THE CONCEPTION OF ORION

THE BIRTH OF THE CONSTELLATION OF ORION

“adnuerant omnes. omnes ad terga iuvenci

constiterant - pudor est ulteriora loqui.
tum superiniecta texere madentia terra:
iamque decem menses, et puer ortus erat.
hunc Hyrieus, quia sic genitus, vocat Uriona:
perdidit antiquum littera prima sonum.”1

The myth that is here related by Ovid in the Fasti is about the birth of the constellation of
Orion. Ovid alludes to more ancient myths that underlie the legends and indicates that the
name of Orion had changed over the course of the ages.

In this myth Hyrieus chances upon the gods Jupiter, Neptune and Mercury (Zeus,
Poseidon and Hermes). By providing hospitality to the gods while in their human form
Hyrieus wins their favour and is granted a wish. Hyrieus requests that he be made a father
without breaking a vow of faithfulness to his deceased wife.

The concept reveals that the true nature of the myth is to enable procreation purely within
a male construct. This device allows the universe to be created outside conventional
procreative means either by a single deity or in this case by three male deities.

vocat Uriona: perdidit antiquum littera prima sonum

According to Ovid the pronunciation of the first letter of Uriona had changed over time
and the name of this deity had become Orion. This suggests that Orion is a corruption of
the original Uriona which itself is a simplification of Uranus or Urania. All of these
derive ultimately from the original god Ouranos.

The archaic Greek deity stood at the apex of the most ancient Greek pantheon. This was
the god of the vault of the heavens that formed a duality with Gaia (the earth) below. It
appears that Ovid is suggesting that in archaic times there was an association between
Uranus and the constellation now known as Orion.

The association of the constellation of Orion with the archaic god Uranus is heretical but
entirely plausible. This primordial deity eventually came to symbolize the heavens in
their entirety. Orion as the most visually compelling constellation must have had an
association with the most prominent deity of the archaic pantheon.

Instead the constellation is inexplicably named after the minor entity of Orion the Hunter
according to the limited modern interpretation. Ovid indicates here that there was an
awareness in his time that the name of Orion was a simplified logo or word that had
changed over the course of time from its primordial source.

The identification, or misidentification, of Uranus with the planet beyond Saturn is a

relatively modern construction. The planet was unknown in ancient times. This then,
according to our modern understanding, leaves Ouranos / Uranus unattached to any
specific heavenly body or constellation. He consequently assumes the chimerical quality
of the father of the heavens.

Therefore the archaic head of the Greek pantheon is left without any significant presence
in the sky while the most visually striking and coherently structured combination of stars
is named after the supposedly minor deity of Orion.

Further evidence of the association of Uranus with Orion is the sexual synthesis of the
legends attached to the deities. Orion is born from the semen splattered hide of an ox (or
bull) that is buried in the earth. Uranus was castrated with a gigantic flint scythe wielded
by Chronos (Saturn) leaving his disembodied phallus shining in the night sky.

According to Cicero “...an ancient belief prevailed throughout Greece that Caelus
(Uranus) was mutilated (castrated) by his son Saturn, and Saturn himself thrown into
bondage by his son Jove: now these immoral fables enshrined a decidedly clever
scientific theory. Their meaning was that the highest element of celestial aether or fire,
which by itself generates all things, is devoid of that bodily part which requires union
with another for the work of procreation.”2

tum superiniecta texere madentia terra:

iamque decem menses, et puer ortus erat.

superiniectum - splatter, throw or scatter over a surface

madentia - be wet with tears, perspiration (or other bodily fluids)
texere - weave, plait together

Ovid states that modesty prevents him from fully describing the act that took place but
from the words used the inference is obvious. In order to give birth to the entity that was
subsequently named Orion the three deities stand over the hide from a freshly slaughtered
ox. They then splatter the hide with their semen covering the surface with a network of
conjoined semen.

The semen splatters are then woven or plaited together to form the constellation of Orion.
The intertwining network of multiple strands of the semen splatter the night sky with a
lattice of heavenly forms.

The semen splattered hide is buried in the earth until it gives birth to Uriona. From
ancient times the pronunciation of the first letter changed so that the constellation came to
be known as Orion.

To translate Uriona as a reference to urine and so suggesting that the gods urinated on the
hide makes no sense within the overall context of the myth. Although hides may be
soaked in urine during the tanning process this does not allow the human mind to imagine
that this could result in a birth. The use of the word superiniecta is not consistent with
soaking the hide in urine. In addition it is unlikely that the use of urine would be
sufficiently scandalous for Ovid to state that modesty prevented him from further
describing the act.

omnes ad terga iuvenci

The previous section of Ovid’s text refers to an ox (bovem) that ploughs the fields of
Hyrieus and it is this animal that is sacrificed and provides the hide for the act. However
here as he gives the partial description of the act he uses the word iuvenci (young bull).

The use of iuvenci suggests that a different version of the myth envisages the semen
splattered hide of a bull. This in itself opens up a range of links to the religious myths that
are focused on the bull as a primary deity.

The secrets of the Mithraic cult, as an example, lie hidden within the confines of their
underground caverns and temples. That a bull’s hide may have been used in some
versions of the legend indicates the interweaving of myths that underlie Ovid’s tale. This
actually demonstrates an authenticity for all myths have many sources.

The existence of another version of this myth is confirmed by Strabo where he references
a lost text from Pindar. “Hyria is the scene of Hyrieus, and of the birth of Orion, of which
Pindar speaks in his dithyrambs; it is situated near Aulis.”3

The act of creation by the three deities of Zeus, Poseidon and Hermes is clearly
associated with the three stars we euphemistically term Orion’s Belt. This is phallic by
association and is further enhanced by representing the triple phallus of the three deities.
Hence Plutarch refers to the triple phallus of the festival of the Pamylia.

“Moreover, when they celebrate the festival of the Pamylia which, as has been said, is of
a phallic member, they expose and carry about a statue of which the male member is
triple; for the god is the Source, and every source, by its fecundity, multiplies what
proceeds from it; and for ‘many times’ we have a habit of saying ‘thrice,’as, for example,
‘thrice happy,’ and unless, indeed, the word ‘triple’ is used by the early writers in its strict
meaning; for the nature of moisture, being the source and origin of all things, created out
of itself three primal material substances, Earth, Air and Fire.”4

The inclusion of Hermes in this trinity of deities is in itself significant. This explains the
name of the Egyptian variant who is called Hermes Trismegistus - the ‘Thrice Greatest.’
He links the creation of Orion to the Egyptian pantheon demonstrating the intertwining of
Egyptian and Greek myth.

The Egyptian creator deity Atum constructs the constellations using his fingers to mould
them out of his own semen as a sculptor might make forms out of clay. According to the
Shabaka Stone this was the original act of creation. “This Ennead of Atum came into
being through his semen and through his fingers.”5

Therefore the universe is formed from an act of male only procreation that is comparable
to the Greek myth of the birth of Orion. In the Egyptian myth the creator is a single deity
that procreates two further entities through an act of self-contained autoeroticism.

The rivers of semen that stream from this act of deified autoeroticism define the creation
myth of ancient Egypt. Atum is self-created through this act which gives birth to the
sacred primordial mound that rises out of the undefined waters of the pre-existing state.
Thus the rising of the phallus of Atum is the first act of creation.
The theology of the Shabaka Stone is supported by the Pyramid Texts of Sakkara which
confirm this theory of creation. The Pyramid Texts document the original Egyptian
creation myth and are in themselves the most ancient evidence of recorded human
thought.

“To say: O Atum-Khepri, when thou didst mount as a hill,

and didst shine as bnw of the ben (or, benben) in the temple of the ‘phoenix’ in
Heliopolis,
and didst spew out as Shu, and did spit out as Tefnut,
(then) thou didst put thine arms about them, as the arm(s) of a ka, that thy ka might be in
them.”6

The autoerotic act of Atum is elaborated in these ancient Pyramid Texts. The rivers of
semen that flow from this act fill the night sky with shining celestial foam. The Nile is
replicated above by these celestial rivers. The celestial aetherial river of the Milky Way is
reflected in the Nile below.

“To say: Atum created by his masturbation in Heliopolis.

To put his phallus in his fist
to excite desire thereby.
The twins were born, Shu and Tefnut.”7

Thus the single entity (the autoerotic mind of Atum) gives birth to two entities (Shu and
Tefnut) without recourse to procreative intercourse. This act avoids the chicken and egg
syndrome by postulating the original act of creation within the self-contained autoerotic
mind of the creator.

Macrobius defines the difficulty in explaining the original act of creation through an act
of conventional procreation. “To say that the egg was produced before the chicken is like
saying a womb came to be before a woman: asking how a chicken could exist without an
egg is like asking how humans were produced before the genitals instrumental in their
procreation.”8

Therefore the act of primordial creation is explicitly linked to the autoerotic act of Atum.
The visual evidence of this is seen in the shining celestial trails of star clusters in the
night sky. The foaming celestial star clusters, formed from the primordial semen, were
envisaged as the ejaculatory splatter of the deity in the night sky.

Another ancient document, the Derveni Papyrus, supports this theory of creation. The
clusters of stars are similarly seen as the foaming secretion of the deified phallus. The
celestial phallus was consequently the originator of the firmament of stars. The Derveni
Papyrus records that “He (the deity) ingested / swallowed the phallus that first procreated
the aether.”9

In this vision the stars become the semen of the gods filling the night sky with a shining
heavenly foam. Aphrodite Urania emerged from the foam surrounding the severed
genitals of Uranus. According to Hesiod this foam formed the heavenly body of the
goddess.

“And so soon as he had cut off the members with flint and cast them from the land into
the surging sea, they were swept away over the main a long time; and a white foam
spread around them from the immortal flesh, and in it there grew a maiden...Her gods and
men call Aphrodite and the foam-born goddess and rich-crowned Cytherea, because she
grew amid the foam…”10

Therefore the foaming clusters of stars are the source of all creation. These streams of
semen were envisaged as rivers of stars formed from the ejaculatory acts of the gods in
the night sky. This semen spatter was woven into an infinite network of stars that formed
the shining constellations.

The single deity Atum produces by an act of autoeroticism Shu and Tefnut. The trinity of
deities is therefore formed in the night sky. Then Atum “didst put thine arms about them,
as the arm(s) of a ka, that thy ka might be in them.”

Orion. Latona nitentibus astris

And Latona set Orion among the shining stars.

“The below is as the above, and the above as the below, to perfect the wonders of the
One.
And as all things came from the One, from the meditation of the One, so all things are
born from this One by adaptation.” (Hermes Trismegistus - the ‘Thrice Greatest’ - the
Emerald Tablet)

iamque decem menses, et puer ortus erat

Orior oriri ortus - to rise

1. Ovid - Fasti 5.531-6
2. Cicero - De Natura Deorum
3. Strabo - Geography 9.2.12
4. Plutarch - Isis and Osiris 34
5. Shabaka Stone
6. Pyramid Text - Utterance 600
7. Pyramid Text - Utterance 527
8. Macrobius - Saturnalia 7.16.10
9. Derveni Papyrus 13
10. Hesiod - Theogony 176-180