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Oil study of dark and luminous evening clouds.
John Constable, Study of Clouds, Evening, 31 August 1822, Birmingham Museums Trust.John Constable; digital image via Birmingham Museums Trust / Art UK / Wikimedia Commons; Public domain. · Source · Public domain. Detail shown.

Orphic Hymns · Hymn 21

The Clouds

Νεφῶν

Orphic tradition · 7 lines · The Clouds

NatureFertilityProsperity

Prayer and ritual

These hymns may be spoken as complete prayers to the Gods. Within the Temple’s practice, a ritual is a direct theurgical act; hymnody gathers the mind and turns it toward the Divine, helping the initiate enter reverent communion with the Gods.

Use a hymn on its own in place of another prayer, or add it to the prayer portion of a suitable ritual. Choose according to the deity addressed and the petition expressed in the hymn. When combining them, preserve the ritual’s prescribed sequence and let the hymn give voice to its purpose.

The petition of this hymn

Prayer to the Clouds for rain that nurtures the fruits of Mother Earth. It praises their fiery and thunderous motion while seeking their gentle, fertile gift.

Recite independently in prayer for fields, gardens, and the nourishment of the land. It may supplement an established seasonal or agricultural rite, giving clear expression to a petition for life sustaining rain.

English hieratic rendering

Hymn 21 · An English rendering aligned with the Greek lines.

  1. Clouds of the air, nourishing fruit, wandering through Heaven,
  2. giving birth to rain, driven by the winds throughout the Cosmos,
  3. thundering, fiery, loudly roaring, travelling watery roads,
  4. bearing a dreadful crash in the bosom of the air,
  5. drawn against one another by the winds, crashing as you rush,
  6. I now beseech you, clothed in dew, breathing kindly with the breezes:
  7. send rains that nurture fruit upon Mother Earth.

Ancient Greek & pronunciation

Read the English pronunciation spelling directly below each Greek line.

7 Greek lines
  1. Ἠέριαι νεφέλαι, καρποτρόφοι, οὐρανόπλαγκτοι,ee-EH-ree-eh neh-FEH-leh, kahr-poh-TROH-fee, oo-rah-NOH-plahng-tee,
  2. ὀμβροτόκοι, πνοιῇσιν ἐλαυνόμεναι κατὰ κόσμον,ohm-vroh-TOH-kee, pnee-EE-seen eh-lahv-NOH-meh-neh kah-TAH KOH-zmohn,
  3. βρονταῖαι, πυρόεσσαι, ἐρίβρομοι, ὑγροκέλευθοι,vrohn-DEH-eh, pee-ROH-eh-seh, eh-REE-vroh-mee, ee-ghroh-KEH-lehf-thee,
  4. ἠέρος ἐν κόλπῳ πάταγον φρικώδε’ ἔχουσαι,ee-EH-rohs ehn KOHL-poh PAH-tah-ghohn free-KOH-dheh’ EH-khoo-seh,
  5. πνεύμασιν ἀντίσπαστοι ἐπιδρομάδην παταγεῦσαι,PNEHV-mah-seen ahn-DEE-spah-stee eh-pee-dhroh-MAH-dheen pah-tah-YEHF-seh,
  6. ὑμᾶς νῦν λίτομαι, δροσοείμονες, εὔπνοοι αὔραις,ee-MAHS NEEN LEE-toh-meh, dhroh-soh-EE-moh-nehs, EHFP-noh-ee AH-vrehs,
  7. πέμπειν καρποτρόφους ὄμβρους ἐπὶ μητέρα γαῖαν.PEHM-been kahr-poh-TROH-foos OHM-vroos eh-PEE mee-TEH-rah YEH-ahn.
Short sound guide for English speakers

Every line beneath the Greek uses English pronunciation spellings. Say each hyphenated syllable in sequence and emphasize the syllable in CAPITALS. For example, οὐρανόθεν is oo-rah-NOH-thehn. Read adjacent vowels separately: theh-AH has two syllables; oo-rah-NEE-een has four. Hyphens guide the voice; they do not mark pauses.

SpellingSound to make
ah · eh · ee · oh · oofather · met · see · go without its final glide · moon. Keep these vowels clear in unstressed syllables too.
th · dhThe unvoiced th in thin · the voiced th in this. Thus DHEE begins with the sound in “thee.”
khThe ch in Scottish loch or German Bach: let air pass at the back of the mouth, without closing it into a k.
hyThe breathy beginning of a carefully spoken Hugh. Raise the middle of the tongue toward the roof of the mouth and let air pass without voice. In shy, sound s followed by hy; do not use the English sh sound or the English word “shy.”
ghMake the kh sound above, then add voice. Keep the passage open; this is a flowing sound, not a hard g.
y · gy as in yes, with gentle friction · always a hard g as in get.
rTap the tongue lightly behind the upper teeth, or use a light roll.
ks · psSound both consonants, even at the beginning of a word: ks as in backs, ps as in lips.
n-g · m-b · n-dSound the nasal and the following consonant. In AHN-geh-leh, the n-g group is like finger, with the g audible.

Always sound s as in hiss, even at the end of DHEE-kees; z is voiced, as in zero. All other consonants have their usual English sounds. Initial consonant groups may be unfamiliar: sound every written consonant, without inserting an extra vowel. A word without capitals carries no written stress in the Greek. Where two syllables have capitals, both written accents are retained. An apostrophe marks a vowel already elided in the Greek; do not add it back. A hyphen at the end of a Greek verse joins the unfinished word to the next verse.

These spellings follow the Modern Greek liturgical reading used throughout this library. Breathings and iota subscripts are silent; separately pronounced vowels remain separate. The few Greek consonants without an exact English equivalent use the sound cues above. Ancient vowel length, pitch accent and metre are not reconstructed.

Hymn notes

Sacred meaning

The Clouds unite water, wind, fire, and thunder in one movement through the Cosmos. Their power is directed in the final line toward fruitfulness, so the hymn reads the storm through its place in Earth's nourishment.

Ancient offering rubric: Myrrh.

Textual note

The seven lines form a single sustained invocation ending in the request for fruit nourishing rain. The number of lines is preserved without adding a separate closing formula.

Text and attribution

Greek text: Eugenius Abel, Orphica (1885), printed pages 70. The text follows the printed main reading of this edition; source-specific variants are recorded where relevant. Read the digitised edition. Greek source. Wikisource transcription, revision 124172; checked and corrected against Abel’s print. The English hieratic rendering and suggested devotional use are new editorial work. The applications are guidance for this library, not additional lines of the ancient poem.