Delphi Complete Works of Aeschylus (Illustrated) (Delphi Ancient Classics) (10 page)
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Authors: Aeschylus
ANTIGONE
[1055]
He
suffered evil and gave evil in return.
HERALD
[1056]
But this
act was against all the citizens, not only one man.
ANTIGONE
[1057]
Discord
is the last of the gods to close an argument. I will bury him. Put an end to
your big talk.
HERALD
[1059]
Well
then, follow your own rash plan, but I forbid it.
[
Exit.
]
CHORUS
[1060]
Ah,
misery! O Erinyes, far-famed destroyers of families, goddesses of death who
have thus laid ruin to the family of Oedipus, digging it up from the roots!
What will happen to me? What should I do? What plan shall I devise? How can I
have the heart neither to weep for you nor escort you to your tomb? But I am
afraid and turn away in terror of the citizens. You, at least, Eteocles, will
have many mourners, while he, wretched man, departs without lamentation and has
a dirge sung only by one sister. Now who could comply with that?
FIRST HALF-CHORUS
[1072]
Let the
city take action or not take action against those who lament for Polynices. We,
at all events, will go and bury him with her, following the funeral procession.
For this grief is shared by all our race, and the city approves as just
different things at different times.
SECOND HALF-CHORUS
[1078]
We will
go with this other corpse, as the city and justice, too, approves. For after
the blessed gods and powerful Zeus, he it was who saved the city of the
Cadmeans from being capsized and flooded by a wave of foreign men — he beyond
all others.
[
Exeunt omnes.
]
Translated by Herbert Weir Smyth
The Suppliants
appeared in 463 BC when
democratic undercurrents were running through Athens in advance of the establishment of a new
democratic government in 461 BC. In the play, the Danaids, the fifty daughters
of Danaus, founder of Argos, flee a forced
marriage to their cousins in Egypt.
They turn to King Pelasgus of Argos for
protection, but Pelasgus refuses until the people of Argos weigh in on the decision, a distinctly
democratic move on the part of the king. The people decide that the Danaids
deserve protection and they are allowed within the walls of Argos despite Egyptian protests.
The Suppliants
is the first play part of
a trilogy, which was followed by two lost plays
The Egyptians
and
The Danaids
.
A plausible reconstruction of the trilogy’s last two-thirds runs thus: during
the course of the war, King Pelasgus has been killed, and Danaus rules Argos. He negotiates a
peace settlement with Aegyptus, as a condition of which, his fifty daughters
will marry the fifty sons of Aegyptus. Danaus secretly informs his daughters of
an oracle predicting that one of his sons-in-law would kill him; he therefore
orders the Danaids to murder their husbands on their wedding night. His
daughters agree.
The Danaids
would
open the day after the wedding.
In short
order, it is revealed that forty-nine of the Danaids killed their husbands as
ordered; Hypermnestra, however, loved her husband Lynceus, and thus spared his
life and helped him to escape. Angered by his daughter’s disobedience, Danaus
orders her imprisonment and, possibly, her execution. In the trilogy’s climax
and dénouement, Lynceus reveals himself to Danaus, and kills him (thus
fulfilling the oracle). He and Hypermnestra will establish a ruling dynasty in Argos. The other
forty-nine Danaids are absolved of their murderous crime, and married off to
unspecified Argive men. The satyr play following this trilogy was titled
Amymone
, after one of the Danaids.
The Danaides (1903) by John William Waterhouse
DANAÜS
PELASGUS, King of Argos
HERALD of the Sons of Aegyptus
CHORUS of the Daughters of Danaüs
Attendant Maidens
SCENE. — A sacred precinct on the
shore not far from Argos.
Many images of the gods are visible whose collective worship is denoted by a
common altar.
TIME. — Prehistoric.
Io, daughter of Inachus, King of
Argos, was priestess of Hera, whose jealousy of her lord’s love for the maiden
brought upon her victim marring of mind and body; and she was driven distraught
and in the semblance of a heifer made to wander over land and sea until she
came to the land of the Nile. There she
regained her human form by the mysterious touch of her lover Zeus, and bore a
child Epaphus, from whom sprang Libya,
and from her Belus and Agenor. Between Belus’s two sons, Aegyptus and Danaüs,
strife arose, and the fifty sons of Aegyptus wished to possess by forced
marriage the fifty daughters of Danaüs. But the maidens, loathing the violence
of their kinsmen, fled amain with their father to Argos, the home of their primal mother, and
besought sanctuary from the king of that land, Pelasgus.
The hesitation of the king to vindicate to the suppliants the right of asylum,
the triumph of that right by vote of the people of Argos, the arrival of the
suitors in pursuit, preceded by their herald demanding the surrender of the
maidens, and his repulse through threatening war, constitute the action of the
play.
The sequel was contained in the Egyptians and the Danaïdes. Danaüs, forced to
acquiesce to the demands of his nephews, enjoins upon his daughter the duty of
killing their bridegrooms on the marriage night. All, save Hypermnestra, obey;
she with splendid perfidy spares Lynceus out of love; and when brought to trial
is defended by the goddess Aphrodite pleading that love of man and woman is
sanctified by the love of Heaven for Earth.
[
Enter a company
of maidens, who have fled from Egypt
and just landed on the shores of Argos;
with them is their father.
]
CHORUS
[1]
May Zeus who
guards suppliants look graciously upon our company, which boarded a ship and
put to sea from the outlets of the fine sand of the Nile.
For we have fled Zeus’ land whose pastures border Syria, and are fugitives, not
because of some public decree pronounced against blood crime, but because of
our own act to escape the suit of man, since we abhor as impious all marriage
with the sons of Aegyptus. It was Danaus, our father, adviser and leader, who,
considering well our course, decided, as the best of all possible evils, that
we flee with all speed over the waves of the sea and find a haven on Argos’
shore. For from there descends our race, sprung from the caress and breath of
Zeus on the gnat-tormented heifer.
[19]
To what kinder
land than this could we come with these wool-wreathed branches in our hands,
sole weapons of the suppliant? O realm, O land, and clear water; gods on high
and earth-bound powers, grievous in your vengeance, which inhabit the tomb; and
you, Zeus the Savior, invoked third, the guardian of the habitations of
righteous men: receive as suppliants this band of women with the compassionate
spirit of the land. But the thronging swarm of violent men born of Aegyptus,
should they set foot upon this marshy land, drive them seaward — and with them
their swift ship — and there may they encounter a cruel sea with thunder,
lightning, and rain-charged winds, and perish by the tempest’s buffeting
blasts, if they ever lay their hands on us, their cousins, and mount unwilling
beds from which Right holds them aloof.
[40]
And now I invoke,
as our champion from beyond the sea, the calf born of Zeus, the offspring of
the flower-grazing cow, our ancestress, the caress of Zeus’ breath. The
appointed period confirmed itself in a name suited to the event — Epaphus, to
whom she gave birth. To him I cry for help. And now in the region wherein our
first mother pastured, by recounting the story of her distress of long ago, I
shall now set forth reliable proofs to the inhabitants of the land; and other evidence,
though unexpected, will yet appear. Men will come to know the truth as my tale
proceeds.
[58]
Now if by chance
there be some neighbor in the land who knows the song of birds, when our
complaint greets his ear, he will fancy that he hears the voice of Metis,
Tereus’ piteous wife, the hawk-chased nightingale.
[63]
For she,
constrained to leave her green leaves, laments pitifully her accustomed haunts,
and composes the tale of her own child’s doom — how he perished, destroyed by
her own hand, victim of the wrath of an unnatural mother.
[68]
Even so I,
indulging my grief in Ionian strains, pain my tender face summered by Nile’s sun and my heart unexercised in tears; and I
gather the flowers of grief, anxious whether there is any friendly kinsman here
to champion our band which has fled from the haze-shrouded land.
[76]
But, gods of our
race, hear, and regard with favor the cause of righteousness; if you refuse
youth fulfillment of its arrogant desires, and readily abhor violence, you
would be righteous toward marriage. Even for those who flee hard-pressed from
war there is an altar, a shelter against harm through respect for the powers of
heaven.
[86]
But may Zeus
grant that it go well with us. For Zeus’ desire is hard to trace: it shines
everywhere, even in gloom, together with fortune obscure to mortal men.
[91]
Safely it falls,
and not upon its back, whatever deed comes to pass at Zeus’ nod; for the
pathways of his understanding stretch dark and tangled, beyond comprehension.
[96]
From their
high-towering hopes he hurls mankind to utter destruction; yet he does not
marshal any armed violence — all that is wrought by the powers divine is free
from toil. Seated on his holy throne, unmoved, in mysterious ways he
accomplishes his will.
[104]
So let him look
upon human outrageousness — in what way it shoots up men in their wooing of us,
sprouted from thoughts of evil intent, having a frenzied purpose as its
irresistible spur, and deluded, turning its thoughts to folly.
[112]
Such piteous
strains of woe I utter in my pain, now shrill, now deep, blended with falling
tears — Alas, alas! groans appropriate to funeral wails; though I live, I chant
my own dirge.
[117]
I invoke Apia’s hilly land — for
well, O land, you understand my barbarous speech — , and many times I lay my
hands upon my Sidonian veil and tear its linen fabric to shreds.
[123]
Sacrifices in
satisfaction of vows are given freely to the gods when all fares well, if only
there be escape from death. Alas, alas, perplexing troubles! Where will this
wave of trouble bear me away?
[128]
I invoke Apia’s hilly land — for
well, O land, you understand my barbarous speech — , and many times I lay my
hands upon my Sidonian veil and tear its linen fabric to shreds.
[134]
Our oars,
indeed, and our timbered ship, bound with yellow rope to withstand the sea,
sped me on by help of favoring winds, unharmed by all tempests; nor have I
reason for complaint. But may the all-seeing Father establish a kindly issue in
due time —
[141]
That the mighty
race of our honorable mother escape the embrace of man (ah me), unwedded,
unvanquished.
[144]
And may Zeus’
pure daughter, she who holds securely the sacred wall, willingly, meeting my
will, look upon me; and, grieved at our pursuit, come with all her might, a
virgin to a virgin’s aid, to deliver me —
[151]
That the mighty
race of our honorable mother may escape the embrace of man (ah me), unwedded,
unvanquished.
[154]
Yet, if she will
not, we, a dark, sun-burned race, with suppliant boughs will invoke the
underworld Zeus, Zeus the great host of the dead; for if the gods of Olympus hear us not, we will hang ourselves.
[163]
Ah Zeus! On
account of the poisonous hate of Io vengeance from the gods pursues us. I know
your consort’s sky-conquering spite; for a stormy sea follows a harsh wind.
[168]
And Zeus shall
then be liable to the charge of injustice that he hates the child of the
heifer, the child whom he himself begat long ago, his very own, and now he
holds his face averted from our prayers. May he from above hear our call!
[176]
Ah Zeus! On
account of the poisonous hate of Io vengeance from the gods pursues us. I know
your consort’s sky-conquering spite; for a stormy sea follows a harsh wind.
DANAUS
[167a] My children, you must be prudent. A prudent captain of your voyage was
your reliable old father here with whom you came. And now that I have
considered with foresight what may befall us here on land, I charge you, record
my injunctions on the tablets of your minds and guard them.
[180]
I see dust, the
voiceless herald of an army; the axle-driven wheels are not silent in their
sockets. I behold a throng, armed with shields and holding spears, with steeds
and curved chariots. Perhaps they are the princes of the land come to look on
us, informed by messengers. But whether a harmless man or one driven by savage
wrath rouses this expedition, it is better, damsels, in any case, to seat
yourselves at that mound sacred to the assembled gods. Stronger than a castle
is an altar — an impenetrable shield. As quick as you can, gather in your left
hands your white-wreathed suppliant boughs, sacred emblems of Zeus the
merciful. Reply to the strangers, as is fitting for aliens, in piteous and
plaintive language of necessity, telling them clearly of your flight, how it
was unstained by deed of blood. Above all let no arrogance accompany your
speech, and reveal nothing impious in your peaceful eyes, from your respectful
face. In your speech neither interrupt, nor hesitate — for this would offend
these people. And remember to be submissive: you are an alien, a fugitive, and
in need. Bold speech does not suit the weak.
CHORUS
[204]
Father,
your words are prudent, and they fall on prudent ears. I will take heed of your
wise words, and hold them in memory. May Zeus, the author of our race, behold
us!
DANAUS
[210]
May he
indeed behold you, and with a gracious eye.
CHORUS
[208]
I would
like even now to be seated by your side.
DANAUS
[207]
Then do
not delay, but put your purpose into action.
CHORUS
[209]
O Zeus,
have pity upon our troubles lest we are ruined.
DANAUS
[211]
If he
wishes it so, all will end well.
CHORUS
[
A verse is here lost.
]
DANAUS
[212]
Invoke now
also that bird of Zeus
CHORUS
[213]
We invoke
the saving beams of the sun.
DANAUS
[214]
Pure
Apollo, too, who, though a god, was exiled once from heaven.
CHORUS
[215]
Knowing
our lot, he may well have pity on mortals.
DANAUS
[216]
May he
have pity indeed, and stand by ready to defend.
CHORUS
[217]
Whom,
further, of these divinities must I invoke?
DANAUS
[218]
I behold a
trident here, the token of its god.
CHORUS
[219]
Well did
he send us here and well may he receive us in this land.
DANAUS
[220]
Here, too,
is Hermes, according to the Hellenic custom.
CHORUS
[221]
May he
then announce good tidings to the free!
DANAUS
[222]
Honor to
the mutual altar of all these protecting powers; and seat yourselves on holy
ground like a flock of doves in dread of hawks of the same feathered tribe — kindred,
yet foes, who would defile their race. If bird prey on bird, how can it be
pure? And how can man be pure who would seize from an unwilling father an
unwilling bride? For such an act, not even in Hades, after death, shall he
escape arraignment for outrage. There also among the dead, so men tell, another
Zeus holds a last judgment upon misdeeds. Take heed and reply in this manner,
that victory may attend your cause.
[
Enter the King
of Argos with
men-at-arms.
]
KING
[234]
From where
comes this band we address, clothed in foreign attire and luxuriating in
closely-woven and barbaric robes? For your apparel is not that of the women of Argos, nor yet of any part of Hellas.
How you have gained courage thus fearlessly to come to this land, unheralded
and friendless and without guides, this makes me wonder. And yet, truly, I see
that branches usually carried by suppliants are laid by your side before the
gods assembled here — as to this alone can Hellas
guess with confidence. As for the rest, there is still much I should with
reason leave to conjecture, if your voice were not here to inform me.
CHORUS
[246]
You have
not spoken falsely about our clothing. But, for my part, how am I to address
you? As commoner, as spokesman, bearer of the sacred wand, or as ruler of the
realm?
KING
[249]
As for
that, answer and speak to me with confidence. For I am Pelasgus, offspring of
Palaechthon, whom the earth brought forth, and lord of this land; and after me,
their king, is rightly named the race of the Pelasgi, who harvest the land. Of
all the region through which the pure Strymon flows, on the side toward the
setting sun, I am the lord. There lies within the limits of my rule the land of
the Perrhaebi, the parts beyond Pindus close to the Paeonians, and the mountain
ridge of Dodona; the edge of the watery sea borders my kingdom. I rule up to
these boundaries.
[260]
The ground where
we stand is Apian land itself, and has borne that name since antiquity in honor
of a healer. For Apis, seer and healer, the son of Apollo, came from Naupactus
on the farther shore and purified this land of monsters deadly to man, which
Earth, defiled by the pollution of bloody deeds of old, caused to spring up — plagues
charged with wrath, an ominous colony of swarming serpents. Of these plagues
Apis worked the cure by sorcery and spells to the content of the Argive land,
and for reward thereafter earned for himself remembrance in prayers.
[271]
Now that you
have my testimony, declare your lineage and speak further — yet our people do
not take pleasure in long discourse.
CHORUS
[274]
Our tale
is brief and clear. Argives we claim to be by birth, offspring of a cow blest in
its children. And the truth of this I shall confirm in full.
KING
[277]
Foreign
maidens, your tale is beyond my belief — how your race can be from Argos. For you are more
similar to the women of Libya
and in no way similar to those native to our land. The Nile,
too, might foster such a stock, and like yours is the Cyprian impress stamped
upon female images by male craftsmen. And of such aspect, I have heard, are
nomad women, who ride on camels for steeds, having padded saddles, and dwell in
a land neighboring the Aethiopians. And had you been armed with the bow,
certainly I would have guessed you to be the unwed, flesh-devouring Amazons.
But inform me, and I will better comprehend how it is that you trace your race
and lineage from Argos.
CHORUS
[292]
Is there a
report that once in this land
of Argos Io was ward of
Hera’s house?