commentator, Zeus did not actually want to have sex with his own mother, but rather to unite with the good mother (this doesn't make much sense in English but it is based on Greek phonetics), so with the mother that produces good things or that is concerned with the good. Also: „In column XXVI of the Derveni Papyrus, the commentator hastens to explain that Zeus, as fire, wishes not to unite with his own mother, but to be combined with air. Air is to be understood as the good mother known as the Intellect, who, producing all things, must be identified with Destiny, which is in reality the Thought of Zeus, identified with the Breath.” (Luc Brisson and Michael Chase, Zeus did not Commit Incest with his Mother. An Interpretation of Column XXVI of the Derveni Papyrus)

[zero-braincells-left]

BIRTH ‼️‼️💥💥💥💥💥🌈🌈🌈🌈💥💥🔥🔥🔥🔥💯💯💯💯🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️

YAYAYAYAYAYAY… 12 MINUTES BUT A LOT OF PPLS TOME ZOMES ITS ALRWADY SO WYYAYYYYYYYY

[lucidiferneedssleep]

Project: Orphic-Silliness Is A-go!

You might be one of the lucky few who voted in the project-focus poll I did some time ago. There, I gave all of you the option to vote between a few different things I could take to working on. As the two top ones became an Orphic ask blog and a comic about the actual MysticTale timeline: Hey, why not do both? So I present to you:

Ask Orphic!

During the (unspecified) amount of time I'll be hosting this little thing, you can send in asks for Orphic (and maybe other characters) to answer while I continue writing the actual book for MysticTale on a03 (*ahem* which I have linked in my introductory post...) AND I still get to draw my favorite silly all the while!

There aren't too many rules to this Ask-Orphic event, but I'll summarize.

RULES

1. Strictly sfw. Don't ask anything weird.

2. No shipping in this project. It makes me a bit uncomfortable in some cases. I'll ignore any asks with it in them.

3. Cursing and dark humor is fine to some extent.

4. Interactive asks like asking to give him things or do stuff with the environment around are allowed, but I might not ALWAYS include them.

5. Please don't bring up IRL situations.

6. Be nice and respectful!

That's it.

Have fun!

"The Captain better have a good reason for sending me all of this...."

Part 1 Skeletons don't have blood.

Part 2 "Nope."

[echthr0s]

WELL

[heartless-curr]

would you be okay with transmascfem lesboy ena shinonome icons? if possible could you include val ena and/or her fragsekai colofes card? if not its totally cool also take your time!!

hi i'm totally down to do these! when i make and post them would you like me to @ you in the post?

[alex-just-vibing]

i’m going to cry

saving this for the gc