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Prayer to Selene for any operation (pre-4th c. AD)
(text: PGM IV 2785-2870)
O Three-faced
Selene, come to me beloved mistress
Graciously hear my
sacred spells:
Image of Night,
Youthful One,
Dawn-born
lightbringer to mortals
Who rides upon
fierce-eyed bulls.
O Queen, you who
drive your chariot
On equal course
with Helios,
You dance with the
triple forms of the triple Graces
As you revel with
the stars.
You are Justice
and the thread of the Fates,
Clotho, Lachesis
and Atropos,
O Three-headed One
you are
Persephone,
Megaira and Allecto
O One of many
shapes who arm your hands
With terrible
dark-glowing lamps,
Who shakes locks
of fearsome serpents at your brow,
Whose mouths send
forth the roar of bulls,
Whose womb is
thick with reptile-scales,
At whose shoulders
are rows of venomous serpents,
Bound across your
back beneath murderous chains.
O Night-bellower,
Lover of solitude, Bull-faced and Bull-headed One
You have the eyes
of bulls and the voice of dogs.
Your forms are
hidden in the legs of lions.
Your ankle is
wolf-shaped, and savage dogs are friendly to you,
Wherefore they
call you Hekate, Many-named, Mene,
Cleaving the air
like arrow-shooting Artemis.
O Goddess of Four
faces, Four names, Four ways,
Artemis,
Persephone, Deer-shooter, Night-shiner,
Thrice-resounding,
Triple-voiced, Three-headed, Thrice-named Selene
O Trident-bearing
One of the Three-faces, Three-necks, Three ways,
Who holds undying
flaming fire in triple baskets.
You frequent the
Three-ways and are Mistress of the Three Decads.
Be gracious unto
me who is invoking you and hearken favourably.
You encompass the
vast world at night,
You make the
Daemones shudder and the Immortals tremble,
O Many-named
Goddess who brings glory to men,
Whose children are
fair, O Bull-eyed One, Horned One,
Nature,
All-mother, who brings forth both Gods and men,
You roam around
Olympus and traverse the wide and fathomless Abyss,
You are the
Beginning and the End, and you alone are Mistress of All:
For from you are
All things, and in you, Eternal One, do All things end.
You bear at your
brow an everlasting diadem,
the unbreakable
and irremovable bonds of great Kronos,
And you hold in
your hands a golden sceptre
Which is encircled
by a formula inscribed by Kronos himself
Who gave it you to
bear in order that all things remain steadfast:
'Overpowerer
and Overpowered One,
Conqueror of
men and Damnodamia.'
You rule Chaos,
Araracharara êphtisikêre,
Hail Goddess and
attend your epithets.
I offer you this
incense Child of Zeus
Arrow-shooter,
Heavenly One, Goddess of Harbours,
Mountain-roamer,
Goddess of Crossroads,
Nocturnal One of
the Underworld, Shadowy One of Hades,
Still One who
frightens, having a feast among the graves.
You are Night,
Darkness and broad Chaos,
For you are
Necessity hard to escape
You are Fate, you
are Erinys and the Torture,
You are the
Murderess and Justice
You hold Cerberus
in chains,
You are
steely-blue with serpent-scales,
O serpent-haired
and Serpent-girdled One,
Blood-drinker,
Death-bringer who breeds corruption,
Feaster on hearts,
Flesh-eater who devours those who died before their time,
Come to my
sacrifices and fulfill this task for me.
NOTES: This potent magical hymn represents an image
of Greco-Roman Hekate with some features in common with the Chaldean
Goddess. These links are discussed in many places Chaldean Hekate,
especially pp 117-8 & n. [29].
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