The Orphia Telesti: A Wandering Initiator

The Orphia or Thessaly is an interesting figure that is actually only mentioned a little. Plutarch in kind of comedy-like settings, right? It's always a kind of parody. I think Plutarch perhaps measures and the Theophrastus. He says he would go to the Orphia Telesti every month with his nurse and his children to get purified because he's always afraid of everything. So it seems a bit like a caricature typical of the new comedy, you see? Typical initiator who is taking money out of credulous people.