This collection includes three full-length plays: AGAMEMNON, THE LIBATION BEARERS, and THE EUMENIDIES, collectively known as THE ORESTEIA. I grieve for this melancholy hearth, On the tomb of Agamemnon he places a lock of his hair, and when Electra discovers it, she is confident that it must be an offering to the dead made by none other than her brother. The women of Lemnos, jealous of Thracian slaves, killed their husbands, so that when the Argonauts visited the island they found no men. [942] The commands proclaimed loudly by Loxias, tenant of the mighty cavern shrine of Parnassus, assail with guileless guile the mischief now become inveterate. [363] No, not even beneath the walls of Troy, father, would I wish you to have fallen and to be entombed beside Scamander's waters among the rest of the host slain by the spear. [854] O Zeus, O Zeus, what should I say? AEGISTHUS View a map of the most frequently mentioned places in this document. CHORUS Indeed I grasp the meaning of the riddle. Chorus. CHORUS ORESTES CHORUS [1059] There is one way to cleanse you: the touch of Loxias will set you free from this affliction. SERVANT: house slave serving in the royal palace. Orestes Hermes of the nether world, you who guard the powers [kratos] of the ancestors, prove yourself my savior [sōtēr] and ally, I entreat you, now that I have come to this land and returned from exile.On this mounded grave I cry out to my father to hearken, 5 to hear me… [There is a gap in the text.] [323] My child, the fire's ravening jaw does not overwhelm the wits of the dead man, but afterwards he reveals what stirs him. The last of these, however, is usually attributed by modern scholars to an unknown playwright. And by setting bounds to his course may you grant that we see him keep a steady pace through this race and win the goal in the straining stride of a gallop.32. 14. [176] It is very much like my own in appearance. [646] The anvil of Justice is planted firm. If you have a better course to urge, speak! Nisus' daughter Scylla, being in love with Minos, cut from the head of her father the purple hair on which his life depended, so that he was slain by the Cretans. The Chorus persuades her to alter the message and bid him come unattended. CHORUS ELECTRA Destiny fashions her arms and forges her sword quickly, and the famed and deeply brooding Fury is bringing the son into our house, to requite at last the pollution of blood shed long ago. Your current position in the text is marked in blue. ORESTES Hear! [494] And in a fabric shamefully devised. [457] And I in tears join my voice to his. For though a man may pour out all he has in atonement for one deed of blood, it is wasted effort. [886] I tell you the dead are killing the living.37. 24. There is no reference to Orestes and Pylades or to Agamemnon and Cassandra. But if there is another matter requiring graver counsel, that is the concern of men, and we will communicate with them. And for those dear to you below the earth, and for those above, exact satisfaction for their dire wrath by working bloody ruin in our house and obliterating the guilt of murder.36. [875] O woe, oh utter woe! [551] I choose your reading of this portent. [400] And it is the eternal rule that drops of blood spilled on the ground demand yet more blood. My sister must go inside, and I charge her to keep concealed this pact with me, so that as by craft they killed a worthy man, so by craft they may likewise be caught and perish in the very same snare, even as Loxias decreed, lord Apollo, the prophet who has never before been false. Hide browse bar Hear, O Earth, and you honored powers below! I mean to kill you by his very side. As I understand it, it fits at every point. [223] Then my own also, if yours. [He forces Clytaemestra within; Pylades follows.]. And yet through all my life my heart is fed with lamentation. No, rather it is a net: you might call it a hunting net, or robes to entangle a man's feet. [Rushes out.]. CHORUS SCENE. What is happening? 9. neokrata, “ newly-mixed.” As friendship, when begun, was pledged by a loving-cup, so Orestes, after his long absence, is to be welcomed as a new friend. I am pursued. [653] Boy! And yet it will be accomplished for our father's sake.15. Again for the third time I call for some one to come out of the house, if by Aegisthus' will it offers welcome to strangers. 12. CHORUS But the spirit of her murdered lord was worth and sent a baleful vision to distress her soul in sleep. Hermes of the nether world, you who guard the powers that are your father's, 1 prove yourself my savior and ally, I entreat you, now that I have come to this land and … In AGAMEMNON, the title character, having sacrificed his daughter, Iphigenia, to win the battle of Troy, returns to Argos. [914] No, surely I did not cast you out in sending you to the house of an ally. Orestes makes known that he has been divinely commissioned to his purpose of vengeance. PYLADES Say it again so that I may catch your meaning better. Od. Tell some what to do, others what to leave undone. She has been recognized by him by reason of her mourning garb; but not until she has had further proof, by signs and tokens, will she be convinced that it is he in very truth. [122] And is it right for me to ask this of the gods? For truly the injustice of him who has unjustly transgressed the sovereign majesty of Zeus lies on the ground trampled under foot.27. [458] And let all our company blend our voices to echo the prayer. To let fall these words brings me fear. [658] Announce me to the masters of the house, for it is in fact to them that I come bearing news. You hear the story of the ignominious outrage done to your father. [490] O Persephone, grant us indeed a glorious victory! The “lash of this double scourge” refers to the appeal to the dead, lashing him to vengenace, to the beating of the head and breast, and to the stamping open the ground, which, like the invocation of the dead, were intended to arouse the nether powers. And see this piece of weaving, your handiwork, the strokes of the batten and the beasts in the design. (Part 1 is called Agamemnon, and Part 3 is called Eumenides. [497] Either send Justice to battle for those dear to you, or grant us in turn to get a similar grip20 on them, if indeed after defeat you would in turn win victory. —The heroic age. May the divine word prevail that so I may not serve the wicked!41 It is right to revere the rule of heaven. The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text. It was because she was shaken by dreams and wandering terrors of the night that she sent these offerings, godless woman that she is. [461] Ares will encounter Ares; Right will encounter Right. [767] Arrayed how? Ah, house laid low in ruin! How in my loyal zeal can I succeed in finding words to match need? [Exit Servant. Do you know something beyond what has been told? I command you to do this as you shall be held to strict account. ELECTRA Let me only take her life, then let me die! No, hope is merely flattering me. Someone give me a battle-axe, and quickly! These, as well as several other more recent translations and academic commentaries, appear in the booklist (left below). But I honor the hearths of homes not heated by passion's fires, and in woman a spirit that shrinks from audacious deeds. ORESTES 1926. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1926. Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License. I can stay no longer. Her own neck, near the razor's edge, is now ready to fall beneath the stroke. [120] As judge or as avenger, do you mean? 35. Boy! [118] What should I say? [456] Father, I call on you; side with your loved ones! Aria was a district of Persia. Boy! And prosperity—this, among mortals, is a god and more than a god. changes, storing new additions in a versioning system. ELECTRA Tucker interprets this passage to mean “fiercely stern with penalties not to be paid with money,” that is, penalties demanding the death of the guilty, who may not offer money to satisfy the claims of vengeance; and thus an allusion to “wer-gild,” known in Homeric times. If only, like a messenger, it had a kind voice, so that I would not be tossed by my distracted thoughts. [He again takes up the bloody robe.] Whereupon Althaea took the brand and put it in a chest; but when Meleager, grown to youthful manhood, slew her brothers, she threw it into the fire, and her son died suddenly. And ye-I say 'twere well to bear a tongue Full of fair silence and of fitting speech What is being accomplished for our house? [997] What name shall I give it, however tactful I may be? [885] What is this? Cilissa!30 Where are you going? But when hope once again lifts and strengthens me, it puts away my distress and dawns brightly on me. [216] And do you know whom among mortals I was invoking? barus pitnôn); so that her vision is itself called an oneiromantis. [451] Yes, let it sink deep into your ears, but keep inside a quiet steadfastness of soul. And may it be to triumph! Whether his friends decide to bring him home or to bury him in the land of his sojourn, a foreigner utterly forever, convey their wishes back to me. Unbar and open the women's door! My beloved, valiant Aegisthus! [777] Not yet; he would be a poor prophet who would so interpret. The Persians, 2. For I know that our nearest kin are bitter foes to us both. [530] What food did it crave, the newborn viper? VIII, Part 3. ORESTES CHORUS (15). [179] But how did he dare to come here? [811] May Maia's son,34 as he rightfully should, lend his aid, for no one can better sail a deed on a favoring course, when he would do so.35 But by his mysterious utterance he brings darkness over men's eyes by night, and by day he is no more clear at all. ORESTES CHORUS ORESTES 13. ELECTRA And Hermes25 overtook him. May Might and Justice, with Zeus, supreme over all, in the third place, lend you their aid! Yet at the sight of this tress cut in mourning, and when you were scrutinizing the footprints of my tracks, your thought took wings and you knew you had found me. In place of dirges over a tomb, a song of triumph within the royal halls will welcome back a reunited friend.9, ORESTES [585] Many are the horrors, dread and appalling, bred of earth, and the arms of the deep teem with hateful monsters. [235] O best beloved darling of your father's house, its hope of a saving seed longed for with tears, trust in your prowess and you will win back your father's house. CHORUS [923] You will kill yourself, not I. CLYTAEMESTRA I do not have the assurance for that, nor do I know what I should say as I pour this libation onto my father's tomb. ELECTRA ELECTRA CHORUS Her inner emotion is joy that the hope of Electra is crushed -- the hope that her brother would return and end the unseemly revelry. What cry for help are you raising in our house? “Phoebus” is used for a prophetic “possession,” which assails Clytaemestra as a nightmare (cp. But while I am still in my senses, I proclaim to those who hold me dear and declare that not without justice did I slay my mother, the unclean murderess of my father, and a thing loathed by the gods. You have lain too long prostrate on the ground. Even what was laid well out of harm's way you bring down with your well-aimed shafts from far off, and you strip me of those I love, utterly wretched as I am. [1021] But since I would have you know, for I do not know how it will end: I think I am a charioteer driving my team far beyond the course. It was he who declared that, if I did this thing, I would be acquitted of wrongdoing. Murder my father and then make your home with me? [1051] What fantasies disturb you, dearest of sons to your father? Which way can we turn, O Zeus? The certainty of a messenger's report is nothing compared with one's own interrogation of the man himself. That is, let him bide his time by guarding against haste. The dice of fortune will turn as they fall and lie with faces all lovely to behold, favorably disposed to whoever stays in our house. But the news so plainly told by the strangers means utter ruin for this house. CHORUS As a “twofold” lion (Clytaemestra and Aegisthus) has ravaged the house, so there has been a twofold slaughter by its defenders. O delightful eyes that have four parts of love for me: for I must call you father; and to you falls the love I should bear my mother, whom I most rightly hate; and the love I bore my sister, victim of a pitiless sacrifice; and you were my faithful brother, bringing me your reverence. The plays are three adaptations by three different writers. But go inside and inquire of the strangers. [111] First to yourself, then to whoever hates Aegisthus. Yet to my mind it would have been irreverent not to fulfill for friends a charge like this when I was bound by promise and hospitality pledged to me. Full against the prow of my heart wrath blows sharply in rancorous hate. [560] In the guise of a stranger, one fully equipped, I will come to the outer gate, and with me Pylades, whom you see here, as a guest and ally of the house. [109] While you pour, utter benedictions for loyal hearts. ORESTES ELECTRA Detailed explanations, analysis, and citation info for every important quote on LitCharts. And in a land beyond the sea you would have found a tomb heaped high with earth, no heavy burden for your house to bear—. I would anticipate these needs. [781] Well, I will go and do your bidding. The Queen sends as messenger Orestes’ old nurse to summon Aegisthus from outside accompanied by his bodyguard. 31. I can stay no longer. Il. [721] O hallowed earth, and hallowed barrow raised high that now lies on the royal form of the commander of the fleet, now hear me, now lend me aid! 40. Orestes offers a lock of his hair to do honour to Inachus, the river-god of Argos, because rivers were worshipped as givers of life. ELECTRA [212] Give recognition to the gods that your prayers have been fulfilled, and pray that success may attend you in the future. [225] Now, even though you see him in me, you are slow to learn. Now Princess Electra dwelt in the palace, but was treated no better than a slave; but, before that Agamemnon was slain, her brother, Prince Orestes, had been sent to abide with his uncle Strophius in a far country, even in Phocis. For where is goodwill greater than from guest to host? Click anywhere in the 7. Stand around in a circle, and display this covering for a man, that the Father may see—not mine, but he who surveys all this, the Sun—that he may see the impious work of my own mother, that he may be my witness in court that I justly pursued this death, my own mother's. ORESTES But all the while I was kept sequestered, despised, accounted a worthless thing. You have lain too long prostrate on the ground. [899] Pylades, what shall I do? To lay this too upon our house would be a fearful burden when it is still festering and galled by the wound inflicted by an earlier murder. Cissia formed part of Susiana. Ah, the unstaunched pain! Our gallant Orestes, with no one to assist him, is now to meet with two in such a contest. [20] Sent forth from the palace I have come to convey libations to the sound of sharp blows of my hands. [729] Our stranger, I think, is working mischief: for over there I see Orestes' nurse all in tears. [42] Intending to ward off evil with such a graceless grace, O mother Earth, she sends me forth, godless woman that she is. [783] Now at my supplication, O Zeus, father of the Olympian gods, grant that the fortunes of our house be firmly established, so that those who rightly desire the rule of order may behold it. ORESTES . [220] But surely, stranger, you are weaving some snare about me? Your current position in the text is marked in blue. CHORUS But the balance of Justice keeps watch: swiftly it descends on those in the light; sometimes pain waits for those who linger on the frontier of twilight; and others are claimed by strengthless night. The language of the passage is accommodated to a double purpose: (1) to indicate an oracular deliverance on the part of the inspired prophetess at Delphi, and (2) to show the alarming nature of Clytaemestra's dream: while certain limiting expressions (as aôponukton, huptou) show the points of difference. ELECTRA Inordinate passion, overmastering the female, gains a fatal victory over the wedded unions of beasts and humans alike. But never yet have I endured a blow like this. Orestes, displaying the bloody robe in which his father had been entangled when struck down, proclaims the justice of his deed. CLYTAEMESTRA Whether by any chance I am speaking to those with whom the question rests and whose concern it is, I do not know. CHORUS A SERVANT CHORUS [892] It is you I seek. Agam. What can you tell me of this to make it plain to my mind? To what calamity should I set this down? You have indeed admonished me thoughtfully. 33. 23. Harvard University Press. Orestes and Pylades, disguised as Phocian travellers, are given hospitable welcome by Clytaemestra, to whom it is reported that her son is dead. ELECTRA For how can I expect to find that someone else, some townsman, owns this lock? With him are Pylades and attendants who display the robe of Agamemnon.]. May such a woman not live with me in my house! For the dark bolt of the infernal powers, who are stirred by kindred victims calling for vengeance, and madness, and groundless terrors out of the night, torment and harass a man, and he sees clearly, though he moves his eyebrows in the dark.8 And with his body marred by the brazen scourge, he is even chased in exile from his country. ORESTES CHORUS of Slave-women ELECTRA A SERVANT CLYTAEMESTRA PYLADES NURSE AEGISTHUS. [439] Yes, and I would have you know he was brutally mangled.19 And even as she buried him in this way, she acted with intent to make the manner of his death a burden on your life past all power to bear. CHORUS “To wail to a tomb” was a proverbial expression according to the Scholiast, who cites the saying, “'tis the same thing to cry to a tomb as to a fool.” Here, though in strictness zôsa is added only to point the contrast with tumbon -- the sentient being with the senseless thing -- it also defines the application of tumbon to Orestes; and its insertion serves to suggest that Clytaemestra means that, though living, she is bewailing her own death. Orestes, the hope of our house, is gone. ORESTES Oh for a man mighty with the spear to deliver our house, an Ares, brandishing in the fight the springing Scythian bow and wielding his hilted sword in close combat. ORESTES [831] Raise up Perseus' spirit within my breast. ORESTES Every word of mine has been uttered in justice. From my eyes thirsty drops of a stormy flood fall unchecked at the sight of this tress. For your own sake we make this lament. [887] Ah! CHORUS 10. [121] Say in plain speech, “One who will take life for life.”. [529] She laid it to rest as if it were a child, in swaddling clothes. They would be a sorry gift to send to the senseless dead: I cannot guess what they mean. 26. Is there one of these tales I have gathered that I do not justly cite? [896] Wait, my son! [As they conclude, Electra discovers the lock of Orestes' hair.]. A proverbial saying, meant for the Nurse, and not for Aegisthus: “In passing through the mouth of its bearer a message may be changed as he pleases.” 17. And as to the manner in which this evil deed was wrought, I charge all men of Argos in time to come to bear me witness. 1. See more The Oresteia : Agamemnon, the Libation Bearers... Email to friends Share on Facebook - opens in a new window or tab Share on Twitter - opens in a new window or tab Share on Pinterest - opens in a new window or tab Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph. Of verses 819-837 only the general sense is clear. [775] What! [1061] You do not see them, but I see them. For he has a woman's mind, or if not, it will soon be found out. [174] And further, in appearance it is very much like—. The Oresteia Trilogy (Agamemnon, Libation Bearers or Choephori and The Eumenides), 7. [554] It is a simple story. [927] Yes, for my father's fate has marked out this destiny for you. Hear me, oh hear me, my honored lord, out of the darkness of your spirit.5 Woe, woe, woe! NURSE CHORUS ELECTRA CLYTAEMESTRA With the gods' blessing may everything turn out for the best! And though all streams flow in one course to cleanse the blood from a polluted hand, they rush in vain. Have compassion on your offspring, on the woman and on the man as well, and let not this seed of Pelops' line be blotted out: for then, in spite of death, you are not dead. [942] Oh raise a shout of triumph over the escape of our master's house from its misery and the wasting of its wealth by two who were unclean, its grievous fortune! [674] I am a stranger, a Daulian of the Phocians. Do what you are asked to do! Why as you set foot in the palace gate do you have a grief as an unhired companion? ELECTRA You handmaidens, look at them there: like Gorgons, wrapped in sable garments, entwined with swarming snakes! [Enter, with attendants, Orestes and Pylades before the palace.]. Another proof! Prometheus Bound The emergence of the individual against his angry God. CHORUS 1926. CHORUS: slave women captured at Troy and serving the royal palace at Argos. For I do not speak of Aegisthus' death: he has suffered the penalty prescribed for adulterers. 28. Boy! CHORUS But I am afraid to utter the words she charged me to speak. For what atonement is there for blood fallen to earth? CHORUS CLYTAEMESTRA [30] For with a hair-raising shriek, Terror, the diviner of dreams for our house, breathing wrath out of sleep, uttered a cry of terror in the dead of night from the heart of the palace, a cry that fell heavily on the women's quarter.3 And the readers of these dreams, bound under pledge, cried out from the god that those beneath the earth cast furious reproaches and rage against their murderers. [221] Then I am devising plots against myself. O Zeus, O Zeus, who send long-deferred retribution up from below onto the reckless and wicked deeds done by the hands of mortals. For since the gods laid constraining doom about my city and led me from my father's house to a slave's lot, it is fitting for me to govern my bitter hate, even against my will, and submit to the wishes of my masters, whether just or unjust. ORESTES [838] I have come not unasked but summoned by a messenger. CHORUS [218] Then how have I found an answer to my prayers? CLYTAEMESTRA [Enter Orestes' Nurse.] [380] This has pierced the earth and reached your ear14 as if it were an arrow. DATE. Prometheus Bound. CHORUS of Slave-women Have pity, child, upon this breast at which many times while you slept you sucked with toothless gums the milk that nourished you. Your story spells our utter undoing. ELECTRA ELECTRA VIII, Part 2. [110] And to whom of those dear to me should I address them? Have I succeeded now by the will of the gods? 19. CHORUS VIII, Part 4. Or shall I speak the words that men are accustomed to use: “To those who send these honors may he return benefits”—a gift, indeed, to match their evil?4. Alas! ORESTES [493] You were caught, my father, in fetters forged by no smith's hand. ORESTES “Their evil” is unexpectedly substituted for “their good.” The question is ironical, since it was natural for a Greek to return evil for evil (cp. Nisus was besieged in his town of Megara by Minos, king of Crete. [173] Yes, for those who ought to have mourned with a lock of hair are enemies. [991] But she who devised this abhorrent deed against her husband, whose children she bore, a burden under her belt, a burden once dear, but now a hateful ill, as it seems: what do you think of her? 1926. By a fresh award redeem the blood of deeds done long ago. [315] O father, unhappy father, by what word or deed of mine can I succeed in sailing from far away to you, where your resting-place holds you, a light to oppose your darkness? The Oresteia trilogy by Aeschylus is the only surviving example of a complete trilogy of ancient Greek plays and consists of the three linked plays Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides. Together they vowed a league of death against my unhappy father, and together they vowed to die, and they have kept their promise well. Then you would have left a good name for your children in their halls, and in their maturity you would have made their lives admired by men. CLYTAEMESTRA [775] Why not, if Zeus at last may cause our ill wind to change? There he had grown to youthful manhood, and on the selfsame day that his mother sought to avert the evil omen of her dream, accompanied by his cousin Pylades, he came to Argos seeking vengeance for his father’s murder. CHORUS [916] Then where is the price I got for you? Click anywhere in the Apollo, his champion (Hom. At once I am devoid of hope and my viscera are darkened at the words I hear. [66] Because of blood drunk up by the fostering earth, the vengeful gore lies clotted and will not dissolve away. CHORUS ELECTRA I am in torment, my brain is in a whirl! Likewise between heaven and earth lights22 hung high in the air draw near; and winged things and things that walk the earth can also tell of the stormy wrath of whirlwinds. [172] There is no one who could have cut it but myself. TIME. This is what I would like to know. Or am I right to suppose that for my father's sake they bear these libations to appease the powers below? As I was on my way, carrying my pack on business of my own to Argos, just as I ended my journey here,28 a man, a stranger to me as I to him, fell in with me, and inquired about my destination and told me his. NURSE 1 person found this helpful [112] Then for myself and for you also shall I make this prayer? Look, the light has come, and I am freed from the cruel curb that restrained our household. And now Orestes: he was indeed prudent in keeping his foot out of the mire of destruction, but now mark down as having abandoned us what was once the one hope in our house of a cure for its fine revelry.29. Alas! [Exit Orestes and Pylades. [911] And fate now brings this destiny to pass. For like a fierce-hearted wolf the temper we have acquired from our mother is implacable. Many years after king Agamemnon's murder at the hands of his wife Clytamnestra and her lover Aigisthos, his son Orestes returns home with Pylades to mourn at his grave. But his wits begin to wander; the Erinyes of his mother, unseen by the others, appear before his disordered vision; he rushes from the scene. [The Chorus withdraws to the side of the scene; then a servant of Aegisthus rushes in.]. ORESTES It can only be for this cause: for indeed I think my own sister Electra is approaching, distinguished by her bitter grief. . Libation Bearers study guide contains a biography of Aeschylus, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis. Aesch. But it is the hour when strangers who have been travelling on a long day's journey should have their proper entertainment. Orestes prays that, as Clytaemestra and Aegisthus had “got grip” of Agamemnon by deception, so he may “get like grip” of them and kill them. . [917] I am ashamed to reproach you with that outright.
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