by Aeschylus
39 / 33 rolls a triple six A winning cast of the dice in petteia, a kind of ancient backgammon.
48–296 / 40–257 Parodos This choral entrance song is the most extended, complex, and magnificent in surviving Greek drama. The first section (48–123 / 40–103) is a chant that accompanies the entrance proper; the following choral ode consists of a series of stanzas in varied rhythms, articulated in pairs of metrically equivalent stanzas known as “strophe” and “antistrophe.” This pattern is characteristic also of act-dividing choral songs. In this parodos there is also one “nonresponding” (i.e., unpaired) stanza referred to as an “epode” (159–78 / 140–59). The Chorus sang its choral odes to the accompaniment of the aulos, a sort of ancient oboe, while dancing to the rhythm of each stanza. Each paired strophe and antistrophe (“turn” and “counterturn”) presumably also featured closely matched dance steps.
48–123 / 40–103 The rhythm of these lines is called “marching anapests” because it is often associated, as here, with the entrance of the choruses in marching formation. It seems to have been chanted in a manner midway between the heightened speech of dialogue verse and the full singing mode of the choral ode.
71 / 59 the Erinys The ominous name (usually translated “Fury” and denoting a spirit of retribution sent by the dead against the living) is withheld in the Greek, as in our translation, until the very end of the sentence. Aeschylus thus introduces early on the figure of revenge that will play so central a part in the trilogy. The simile of birds lamenting the loss of their young has as its immediate referent the Greeks poised to seek retribution from the Trojans, but it suggests also the sacrifice of the young Iphigenia, to which the Chorus will return in its song. See further Introduction, p. X.
73 / 61–62 Zeus, protector of host and guest Zeus xenios (i.e., protector of the rights of xenoi, those who are in a reciprocal relation of guest-friendship) is invoked because the justice of the war against Troy lies in its punishment of Paris’ violation of Menelaus’ hospitality by stealing Helen from him.
77 / 62 one woman claimed by many men Helen was abducted by Theseus, courted by all the Greek heroes, and won by Menelaus. Taken to Troy Paris, after his death she married his brother Deiphobus.
79–80 / 65 the flickering rite / before the blazing sacrifice The battles over Troy are imaged as proteleia, preliminary rites before the sacrifice that is the city’s destruction. This use of proteleia is deeply ironic, since the word is associated primarily with a sacrifice offered before marriage and therefore has in its ordinary usage happy and propitious associations. It will be used again in contexts of bloodshed and violence at 260 / 226 and 821 / 720, and see also note on Eumenides 972–73.
85–86 / 69 tongue / of fire, or liquid Burnt offerings or libations, the most common forms of propitiatory sacrifice. Once the struggle has reached its “destined end,” such rituals will have no efficacy.
100–102 / 83–84 It is possible that Clytemnestra has appeared at the doors of the palace at this point, but since she will not be addressed again until 297 / 258, it seems far likelier that the Chorus here summons her by way of motivating their appearance at the palace. They have observed the sacrifices that she has instituted throughout the city (102–15 / 85–96), and they hope to learn why she has done so.
124–296 / 104–257 The choral ode proper is exceedingly rich and complex. It is divided by rhythm as well as subject into three main divisions: 124–78 / 104–59 deals with the omen that greeted the assembled Greek fleet at Aulis; 179–221 / 160–90 is largely devoted to the “hymn to Zeus,” in which the Chorus gropes to understand the meaning of the events that their song evokes, but also includes the beginning of the narrative of the sacrifice of Iphigenia that is developed at length and with extraordinary pathos in the third section, 222–96 / 191–57.
139 / 121 Sing sorrow, sorrow This line becomes a refrain (cf. 158 / 139, 178 / 159) as the power of “persuasion” (another leading theme of the trilogy introduced early and in an equivocal fashion) leads them against their will, as it were, to sing the terrible story of Iphigenia. Notice how quickly the mood changes from the confident declaration of “mastery … to sing of the good omens” at 124 / 104 to this note of discomfiture as the omens turn against them.
140 / 122 the good seer Identified as Calchas at 175 / 156.
148 / 130 Fate Greek Moira, literally “lot” or “portion,” personified in the Oresteia to represent not a general notion of destiny but a specific divine enforcer of the connection between actions and their consequences, and thus a moral, or even quasi-legal, force. One godsent moira can conflict with another (see note on 1166), but at the end of Eumenides Zeus and Fate stand together (1224 / 1045–46) as guarantors of the new civic peace.
154–55 / 136 her father’s flying blood- / hounds The eagles, birds identified with her father Zeus. The depiction of the hare as pregnant with “unripe young” (156 / 137) suggests that it is as goddess of childbirth that Artemis is angered, in which case the culmination of the prophecy in the slaughter of Iphigenia takes on a dark irony.
159–62 / 140–43 These lines emphasize Artemis’ role as protector of wild beasts, but since the eagles in the omens represent the Atreidae, we can also interpret her revulsion at the birds (connected with her father in his role as enforcer of the laws of guest-friendship) as opposition to their expedition. In Homer’s Iliad, Artemis is a supporter of the Trojans, and here she seems to be exacting her own retribution for the loss she will suffer there. It is worth noting that the saga tradition (known to us from Hesiod and the fragmentary remains of the Cypria, a post-Homeric epic of the Troy cycle, has Artemis punish Agamemnon for shooting one of her sacred deer and boasting that he was a better archer than she. Aeschylus prefers to leave her anger—and Agamemnon’s responsibility—less clearly explained.
179–82 / 160–62 Whoever Zeus may be The “Hymn to Zeus,” following the pained description of Calchas’ interpretation of the omen, sounds as much like an attempt to achieve some peace of mind as like a declaration of faith. In this context, a prayer formula meant to assure that the desired god is addressed by the correct name takes on the overtones of a real question: who—what—is the overwhelming, incomprehensible power apparently at work everywhere the Chorus looks?
189–99 / 168–75 Uranus (Greek Ouranos, the sky), is “he who was once great,” the first ruler of the universe. He was castrated and deposed by his son, Cronus, “he who threw him.” Cronus and his siblings of the Titan generation were defeated and deposed in turn by Zeus. That they are nameless, as if they never existed, is an indication of Zeus’ might and the completeness of his victory. The language of this victory is taken from the Greek wrestling match, in which the victor had to win three falls. See further Introduction, pp. 35–36.
211–21 / 83–90 The law of Zeus expounded in the preceding strophe is exemplified in its antistrophe by a specific dilemma, the winds that keep the fleet from sailing. The resulting example of violence and suffering—Agamemnon’s decision to sacrifice his daughter—is one from which the Chorus implicitly hopes some grace can be shown to have come, some lesson to have been learned.
248–53 / 218–21 the yoke-strap / of necessity … mere ruthlessness Notice that although Agamemnon has clearly set out the dilemma and his possible responses to it, his decision is treated first as tantamount to acting under compulsion, then as yielding to an evil madness. Both reactions express deeply felt reactions to the horrible sequence of events. Their apparent incompatibility (at least from our point of view) demonstrates the utter insolubility of the dilemma.
260 / 226 an early offering This translates proteleia, the usual name for an offering made before a wedding, but which here ironically refers to the sacrifice of the still unmarried daughter. See also the note on 79–80.
261–84 / 228–47 For comments on some aspects of the representation of the sacrifice of Iphigenia, see Introduction, pp. 8–9, 29–30. This is one of the most important of a series of perverted rites of sacrifice a
nalyzed in detail by Zeitlin, “Corrupted Sacrifice” (see Introduction, footnote 9).
270 / 235–36 he had her mouth gagged This is the first of many instances of cloths used to bind, stifle, and ensnare; and these images are closely related to the motif of the yoke or bridle, as at 248 / 218.
297–406 / 258–354 First episode
320–59 / 281–316 Clytemnestra’s beacon speech. The leading image here is that of fire leaping from Mount Ida, above the plain of Troy, to Arachne’s peak, a mountain close to Argos, from which it “swooped down on the royal house” (352 / 310). Symbolically, then, the movement of the beacon flame that ostensibly signals the end of a long and terrible war suggests instead the passage of the flames that have ravaged Priam’s city to Agamemnon’s, where they will wreak further destruction. Although not all the places mentioned are identifiable, the pattern of movement from east to west is clear and suggests at once Clytemnestra’s careful planning for Agamemnon’s return and the ineluctable approach of new deaths and suffering.
354–57 / 312–14 Clytemnestra likens the passing of the beacons to a torch-relay race, such as those held at Athens in honor of several deities, including Athena, at the great Panathenaic festival, and the god of fire himself, Hephaestus (cf. 320 / 281). In Clytemnestra’s race, she says with heavy irony, there are only victors, but although the import of the beacons is decidedly mixed, this “flame descendant of the fire of Ida” will have as its final offspring the final torchlit procession of the Athenians who accompany the Eumenides to their new home (Eumenides, 1195ff. / 1021ff.).
386–98 / 338–47 Clytemnestra’s warning of troubles to come for the Greeks is both prophetic and ironic. The original audience would have been aware of a number of atrocities and sacrileges attributed to the victors, such as Neoptolemus’ slaughter of Priam at the altar of Zeus, where he was a suppliant, and the rape of Cassandra by Ajax, son of Oileus, in the temple of Athena, where she had sought refuge. They knew that as a consequence, the gods had sent a terrible storm that dispersed the returning fleet, in which many warriors were drowned and others set on long, difficult homecomings. The irony that comes from Clytemnestra’s murderous intentions is clearest in her final prayer, with its entirely equivocal wish that “the good / win out completely for all men to see” (399–400 / 349), but extends as well to her warning against wakening “the anger of the dead / for what was done to them” (396–97 / 346), which might surely include Iphigenia. Clytemnestra’s admonition about the desecration of sacred places (386–89 / 338–40) is sometimes taken as an ugly pretense masking her real hopes, but its primary purpose is not to characterize her, but to invest with a sense of inevitable ruin the Greek Herald’s announcement (598–99 / 527–28) that Troy’s altars and shrines have been destroyed (see further Introduction, pp. 10–11).
407–552 / 355–488 First stasimon (act-dividing choral song) The Chorus Leader ended the first episode on a hopeful note, and the Chorus proceeds to sing the song of thanks he promised to the gods. As in the parodos, however, the mood quickly changes to one of discontent and foreboding becoming a lament for all who died in the struggle and a warning against striving for “excessive glory” (533 / 468). This song, like many others in tragedy, separates events—here, the announcement of Troy’s fall by means of the beacons and the return of Agamemnon and his Argives—that are depicted as simply following one another but cannot (and need not) be regarded as contiguous in time.
411 / 358 the smothering mesh This net is another example of the trilogy’s pervasive binding/bridling imagery (see note on 270).
417 / 362 Zeus, lord of host and guest Zeus xenios (see note on 73).
441 / 385 miserable Persuasion Persuasion is another central motif of the trilogy (for an overview, see Introduction, pp. 21–23). The persuasion referred to here is the sort of temptation with which personified Destruction (Greek Atê)is said to lead people astray, and which can thus be personified as her daughter. Helen is one agent of such temptation (in her case erotic temptation, a form so well known that Persuasion is sometimes pictured as a minor goddess in Aphrodite’s retinue), and her sister Clytemnestra will soon prove to be another.
447 / 390 bad bronze blackening Bronze adulterated with lead turns black with use.
500 / 438 The war god, broker of bodies Ares is compared to a gold-changer, who gives gold (or gold dust) in exchange for objects that would almost certainly be much heavier. Ares sets up his scales in the midst of battle, exchanging live warriors for the ashes that comes from the funeral pyre. This dust, however, is said to be heavy (baru, which can also mean “grievous”) because it is freighted with the grief of loved ones.
548 / 483 So like a woman’s sharp spirit At 403 / 351, the Chorus Leader spoke of Clytemnestra’s account of the beacons and Troy’s fall as spoken “like a wise man,” but by the end of its song, the Chorus’ mood is somber and it is less ready to give credence to what it construes as a woman’s credulous hope.
553–773 / 489–680 Second episode The pattern of movement from hope to foreboding, good news to bad, continues in the speeches of the Argive Herald, who announces Agamemnon’s imminent arrival.
553–67 / 489–500 The manuscripts give these lines to Clytemnestra, but we follow most recent editors in giving them to the Chorus Leader, and believe that Clytemnestra does not return to the stage until 669. The grounds for these positions are given by Taplin, Stagecraft of Aeschylus 294–302.
577 / 510 your shafts no longer raining down Apollo, although addressed by a cult name—king of Pytho—that derives from his oracular role at Delphi, is invoked specifically as archer god. The Greek audience would think of the plague Apollo sent against the Greeks with his arrows in Book 1 of Homer’s Iliad, especially because the god is asked to be “once again our healer” (580 / 512), another of his traditional roles.
588 / 519 deities that greet the sun The reference is uncertain, but we are apparently to imagine that images of gods revered in Argos are standing before the palace; that they “greet the sun” may mean no more than that the palace faces east.
597 / 525–26 avenging Zeus Zeus dikêphoros, literally “vengeance bearer” or “bringer of justice.”
598–99 / 527–28 The altars … are leveled See note on 386–98.
600 / 529 the yoke For the image, see 248–53 / 218–21 and 270 / 325–26 with notes.
667–68 / 585–86 The Chorus Leader’s final couplet may accompany Clytemnestra’s entrance, but is even more effective (as Taplin, Stagecraft [see Introduction, footnote 7] 299–300, points out) if it is spoken before she appears, and is in effect an invitation to the Herald to enter the palace and give Clytemnestra his news. In that case, Clytemnestra’s abrupt entrance, before he can even knock on the door, will confer an almost uncanny sense that she is in control of the situation. She will leave with similar abruptness after making her speech, but without involving anyone else in dialogue. As she says (681 / 598), she has no need of the Herald’s message.
669 / 587 I cried in triumph See note on 33–34. The ololugmos is repeated at 678 / 595.
688 / 604 take to my lord this message Clytemnestra boldly tests in the presence of the Chorus the hypocritical professions of fidelity with which she will later greet Agamemnon.
695 / 609 the marriage seal The Greek simply has “seal” and might refer to the normal practice of sealing treasures in storerooms during a king’s absence, but we have preferred to make clear that the word in this context connotes “seal of chastity,” as indicated by the lines immediately following.
698 / 612 how to dye bronze The phrase might refer to the tempering of metal—in which a woman would presumably be untrained—but Greek baphas can equally denote dyeing of fabrics (as at 1100 / 960), and here suggests the coloring of a sword with blood—something that Clytemnestra will soon show Agamemnon she knows how to do.
703 / 617 tell me now of Menelaus The wanderings of Menelaus, recounted in Book 4 of Homer’s Odyssey, formed the subject of Proteus, the lost satyr play that
followed the three tragedies of the Oresteia (see Introduction, footnote 1). Here, the Chorus Leader’s questioning leads the Herald, against his will (722–23 / 636–37), even further into words of ill omen.
730–31 / 642–43 double-pointed … two-tipped … twins The image here derives from the two points of the Greek whip or scourge, the repetition presumably emphasizing the doubling of disasters, public and private, of which the Herald is speaking.
735 / 645 to sing in tribute to the Erinyes The Herald proposes, in a shocking oxymoron, to offer the paean, a song of thanksgiving or triumph associated above all with Apollo, in honor of the Erinyes. The music that befits them is “the dirge the lyre shuns” (1135 / 990–92, and cf. Eumenides, 390 / 332–33).
741 / 651 fire and sea The fire is Zeus’ lightning; the phrasing is designed to evoke the proverbial enmity of fire and water to suggest a world in which even the elemental forces of nature conspire to destroy the returning Greeks.
774–891 / 681–809 Second stasimon This song turns back to the beginning of the Trojan calamity through the figure of Helen, who becomes the starting point for a meditation on the more general truths that no evil action is without its consequences.