Orphismn.

1818 G. S. Faber Horæ Mosaicæ (ed. 2) II. ii. ii. 203 Into this ancient philosophy, which constituted the basis of Gnosticism and Manicheism, Virgil and Porphyry have largely entered: it may be pronounced the very essence of Pythagorism and Orphism and Platonism.

1868 S. Winkworth tr. C. C. J. Bunsen God in Hist. II. iv. vii. 91 All the more earnest and honest minds who were inclined towards Orphism, affiliated themselves to him [sc. Pythagoras] and his school.

1880 Church Q. Rev. 244 The whole system of what M. Girard designates under the name of Orphism, which..inculcated the strict necessity on the part of man to shake off the low elements of his nature.

1884 W. M. Ramsay in Encycl. Brit. XVII. 128/2 The spirit of Orphism was that of the Oriental Phrygian cultus.

1903 Daily Chron. 29 Dec. 3/3 Orphism..grafted on the early rites of purification and sympathetic magic the higher conceptions of a possible union between the human and divine.

1934 Mind 43 604 He goes on to discuss..the use of the alphabet in the dedications of sacred buildings, Orphism and immortality, and Etruscan notions of punishment.

1984 Times Lit. Suppl. 25 May 597/1 An insubstantial religion constructed by scholars out of myths, cults, verses and ritual connected with his [sc. Orpheus's] name,..Orphism is now obsolete.

2011 R. G. Edmonds ‘Orphic’ Gold Tablets & Greek Relig. x. 257 Orphism did not exist for the ancient Greeks. Even Bianchi, who argued for the opposite conclusion, admitted that a term like ‘Orphism’ must refer to a modern scholarly construct.

1914 A. J. Eddy Cubists & Post-Impressionism (1915) xiv. 207 Superficial Impressionism leads naturally to the painting of pure color effect—color music, orphism, compositional painting.

1959 H. Read Conc. Hist. Mod. Painting iii. 91 Robert Delaunay..was responsible for another deviation from orthodox Cubism... This deviation Apollinaire christened Orphism.

1971 J. Willett in A. Bullock 20th Cent. x. 235/1 Expressionism..was an all-absorbent force which sucked up every other new tendency since Fauvism (Cubism, Futurism and Delaunay's near-abstract Orphism).

1988 R. Lipsey Art of our Own vii. 90 Orphism was declared to exist virtually by fiat, without consulting the artists in question, by Apollinaire in the fall of 1912. Pablo Picasso, Robert Delaunay, Fernand Léger, Francis Picabia, and Marcel Duchamp were the beneficiaries of this critical insight.

1996 I. Flett tr. V. Essers in tr. I. F. Walther Masterpieces Western Art II. 595/1 Orphism sought a pictorial solution to the problem of simultaneity of space and movement, taking as its starting-point proportions borne by colour alone.