Last Train to Hyperborea

When I was in my early to mid-twenties there was a period of time during which, unable to sleep, I would get up and drive to work in the very early hours of the morning. At the time I called it insomnia, but I also distinctly remember feeling excitement throughout the night, almost as a child on Christmas Eve might. Whatever the cause, the effect was that some days I would arrive at work as early as six in the morning. Alone, in solitude, the lights of the lab thermocyclers my companions. Maybe this is what I liked. Many days I would get there even earlier than Dmitry, the endearingly gruff and taciturn PhD who when once asked what kind of shampoo he used said "a bar of soap". Even Dmitry one morning asked me why I got there so early, and, surprised that he had spoken and unable to articulate why in fact I was there so early, I gave a short nonsensical response. The drive to work those mornings, in my then-new gray 2010 Mazda3, in the dark, was accomplished to the sounds of what I now call my "night music" playlist, with M83's "Midnight City", Ulrich Schnauss' "Stars", Shiny Toy Guns "Major Tom", and Tangerine Dream's "Love on a Real Train" on heavy rotation. "Love on a Real Train" evokes movement and points and streaks of light in the cool dark. Maybe because I subconsciously recalled its music video, a nighttime view of a ride on the Tokyo Rinkai monorail. "Love on a Real Train" occurs on the deluxe version of Tangerine Dream's album Hyperborea, a name that conjures snow, ice, night in my mind.

Hyperborea, though a name used sometimes synonymously with the snow and winter of the far North, was in fact by most accounts (thank you, Theoi) a paradisiacal land of perpetual Spring, absent of illness and old age. Well-attested by the Greeks, it lay beyond the Boreas (North Wind) and was unreachable by most as only demigods, such as the likes of Herakles and Perseus, were able to find it, and the latter only under the guidance of Athene. Further than Aigyptos or Kyprus [Homeric Hymn 7 to Dionysos], and beyond the Grypes (Griffins) who guard gold and were themselves beyond the one-eyed Arimaspians and then the Issedones was Hyperborea [Herodotus, Histories], and so “neither ship nor marching feet may find their wondrous way to it” [Pindar, Pindar Pythian Ode 10]. In his Natural History, Pliny the Elder places the Hyperboreans “beyond the point where north-north-east begins” and outside of the Scythians who are themselves located “from the extreme north-north-east to the northernmost point at which the sun rises in the summer”. In the same text, he additionally when describing the geography and peoples of Europe states that the Maeotae, a Scythian tribe, are along the coast as far as the river Tanais (Don), the Arimaspi are in the rear of these, then come the Ripaean Mountains and the region called Peterophorus, and finally behind these mountains and the Aquilo (Boreas) dwell the Hyperboreans.

Additional clues can be found in the descriptions of the route the Hyperborean offerings took to their destination, Delos, the birthplace of Artemis and Apollon. Pausanias in his Description of Greece says that they sent these to the temple of Apollon at Prasiai by way of first the Arimaspoi, then the Issedones, and Scythians who brought them to Sinope from which place they were carried by the Greeks to Prasiai. Herodotus in Histories says that the Hyperborean offerings were brought to the Scythians and then from these each nation received them in turn until their eventual arrival in Delos. Though the precise order of neighboring peoples differs, by all accounts Hyperborea is far, beyond, North. On a final interesting note as to its location, Pseudo-Apollodorus places Atlas and the apples of the Hesperides not in Libya but instead among the Hyperboreans, which if in fact is at the Northern-most point on the globe, I cannot help but note is a more fitting location from which to hold the sky aloft.

Callimachus, Herodotus, Pausanias, and Pliny the Elder tell that the offerings were of first-fruits wrapped in straw (though Callimachus more specifically says cornstalks and holy sheaves of corn-ears). These were in earlier times brought to Delos by Hyperborean maidens, but as they during one voyage were violated and never returned home, the custom then became for the offerings to be passed from Hyperborea to each nation in turn until they reached Delos. The exact identities of these maidens vary by account; Herodotus names Hyperoche and Laodice, whereas Callimachus states that they were Opis, Loxo, and Hecaerge. A hint as to their fate can be found in Clement’s Exhortation to the Greeks, wherein he states that Hyperoche and Laodice are buried in the Artemision at Delos. Small wonder that the Hyperboreans it seems wish to remain elusive. Additionally, Pausanias says that Erysichthon once brought these offerings but died on the voyage home to Delos. Apart from the temples at Delos, the Hyperboreans were associated with the oracle at Delphi, and it was said by Boeo that the oracle was established by Hyperboreans, and moreover that among these was Olen, the first prophet of Phoibos if not the very first to prophesy and chant in hexameter.

As for the Hyperboreans themselves, they are a happy, long-lived people of good fortune, as befitting the fertile land of genial climate (“exempt from every harmful blast”, according to Pliny the Elder) on which they live. They enjoy music and dancing (“the Mousa is not a stranger to their life”[Pindar, Pythian Ode 10]), with the flute, lyre, and cithara specifically mentioned as being instruments they played. Their homes

are the woods and groves, the land is “productive of every crop, and produces two harvests each year because it has an unusually temperate climate”[Diodorus Siculus, Library of History]. There is neither sickness nor sorrow, and death is a choice made when the natives, having reached the “satiety of life”, jump off of a specific rock into the sea. They are servants of Apollon, some say owing to Leto having been born in Hyperborea, and especially honor him, who partakes and delights in their feasts and revelry.

Now for a few nuggets of information that, like our mysterious Northerly denizens, cannot be easily found, courtesy of OMSF. And the key indeed is in concealed, hidden. Homer speaks of another group of elusive peoples whose island home is a blessed realm hidden in mists. Though generally uninterested in humans, being hospitable, they allow Odysseus to attend their feast and even arrange for his return home on their oarless ships which are able to be controlled by thought alone. These are the Phaeacians, whose king, Nausithous, took his people and fled their homeland to escape the one-eyed giants. The Phaeacians are sylph-like, gray. Very technologically advanced. And they are still around the place today, albeit hidden.

And they like music. Maybe it was the night drive all along.

*Information on Hyperborea was obtained from the sources in Theoi's "Classical Literature Quotes" section