Athena, appointed to adjudicate the cosmic showdown, feels the task is too daunting, and too dangerous, for her alone. She might have called on other gods for help, but instead she empanels a board of Athenian citizens, nameless, mute characters who file onto the stage at around line 570. This is the first time any such jury has been convened, and Athena proclaims it to be a template for the future: we are witnessing the foundation of the jury trial system, with its faith in the power of ordinary mortals to determine facts and distinguish right from wrong. Significantly, Aeschylus situates this event at Athens, and he gives credit for it to that city’s patron goddess. Athens, by 458 B.C., had gone further than any other Greek city toward radical (for its time) democratic government, in part by creating a vast jury system employing thousands of citizens. Athenians who watched this play in the Theater of Dionysus beheld, among other things, an elevation to mythic dimensions of their own political evolution.
That evolution, however, had not been easily achieved and was not universally supported. Many in Athens disliked diffusion of power, especially the aristocratic families who had traditionally held it. Just before this play was produced, the city had gone through a turbulent series of constitutional changes, greatly strengthening the hand of the people but angering the nobles. The governing body dominated by the latter, named the Areopagus for the “Hill of Ares” on which it met, had been stripped of much of its role so that larger, more representative bodies could expand theirs. The changes were so controversial that Ephialtes, a democratic leader who spearheaded them, had been assassinated by reactionary foes. But one important function was kept in the hands of the Areopagites: the right to try cases of deliberate homicide.
This of course is exactly the privilege that Athena accords to the nameless jurors of the Eumenides, who are sometimes identified by scholars not just as any trial jury but as the court of the Areopagus in mythic guise. The play thus cannot be read as a simple, univocal endorsement of democratic reforms at Athens; the old order, too, gets its share of the glory. It’s also crucial to note that the new jury system, though clearly celebrated by the playwright as a triumph of social progress, is not seen operating smoothly or autonomously. The jurors reach an impasse when their votes are tied, and the goddess Athena leads the way out of the dilemma by breaking the tie (or, in some interpretations, by casting the tying vote, which under her own trial rules secures an acquittal).
Was the decision a fair one? Aeschylus does not make it easy to answer yes. The Erinyes score major debate points by equating Orestes’ murder of his mother with Clytemnestra’s killing of her husband. Apollo’s rebuttal is one that many of Aeschylus’ contemporaries would have found specious (as do all modern readers): the mother is not homaimos, blood-related, to her child, since she only supplies the vessel in which the father’s seed can grow. Though some Greek thinkers did endorse this theory, it was hardly a consensus view, and Apollo’s deployment of it here can only be seen as a legalistic maneuver. Likewise, Athena’s autobiographical reason for voting to acquit Orestes—“There is no mother who gave birth to me. / With all my heart, I hold with what is male” (lines 736–37)—smacks of favoritism and bias rather than, as we would hope for from a modern judge, universal principles.
The Olympians are allowed to win the case, but not to lay claim to the moral high ground. The Erinyes are, understandably, enraged, and they threaten to use their ancient power to make barren the soil of Athens and the wombs of Athenian women. Athena, for her part, hints that she can call down the thunderbolt of Zeus, the ultimate weapon of destruction, should she choose to do so (lines 826–29). The threat of an all-out war, and a return to cosmic chaos, is very real. But then Aeschylus’ play takes a surprising turn. Persuasion—peitho in Greek—rather than the thunderbolt is invoked to soothe the outraged Erinyes; new honors are offered up to replace, and more, those they have lost. Their war dance turns into a ballet of joy. Torchbearers arrive with animals for a sacrificial feast. Suddenly the whole city has turned out for a festal procession and a celebration of the Eumenides—the Kindly Ones, fulfilling their titular role at last.
How did it happen so quickly? The sudden transformation seems almost miraculous. But, Aeschylus might say, all compacts and compromises partake of the miraculous, in a city whose political passions might at any moment erupt into civil war. Those passions had been at fever pitch just before this play was put on, but they had begun to cool; disaster had been averted. The city’s relief can be felt throughout the final scene, in which curses are turned to blessings and hatred to love.
THE ORESTEIA
EUMENIDES
Translated by Sarah Ruden
Throughout the translation, I have used the Greek edition of Alan H. Sommerstein, Aeschylus Eumenides (Cambridge: Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics, 1989.) Wherever I have disagreed on his reconstruction or interpretation of the text, I have indicated the variance in a footnote.
CAST OF CHARACTERS (IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE)
THE PYTHIA, head priestess of Apollo’s oracular shrine at Delphi
ORESTES, son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, murdered rulers of Argos
APOLLO
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA
CHORUS of Furies (Erinyes), also known as Eumenides (Kindly Ones)
ATHENA
A group of ATHENIAN JURYMEN
ESCORT, a procession of women bearing torches and offerings
Setting: Early morning, at Delphi, in front of the entrance to the oracular shrine of Apollo.
PYTHIA: Earth I address, the primal seer, giving
her precedence; then Themis,*1 the successor
to her mother in the seat of prophecy—
tradition says. The third who got this place—
willingly, by no violent overthrow*2—
was also Earth’s child and a female Titan,
Phoebe.*3 And as a birthday gift, she gave it
to Phoebus,*4 adding that name to his others.
He left the lake and rocky spine of Delos*5
10
and sailed the busy route to Pallas’ shrine
and reached Parnassus,*6 which would be his homeland.
Hephaestus’ sons, the artisans of roads,*7
honored his journey here by rendering
untempered country tame beneath their hands.
He came to find great honor from the people,
and the ruler Delphus at the region’s helm.
Zeus sent this art to seize the young god’s mind
and placed him on the throne as its fourth prophet,
as Loxias, who speaks for Zeus, his father.*8
20
These gods are in the prelude of my prayers.
Pallas Before the Temple*9 has her tribute
now, too. The nymphs of the Corycian grotto—
the birds’ delight, the gods’ resort*10—I honor.
Bromius*11 lives here also, as I’m mindful,
ever since he led phalanxes of Bacchants
and twined death around Pentheus, like a hare.*12
Pleistus’ source*13 and Poseidon’s power I call on,
and Zeus Fulfiller, highest of the gods;
and now I take the seat of prophecy.
30
May they all grant, as I go in, the very
best fortune yet. And let the Greeks who’re here
come in turn and draw numbers;*14 it’s the custom.
However god commands, I prophesy.
(She exits into the temple, leaving the stage momentarily empty. Then she returns, on all fours, in distress.)
A horror on my tongue and in my eyes!
It threw me backward, out of Loxias’ house—
no sinew’s left in me—I can’t stand upright—
my hands run—hardly agile: an old woman
is useless in a panic, like an infant.
I came into the wreath-hung shrine, and there
40
a man was seated on the navel stone*15
in godless filth, a suppliant for cleansing:
hands dripping blood, sword pulled from some fresh wound.
He held an olive branch, grown straight and high,
wreathed with a mass of wool, the proper way—
a silvery fleece, as I can best describe it.*16
In front of this man was a shocking band
of women, sleeping upright on their chairs—
not women, though: I want to call them Gorgons*17—
but no, and they’re not like the creatures, either,
50
I saw once in a painting as they robbed
Phineus of his supper.*18 These were wingless—
and black, and absolutely nauseating.
Out of their mouths repellent snores were blasting,
and from their eyes disgusting matter streamed.
It isn’t right to bring in clothes like theirs
to the gods’ images or human homes.
I never saw the tribe this cohort came from;
no land I know could boast of nurturing
this breed without a deep groan for its trouble.
60
I leave what follows this to Loxias
himself, the potent master of this house;
Seer and healer, he can read the omens
in others’ homes and be the purifier.
(The Pythia runs offstage. The temple door opens to reveal Apollo, Orestes, and the sleeping Furies, monstrous creatures dressed in black with snakelike hair. Orestes clings to the navel stone at the center.)
85
ORESTES: Ruler Apollo, you know how to act
righteously. Add attention to this skill!
87
Your power soundly pledges what I need.
64
APOLLO: I won’t betray you. Till the end, I’ll stand
guard over you, close by or from a distance—
I’m no soft rind your enemies can bite through.
You see these lunatics now, in a trap,
tripped into sleep—girls ripe for spitting on,
decrepit husks of children, whom no god
70
or man or animal would ever touch.
For evil’s sake they came to be: their portion
is evil darkness, Tartarus underground,
which men and the Olympian gods both loathe.
Run and don’t weaken, even though they’re sleeping.
They’re going to stride across paths wanderers
wear down, they’ll drive you over sprawling mainland
and sea, and through the cities skimmed by water.
Don’t tire too soon; be like a careful shepherd
of this labor. When you come to Pallas’ city,
80
sit and embrace the ancient wooden image.*19
With judges of this matter there, with speeches
that work like spells, we’ll find the right devices
to free you wholly from these trials—since I
84
urged you to kill the body you had come from.
88
Watch out, or fear will win, outwitting you.
But brother, and my father’s other true son,
90
Hermes, take charge of him, escort him, prove
your epithet’s the right one;*20 guard this lamb,
my suppliant—Zeus has regard for exiles—
your lucky guidance speeds back to the world.
(The ghost of Clytemnestra rises up as if from below the ground and speaks to the Furies.)
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: Sleep on, then…No! What good are you asleep?
Look at me! Thanks to you, I’m stripped of honor
among the dead, since there the noise of blame
for killings that I carried out won’t cease.
Look at my abject wandering, and listen:
this is a fearful charge they lay against me.
100
My closest kindred made me suffer all this,
but no god takes my part with his resentment,
though I was slaughtered by my own son’s hands.*21
Look, with your mind’s eye, at the wounds he gave me.
mortals by day can’t see their fate ahead.>*22
Often you licked my gifts up—never wine,
but the appeasements of sobriety.
I offered solemn banquets by the hearth’s flame
at night, a time no god can share with you.
110
But now I see you trampling all of this!
He’s gone, a hunted fawn slipped from the nets
strung high around him—no, he gamboled out,
jumped free, but turned to make a face at you.
You’ve heard, and for my soul’s sheer sake I spoke.
Take it to heart, goddesses from below.
This vision, Clytemnestra, calls on you!
CHORUS: (whimpers)
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: Whine away, but the man’s run off, he’s vanished.
[Suppliants don’t lack friends, though I have none.]*23
120
CHORUS: (whimpers)
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: Plenty of dozing, but for me no pity!
His mother’s murderer, Orestes, gone!
CHORUS: (groans)
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: You groan, you doze. Wake up, and wake up now!
What work, what skill was granted you but evil?
CHORUS: (groans)
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: Fatigue and sleep have powerfully conspired
to drain the ghastly serpent of his spirit.
130
CHORUS: (giving two sharp yelps) Catch him, catch him, catch him, catch him! Look there!
GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA: You dream you’re on the creature’s trail. You’re baying
like a dog. The urge for slaughter never leaves you.
What’s this? Don’t slack, don’t soften, don’t surrender
to weary mindlessness of what I suffer.
I’m right to taunt you. Let it stab your entrails.
Send your breath after him, a storm of gore!
Blast, shrivel him with fire from your womb!
Wither him as you hound him once again!
140
CHORUS LEADER: Wake up, and now that you’re awake, wake her!
Sleep’s got you still? Kick it aside, get up!
Does our dream open to the truth? We’ll see!
(The Chorus arise and begin an agitated dance. In the first strophe, after the first line, the song is passed from one member to another.)
strophe 1
CHORUS: (together) No! No! The outrage! The suffering for us, my darlings!
(severally)—The torment, and nothing to show for it!
—The anguish, the agony fallen on us, I shriek it, it’s affliction I can’t endure.
—The beast has leaped over our nets, he is gone.
—Sleep pulled me down—I lost my quarry.
antistrophe 1
(together) I storm at you, Zeus’s son—you’re a bandit,
150
a boy who’s ridden us down—though we’re gray-haired goddesses—
you’ve honored the suppliant, the godless man,
his parents’ enemy.
You—a god!—stole him away, when he’d struck his mother dead.
What justice could anyone name in this?
strophe 2
The taunts let loose in my dreams!
The charioteer got a firm grip
on the goad and thrust it
into my heart, my liver.
160
The appointed torturer steps up, with his scourge
inflicting the pain beyond pain, the searing chill.
antistrophe 2
This is the work of the young gods*24
in their power that overflows justice.
We can see the holy throne
dripping blood
from its feet to its headrest,
and the navel of this round earth*25 now endowed
with a bristling pelt of blood-defilement.
strophe 3
What a prophet,*26 to smear his own hearth, his own shrine
170
with this filth! He brought it on, invited it,
when he granted human privilege that divine law
forbids. He destroyed our portion,*27 born with the world!
antistrophe 3
He flies in my face—but he won’t untangle this man,
even below the ground there will be no refuge, no freedom for him.
He begs to be rid of his defilement, but as far as he goes he will find
no one but his own murderer to take it on.
APOLLO: (addressing the Furies) Get out! Do what I tell you! Leave this house,
180
now! It’s a prophet’s shrine—remove yourselves,
unless you’d like a glistening, winged snake
sped out of my gold bowstring into you.
The pain would bring up cannibal black froth—
you’d spew back gobs of blood sucked from your killings.
It’s a disgrace that you come near my temple;
here we don’t have beheadings, gouged-out eyes
from guilty verdicts, massacres, uprooting
of manhood as it sprouts in boys, hacked limbs,
stoning, and pitiful loud moans from those
190
impaled beneath their spines. Can’t you believe
The Greek Plays Page 19