The Orphic Hymns

Of Nature. Incense: aromatics. O Nature, goddess, mother of all, resourceful mother, heavenly, eldest, power, maker of many things, queen, tamer of all and yourself untamed, helmswoman, all-radiant,

Physis comes from the verb phyō, "bring forth, grow," and its first sense is the way a thing is born and grows. Many of the early Greek philosophers wrote books that went by the title On Nature, about how the whole world came to be; in this hymn Nature becomes a goddess to whom one prays. She is polymēchanos, "resourceful," Homer's word for Odysseus. She is pandamatōr, "tamer of all," and in the same breath adamastos, "untamed." Both words come from damaō, "tame, subdue": she subdues everything, and nothing subdues her. Almost the whole hymn is a list of her titles, twenty-eight lines of them, before the prayer itself in the last two. Many of the titles have already been given to other gods in this book: "untamed" and "supreme power" to Heaven, "tamer of all" to Aether, "rich in seed" to the First-born, "giver of quick births" to the goddess of childbirth. Here they are gathered on one goddess.