Note 19 — Chapter X · THE ORPHICS

Onomakr. εἶναι τοὺς Τιτᾶνας τῷ Διονύσῳ τῶν παθημάτων ἐποίησεν αὐτουργούς, Paus. 8, 37, 5. Lob., p. 335, thinks this refers to the “Theogony”: but no authority attributes a single one of the several Orphic Theogonies to Onomakr. as its real author. We should rather be inclined to think of the τελεταί which is distinctly ascribed to Onomakr. and which at least dealt with the practical side of worship: cf. Pl., Rp. 364 E–365 A, λύσεις, καθαρμοί ἀδικημάτων κτλ. ἃς δὴ τελετὰς καλοῦσιν (but it was not that the mystical βίβλοι were called τελεταί as Gruppe, Gr. Culte u. Mythen, i, 640, mistakenly supposes: he is otherwise quite right in his protest against Abel’s treatment of the τελεταί). They must almost necessarily have dealt with the reproduction of the πάθη τοῦ Διονύσου (as providing the ἱερὸς λόγος to the δρώμενα), and, as the central idea of the orgiastic cult, must have included the most important circumstance of the Orphic τελεταί (see D.S. 5, 75, 4; Clem. Al., Protr. ii, 17, p. 15 P.).