There is no evidence that the Italians of the fifteenth century knew (or at any rate considered) the true meaning of the Orpheus myth.

Of its relation to the Sun myth and of Euridice as the dawn they give no hint.

To them Orpheus was the embodiment of the Arcadian idea.

He was the singer of the hymns that woke all nature to life.

For him the satyr capered and the coy nymph came bridling from her retreat, the woods became choral and the streams danced in the sunlight to the magic of his pipe.