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BY AESCHYLUS
Translation of Herbert Weir Smyth
Revised by Gregory Crane and Graeme Bird
Further revised by Gregory Nagy and Casey Dué
Upon the roof of the palace of Agamemnon at Argos.
Watchman
I ask the gods for release from these ordeals [ponoi] of mine, throughout this long year’s watch, in which, lying upon the palace roof of the Atreidae, upon my bent arm, like a dog, I have learned to know well the gathering of the night´s stars, those radiant potentates conspicuous in the firmament, 5 bringers of winter and summer to mankind.
So now I am still watching for the signal [sumbolon] of the flame, the gleaming fire that is to bring news from Troy and 10 tidings of its capture. For thus commands my Queen, woman in passionate heart and man in strength of purpose. And whenever I make here my bed, restless and dank with dew and unvisited by dreams - for instead of sleep fear stands ever by my side, 15 so that I cannot close my eyelids fast in sleep - and whenever I care to sing or hum (and thus apply an antidote of song to ward off drowsiness), then my tears start forth, as I bewail the fortunes of this house of ours, not ordered for the best as in days gone by. 20 But tonight may there come a happy release from these ordeals [ponoi] of mine! May the fire with its glad tidings flash through the gloom!
The signal fire suddenly flashes out.
Oh welcome, you blaze in the night, a light as if of day, you harbinger of the setting up [kata-stasis] of many khoroi in Argos in thanksgiving for this glad event!
25 Iou! Iou! To Agamemnon’s Queen I thus make a signal [sêmainô] to rise from her bed, and as quickly as she can to utter in a proper way [euphêmeô ] in her palace halls a shout of ololu in welcome of this fire, if the city of Ilium 30 truly is taken, as this beacon unmistakably announces. And I will join the khoros in a prelude upon my own account; for my lord’s lucky roll of the dice I shall count to my own score, now that this beacon has thrown me triple six. Ah well, may the master of the house come home and may 35 I clasp his welcome hand in mine! For the rest I stay silent; a great ox stands upon my tongue - yet the house itself, could it but speak, might tell a plain enough tale; since, for my part, by my own choice I have words for those who know, and to those who do not know, I am without memory.
He descends by an inner stairway. The chorus of Argive Elders enters.
Chorus
anapests
40 This is now the tenth year since Priam’s mighty adversary, King Menelaus, and with him King Agamemnon, the mighty pair of Atreus’ sons, joined in honor of throne and scepter by Zeus, 45 set forth from this land with an army of a thousand ships manned by Argives, a warrior force to champion their cause. Loud rang the battle-cry they uttered in their rage, just as eagles scream which, 50 in lonely grief for their brood, rowing with the oars of their wings, wheel high over their nests, because they have wasted the toil [ponos] of guarding their nurslings’ nest.
55 But some one of the powers supreme - Apollo perhaps or Pan, or Zeus - hears the shrill wailing scream of the clamorous birds, these sojourners in his realm, and against the transgressors sends an Erinys at last though late. 60 Even so Zeus, whose power is over all, Zeus lord of xenoi, sends the sons of Atreus against Alexander, so that for the sake of a woman with many a husband he may inflict many and wearying struggles - when the knee is pressed in the dust and 65 the spear is splintered in the onset - on Danaans and on Trojans alike. The case now stands where it stands - it moves to fulfillment [telos] at its destined end. Not by offerings burned in secret, not by secret libations, 70 not by tears, shall man soften the stubborn wrath of unsanctified sacrifices.
But we, incapable of service by reason of our aged frame, discarded from that martial mustering of long ago, wait here at home, 75 supporting on our canes a strength like a child’s. For just as the vigor of youth, leaping up within the breast, is like that of old age, since the war-god is not in his place; so extreme age, its leaves 80 already withering, goes its way on triple feet, and, no better than a child, wanders, a dream that is dreamed by day.
But, O daughter of Tyndareos, Queen Clytemnestra, 85 what has happened? What news do you have? On what intelligence and convinced by what report do you send about your messengers to command sacrifice? For all the gods our city worships, the gods supreme, the gods below, 90 the gods of the heavens and of the agorâ, have their altars ablaze with offerings. Now here, now there, the flames rise high as heaven, yielding 95 to the soft and guileless persuasion of holy ointment, the sacrificial oil itself brought from the inner chambers of the palace. Of all this declare whatever you can and dare reveal, and be a healer of my uneasy heart. 100 This now at one moment bodes ill, while then again hope, shining with kindly light from the sacrifices, wards off the biting care of the sorrow that gnaws my heart.
strophe 1
I have the authority to proclaim the augury of power [kratos] given on their way 105 to princely men - since my age still breathes Persuasion upon me from the gods, the strength of song - how the twin-throned power [kratos] of the Achaeans, 110 the single-minded captains of Hellas’ youth, with avenging spear and arm against the Teucrian land, was sent off by the inspiriting omen appearing to the kings of the ships - kingly birds, 115 one black, one white of tail, near the palace, on the spear-hand, in a conspicuous place, devouring a hare with offspring unborn 120 caught in the last effort to escape.
Sing the song of woe, the song of woe, but may the good prevail!
antistrophe 1
Then the wise seer of the host, noticing how the two warlike sons of Atreus were two in temper, recognized the devourers of the hare as the leaders of the army, and 125 thus interpreted the portent and spoke: "In time those who here issue forth shall seize Priam’s town, and fate shall violently ravage before its towered walls all the public store of cattle. 130 Only may no jealous god-sent wrath glower upon the embattled host, the mighty bit forged for Troy’s mouth, and strike it before it reaches its goal! 135 For, in her pity, holy Artemis is angry at the winged hounds of her father, for they sacrifice a wretched timorous thing, together with her young, before she has brought them forth. An abomination to her is the eagles’ feast."
Sing the song of woe, the song of woe, but may the good prevail!
epode
140 "Although, O Lovely One, you are so gracious to the tender whelps of fierce lions, and take delight in the suckling young of every wild creature that roams the field, promise that the issue be brought to pass in accordance with these signs [sumbola], portents 145 auspicious yet filled with ill. And I implore Paean, the healer, that she may not raise adverse gales with long delay to stay the Danaan fleet from putting forth, 150 urging another sacrifice, one that knows no law, unsuited for feast, worker of family strife, dissolving wife’s reverence for husband. For there abides mênis - 155 terrible, not to be suppressed, a treacherous guardian of the home, a wrath that never forgets and that exacts vengeance for a child."
Such utterances of doom, derived from auguries on the march, together with many blessings, did Kalkhas proclaim to the royal house; and in accord with this.
Sing the song of woe, the song of woe, but may the good prevail!
strophe 2
160 Zeus, whoever he may be - if by this name it pleases him to be invoked, by this name I call to him - as I weigh all things in the balance, I have nothing to compare 165 save "Zeus," if in truth I must cast aside this vain burden from my heart.
antistrophe 2
He who once was mighty, swelling with insolence for every fight, 170 he shall not even be named as having ever existed; and he who arose later, he has met his overthrower and is past and gone. But whoever, heartily taking thought beforehand, sings a victory song for Zeus, 175 he shall gain wisdom altogether.
strophe 3
Zeus, who sets mortals on the path to understanding, Zeus, who has established this as a fixed law: "Learning comes by suffering [pathos]." But even as the ordeal [ponos], bringing memory of pain, drips over the mind in sleep, 180 so equilibrium [being sôphrôn] comes to men, whether they want it or not. Violent, it seems to me, is the kharis of daimones enthroned upon their awesome seats.
antistrophe 3
So then the captain of the Achaean ships, the elder of the two - 185 holding no seer at fault, bending to the adverse blasts of fortune, when the Achaean people, on the shore over against Khalkis 190 in the region where Aulis’ tides surge to and fro, were very distressed by opposing winds and failing stores;
strophe 4
and the breezes that blew from the Strymon, bringing harmful leisure, hunger, and tribulation of spirit in a cruel port, idle wandering of men, and sparing neither ship 195 nor cable, began, by doubling the season of their stay, to rub away and wither the flower of Argos; and when the seer, pointing to Artemis as cause, proclaimed to the chieftains another remedy, 200 more oppressive even than the bitter storm, so that the sons of Atreus struck the ground with their canes and did not stifle their tears -
antistrophe 4
205 then the elder king spoke and said: "It is a hard fate to refuse obedience, and hard, if I must slay my child, the glory of my home, and at the altar-side stain 210 a father’s hand with streams of virgin’s blood. Which of these courses is not filled with evil? How can I become a deserter to my fleet and fail my allies in arms? 215 For that they should with all too impassioned passion crave a sacrifice to lull the winds - even a virgin’s blood - stands within their right. May all be for the best."
strophe 5
But when he had donned the yoke of Necessity, with veering of mind, 220 impious, unholy, unsanctified, from then he changed his intention and began to conceive that deed of uttermost audacity. For wretched delusion, counselor of ill, primal source of woe, makes man bold. So then he hardened his heart to sacrifice his daughter 225 so that he might further a war waged to avenge a woman, and as an offering for the voyaging of a fleet!
antistrophe 5
For her supplications, her cries of "Father," and her virgin life, 230 the commanders in their eagerness for war cared nothing. Her father, after a prayer, told his ministers to raise her - fallen about her robes, she lay face-down 235 in supplication with all her thûmos - to lift her like a young goat, high above the altar; and with a gag upon her lovely mouth to hold back the shouted curse against her house -
strophe 6
by the bit’s strong and stifling might. Then, as she shed to earth her saffron robe, she 240 struck each of her sacrificers with a glance from her eyes beseeching pity, looking as if in a drawing, wishing she could speak; for she had often sung where men met at her father’s hospitable table, 245 and with her virgin voice would lovingly honor her dear father’s prayer for blessing at the third libation.
antistrophe 6
What happened next I did not see and do not tell. The art of Kalkhas was not unfulfilled. 250 Justice [Dikê] inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering [pathos]. But the future, that you shall know when it occurs; till then, leave it be - it is just as someone weeping ahead of time. Clear it will come, together with the light of dawn.
Clytemnestra enters.
255 But as for what shall follow, may the issue be happy, even as she wishes, our sole guardian here, the bulwark of the Apian land, who stands nearest to our lord. I have come, Clytemnestra, in obedience to your royal power [kratos], for it is dikê to do homage to the consort of a sovereign prince 260 when her lord’s throne is tenantless. Now whether the news you have heard is good or ill, and you do make sacrifice with hopes that herald gladness, I wish to hear; yet, if you would keep silence, I make no complaint.
Clytemnestra
As herald of gladness, with the proverb, 265 "May Dawn be born from her mother Night!" You shall hear joyful news surpassing all your hopes: the Argives have taken Priam’s town!
Chorus
What have you said? The meaning of your words has escaped me, so incredible they seemed.
Clytemnestra
I said that Troy is in the hands of the Achaeans. Is my meaning clear?
Chorus
270 Joy steals over me, and it challenges my tears.
Clytemnestra
Sure enough, for your eye betrays your loyal heart.
Chorus
What then is the proof? Have you evidence of this?
Clytemnestra
I have, indeed; unless some god has played me false.
Chorus
Do you believe the persuasive visions of dreams?
Clytemnestra
275 I would not heed the fancies of a slumbering brain.
Chorus
But can it be some pleasing rumor that has fed your hopes? Clytemnestra
Truly you scorn my understanding as if it were a child’s.
Chorus
But at what time was the city destroyed?
Clytemnestra
In the night, I say, that has but now given birth to this day here.
Chorus
280 And what messenger could reach here with such speed?
Clytemnestra
Hephaistos, from Ida speeding forth his brilliant blaze. Beacon passed beacon on to us by courier-flame: Ida, to the Hermaian crag in Lemnos; to the mighty blaze upon the island succeeded, third, 285 the summit of Athos sacred to Zeus; and, soaring high aloft so as to leap across the sea, the flame, travelling joyously onward in its strength...
[There is a gap in the text.]
...the pinewood torch, its golden-beamed light, as another sun, passing the message on to the watchtowers of Makistos. 290 He, delaying not nor carelessly overcome by sleep, did not neglect his part as messenger. Far over Euripos’ stream came the beacon-light and signaled [sêmainô] to the watchmen on Messapion. They, kindling a heap of 295 withered heather, lit up their answering blaze and sped the message on. The flame, now gathering strength and in no way dimmed, like a radiant moon overleaped the plain of Asopos to Kithairon’s ridges, and roused another relay of missive fire. 300 Nor did the warders there disdain the far-flung light, but made a blaze higher than their commands. Across Gorgopis’ water shot the light, reached the mount of Aigiplanktos, and urged the ordinance of fire to make no delay. 305 Kindling high with unstinted force a mighty beard of flame, they sped it forward so that, as it blazed, it passed even the headland that looks upon the Saronic gulf; until it swooped down when it reached the lookout, near to our city, upon the peak of Arakhnaion; and 310 next upon this roof of the Atreidae it leapt, this very fire not undescended from the Idaean flame.
Such are the torch-bearers I have arranged - in succession one to the other completing the course; and the victor is he who ran both first and last. 315 This is the kind of proof and token [sumbolon] I give you, the message of my lord from Troy to me.
Chorus
Lady, my prayers of thanksgiving to the gods I will offer soon. But as I would like to hear and satisfy my wonder at your tale straight through to the end, so may you tell it yet again.
Clytemnestra
320 This day the Achaeans hold Troy. Within the town there sounds loud, I believe, a clamor of voices that will not blend. Pour vinegar and oil into the same vessel and you will say that, as foes, they keep apart; so the cries of vanquished and victors greet the ear, 325 distinct as their fortunes are diverse. Those, flung upon the corpses of their husbands and their brothers, children upon the bodies of their aged fathers who gave them life, bewail from lips no longer free the death of their most philoi, while these - 330 a night of restless labor [ponos] after battle sets them down famished to breakfast on such fare as the town affords; not faring according to rank, but as each man has drawn his lot by chance. 335 And even now they are quartered in the captured Trojan homes, delivered from the frosts and dew of the naked sky, and like happy men will sleep all the night without a guard.
Now if they are reverent towards the gods of the town - those of the conquered land - and towards their shrines, 340 the captors shall not be made captives in their turn. Only may no mad impulse first assail the army, overmastered by greed, to pillage what they should not! For to win the salvation [sôtêriâ] of nostos they need to travel back the other length of their double course. 345 But even if, without having offended the gods, our troops should reach home, the grievous suffering of the dead might still remain awake - if no fresh disaster happens. These are my woman’s words; but may the good prevail clearly for all to see! 350 For, choosing thus, I have chosen the enjoyment of many a blessing.
Chorus
Lady, you speak as wisely as a balanced [sôphrôn] man. And, for my part, now that I have listened to your certain proofs, I prepare to address due prayers of thanksgiving to the gods; for a success has been achieved that is not without tîmê in return [kharis] for the ordeal [ponos].
anapests
355 Hail, sovereign Zeus, and you kindly Night, possessor of the great kosmoi, you who cast your meshed snare upon the towered walls of Troy, so that neither old nor young could overleap 360 the huge enslaving net of all-conquering Atê. I revere great Zeus of xenoi - he who has brought this to pass. He long kept his bow bent against Alexander 365 until his bolt would neither fall short of the mark nor, flying beyond the stars, be launched in vain.
strophe 1
"The stroke of Zeus" they may call it; his hand can be traced there. As he determines, so he acts. Someone said 370 that the gods do not trouble themselves to remember mortals who trample underfoot the kharis of inviolable sanctities. But that man was impious!
Now it stands revealed! 375 The penalty for reckless crime is ruin when men breathe a spirit of arrogance above just measure, because their mansions teem with more abundance than is good for them. But let there be such wealth as brings no distress, enough to satisfy 380 a sensible man. For riches do not protect the man who in his insatiability [koros] has kicked the mighty altar of Dikê into obscurity.
antistrophe 1
385 Perverse Persuasion, the overmastering child of designing Atê, drives men on; and every remedy is futile. His evil is not hidden; it shines forth, a baleful gleam. 390 Like base metal beneath the touchstone’s rub, when tested he shows the blackness of his grain - for he is like a child who chases a winged bird - 395 and upon his people he brings a taint against which there is no defense. No god listens to his prayers. The man associated with such deeds, him they destroy in his unrighteousness.
And such was Paris, who came 400 to the house of the sons of Atreus and dishonored the hospitality of his host by stealing away a wedded wife.
strophe 2
405 But she, bequeathing to her people the clang of shield and spear and army of fleets, and bringing to Ilium destruction in place of dowry, with light step she passed through the gates - daring a deed undareable. Then loud wailed the spokesmen [prophêtês pl.] of the house, crying, 410 "Alas, alas, for the home, the home, and for the princes! Alas for the husband’s bed and the impress of her form so dear! He sits apart in the anguish of his grief, silent, dishonored but making no reproach. In his yearning for her who sped beyond the sea, 415 a phantom will seem to be lord of the house. The pleasure [kharis] of fair-formed statues is hateful to him; and in the hunger of his eyes all loveliness [Aphrodite] is departed.
antistrophe 2
420 Apparitions causing sorrow [penthos] come to him in dreams, bringing only vain kharis; for vainly, whenever in his imagination a man sees delights, 425 immediately the vision, slipping through his arms, is gone, winging its flight along the paths of sleep." Such are the sorrows [akhos pl.] at hearth and home, but there are sorrows surpassing these; and at large, in every house of all who went forth together from the land of Hellas, 430 unbearable grief [penthos pl.] is seen. Many things pierce the heart. Each knows whom he sent forth. But to the home of each come 435 urns and ashes, not living men.
strophe 3
Ares barters the bodies of men for gold; he holds his balance in the contest of the spear; and 440 back from Ilium to their loved ones he sends a heavy dust passed through his burning, a dust cried over with plenteous tears, in place of men sending well-made urns with ashes. 445 So they lament, praising now this one: "How skilled in battle!" now that one: "Fallen nobly in the carnage". "For another’s wife," some mutter in secret, and 450 grief charged with resentment spreads stealthily against the sons of Atreus, champions in the strife. But there far from home, around the city’s walls, those in their beauty’s bloom have graves in Ilium - 455 the enemy’s soil has covered its conquerors.
antistrophe 3
Dangerous is a people’s voice charged with anger - it acts as a curse of publicly ratified doom. 460 In anxious fear I wait to hear something shrouded still in gloom. The gods are not blind to men with blood upon their hands. In the end the black Spirits of Vengeance [Erinyes] bring to obscurity that one who has prospered by renouncing Dikê and 465 wear down his fortunes by reverse. Once a man is among the unseen, there is no more help for him. Glory in excess is fraught with peril; 470 the lofty peak is struck by Zeus’ thunderbolt. I choose prosperity [olbos] unassailed by envy. May I not be a sacker of cities, and may I not myself be despoiled and live to see my own life in another’s power!
epode
- 475 Heralded by a beacon of good tidings a swift report has spread throughout the town. Yet whether it is true, or some deception of the gods, who knows?
- Who is so childish or so bereft of sense, 480 once he has let his heart be fired by sudden news of a beacon fire, to despair if the story change?
- It is just like a woman’s eager nature to yield assent to pleasing news before yet the truth is clear.
- 485 Over credulous, a woman’s mind has boundaries open to quick encroachment; but quick to perish is kleos spread by a woman.
Clytemnestra
We shall soon know about this passing on of flaming lights 490 and beacon signals and fires, whether they perhaps are true [alêthês pl.] or whether, dream-like, this light’s glad coming has beguiled our senses. Look! There, I see approaching from the shore a herald crowned with boughs of olive. 495 The thirsty dust, consorting sister of the mud, assures me that neither by pantomime nor by kindling a flame of mountain wood will he signal [sêmainô] with smoke of fire. Either in plain words he will bid us to rejoice the more, or else - but I have little love for the report opposite to this! 500 May still further good be added to the good that has appeared!
Chorus
Whoever makes this prayer with other intent toward the polis, let him reap himself the fruit of his misguided purpose!
A Herald enters.
Herald
All hail, soil of Argos, land of my fathers! On this happy day in the tenth year I have come to you. 505 Many hopes have shattered, one only have I seen fulfilled; for I never dared to dream that here in this land of Argos I should die and have due portion of burial most philos to me. Now blessings on the land, blessings on the light of the sun, and blessed be Zeus, the land’s Most High, and the Pythian lord; 510 and may he launch no more his shafts against us. Enough of your hostility did you display by Scamander’s banks; but now, in other mood, be our savior [sôtêr] and our healer, O lord Apollo. And the gods of the gathering [agôn], I greet them all; him, too, my own patron, 515 Hermes, beloved herald, of heralds all revered; and the cult-heroes [hêrôes] who sent us forth - I pray that they may receive back in kindliness the remnant of the host which has escaped the spear.
Hail, halls of our Kings, beloved roofs, and you august seats, and you daimones that face the sun, 520 if ever you did in days gone by, now after long lapse of years, with gladness in your eyes give fine welcome to your King. For bearing light in darkness to you and to all assembled here alike, he has returned - Agamemnon, our King. Oh, greet him well, as is right, 525 since he has uprooted Troy with the mattock of Zeus the Avenger, with which her soil has been uptorn. Demolished are the altars and the shrines of her gods; and the seed of her whole land has been wasted utterly. Upon the neck of Troy he has cast such a yoke. 530 Now he has come home, our King, Atreus’ elder son, a fortunate [eudaimôn] man, worthy of honor beyond all living men. For neither Paris nor his partner city can boast that the deed [drâma] was greater than the suffering [pathos]. Convicted for robbery and for theft as well, 535 he has lost the plunder and has razed in utter destruction his father’s house and even the land. The sons of Priam have paid a twofold penalty for their errors.
Chorus
Joy to you, Herald from the Achaean host!
Herald
I do rejoice. I will no longer refuse to die, if that pleases the gods.
Chorus
540 Was it yearning for this your fatherland that wore you out?
Herald
Yes, so that my eyes are filled with tears for joy.
Chorus
It was then a pleasing malady from which you suffered.
Herald
How so? Teach me, and I shall master what you say.
Chorus
You were smitten with desire for those who returned your love.
Herald
545 Do you mean that our land longed for the longing host?
Chorus
So longed that often from a darkly brooding spirit I have sighed.
Herald
Where did this gloom of melancholy upon your spirit come from?
Chorus
Long since have I found silence an antidote to harm.
Herald
How so? Did you fear anyone when our princes were gone?
Chorus
550 In such fear that now, in your own words, even death would be a great favor [kharis].
Herald
Yes, all’s well, well ended. Yet, of what occurred in the long years, one might well say that part fell out happily, and part in turn amiss. But who, unless he is a god, is free from suffering all his days? 555 For were I to recount our hardships and our wretched quarters, the scanty space and the sorry berths - what did we not have to complain of? Then again, ashore, there was still worse to loathe; for we had to lie down close to the enemy’s walls, 560 and the drizzling from the sky and the dews from the meadows distilled upon us, working constant destruction to our clothes and filling our hair with vermin.
And if one were to tell of the wintry cold, past all enduring, when Ida’s snow slew the birds; 565 or of the heat, when upon his waveless noonday couch, windless the sea [pontos] sank to sleep - but why should we bewail all this? Our ordeal [ponos] is past; past for the dead so that they will never care even to wake to life again. 570 Why should we count the number of the slain, or why should the living feel pain at their past harsh fortunes? Our misfortunes should, in my opinion, bid us a long farewell. For us, the remnant of the Argive host, the gain has the advantage and the loss does not bear down the scale; 575 so that, as we speed over land and sea, it is fitting that we on this bright day make this boast: "The Argive army, having taken Troy at last, has nailed up these spoils to be a glory for the gods throughout Hellas in their shrines from days of old." 580 Whoever hears the story of these deeds must extol the city and the leaders of her host; and the kharis of Zeus that brought them to accomplishment shall receive its due measure of gratitude. There, you have heard all that I have to say.
Chorus
Your words have proved me wrong. I do not deny it; for the old have ever enough youth to learn aright. 585 But these tidings should have most interest for the household and Clytemnestra, and at the same time enrich me.
Clytemnestra enters.
Clytemnestra
I raised a shout of triumph in my joy long before this, when the first flaming messenger arrived by night, telling that Ilium was captured and overthrown. 590 Then there were some who chided me and said: "Are you so convinced by beacon-fires as to think that Troy has now been sacked? Truly, it is just like a woman to be elated in heart." By such taunts I was made to seem as if my wits were wandering. Nevertheless I still held on with my sacrifice, and throughout all the quarters of the city, according to their womanly custom, 595 they uttered in a proper way [euphêmeô] a shout of happy praise while in the shrines of the gods they lulled to rest the fragrant spice-fed flame.
So now why should you rehearse to me the account at length? From the King himself I shall hear the whole tale; 600 but I should hasten to welcome my honored lord best on his return. For what joy is sweeter in a woman’s eyes than to unbar the gates for her husband when the god has given him salvation from war? Give this message to my lord: 605 let him come with all speed, his country’s fond desire, come to find at home his wife faithful, even as he left her, a watchdog of his house, loyal to him, a foe to those who wish him ill; yes, for the rest, unchanged in every part; 610 in all this length of time never having broken any seal [sêmantêrion]. Of pleasure from any other man or of scandalous repute I know no more than of dyeing bronze.
She exits.
Herald
A boast like this, loaded full with truth [alêtheia], does not shame the speech of a noble wife.
Chorus
615 Thus has she spoken for your schooling, but speciously for those that can interpret right. But, Herald, say - I want to hear of Menelaus . Has he, our land’s own power [kratos], achieved a nostos and a way of salvation back home?
Herald
620 It would be impossible to report false news as fair so that those I love should take pleasure for long.
Chorus
Oh if only you could tell tidings true [alêthês] yet good! It is not easy to conceal when true and good are split apart.
Herald
The prince was swept from the sight of the Achaean host, 625 himself, and his ship likewise. I speak no lies.
Chorus
Did he put forth in sight of all from Ilium, or did a storm, distressing all in common, snatch him from the fleet?
Herald
Like master bowman you have hit the mark; a long tale of distress have you told in brief.
Chorus
630 Did the general voice of other voyagers bring news of him as alive or dead?
Herald
None knows to give clear report of this - except only the Sun that fosters life upon the earth.
Chorus
How then do you say 635 the storm rose by the anger of the daimones upon the naval host and passed away?
Herald
An auspiciously spoken-of [euphêmos] day one should not pollute with a tale of misfortune - the tîmê due to the gods keeps them apart. When a messenger with gloomy countenance reports to a people dire disaster of its army’s rout - 640 one common wound inflicted on the polis, while from many a home many a victim is devoted to death by the two-handled whip beloved of Ares, destruction [atê] double-armed, a gory pair - when, I say, he is packed with woes like this, 645 he should sing the triumph-song of the Avenging Spirits [Erinyes].
But when one comes with glad news of salvation [sôtêriâ] to a city rejoicing in its happiness - how shall I mix fair with foul in telling of the storm, not unprovoked by the gods’ mênis, that broke upon the Achaeans? 650 For fire and sea, beforehand bitterest of foes, swore alliance and as proof destroyed the unhappy Argive army. In the nighttime arose the mischief from the cruel swells. Beneath blasts from Thrace ship dashed against ship; 655 and they, gored violently by the furious hurricane and rush of pelting rain, were swept out of sight by the whirling gust of an evil shepherd. But when the radiant light of the sun rose we beheld the Aegean flowering with corpses 660 of Achaean men and wreckage of ships. Ourselves, however, and our ship, its hull unshattered, some power, divine not human, preserved by stealth or intercession, laying hand upon its helm; and Fortune the Savior [sôtêr] chose to sit aboard our craft 665 so that it should neither take in the swelling surf at anchorage nor drive upon a rock-bound coast. Then, having escaped Hades of the sea [pontos], in the clear bright day, scarce crediting our fortune, we brooded in anxious thought over our latest pathos, 670 our fleet distressed and sorely buffeted. So now, if any of them still draw the breath of life, they speak of us as lost - and why should they not? We think the same of them. But may all turn out for the best! For Menelaus , indeed - 675 first and foremost expect him to return. At least if some beam of the sun investigates and finds [historeô] him alive and well, by the design of Zeus, who has not yet decided utterly to destroy the family, there is some hope that he will come home again. 680 Hearing so much, be assured that you hear the truth [alêthês].
He exits.
Chorus
strophe 1
Who can have given a name so altogether true - was it some power invisible guiding his tongue aright by forecasting of destiny? - 685 who named that bride of the spear and source of strife with the name of Helen? For, true to her name, a Hell she proved to ships, Hell to men, Hell to city, 690 when stepping forth from her luxuriant [habros] and costly-curtained bower, she sailed the sea before the breath of earth-born Zephyros. And after her a goodly host of warrior 695 huntsmen followed on the oars’ vanished track in pursuit of a quarry that had beached its boat on Simois’ leafy banks - in a conflict [eris] to end in blood.
antistrophe 1
To Ilium, its purpose fulfilling, 700 the goddess Mênis brought a marriage rightly named a mourning, exacting in later requital for the dishonor done to hospitality and to Zeus, the partaker of the hearth, 705 upon those who with loud voice celebrated the song in honor of the bride, even the bridegroom’s kin to whom it fell that day to raise the marriage-hymn. 710 But Priam’s city has learned, in her old age, an altered strain, and now, I trust, wails a loud song, full of lamentation, calling Paris "evil-wed"; for she has borne the burden of a life in which everything was destroyed, a life full of lamentation because of 715 the wretched slaughter of her sons.
strophe 2
Even so a man reared in his house a lion’s whelp, robbed of its mother’s milk yet still desiring the breast. Gentle it was 720 in the prelude of its life, kindly to children, and a delight to the old. Much did it get, held in arms like a nursling child, with its 725 bright eye turned toward his hand, and fawning under compulsion of its belly’s need.
antistrophe 2
But brought to full growth by time it demonstrated [verb of apodeixis] the nature it had from its parents. Unbidden, in return [kharis] for its fostering, 730 it prepared a feast with a slaughter of destruction [atê] inflicted on the flocks; so that the house was defiled with blood, and they that lived there could not control their anguish, and great was the carnage far and wide. 735 A priest of Derangement [atê], by order of a god, it was reared in the house.
strophe 3
At first, I would say, there came to Ilium the spirit of unruffled calm, 740 a delicate ornament of wealth, a darter of soft glances from the eye, love’s flower that stings the heart. Then, swerving from her course, she brought 745 her marriage to a bitter end, sped on to the children of Priam under escort of Zeus, the warder of host and guest, ruining her sojourn and her companions, a vengeful Fury [Erinys] to be lamented by mourning brides.
antistrophe 3
750 A venerable utterance proclaimed of old has been fashioned among mankind: the prosperity [olbos] of man, when it has come to fulfillment [telos], engenders offspring and does not die childless, 755 and from his good fortune there springs up insatiable misery.
But I hold my own mind and think apart from other men. It is the evil deed that afterwards begets more iniquity 760 like its own breed; but when a house has straight dikê, the lot of its children is blessed always.
strophe 4
But an old Hubris tends to give birth, 765 in evil men, sooner or later, at the fated hour of birth, to a young Hubris and that irresistible, unconquerable, unholy daimôn, Recklessness, 770 and black spirits of Derangement [atê] upon the household, which resemble their parents.
antistrophe 4
But Dikê shines in smoke-begrimed dwellings 775 and esteems the virtuous man. From gilded mansions, where men’s hands are foul, she departs with averted eyes and makes her way to pure homes; she does not worship the power 780 of wealth stamped counterfeit [para-sêmos] by the praise [ainos] of men, and she guides all things to their proper end.
Enter Agamemnon and Cassandra, in a chariot, with a numerous retinue.
anapests
All hail, my King, sacker of Troy, offspring of Atreus! 785 How shall I greet you? How shall I do you homage, not overshooting or running short of the due measure of kharis? Many of mortal men put appearance before truth and thereby transgress dikê. 790 Every one is ready to heave a sigh over the unfortunate, but no sting of true sorrow reaches the heart; and in seeming sympathy they join in others’ joy, forcing their faces into smiles. 795 But whoever is a discerning shepherd of his flock cannot be deceived by men’s eyes which, while they feign loyalty of heart, only fawn upon him with watery affection [philotês]. Now in the past, when you marshaled the army in Helen’s cause, 800 you were depicted in my eyes - for I will not hide it from you - most ungracefully and as not rightly guiding the helm of your mind in seeking through your sacrifices to bring courage to dying men. 805 But now, from the depth of my heart and with no lack of love...
[There is a gap in the text.]
...their ordeal [ponos] is joy to those who have won success. In course of time you shall learn by enquiry which ones of the citizens have with dikê, and which ones with no true aim, served as guardians of the city.
Agamemnon
810 Argos first, as is dikê and proper, I greet, and her local gods who have helped me to my nostos and to the justice [dikê] I exacted from Priam’s city. For listening to no pleadings [dikê pl.] by word of mouth, without dissenting voice, they cast into the 815 bloody urn their ballots for the murderous destroying of Ilium; but to the urn of acquittal that no hand filled, Hope alone drew near. The smoke even now is a proper signal [eu-sêmos] of the city’s fall. The blasts of Destruction [atê] still live, and 820 the embers, as they die, breathe forth rich fumes of wealth. For this success we should render to the gods a return in ever-mindful kharis, seeing that we have thrown round the city the toils of vengeance, and in a woman’s cause it has been laid low by the fierce Argive beast, 825 brood of the horse, a shield-armed folk, that launched its leap when the Pleiades waned. Vaulting over its towered walls, the ravening lion lapped up his fill of the blood of turannoi.
For the gods then I have stretched out this prelude. 830 But, touching your sentiments - which I heard and still bear in memory - I both agree and you have in me an advocate. For few there are among men in whom it is inborn to admire without envy the good fortune of a philos. For the venom of malevolence settles upon the heart and 835 doubles the burden of him who suffers from that plague: he is himself weighed down by his own calamity, and groans to see another’s prosperity [olbos]. From knowledge - for well I know the mirror of companionship - I may call an image of a shade 840 those who feigned exceeding loyalty to me. Only Odysseus, the very man who sailed against his will, once harnessed, proved my zealous yoke-fellow. This I affirm of him whether he is alive or dead.
But, for the rest, in what concerns the polis and public worship, 845 we shall appoint public debates in assembly [agônes] and consider. Where all goes well, we must take counsel so that it may long endure; but whenever there is need of healing remedy, we will by kind appliance of cautery or the knife 850 endeavor to avert the mischief of the disease.
And now I will pass to my palace halls and to my household hearth, and first of all pay greeting to the gods. They who sent me forth have brought me home again. May victory, now that it has attended me, remain ever with me constant to the end!
He descends from his chariot. Clytemnestra enters, attended by maidservants carrying purple tapestries.
Clytemnestra
855 Citizens of Argos, you Elders present here, I shall not be ashamed to confess in your presence my fondness for my husband - with time diffidence dies away in humans.
Untaught by others, I can tell of my own weary life 860 all the long while this my lord was beneath Ilium’s walls. First and foremost, it is a terrible evil for a wife to sit forlorn at home, severed from her husband, forever hearing malignant rumors manifold, and for one messenger after another 865 to come bearing tidings of disaster, each worse than the last, and cry them to the household. And as for wounds, had my lord received so many as rumor kept pouring into the house, no net would have been pierced so full of holes as he. Or if he had died as often as reports claimed, 870 then truly he might have had three bodies - a second Geryon - and have boasted of having taken on him a triple cover of earth - ample that above; of that below I speak not - one death for each different shape. Because of such malignant tales as these, 875 many times others have had to loose the high-hung halter from my neck, held in its strong grip. It is for this reason, in fact, that our boy, Orestes, does not stand here beside me, as he should - he in whom are authorized the pledges of my love and yours. Nor should you think this strange. 880 For he is in the protecting care of our well-intentioned ally, Strophios of Phokis, who warned me of trouble on two scores - your own peril beneath Ilium’s walls, and then the chance that the people in clamorous revolt might overturn the Council, as it is natural 885 for men to trample all the more upon the fallen. Truly such an excuse supports no guile.
As for myself, the welling fountains of my tears are utterly dried up - not a drop remains. In nightlong vigils my eyes are sore 890 with weeping for the beacon-lights set for you but always neglected. The faint whir of the buzzing gnat often woke me from dreams in which I beheld more of your sufferings [pathos pl.] than the time of sleep could have compassed.
895 But now, having borne all this, my mind freed from its sorrow [penthos], I would hail my lord here as the watchdog of the fold, the savior [sôtêr] forestay of the ship, firm-based pillar of the lofty roof, only-begotten son of a father, or land glimpsed by men at sea beyond their hope, 900 dawn most fair to look upon after storm, the gushing stream to thirsty wayfarer - sweet is it to escape all stress of need. Such truly are the greetings of which I deem him worthy. But let envy be far removed, since many were the ills 905 we endured before. And now, I pray you, philos, dismount from your car, but do not set on common earth the foot, my lord, that has trampled upon Ilium.
To her attendants.
Why this loitering, women, to whom I have assigned the task to strew with tapestries the place where he shall go? 910 Quick! With purple let his path be strewn, that Dikê may usher him into a home he never hoped to see. The rest my unslumbering vigilance shall order duly - if it please the god - even as is ordained.
Agamemnon
Offspring of Leda, guardian of my house, 915 your ainos fits well with my absence; for you have drawn it out to ample length. But becoming praise - this prize should rightly proceed from other lips. For the rest, treat me not as if I were a woman, in a luxuriant [habros] manner, nor, like some barbarian, 920 grovel before me with widemouthed acclaim; and do not draw down envy upon my path by strewing it with tapestries. It is the gods we must honor thus; but it is not possible for a mortal to tread upon embroidered fineries without fear. 925 I tell you to revere me not as a god, but as a man. Footmats and embroideries sound diverse in the voice of Rumor; to think no folly is the best gift of the gods. Only when man’s life comes full circle [telos] in prosperity dare we pronounce him blessed [olbios]; 930 and if I may act in all things as I do now, I have good confidence.
Clytemnestra
Come now, do not speak so contrary to my purpose.
Agamemnon
Purpose! Be assured that I shall not weaken mine.
Clytemnestra
You must in fear have vowed to the gods thus to act.
Agamemnon
With full knowledge I pronounced this my definitive word [telos], if ever man did.
Clytemnestra
935 What do you suppose that Priam would have done, if he had achieved your triumph?
Agamemnon
He would have set foot upon the embroideries, I certainly believe.
Clytemnestra
Then do not be ashamed of mortal reproach.
Agamemnon
And yet a people’s voice is a mighty power.
Clytemnestra
True, yet he who is unenvied is unenviable.
Agamemnon
940 Surely it is not woman’s part to long for fighting.
Clytemnestra
True, but it is seemly for the fortunate [olbioi] to yield the victory.
Agamemnon
What? Is this the kind of victory in strife that you prize?
Clytemnestra
Oh yield! Yet of your own free will entrust the victory to me.
Agamemnon
Well, if you will have your way, 945 quick, let some one loose my sandals, which, slavelike, serve the treading of my foot! As I walk upon these purple vestments may I not be struck from afar by any glance of the gods’ jealous eye. A terrible shame it is for one’s foot to mar the resources of the house by wasting wealth and costly woven work.
950 So much for this. Receive this foreign girl into the house with kindness. A god from afar looks graciously upon a gentle master; for no one freely takes the yoke of slavery. But she, 955 the choicest flower of rich treasure, has followed in my train, my army’s gift. Since I have been subdued and must listen to you in this, I will tread upon a purple pathway as I pass to my palace halls.
Clytemnestra
There is the sea - and who shall drain it dry? - producing stain of abundant purple, costly as silver 960 and ever fresh, with which to dye our clothes; and of these our house, through the gods, has ample store; it knows no poverty. Vestments enough I would have devoted to be trampled underfoot had it been so ordered in the seat of oracles 965 when I was devising a ransom for your life [psûkhê]. For if the root still lives, leaves come again to the house and spread their over-reaching shade against the scorching dog star Sirius; so, now that you have come to hearth [hestiâ] and home, it signals [sêmainô] that warmth has come in wintertime; 970 and again, when Zeus makes wine from the bitter grape, then immediately there is coolness in the house when its rightful lord occupies his halls.
Agamemnon enters the palace.
O Zeus, Zeus, you who bring things to fulfillment [telos], fulfill my prayers! May you see to that which you mean to fulfill!
She exits.
Chorus
strophe 1
975 Why does this terror so persistently hover standing before my prophetic heart? Why does my song, unbidden and unfed, chant strains of augury? Why does assuring confidence not sit on my heart’s throne 980 and spurn the terror like an uninterpretable dream? But Time has collected the sands of the shore upon the cables cast thereon 985 when the shipborn army sped forth for Ilium.
antistrophe 1
Of their nostos I learn with my own eyes and need no other witness. 990 Yet still my thûmos within me, self-taught [auto-didaktos], intones the lyreless dirge of the Avenging Spirit [Erinys], and cannot wholly win its customary confidence of hope. 995 Not for nothing is my bosom disquieted as my heart throbs within my justly fearful phrenes in eddying tides that warn of some event. But I pray that my expectation may fall out false 1000 and not come to fulfillment.
strophe 2
Truly blooming health does not rest content within its due bounds; for disease ever presses close against it, its neighbor with a common wall. 1005 So human fortune, when holding onward in straight course, strikes upon a hidden reef. And yet, if with a well-measured throw, caution heaves overboard 1010 a portion of the gathered wealth, the whole house, with woe overladen, does not founder nor engulf the hull. Truly the generous gift from Zeus, 1015 rich and derived from yearly furrows, makes an end of the plague of famine.
antistrophe 2
But a man’s blood, once it has first fallen by murder to earth 1020 in a dark tide - who by magic spell shall call it back? Even he who possessed the skill to raise from the dead - did not Zeus make an end of him as warning? 1025 And unless one fate ordained of the gods restrains another fate from winning the advantage, my heart would outstrip my tongue and pour forth its fears; 1030 but, as it is, it mutters only in the dark, distressed and hopeless ever to unravel anything in time when my phrên is aflame.
Clytemnestra enters.
Clytemnestra
1035 Get inside, you too, Cassandra; since it is not with mênis that Zeus has appointed you to share the holy water of a house where you may take your stand, with many another slave, at the altar of the god who guards its wealth. Get down from the car and do not be too proud; 1040 for even Alkmene’s son, men say, once endured to be sold and to eat the bread of slavery. But if such fortune should of necessity fall to the lot of any, there is good cause for gratitude [kharis] in having masters of ancient wealth; for they who, beyond their hope, have reaped a rich harvest of possessions, 1045 are cruel to their slaves in every way, even exceeding due measure. You have from us such usage as custom [nomos] warrants.
Chorus
To Cassandra.
It is to you she has been speaking and clearly. Since you are in the toils of destiny, perhaps you will obey, if you are so inclined; but perhaps you will not.
Clytemnestra
1050 Well, if her language is not strange and foreign, even as a swallow’s, I must speak within her comprehension and move her to comply.
Chorus
Go with her. With things as they now stand, she gives you the best. Do as she bids and leave your seat in the car.
Clytemnestra
1055 I have no time to waste with this woman here outside; for already the victims stand by the central hearth awaiting the sacrifice - a grace [kharis] we never expected to be ours. As for you, if you will take any part, make no delay. 1060 But if, failing to understand, you do not catch my meaning, then, instead of speech, make a sign with your barbarian hand.
Chorus
It is an interpreter [hermêneus] and a plain one that the stranger seems to need. She bears herself like a wild creature newly captured.
Clytemnestra
No, she is mad and listens to her wild mood, 1065 since she has come here from a newly captured city, and does not know how to tolerate the bit until she has foamed away her fretfulness in blood. No! I will waste no more words upon her to be insulted thus.
She exits.
Chorus
But I will not be angry, since I pity her. 1070 Come, unhappy one, leave the car; yield to necessity and take upon you this novel yoke.
Cassandra
strophe 1
Woe, woe, woe! O Apollo, O Apollo!
Chorus
Wherefore your cry of "woe" in Loxias’ name? 1075 He is not the kind of god that has to do with mourners.
Cassandra
antistrophe 1
Woe, woe, woe! O Apollo, O Apollo!
Chorus
Once more with ill-omened words she cries to the god who should not be present at times of lamentation.
Cassandra
strophe 2
1080 Apollo, Apollo! God of the Ways, my destroyer! For you have destroyed me this second time utterly.
Chorus
I think that she is about to prophesy about her own miseries. The divine gift still abides even in the phrên of one enslaved.
Cassandra
antistrophe 2
1085 Apollo, Apollo! God of the Ways, my destroyer! Ah, what way is this that you have brought me? To what house?
Chorus
To that of Atreus’ sons. If you do not perceive this, I’ll tell it to you. And you shall not say that it is untrue.
Cassandra
strophe 3
1090 No, no, rather to a god-hating house, a house that knows many a horrible butchery of kin, a slaughter-house of men and a floor swimming with blood.
Chorus
The stranger seems keen-scented as a hound; she is on the trail where she will discover blood.
Cassandra
antistrophe 3
1095 Here is the evidence in which I put my trust! Behold those babies bewailing their own butchery and their roasted flesh eaten by their father!
Chorus
Your kleos for reading the future had reached our ears; but we have no need of spokesmen [prophêtês pl.] here.
Cassandra
strophe 4
1100 Alas, what can she be planning? What is this fresh woe [akhos] she contrives here within, what monstrous, monstrous horror, unbearable to philoi, beyond all remedy? And help stands far away!
Chorus
1105 These prophesyings pass my comprehension; but the former I understood - the whole city rings with them.
Cassandra
antistrophe 4
Ah, damned woman, will you do this thing? Your husband, the partner of your bed, when you have cheered him with the bath, will you - how shall I tell the end [telos]? 1110 Soon it will be done. Now this hand, now that, she stretches forth!
Chorus
Not yet do I comprehend; for now, after riddles [ainigma pl.], I am bewildered by dark oracles.
Cassandra
strophe 5
Ah! Ah! What apparition is this? 1115 Is it a net of death? No, it is a snare that shares his bed, that shares the guilt of murder. Let the fatal group [stasis], insatiable [without koros] against the family, raise a shout of jubilance over a victim accursed!
Chorus
What Spirit of Vengeance [Erinys] is this that you bid 1120 raise its voice over this house? Your words do not cheer me. Back to my heart surge the drops of my pallid blood, even as when they drip from a mortal wound, ebbing away as life’s beams sink low; and Destruction [atê] comes speedily.
Cassandra
antistrophe 5
1125 Ah, ah, see there, see there! Keep the bull from his mate! She has caught him in the robe and gores him with the crafty device of her black horn! He falls in a vessel of water! It is of doom wrought by guile in a murderous cauldron that I am telling you.
Chorus
1130 I cannot boast that I am a keen judge of prophecies; but these, I think, spell some evil. But from prophecies what word of good ever comes to mortals? Through terms of evil their wordy arts 1135 bring men to know fear chanted in prophetic strains.
Cassandra
strophe 6
Alas, alas, the sorrow of my ill-starred doom! For it is my own suffering [pathos], crowning the cup, that I bewail. Ah, to what end did you bring me here, unhappy as I am? For nothing except to die - and not alone. What else?
Chorus
1140 Frenzied in phrenes you are, by some god possessed, and you wail in wild strains your own fate, like that brown bird that never ceases making lament - alas! - and in the misery of her phrenes moans Itys, Itys, 1145 throughout all her days abounding in sorrow, the nightingale.
Cassandra
antistrophe 6
Ah, fate of the clear-voiced nightingale! The gods clothed her in a winged form and gave to her a sweet life without tears. But for me waits destruction by the two-edged sword.
Chorus
1150 From where come these vain pangs of prophecy that assail you? And why do you mold to melody these terrors with dismal cries blended with piercing strains? How do you know the bounds of the path of your 1155 ill-boding prophecy?
Cassandra
strophe 7
Ah, the marriage, the marriage of Paris, that destroyed his philoi! Ah me, Scamander, my native stream! Upon your banks in bygone days, unhappy maid, was I nurtured with fostering care; 1160 but now by Kokytos and the banks of Acheron, I think, I soon must chant my prophecies.
Chorus
What words are these you utter, words all too plain? A newborn child hearing them could understand. I am smitten with a deadly pain, while, 1165 by reason of your cruel fortune, you cry aloud your pitiful moans that break my heart to hear.
Cassandra
antistrophe 7
O the ordeals [ponoi], the ordeals [ponoi] of my city utterly destroyed! Alas, the sacrifices my father offered, the many pasturing cattle slain to save its towers! 1170 Yet they provided no remedy to save the city from suffering even as it has; and I, my noos at boiling point, must soon fall to the ground.
Chorus
Your present speech chimes with your former strain. 1175 Surely some malignant spirit, falling upon you with heavy swoop, moves you to chant your piteous woes fraught with death. But the end I am helpless to discover.
Cassandra
And now, no more shall my prophecy peer forth from behind a veil like a new-wedded bride; 1180 but it will rush upon me clear as a fresh wind blowing against the sun’s uprising so as to dash against its rays, like a wave, a woe far mightier than mine. No more by riddles [ainigma pl.]will I put knowledge in your phrenes. And bear me witness, as, running close behind, 1185 I scent the track of crimes done long ago. For from this roof never departs a khoros chanting in unison, but singing not a happy tune; for it tells not of good. And so, gorged on human blood, so as to be the more emboldened, a reveling band [kômos] of kindred Furies [Erinyes] haunts the house, 1190 hard to drive away. Lodged within its halls they sing their hymn, the primal atê; and, each in turn, they spurn with loathing a brother’s bed, for they bitterly spurn the one who defiled it. Have I missed the mark, or, like a true archer, do I strike my quarry? 1195 Or am I prophet of lies, a door-to-door babbler? Bear witness upon your oath that I know the deeds of error, ancient in story, of this house.
Chorus
How could an oath, a pledge although given in honor, effect any cure? Yet I marvel at you that, 1200 though bred beyond the sea [pontos], you speak truth of a foreign polis, even as if you had been present there.
Cassandra
The seer Apollo appointed me to this office.
Chorus
Can it be that he, a god, was smitten with desire?
Cassandra
Before now I was ashamed [aidôs] to speak of this.
Chorus
1205 In prosperity everyone becomes delicate [habros].
Cassandra
Oh, but he wrestled me down, breathing down ardent pleasure [kharis] on me.
Chorus
Did you in due course come to the rite of marriage?
Cassandra
I consented to Loxias but broke my word.
Chorus
1210 Were you already possessed by the art inspired of the god?
Cassandra
Already I prophesied to my countrymen all their sufferings [pathos pl.].
Chorus
How came it then that you were unharmed by Loxias’ wrath?
Cassandra
Ever since that fault I could persuade no one of anything.
Chorus
And yet to us at least the prophecies you utter seem true enough.
Cassandra
Ah, ah! Oh, oh, the agony! 1215 Once more the dreadful ordeal [ponos] of true prophecy whirls and distracts me with its ill-boding onset. Do you see them there - sitting before the house - young creatures like phantoms of dreams? Children, they seem, slaughtered by their own kindred, 1220 their hands full of the meat of their own flesh; they are clear to my sight, holding their vitals and their inward parts - piteous burden! - which their father tasted. For this cause I tell you that a strengthless lion, wallowing in his bed, plots vengeance, 1225 a watchman waiting - ah me! - for my master’s coming home - yes, my master, for I must bear the yoke of slavery. The commander of the fleet and the overthrower of Ilium little knows what deeds shall be brought to evil accomplishment by the hateful hound, whose tongue licked his hand, who stretched forth her ears in gladness, 1230 like treacherous Atê. Such boldness has she - a woman to slay a man. What odious monster shall I fitly call her? An Amphisbaina? Or a Scylla, tenanting the rocks, a pest to mariners, 1235 a raging, devil’s mother, breathing relentless war against her philoi? And how the all-daring woman raised a shout of triumph, as when the battle turns, while she feigned joy at the salvation [sôtêriâ] of nostos! And yet, it is all one, whether or not I am believed. What does it matter? 1240 What is to come, will come. And soon you yourself, present here, shall with great pity pronounce me all too true [alêthês] a prophetess.
Chorus
Thyestes’ banquet on his children’s flesh I understood, and I tremble. Terror possesses me as I hear the truth [alêthês], nothing fashioned out of falsehood to resemble truth. 1245 But as for the rest I heard I am thrown off the track.
Cassandra
I say you shall look upon Agamemnon dead.
Chorus
Lull your speech, miserable girl, making it euphêmos.
Cassandra
Over what I tell no healing god presides.
Chorus
No, if it is to be; but may it not be so!
Cassandra
1250 You do but pray; their business is to slay.
Chorus
What man is he that contrived this woe [akhos]?
Cassandra
Surely you must have missed the meaning of my prophecies.
Chorus
I do not understand the scheme of him who is to do the deed.
Cassandra
And yet all too well I understand the Greek language.
Chorus
1255 So, too, do the Pythian oracles; yet they are hard to understand.
Cassandra
Oh, oh! What fire! It comes upon me! Woe, woe! Lukeian Apollo! Ah me, ah me! This two-footed lioness, who mates with a wolf in the absence of the noble lion, 1260 will slay me, miserable as I am. As if brewing a drug, she vows that with her wrath she will mix requital for me too, while she whets her sword against her husband, to take murderous vengeance for bringing me here. Why then do I bear these mockeries of myself, 1265 this wand, these prophetic chaplets on my neck?
Breaking her wand, she throws it and the other insignia of her prophetic office upon the ground, and tramples them underfoot.
You at least I will destroy before I die myself. To destruction with you! And fallen there, thus do I repay you. Enrich with doom some other in my place. Look, Apollo himself is stripping me 1270 of my prophetic garb - he that saw me mocked to bitter scorn, even in this bravery, by friends turned foes, with one accord, in vain - but, like some wandering vagabond, called "beggar," "wretch," "starveling," I bore it all. 1275 And now the prophet, having undone me, his prophetess, has brought me to this lethal pass. Instead of my father’s altar a block awaits me, where I am to be butchered in a hot and bloody sacrifice. Yet, we shall not die without vengeance [tîmê] from the gods; 1280 for there shall come in turn another, our avenger, a scion of the family, to slay his mother and exact requital for his sire; an exile, a wanderer, a stranger from this land, he shall return to put the coping-stone upon these unspeakable derangements [atai] of his house. For the gods have sworn a mighty oath 1285 that his slain father’s outstretched corpse shall bring him home. Why then thus raise my voice in pitiful lament? Since first I saw the city of Ilium fare how it has fared, while her captors, by the gods’ sentence, are coming to such an end, 1290 I will go in and meet my fate. I will dare to die. This door I greet as the gates of Death. And I pray that, dealt a mortal stroke, without a struggle, my life-blood ebbing away in easy death, I may close these eyes.
Chorus
1295 O woman, very pitiful and very sophê, long has been your speech. But if, in truth, you have knowledge of your own death, how can you step with calm courage to the altar like an ox, driven by the god?
Cassandra
There is no escape; no, my friends, there is none any more.
Chorus
1300 Yet he that is last has the advantage in respect of time.
Cassandra
The day has come; flight would profit me but little.
Chorus
Well, be assured, you are brave suffering with courageous phrên.
Cassandra
None who is happy is commended thus.
Chorus
Yet surely to die with kleos is a grace [kharis] for mortals.
Cassandra
1305 Alas for you, my father, and for your noble children!
She starts back in horror.
Chorus
What ails you? What terror turns you back?
Cassandra
Alas, alas!
Chorus
Why do you cry "alas"? Unless perhaps there is some horror in your phrenes.
Cassandra
This house stinks of blood-dripping slaughter.
Chorus
1310 And what of that? It is just the savor of victims at the hearth.
Cassandra
It is like a breath from a charnel house.
Chorus
You are not speaking of proud Syrian incense for the house.
Cassandra
Nay, I will go to bewail also within the palace my own and Agamemnon’s fate. Enough of life! 1315 Alas, my friends, not with vain terror do I shrink, as a bird that fears a bush. After I am dead, bear witness for me of this - when for me, a woman, another woman shall be slain, and for an ill-wedded man another man shall fall. 1320 I claim this from you as my xenos now that I am about to die.
Chorus
Poor woman, I pity you for your death foretold.
Cassandra
Yet once more I would like to speak, but not a dirge. I pray to the sun, in the presence of his latest light, that my enemies may at the same time pay to my avengers a bloody penalty for 1325 slaughtering a slave, an easy prey. Alas for human fortune! When prosperous, a mere shadow can overturn it; if misfortune strikes, the dash of a wet sponge blots out the drawing. 1330 And this last I deem far more pitiable than that.
She enters the palace.
Chorus
anapests
It is the nature of all human kind to be unsatisfied with prosperity. From stately halls no one bars it with warning voice that utters the words "Enter no more." 1335 So the Blessed Ones [makares] have granted to our prince to capture Priam’s town; and, divinely-honored, he returns to his home. Yet if he now must pay the penalty for the blood shed by others before him, and by dying for the dead 1340 he is to bring to pass retribution of other deaths, what mortal man, on hearing this, can boast that he was born with an unharmful daimôn?
A shriek is heard from within.
Agamemnon
Alas! I am struck deep with a mortal blow!
Chorus
Silence! Who is this that cries out, wounded by a mortal blow?
Agamemnon
1345 And once again, alas! I am struck by a second blow.
Chorus
- The deed is done, it seems - to judge by the groans of the King. But come, let us take counsel together if there is perhaps some safe plan of action.
- I tell you my advice: summon the townsfolk to bring rescue here to the palace.
- 1350 To my thinking we must burst in and charge them with the deed while the sword is still dripping in their hands.
- I, too, am for taking part in some such plan, and vote for action of some sort. It is no time to keep on delaying.
- It is plain. Their opening act 1355 is the signal [sêmeion pl.] of a plan to set up a tyranny in the polis.
- Yes, because we are wasting time, while they, trampling underfoot the kleos of Delay, allow their hands no slumber.
- I know not what plan I could hit on to propose. It is the doer’s part likewise to do the planning.
- 1360 I too am of this mind, for I know no way to bring the dead back to life by mere words.
- What? To prolong our lives shall we thus submit to the rule of those defilers of the house?
- No, it is not to be endured. No, death would be better, 1365 for that would be a milder lot than tyranny.
- And shall we, upon the evidence of mere groans, divine that the man is dead?
- We should be sure of the facts before we indulge our wrath. For surmise differs from assurance.
- 1370 I am supported on all sides to approve this course: that we get clear assurance how it stands with Atreus’ son.
The bodies of Agamemnon and Cassandra are disclosed, with Clytemnestra standing beside them.
Clytemnestra
Much have I said before to serve my need and I shall feel no shame to contradict it now. For how else could one, devising hate against enemies [ekhthroi] 1375 who bear the semblance of philoi, fence the snares of ruin too high to be overleaped? This is the agôn of an ancient feud, pondered by me of old, and it has come - however long delayed. I stand where I dealt the blow; my purpose is achieved. 1380 Thus have I done the deed - deny it I will not. Round him, as if to catch a haul of fish, I cast an impassable net - fatal wealth of robe - so that he should neither escape nor ward off doom. Twice I struck him, and with two groans 1385 his limbs relaxed. Once he had fallen, I dealt him yet a third stroke as a prayer of gratitude [kharis] to the infernal Zeus, the savior [sôtêr] of the dead. Fallen thus, he gasped away his thûmos, and as he breathed forth quick spurts of blood, 1390 he struck me with dark drops of gory dew; while I rejoiced no less than the sown earth is gladdened in heaven’s refreshing rain at the birthtime of the flower buds.
Since this is so, old men of Argos, rejoice, if you would rejoice; as for me, I glory in the deed. 1395 And had it been a fitting act to pour libations on the corpse, over him this would have been done with dikê. With dikê and then some! With so many accursed lies has he filled the mixing-bowl in his own house, and now he has come home and himself drained it to the dregs.
Chorus
We are shocked at your tongue, how bold-mouthed you are, 1400 that over your husband you can utter such a boastful speech.
Clytemnestra
You are testing me as if I were a witless woman. But my heart does not quail, and I say to you who know it well - and whether you wish to praise or to blame me, it is all one - here is Agamemnon, 1405 my husband, now a corpse, the work of this right hand, an artisan of dikê. So stands the case.
Chorus
strophe 1
Woman, what poisonous herb nourished by the earth have you tasted, what potion drawn from the flowing sea, that you have taken upon yourself this maddened rage and the loud curses voiced by the community [dêmos]? 1410 You have cast him off; you have cut him off; and out from the polis you shall be cast, a burden of hatred to your people.
Clytemnestra
It’s now that you would doom me to exile from the polis, to the hatred of my people and the curses of the dêmos; though then you had nothing to urge against him that lies here. And yet he, 1415 caring no more than if it had been a beast that perished - though sheep were plenty in his fleecy folds - he sacrificed his own child, she whom I bore with most philos travail, to charm the winds of Thrace. Is it not he whom you should have banished from this land 1420 in requital for his polluting deed? No! When you arraign what I have done, you are a stern judge. Well, I warn you: threaten me thus on the understanding that I am prepared, conditions equal, to let you lord it over me if you shall vanquish me by force. But if a god shall bring the contrary to pass, 1425 you shall learn equilibrium [sôphronein] though taught the lesson late.
Chorus
antistrophe 1
You are proud of spirit, and your speech is overbearing. Even as your phrên is maddened by your deed of blood, upon your face a stain of blood shows full plain to behold. Bereft of all honor, forsaken of philoi, 1430 you shall hereafter atone for stroke with stroke.
Clytemnestra
Listen then to this too, this the righteous sanction on my oath: I swear by Dikê, exacted for my child, by Atê, and by the Erinys, to whom I sacrificed that man, that my expectations do not tread for me the halls of fear, 1435 so long as the fire upon my hearth is kindled by Aegisthus, loyal in phrenes to me as in days gone by. For he is no slight shield of confidence to me. Here lies the man who did me wrong, plaything of each Chryseis at Ilium; 1440 and here she lies, his captive, and auguress, and concubine, his oracular faithful whore, yet equally familiar with the seamen’s benches. The pair has met no undeserved fate. For he lies thus; while she, who, like a swan, 1445 has sung her last lament in death, lies here, his beloved; but to me she has brought for my bed an added relish of delight.
Chorus
strophe 2
Alas! Ah, that some fate, free from excess of pain, nor yet lingering, 1450 might come full soon and bring to us everlasting and endless sleep, now that our most gracious guardian has been laid low, who in a woman’s cause had much endured and by a woman’s hand has lost his life. 1455 O Helen, distorted in noos, who did yourself alone push over the brink these many lives [psûkhai], these lives exceeding many, beneath the walls of Troy. Now you have bedecked yourself with your final crown, that shall long last in memory, 1460 because of blood not to be washed away. Truly in those days Eris, an affliction that has subdued our lord, dwelt in the house.
Clytemnestra
anapests
Do not burden yourself with thoughts such as these, nor invoke upon yourself the fate of death. Nor yet turn your wrath upon Helen, 1465 and deem her a slayer of men, as if she alone had pushed over the brink many a Danaan life [psûkhê] and had wrought anguish past all cure.
Chorus
antistrophe 2
O daimôn who falls upon this house and Tantalus’ two descendants, 1470 you who by the hands of women wield a power [kratos] matching their temper, a rule bitter to my psûkhê! Perched over his body like a hateful raven, in hoarse notes she chants her song of triumph.
Clytemnestra
anapests
1475 Now you have corrected the judgment of your lips in that you conjure up the thrice-gorged daimôn of this family. For by him the lust for lapping blood is fostered in the mouth; so before 1480 the ancient woe [akhos] is healed, there is fresh blood.
Chorus
strophe 3
So you speak words of praise [ainos] about a mighty daimôn, haunting the house, and heavy in his mênis - alas, alas! - an evil tale of catastrophic fate insatiable [without koros]; 1485 woe, woe, done by the will of Zeus, author of all, worker of all! For what is brought to pass for mortal men save by the will of Zeus? What of this is not wrought by god?
Alas, alas, my King, my King, 1490 how shall I bewail you? How to voice my phrên that is dear [philê] to you? To lie in this spider’s web, breathing forth your life in an impious death! Alas, to lie on this ignoble bed, struck down in treacherous death wrought 1495 by a weapon of double edge wielded by your own wife’s hand!
Clytemnestra
anapests
Do you affirm this deed is mine? Do not imagine that I am Agamemnon’s spouse. 1500 A phantom resembling that corpse’s wife, the ancient bitter evil spirit of Atreus, that grim banqueter, has offered him in payment, sacrificing a full-grown victim in vengeance for those slain children.
Chorus
antistrophe 3
1505 That you are not responsible [aitios] for this murder - who will bear you witness? How could anyone do so? And yet the avenger from his father might well be your accomplice. By force 1510 amid streams of kindred blood black Ares presses on to where he shall grant vengeance for the gore of children served for meat.
Alas, alas, my King, my King, how shall I bewail you? 1515 How to voice my phrên that is dear [philê] to you? To lie in this spider’s web, breathing forth your life in an impious death! Alas, to lie on this ignoble bed, struck down in treacherous death 1520 wrought by a weapon of double edge wielded by your own wife’s hand!
Clytemnestra
anapests
I do not think he met an ignoble death. Did he not himself by treachery bring ruin [atê] on his house? 1525 Yet, as he has suffered - worthy prize of worthy deed - for what he did to my sweet flower, shoot sprung from him, the much-bewailed Iphigeneia, let him make no great boasts in the halls of Hades, since with death dealt him by the sword he has paid for what he first began.
Chorus
strophe 4
1530 Bereft of any ready expedient of thought, I am bewildered where to turn now that the house is tottering. I fear the beating storm of bloody rain that shakes the house; no longer does it descend in drops. 1535 Yet on other whetstones Destiny [Moira] is sharpening justice [dikê] for another evil deed.
O Earth, Earth, if only you had taken me to yourself before I ever lived to see my lord 1540 occupying a lowly bed of a silver-sided bath! Who shall bury him? Who shall lament him? Will you harden your heart to do this - you who have slain your own husband - to lament for him 1545 and crown your unholy work with a kharis without kharis to his psûkhê, atoning for your monstrous deeds? And who, as with tears he utters praise [ainos] over the godlike man’s grave, 1550 shall sorrow in truth [alêtheia] of phrenes?
Clytemnestra
anapests
To care for that duty is no concern of yours. By our hands down he fell, down to death, and down below shall we bury him - but not with wailings from his household. 1555 No! Iphigeneia, his daughter, as is due, shall meet her father lovingly at the swift-flowing ford of sorrows [akhos pl.], and shall fling her arms around him and kiss him.\
Chorus
antistrophe 4
1560 Reproach thus meets reproach in turn - hard is the struggle to decide. The spoiler is despoiled, the slayer pays penalty. Yet, while Zeus remains on his throne, it remains true: "The doer suffers [paskhô]." For it is divine law. 1565 Who can cast from out the house the seed of the curse? The family is bound fast in calamity [atê].
Clytemnestra
anapests
You have touched with truth [alêtheia] upon this oracular saying. As for me, however, I am willing to make a sworn compact with the daimôn of the Pleisthenidai 1570 that I will be content with what is done, hard to endure though it is. Henceforth he shall leave this house and bring tribulation upon some other family by murder of kin. A small part of the wealth is fully enough for me, if I may but rid these halls 1575 of the frenzy of mutual murder.
Aegisthus enters with armed guards.
Aegisthus
Hail gracious light of the day of retribution! At last the hour has come when I can say that the gods who avenge mortal men look down from on high upon the sorrows [akhos pl.] of earth - 1580 now that, to my joy, I behold this man lying here in a robe spun by the Avenging Spirits [Erinyes] and making full payment for the deeds contrived in craft by his father’s hand.
For Atreus, lord of this land, this man’s father, challenged in his sovereignty [kratos], drove forth from polis and from home Thyestes, who - to speak it clearly - was my father 1585 and his own brother. And when he had come back as a suppliant to his hearth, unhappy Thyestes secured such safety for his lot as not himself to suffer death and stain with his blood his native soil. 1590 But Atreus, the godless father of this slain man, with welcome more hearty than kind, on the pretence that he was cheerfully celebrating a happy day by serving meat, served up to my father a banquet of his own children’s flesh. 1595 The toes and fingers he broke off...
[Some lines are missing.]
...sitting apart. And when unknowingly my father had quickly taken servings that he did not recognize, he ate a meal which, as you see, has proved fatal to his family. Now, discovering his unhallowed deed, he uttered a great cry, reeled back, vomiting forth the slaughtered flesh, and invoked 1600 an unbearable curse upon the line of Pelops, kicking the banquet table to aid his curse: "Thus perish all the family of Pleisthenes!" This is the reason that you see this man fallen here. I am he who planned this murder with dikê. For together with my hapless father he drove me out, 1605 me his third child, still a baby in swaddling clothes. But grown to manhood, Dikê has brought me back again. Exile though I was, I laid my hand upon my enemy, compassing every device of cunning to his ruin. 1610 So even death would be sweet to me now that I behold him in the net of Dikê.
Chorus
Aegisthus, hubris amid distress I do not honor. You say that of your own intent you slew this man and did alone plot this pitiful murder. 1615 I tell you in the hour of dikê that you yourself - be sure of that - will not escape the people’s curses and death by stoning at their hand.
Aegisthus
You speak like that, you who sit at the lower oar when those upon the higher bench control the ship? Old as you are, you shall learn how bitter it is 1620 at your age to be schooled when equilibrium [sôphronein] is the lesson set before you. Bonds and the pangs of hunger are far the best doctors of the phrenes when it comes to instructing the old. Do you have eyes and lack understanding? Do not kick against the goads lest you strike to your own hurt.
Chorus
1625 Woman that you are! Skulking at home and awaiting the return of the men from war, all the while defiling a hero’s bed, did you contrive this death against a warrior chief?
Aegisthus
These words of yours likewise shall prove a source of tears. The tongue of Orpheus is quite the opposite of yours. 1630 He led all things by the rapture of his voice; but you, who have stirred our wrath by your silly yelping, shall be led off yourself. You will appear tamer when put down by force.
Chorus
As if you could ever truly be turannos here in Argos, you who did contrive this one’s death, and 1635 then had not the courage to do this deed of murder with your own hand!
Aegisthus
Because to ensnare him was clearly the woman’s part; I was suspect as his enemy of old. However, with his money I shall endeavor to control the citizens; and whoever is unruly, 1640 him I’ll yoke with a heavy collar - and he shall be no well-fed trace-horse! No! Loathsome hunger that lives with darkness shall see him turned gentle.
Chorus
Why then, in the baseness of your psûkhê, did you not kill him yourself, but leave his slaying to a woman, 1645 a plague to her country and her country’s gods? Oh, does Orestes perhaps still behold the light, that, with favoring fortune, he may come home and be the slayer of this pair with victory complete?
Aegisthus
Since you plan to act and speak like that, you shall be taught a lesson soon.
Chorus
1650 On guard, my philoi company, the task is close at hand.
Aegisthus
On guard, then! Let every one make ready his sword with hand on hilt.
Chorus
My hand, too, is laid on my sword-hilt, and I do not shrink from death.
Aegisthus
"Death for yourself," you say. We accept the omen. We welcome fortune’s test.
Clytemnestra
No, most philos of men, let us work no further evils. 1655 Even these are many to reap, a wretched harvest. Of woe we have enough; let us have no bloodshed. Old men, go back to your homes, and yield in time to destiny before you come to harm. What we did had to be done. But should this trouble prove enough, we will accept it, 1660 sorely battered as we are by the heavy hand of a daimôn. Such is a woman’s counsel, if any care to learn from it.
Aegisthus
But to think that these men should let their wanton tongues thus blossom into speech against me and cast about such insults, putting their fortune [daimôn] to the test! To reject balanced [sôphrôn] counsel and insult their master!
Chorus
1665 It would not be like men of Argos to cringe before a man as low as you.
Aegisthus
Ha! I will visit you with vengeance yet in days to come.
Chorus
Not if a daimôn shall guide Orestes to return home.
Aegisthus
From my own experience I know that exiles feed on hope.
Chorus
Keep on, grow fat while polluting dikê, since you can.
Aegisthus
1670 Know that you shall atone to me for your insolent folly.
Chorus
Brag in your bravery like a cock beside his hen.
Clytemnestra
Ignore their idle barking. You and I will be masters of this house and order it aright.