Note 95a — Chapter IX · DIONYSIAC RELIGION IN GREECE ITS AMALGAMATION WITH APOLLINE RELIGION. ECSTATIC PROPHECY. RITUAL PURIFICATION AND EXORCISM. ASCETICISM

The late interpolation in Hes., Th. 411–52, in praise of Hekate leaves out the uncanny side of her character altogether. Hekate has here become so much the universally revered goddess that she has lost all definite personality in the process. The whole is a telling example of the sort of extension that might be given to a single divinity who had once been the vital cult-object of a small locality. The name of this universally known daimon becomes finally of little importance (for everything is heaped upon one personality). Hence there is little to be learnt of the special characteristics of Hekate from this Hymn. (In any case it is time we gave up calling this Hymn to Hekate “Orphic”: the word is even more than usually meaningless and conventional in this case.)