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The Orphic Hymns
the Orphic tradition · Hymn 21, lines 1–3 · Airy clouds, nurses of the crops
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Hymn 21 · The Clouds
ΝΕΦΩΝ, θυμίαμα σμύρναν
Of the Clouds · incense: myrrh
21.1
The Orphic Hymns 21.1 · Airy clouds, nurses of the crops
The Clouds are called as goddesses: wanderers of the sky, driven by the winds, full of thunder and fire.
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ΝΕΦΩΝ1
Nephôn
Of the Clouds
. θυμίαμα2
thymíama
Incensewhat is burned
σμύρναν3
smýrnan
myrrh
. Ἠέριαι4
Ēériai
Airy
νεφέλαι5
nephélai
clouds
, καρποτρόφοι6
karpotróphoi
nurses of the cropsripening fruit
, οὐρανόπλαγκτοι7
ouranóplanktoi
wanderers of the sky
, ὀμβροτόκοι8
ombrotókoi
rain-bearinggiving birth to rain
, ἐλαυνόμεναι9
elaunómenai
driven
πνοιῇσιν10
pnoiêisin
by the winds
κατὰ11
katà
across
κόσμον12
kósmon
the world
, βρονταῖαι13
brontaîai
thundering
, πυρόεσσαι14
pyróessai
fiery
, ἐρίβρομοι15
eríbromoi
loud-roaring
, ὑγροκέλευθοι16
hygrokéleuthoi
on watery paths
, Of the Clouds. Incense: myrrh. Airy clouds, nurses of the crops, wanderers of the sky, rain-bearing, driven by the winds across the world, thundering, fiery, loud-roaring, on watery paths,
Of the Clouds. Incense: myrrh. Airy clouds, nurses of the crops, wanderers of the sky, rain-bearing, driven by the winds across the world, thundering, fiery, loud-roaring, on watery paths,
Interpretation
Of the Clouds. Incense: myrrh. Airy clouds, nurses of the crops, wanderers of the sky, bearers of rain, driven by the winds across the world; thundering, fiery, loud-roaring clouds on your watery paths,
The Clouds are best known to us as the chorus of Aristophanes' comedy, where Socrates prays to them as his new goddesses and tells an old countryman that it is they, not Zeus, who make the rain and the thunder: thunder, he says, is the crash of clouds full of water colliding. The hymn also gives the clouds thunder and fire, but it honors them for a farmer's reason. They are karpotrophoi, "nurses of the crops," and the prayer at the end asks them for rain.
21.4
The Orphic Hymns 21.4 · Send rain on mother earth
The clouds crash as they race before the wind. The prayer asks them for rain on the fields.
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holding a dread crash in the bosom of the air, pulled against by the winds, crashing as you rush on, now I pray you, dew-clad, airy with breezes, to send crop-nourishing rains onto mother earth.