Good Works Translation from Ancient Greek

This page translates Kern fragments 280-283 from the Astrologica section of Otto Kern's Orphicorum fragmenta. These fragments belong to the Orphic Georgica, or farming poem. The witnesses are Tzetzes' prolegomena and scholia on Hesiod, Tzetzes' Chiliades, Tzetzes' commentary on Homer, and a related summary in Tzetzes on the Moon in Virgo.

Translation

Kern Fr. 280 — Opening of the Georgica

Tzetzes says that the beginning of Orpheus' Works, or the poem On Farming, was this:

If desire
for mortal-feeding farming
takes hold of you,

and you make ready
the works
for a golden crop,

driving the well-bent plough
over grain-giving earth,

or if, in the furrows,
you long to set down
the Methymnaean vine-shoot,

and to take
the sweet food
of autumn,

and with the mattock
to gain
the deathless earth:

then at once
I will tell you
the whole truth,

how the all-bright Moon
may be persuaded

to send up for you
the nourishing gifts
of Demeter
and mind-lifting Bacchus,

and to grant
year-long prosperity.

Kern Fr. 281 — The Moon in Aries

Tzetzes quotes one Orphic line about the Moon:

For if indeed
she goes
over swift Aries.

Kern Fr. 282 — Virgo, Planting, and the Vines of Icarius

Tzetzes says that Orpheus also remembers Virgo in the Georgica:

The maiden Astraea
is best
for all seeds,

and favorable
for plants,

and for casting
all shoots
into trenches,

even those
called oak-tips.

But avoid vines.

For the daughter
of Icarius
hates exceedingly
wine-presses
and bitter vines,

remembering
how many grievous things
the people of Attica devised
against Icarius
because of Dionysus,

overcome
by terrible drunkenness:

they shattered him
with hard clubs,

stumbling
under the gifts
of dance-maddening Bacchus.

Tzetzes elsewhere summarizes the same rule:

Orpheus commands that everything be done mathematically. For example: when the Moon runs around Virgo, plant everything except only vines. For Virgo hates the vine because of her father Icarius.

Kern Fr. 283 — Days, Signs, and Stars

Tzetzes says:

That Thracian Orpheus, in the poem On Farming, does not say that a given day of the Moon by itself is useful or useless. Rather, he says this when the Moon is configured in such a way and runs together with the zodiacal signs and the stars.

Colophon

This Good Works translation was made from Otto Kern's Orphicorum fragmenta (Berlin: Weidmann, 1922), frr. 280-283, in the Astrologica section headed "Georgica." Kern's numbering is retained.

The source witnesses translated here are Tzetzes' prolegomena and scholia on Hesiod's Works and Days, Tzetzes' commentary on Homer's Iliad, and Tzetzes' Chiliades, as printed by Kern.

Source Text

Kern Frr. 280-283 — Georgica

Kern fr. 280:

εἰ δὲ γεωπονίης σε φιλομβρότου ἵμερος αἱρεῖ
καί τ᾽ ἐπὶ χρυσείης γενεῆς ἐντύνεαι ἔργα,
γαῖαν ἐπὶ ζείδωρον ἄγων εὐκαμπὲς ἄροτρον,
ἢ γυροῖς ἔνι κλῆμα Μεθυμναίου λελίησαι
κατθέμεναι, καὶ λαρὸν ὀπώρης εἶδαρ ἑλέσθαι
ἱμείρεις σκαπάνῃ τε λαχήμεναι ἄμβροτον αἶαν·
αὐτίκα δή τοι πᾶσαν ἐτητυμίην καταλέξω,
ὅππως ἂν πανδῖα Σεληναίη πεπίθοιτο,
ὄμπνιά σοι Δήμητρος ἀερσινόοιο τε Βάκχου
δῶρ᾽ ἀναπεμπέμεναι καὶ ἐπηετανὸν ὄλβον ὀπάζειν.

Kern fr. 281:

εἰ μὲν γὰρ στείχῃσιν ἐπ᾽ Ἀρνειοῖο θοοῖο.

Kern fr. 282:

Ἀστραίη κούρη δὲ πέλει πρὸς ἅπαντα φερίστη
σπέρματα, καὶ δὲ φυτοῖσιν ἐναίσιμος, ἔν τε βόθροισι
βάλλειν ἔρνεα πάντα, τά τε δρυὸς ἄκρα λέγονται,
οἴνας δ᾽ ἐξαλέασθαι, ἐπεὶ στυγέει περίαλλα
Ἰκαρίου κούρη ληνοὺς καὶ ἀδευκέας οἴνας,
μνωομένη, ὅσα λυγρὰ Διωνύσοιο ἕκητι
Ἀκταῖοι μήσαντο, μέθῃ δεδμημένοι αἰνῇ,
Ἰκάριον, καί μιν στυφελαῖς κορύνῃσι δάϊξαν,
σφαλλόμενοι δώροισι, χοροιμανέος Βάκχοιο.

Tzetzes' prose summary on Virgo:

Ὀρφεὺς δὲ μαθηματικῶς πάντα παρακελεύεται δρᾶν· οἷον Σελήνης τρεχούσης περὶ Παρθένον πάντα φυτεύειν πλὴν μόνων ἀμπέλων· μισεῖ γὰρ ἡ Παρθένος τὴν ἄμπελον διὰ τὸν πατέρα Ἰκάριον.

Kern fr. 283:

Ὀρφεὺς δὲ ἐκεῖνος ὁ Θρᾴκιος ἐν τῇ περὶ Γεωργίας οὐ τὴν ἁπλῶς ἡμέραν τῆς Σελήνης τὴν τοιάνδε λέγει λυσιτελῆ ἢ καὶ ἀνόνητον, ἀλλ᾽ ὅταν τοιῶσδε σχηματισθῇ καὶ συντρέχῃ ζῳδίοις τε καὶ τοῖς ἄστρασιν.