Orpheus was the son of Apollo and the Muse Calliope. Presented with a Lyre as a boy by his father, he became the most talented musician alive, rivaling only the gods. One day he played his Lyre in the forest and awakened the wood nymph Eurydice. They fell in love and married. When Eurydice was gaily running through a meadow with Orpheus, she was bitten by a serpent, died and immediately descended to Hades. Devastated, Orpheus traveled down into the underworld to beg for her return. He successfully charmed the creatures of death with his sweet music, and finally Hades agreed to return Eurydice to him on one condition: he was not to look back at his wife as she followed him back above ground. Just before the two lovers returned to the light, Orpheus could not wait any longer and looked back when he saw his wife disappearing, saying "Farewell." At that very moment, she was snatched back because he did not trust that she was there. Orpheus tried again to enter the underworld and demand her return, but one cannot enter twice the same way. No other option but death was open to him. Orpheus died being torn to pieces by the Maenads and thrown to the winds, but the Muses mourned the death of their son and prodigy and saved his head to sing forever.

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