Orpheus in Thracian Rural Beliefs and Rites

The available database from the Thracian lands allows us to understand how the prehistoric civilizational models began and how the principles of interacting between their two main structures — the village and the city have crystalized. Nowhere else in Europe it is possible to trace better the peculiarities throughout thousands of past years and outline the essential differences between rural and urban culture. And to understand the fundamental differences in worldviews, to look at the differences in everyday stereotypes and the ways in which peasants and citizens conceive, perceive and strive to organize the world. This is also illustrated by the available written information and monuments about one of the most ancient cultural heroes — Orpheus, which should not be associated with the Thracian Orphism postulates in Thracology. In fact, for the Thracian cattle-breeding community, the invention of agriculture, the cleansing of wicked deeds, the remedies for diseases and the redemption of God’s wrath were most important in order to ensure fertility of flocks, fields and people. It is significant that in the Bogomil Books and Legends, in the Bulgarian apocryphal works and folklore there are many Orpheus notions: about Good and Evil and the corresponding anthem-prayers; data on medicines, divinations and prayers; substances for the remission of sins; fortune-telling; and last but not least, prayers and blessings for fertility.