Three Theban Plays, The

4 The two of us: the intimate bond between the two sisters (and the two brothers) is emphasized in the original Greek by an untranslatable linguistic usage—the dual, a set of endings for verbs, nouns and adjectives that is used only when two subjects are concerned (there is a different set of endings—the plural—for more than two). Significantly, Antigone no longer uses these forms to speak of herself and her sister after Ismene refuses to help her bury their brother.

6 Our lives are pain: the translation here is dictated rather by the logic of the passage than the actual Greek words. The phrase in Greek to which these words correspond is clearly corrupt (it seems to interrupt a culminating series of negatives with a positive), and no satisfactory emendation or explanation has ever been offered.

12 The doom reserved for enemies: this seems to refer to the fact that Creon had also exposed the corpses of the other six (non-Theban) attackers of the city; they are foreign “enemies,” whereas Polynices, for Antigone, is still a “friend,” since he was a blood relative. The exposure of the other bodies was part of the legend as we find it elsewhere (in Euripides’ play The Suppliants, for example) and is referred to in Tiresias’ speech to Creon later in our play (1202-5). Some scholars interpret the Greek differently, to mean “evils planned by enemies,” i.e., by Creon.

43 Stoning to death: a penalty which involves the community in the execution; it is therefore particularly appropriate in cases of treason, where the criminal has acted against the whole citizen body. It depends, of course, on the willingness of the citizens to carry it out, and it is noticeable that though Creon later refuses to accept Haemon’s assertion that public opinion favors Antigone (776-82), he changes his mind about the penalty and substitutes one which does not require citizen participation.

52 Will you lift up his body ... ? If she is to bury the body (and she speaks of “lifting” it), Antigone by ously needs Ismene’s help; without it all she can do is perform a symbolic ritual—sprinkling the corpse with dust and pouring libations.

88 An outrage sacred to the gods: literally, “committing a holy crime.” What is criminal in the eyes of Creon is holy in the eyes of the gods Antigone champions.

113 EXIT ANTIGONE. There is of course no stage direction in our text (see pp. 389-90). We suggest that Antigone leaves the stage here not only because after her speech she obviously has nothing more to say to Ismene, but also because the effect of her harsh dismissal of her sister would be weakened if she then stood silent while Ismene had the last word. We suggest that she starts out toward the side exit and Ismene speaks to her retreating figure before she herself goes off stage, but through the door into the palace.

117-79 The parodos (literally, “the way past”) is the name of the space between the end of the stage building and the end of the spectators’ benches (see Introduction, pp. 19, 258). Through these two passageways the chorus made its entrance, proceeding to the orchestra, the circular dancing-floor in front of the stage building. The word parodos is also used to denote the first choral song, the lines which the chorus chants as it marches in.

This song is a victory ode, a celebration of the city’s escape from capture, sack and destruction. The chorus imagines the enemy running in panic before the rising sun; their shields are white (122) perhaps because the name Argos suggests the adjective argos, which means “shining.” The enemy assault of the previous day they compare to an eagle descending on its prey, but it was met and routed by a dragon (138); the Thebans believed that they were descended from dragons’ teeth, which, sown in the soil by Cadmus, their first king, turned into armored men. Of all the seven chieftains who attacked the gates, Capaneus was the most violent and boastful; high on a scaling ladder he reached the top of the wall but was struck down by a lightning bolt of Zeus (147). The defeat of the other attackers is the work of Ares (154), the war god, who is also one of the patron deities of Thebes. The seven chieftains were all killed; all seven were stripped of their armor, which was then arranged on wooden frames in the likeness of a warrior. This is what the Greeks called a tropaion (our word “trophy”); the Greek word suggests “turning point,” and in fact the trophy was set up at the point where the losing side first turned and ran. The god who engineered such reversals was Zeus Tropaios—“god of the breaking rout of battle” (159). In the last stanza the dancers address Victory, who is always represented in Greek art as a winged female figure; they look forward to the joys of peace, the revelry associated with the god Dionysus, born of a Theban mother.

188 Their children: i.e., the children of Oedipus and Jocasta.

213 Truer than blood itself: this is an attempt to bring out in English the double meaning of the word translated “friendships”; the Greek word philous means both “friends” and “close relations.”

215 Closely akin: the Greek word means literally “brother to.” But Creon is in fact disregarding the claims of kinship.

278 Someone’s just buried it: this is a token burial (see n. 52); it is defined in the lines that follow (289-92). The sprinkling of dust and the pouring of a libation were considered the equivalent of burial where nothing more could be done and so were a direct defiance of Creon’s order (see 346).

300-1 Red-hot iron ... go through fire: traditional (and hyperbolic) assertions of truthfulness; the reference is to some form of trial by ordeal in which only the liar would get burned.

376-416 The chorus entered the orchêstra to the strains of the parodos; it now, with the stage area empty of actors, sings the first stasimon. The word means something like “stationary”; it distinguishes the songs the chorus sings once it has reached the orchêstra (where it will, normally, remain until the end of the play) from the parodos, which it sings while marching in. But of course the chorus is not actually stationary; its members dance in formation as they sing.

This famous hymn to the inventiveness and creativeness of man has important thematic significance for the play, in which a ruler, in the name of man’s creation, the state, defies age-old laws: the ode ends with a warning that man’s energy and resourcefulness may lead him to destruction as well as greatness. But choral odes, though one of their important functions is to suggest and discuss the wider implications of the action, usually have an immediate dramatic relevance as well. In this case the chorus must be thinking of the daring and ingenuity of the person who gave Polynices’ body symbolic burial. This does not mean that they are expressing approval of the action; the wonders of the world, of which man is the foremost, are “terrible wonders.”

385 The breed of stallions: mules, then, as now, the work animal of a Greek farm.

409 Weaves in: this is a literal translation of the reading found in all the manuscripts, pareirôn. Though the word occurs elsewhere in fifth-century tragedy, editors have thought the metaphor too violent here; most editors take it as a copyist’s mistake for gerairôn, which would give the meaning “honors,” “reveres.”

424 Act of mad defiance: the chorus here and later (677, “fury at the heart”) can explain Antigone’s defiance of power only as mental aberration; Creon speaks in similar terms of the two sisters when Ismene wishes to join her sister in death (“They’re both mad, I tell you ...” 632).

480 Three ... libations: drink-offerings to the dead; they might be of honey, wine, olive oil, or water.

590 The verbs used in this famous line, synechthein and symphilein, appear nowhere else in Greek literature and may have been expressly coined by Sophocles to express the distinction Antigone is making: that she is incapable of taking sides in her brothers’ political hatred for each other but shares in the blood relationship which, she believes, unites them in love in the world below.

645-49 ISMENE. Dearest Haemon ... All the manuscripts give this line to Ismene. But manuscript attributions are very often wrong (see pp. 389-90) and many editors give the line to Antigone. (The phrase in Creon’s line that follows, translated “your talk of marriage,” could equally well mean “your marriage” and so refer to Antigone, who has not been talking about marriage, instead of Ismene, who has.) If the line is Ismene’s, however, Sophocles has given us an Antigone who never mentions Haemon, though we learn later that he loves her more than his own life. But there is a technical reason (apart from any question of interpretation) against giving the line to Antigone: Ismene must have the next reply to Creon (647, “Creon—you’re really going to rob your son of Antigone?”), and this would present us with a phenomenon for which we have no parallel—a long exchange of single lines between two actors interrupted for one line by a third. Dawe has recently proposed a solution to this difficulty: to give all three lines (including line 649, the one here assigned to the leader) to Antigone. This is linguistically unassailable (line 647 would then mean: “Creon—you’re really going to rob your son of me?”); her next line would mean: “It’s decided then? I’m going to die?”; and Creon’s reply would mean: “Decided, yes. By you and me.” This reading has its very attractive aspects but gives us an Antigone whose second line sounds a completely uncharacteristic note of self-pity and is in effect a plea for her life—also uncharacteristic. We have assigned 645 and 647 to Ismene, 649 to the leader of the chorus.

656-700 The chorus sees an explanation for the death which now threatens the two last remaining members of the house of Oedipus: it is the working of a hereditary doom. The reason for it is not given (though legends known to some of the audience traced it back to the wrongdoing of Laius, father of Oedipus) but it is thought of as the work of the gods. In the opening speech of the play Antigone spoke in similar terms and attributed the sorrows of her line to Zeus. And in the second unit of this stasimon the chorus sings of the power of Zeus and man’s inability to override it. So far, clearly, they have been meditating on the fate of Antigone, but their reflections proceed along a line which does not seem relevant to her case. The law of Zeus is that As they develop this theme along lines thoroughly familiar to the audience, which shared this instinctive feeling that greatness is dangerous, it must have become clear that their words express anxiety not for Antigone, the helpless and condemned, but for Creon, the man who holds and wields supreme power in the state.

667-69 Sorrows of the house ... piling on the sorrows of the dead. This could be read as “sorrows of the dead ... fall on the sorrows of the living.” Both interpretations come to much the same thing.

676 Bloody knife: kopis is the Greek word. The manuscripts all read konis, which means “dust.” It is true that the dust she has thrown on Polynices’ corpse has brought her to her death, but the metaphor seems too violent and most editors print kopis, a conjecture made by Jortin, an English scholar of the eighteenth century.

711-12 Than you, / whatever good direction... The Greek is ambiguous and could mean “than your good leadership” or “than you, if you give proper leadership.”

736 Zeus... kindred blood: Zeus Homaimos (see Glossary).

794 Spread them... empty. A metaphor from writing tablets, two slats of wood covered with wax, on which the message was inscribed. It would be delivered closed and sealed; the recipient would open it and read—in this case to find the tablet blank.

872-73 Short rations ... piety demands ... The city would be kept “free of defilement” not only because (contrary to Creon’s first decision) the citizens would not be involved in stoning Antigone to death but also because, if Antigone were to starve to death (or commit suicide), there would literally be no blood on anyone’s hands: Greek superstitious belief thought of responsibility for killing in terms of pollution by the blood of the victim, which called for blood in return. We know of no parallels to Creon’s sentence, except the similar punishment inflicted in Rome on Vestal Virgins who broke their vows of chastity.

879-94 Love ... The Greek world erôs has a narrower field of meaning than its English equivalent; it denotes the passionate aspect of sexual attraction, an irresistible force which brings its victims close to madness. The immediate occasion of this hymn to Eros is of course the chorus’ fear that Haemon, infuriated by the prospect of losing Antigone, may “do something violent” (862). But the song also reminds the audience that Creon has now offended not only the gods who preside over the lower world and those who sustain the bonds of family friendship, but also Eros and Aphrodite who, as the concluding lines of the ode emphasize, are great powers in the universe—“Throned in power, side-by-side with the mighty laws!” (892).

889 This kindred strife: the Greek adjective xynaimon (literally, “common-blood”) recalls Haemon’s name.

895-969 The first half of the scene which follows the choral ode is a lyric dialogue known as a kommos: actor and chorus sing in responsion. At first the chorus addresses Antigone in a march-type rhythm (anapests) that was probably chanted rather than sung; she replies in song, in fully lyric meters. At line 943, as emotion rises to a high pitch, the chorus, too, breaks into full song. Creon’s harsh intervention (969) is couched in iambic spoken verse, and Antigone uses the same medium for her farewell speech (978-1021). But the scene ends in the chanted rhythm of marching anapests as Antigone is led off to her tomb (1027-34).

909 Not crowned with glory ... The usual version of this line is: “crowned with glory ...” The Greek word oukoun can be negative or positive, depending on the accent, which determines the pronunciation; since these written accents were not yet in use in Sophocles’ time, no one will ever know for sure which meaning he intended. We take the view that the chorus is expressing pity for Antigone’s ignominious and abnormal death; she has no funeral at which her fame and praise are recited, she will not die by either of the usual causes—violence or disease—but by a living death. It is, as they say, her own choice; she is “a law to [herself]” (912).

915 Niobe boasted that her children were more beautiful than Apollo and Artemis, the children of Leto by Zeus. Apollo and Artemis killed Niobe’s twelve (or fourteen) children with bow and arrow; Niobe herself, inconsolably weeping, turned to stone. On Mount Sipylus, in Asia Minor, there was a cliff face which from a distance looked like a weeping woman; it was identified with Niobe.

925 But she was a god ... The chorus reproves Antigone for comparing her own death to that of Niobe, who was not strictly a god, but moved on terms of equality with the gods. The chorus’ condescending tone accounts for Antigone’s indignant outburst in the next few lines.

944 Smashing against the high throne of Justice! The text is very disturbed here. Different readings would add the detail “with your foot” (or “feet”) and a radically different sense: “falling in supplication before the high throne ...”

957 Your marriage murders mine: Polynices had married the daughter of Adrastus of Argos, to seal the alliance which enabled him to march against Thebes.

977 The Greek word translated “stranger’s rights,” metoikias, had a precise technical sense in Athens; it described the status of a resident alien who was not a full citizen. Creon speaks as if Antigone had already forfeited her citizenship by her action and become a metoikos, a resident alien; he will now deprive her of even that status, by burying her alive. Similarly at lines 940 and 956 Antigone speaks of herself as an alien, metoikos, both in the world of the living and that of the dead.

988 My loving brother, Eteocles ... The name Eteocles does not appear in the Greek but has been added by the translator to remove a possible ambiguity.

989 When you died ... Antigone’s speech has been judged adversely by many critics, who suspect its authenticity; some would go so far as to suppress the whole passage from this point on; others content themselves with removing lines 993 to 1012 (904-5 through 920 in the Greek). We believe the whole of the speech is genuine; for a defense of this position, see the Introduction, pp. 45-50.

1028 First gods of the race: the Theban royal house was descended from Cadmus, whose wife Harmonia was the daughter of Aphrodite and Ares. Dionysus was the son of Zeus and Semele, a daughter of Cadmus. See the Genealogy, p. 425.

1035-90 Danaë, Danaë ... The dramatic relevance of the mythological material exploited in this choral ode is not as clear to us as it must have been to the original audience; the second half of the ode, in particular, alludes to stories of which we have only fragmentary, late and conflicting accounts. The chorus, which reprimanded Antigone for comparing herself to Niobe, now tries to find some satisfactory parallels. Acrisius, king of Argos, was told by an oracle that his grandson would be the cause of his death. He had only one child, Danaë, and, to prevent her from bearing a child, he shut her up in a bronze prison (a tower in some accounts, or, as here, a sort of underground vault). But Zeus, in the form of golden sunlight, reached her and she gave birth to the hero Perseus, who, many years later, after killing the Gorgon Medusa and rescuing the princess Andromeda from the sea monster, accidentally killed his grandfather Acrisius at an athletic contest. The point of comparison with Antigone is clearly the imprisonment in an underground room, and the fact that the room was for Danaë a place to which a forbidden bridegroom forced an entrance will not be lost on the audience when, later on, it hears of Haemon’s entry into the tomb of Antigone, and its tragic sequel. But, the parallel once established, the chorus goes on to sing of the power of fate, which no human power (wealth, military strength, fortifications, fleets—the powers of the state) can defy. Acrisius could not escape what was predicted; but what has this to do with Antigone? The resources of power are Creon’s, not hers, and he, like Acrisius, tried to prevent the consummation of a marriage. In these lines the chorus is made to express, even if it may not, as a character, understand fully the implication of its own words, its fear for Creon, the beginning of its disenchantment with his course of action.

The next parallel with Antigone, Lycurgus, king of the barbarous Thracians, also has imprisonment as its base. Lycurgus (like Pentheus in Euripides’ Bacchae) attempted to suppress the worship of Dionysus; he pursued the wild women devotees on the hills, laid hands on the god, mocked and insulted him. Dionysus confined him in a rock—a rocky cave or a miraculous stone envelope—and he went mad. (In one version of the legend, not hinted at here but probably known to the audience, he killed his son in his mad fit.) Here imprisonment, the connection with Antigone, is overshadowed by the ominous resemblances to Creon: he is the one who uses force against a woman, against the gods of the underworld; his is the angry, taunting voice, the frenzied rage. And he will be responsible in the end for the death of his son.

For the last two stanzas of the ode there is no sure line of interpretation. The myth to which it refers (but so cryptically that only two of the people involved are named in the text) told the story of Cleopatra, daughter of an Athenian princess and Boreas, the North Wind. She was married to the Thracian king Phineus, by whom she had two sons. They were blinded by Phineus’ second wife; in some versions Cleopatra was already dead, in others she was imprisoned by the new wife and later released. (In some versions, the sons were imprisoned too—like Antigone, in a tomb.) Sophocles could rely on the audience’s familiarity with this material (he wrote two plays dealing with Phineus) but we are left to grasp at straws. The last lines of the ode, an address to Antigone which echoes the chorus’ similar address at the beginning (“my child,” 1042 and 1090) suggests strongly that Antigone is compared to Cleopatra here, as she is to Danaë in the opening lines. In that case Sophocles is almost certainly referring to a version (perhaps that of one of his own plays) in which Cleopatra, like Danaë and Antigone, was imprisoned. We have therefore taken the liberty, in order to produce a translation which makes some kind of sense, of putting this crucial detail into the text. But the reader is warned that lines 1080—81—“their mother doomed to chains, / walled off in a tomb of stone”—have no equivalent in the Greek text.

1096 Never wavered from your advice before: this may be just an acknowledgment of the omnipresence of Tiresias in Theban affairs over many generations. On the other hand it may refer to a legend that Tiresias advised Creon, during the attack by the Seven, that Thebes could only be saved by the sacrifice of his son Megareus (who did in fact give his life for his fellow-citizens). Anyone in the audience who remembered this might see bitter irony in Creon’s line (1098) “I owe you a great deal, I swear to that.” The death of Megareus will later (1428-31) be blamed on Creon by his wife Eurydice.

1102 Warnings of my craft: in this speech Tiresias describes the results of two different techniques of foretelling the future: interpretation, first, of the movements and voices of birds; next, of the behavior of the animal flesh burnt in sacrifice to the gods. The birds, as Tiresias tells us later (1125-26), have been eating the flesh of the corpse exposed by Creon’s order; their voices, normally intelligible to the prophet, now convey nothing but their fury as they fight each other. Tiresias turns to the other method of divination, but the fire will not blaze up; it is quenched by the abnormal ooze from the long thighbones. These are all signs that the gods are “deaf to our prayers,” as the prophet soon tells Creon (1127).

1150 Silver-gold of Sardis: electrum, a natural mixture of silver and gold (“white gold”) found in the river near Sardis in Asia Minor.

1192-93 Violence / you have forced upon the heavens: by leaving a corpse exposed Creon has not only deprived the lower gods of their rights, he has also polluted with death the province of the Olympian gods of the upper air. The Furies, avenging spirits of both lower and upper gods, lie in wait for him now.

1200 Cries for men and women break / throughout your halls: Tiresias prophesies the deaths of Haemon and Eurydice.

1201-2 Great hatred... cities in tumult: Creon was eventually forced to bury the bodies of the other champions, so Athenian legend ran, by an Athenian army under the leadership of Theseus (this is the theme of Euripides’ Suppliants). But in the next generation, the sons of the Seven, the Epigonoi, attacked Thebes again and this time succeeded in taking the city.

1239-72 God of a hundred names! ... The tone of this choral song is one of exultation; the old men rejoice that Creon has seen the error of his ways and call on the Theban god Dionysus to appear, to come dancing, and as a healer to lead the joyous celebration. The hopes expressed in the song are quickly belied by the tragic events announced by the messenger; a similar ironic sequence is to be found in Oedipus the King (1195-1310). The hymn to Dionysus is constructed along the lines of real religious hymns: first the invocation of the god under his (or her) many titles, then a reference to the god’s place of origin (Thebes), an enumeration of the most important places of his worship (Delphi, Nysa), an appeal to the god to come to the aid of the worshiper, and finally an invocation of the god by new names and titles.

1243 King of Eleusis: Iacchus (1271), the young god associated with Demeter and Persephone in the mystery religion centered at Eleusis in Attica, was often identified with Dionysus (Bakchos). Dionysus was supposed to be present, in the winter season, at Apollo’s site, Delphi on Mount Parnassus, where the “twin peaks” of the cliffs (1250) towered above the sanctuary and the Castalian spring flowed below (1253). Nysa (1254) is a name given to many mountains in the ancient world, but the reference here is probably to the one on the long island of Euboea, opposite Theban territory, and separated from it by the Euripus (“the moaning straits,” 1265).

1321 Hecate of the Crossroads: a goddess associated with burial grounds and the darkness of the night; offerings to her were left at crossroads. Here she is thought of as associated with Pluto (another name of Hades), as one whose privileges have been curtailed by Creon’s action.

1341 The tomb’s very mouth: Sophocles evidently imagined Antigone’s prison on the model of the great domed Mycenaean tombs, built of stone and then covered with earth. Haemon has prised loose some of the stones to effect an entrance; once inside this, Creon’s men go along a passage to the “mouth” (i.e., the doorway) of the main chamber.

1346-47 We found her ... / hanged by the neck ... The details are not clear. These words seem to mean that the speaker saw Antigone still hanging. At the end of his speech he describes Haemon as embracing Antigone—“there he lies, body enfolding body” (1369)—in terms which clearly imply that her body has been lowered to the ground. Sophocles does not tell us how or when this happened, but we probably are meant to imagine that Haemon cut the rope with his sword—which would be the normal, instinctive reaction to the sight of a hanging body.

OEDIPUS THE KING

3 Branches wound in wool: the priests come as suppliants, people who have lost all hope of salvation except through divine intervention. Such suppliants carried branches of olive or laurel, which had tufts of wool tied around them. The branches were laid on the altar of the god or gods to whom supplication was made and they were left there until the worshipers’ prayer was granted. It is significant that though the altar in the orchestra represents an altar of Apollo (as we learn later, 1007), the priest, addressing Oedipus, speaks of “your altars” (18); when Oedipus promises to find the murderer of Laius he tells the priests to take up the branches (161). He acts, and is seen by his fellow-citizens, as almost divine.

5 The Healer: Paian, a title of Apollo. We know from the beginning of Homer’s Iliad that Apollo could send plague as well as cure it. There is no overt suggestion in this play that Apollo has caused the plague to come to Thebes (in fact the chorus later associates him with other gods as a rescuer, 184, 231-34), but the original prophecy was made by Apollo and his hand is felt to be mysteriously at work in its fulfillment and the revelation, prompted by the onset of the plague, that it has been fulfilled.

26-27 River-shrine where the embers glow and die ... An oracular shrine of Apollo by the Theban river, the Ismenus, where the future was foretold by priests who interpreted as prophetic signs any unusual behavior of the burnt offerings on the fire. The translation is an explanatory expansion of the original, which reads simply—“at the prophetic ash of Ismenus.” Compare Tiresias’ speech in Antigone 1111-21.

54 What do you know? The Greek phrase oistha pou, with its resemblance to the name Oidipous (the Greek form), is the first of a series of such punning references to the name of the man who seems to know everything but does not in fact even know who he is.

80 One cure: the first of a series of images of Oedipus as physician, which ends in the revelation (and his realization) that he is not the physician but the disease (see 1529).

89 The god makes clear: ambiguous in the original. Apollo will make clear his demands; he will also, in the end, make clear the truth.

99-100 Even the hardest things to bear ... Creon is vague and ambiguous; he wants to deliver his message to Oedipus in private.

109 Corruption: the Greek word is miasma, which is literally a stain. The blood of the murdered man is thought of as something which pollutes not only the killer but all those who come in contact with him.

139-40 Thieves ... A thief: Oedipus, a leader of men himself, thinks of the leader, not the gang; he takes it for granted that this brigand chieftain must have been backed by conspirators in Thebes. (His suspicion will later fasten on Tiresias and Creon.) It is an ironic twist that though here he speaks of one attacker rather than many, he will later (931-34) base his hopes that he is innocent on the reports that Laius was killed not by one man but by many. These reports (789-90) stem from the story told by the one survivor of the encounter at the crossroads. The shepherd’s motive for reporting that Laius was killed by a band of attackers is never made clear; perhaps we are to assume that he exaggerated the number of the attackers so that he would not be asked why he and the wagon driver did not succeed in defending their king.

168-244 Zeus! ... The parodos (see Antigone n. 117-79). The chorus, older citizens of Thebes, have not heard the news which Creon brought from Delphi; they know only that the emissaries sent to Delphi have returned. They sing, in sorrow and terror, of the plague and its ravages; the song is a hymn of supplication to the gods, calling for salvation. They open with a prayer to Athena, Artemis and Apollo and at the conclusion of the hymn invoke the supreme god Zeus, Apollo and Artemis and lastly Dionysus, the god born of a Theban mother.

169 Welcome voice of Zeus: Apollo was the prophetic god at Delphi but he spoke for and in the name of his father, Zeus.

173 Healer of Delos: Apollo was supposed to have been born on Delos, a very small island in the Cyclades. It was a famous center of his worship.

175 Some new sacrifice? some ancient rite from tire past ... ? Cities which consulted the Delphic oracle in time of plague or other calamity were often ordered to make ritual expiation by sacrifice or some other means. In 426-25 B.C., for example, the Athenians followed the instructions of an oracle (we do not know if it was Delphi) to “purify” the island of Delos by removing all the bones from the graves and forbidding future burials in sacred territory; this seems to be connected in some way with the plague that afflicted Athens from 430-25.

201 Winging west: the west, the region of the setting sun, is thought of as the location of the underworld.

216 Golden daughter of god: Athena.

219 Raging god of war: Ares (named in the Greek). He is not elsewhere associated with plague; possibly this unusual identification is a reflection of the situation in Athens during the early years of the war (430- 25)—plague inside the city and Spartan invasion outside.

239 Your name and ours are one: Dionysus, son of Zeus, was born of a Theban mother, and Thebes was traditionally the first Greek city which celebrated his rites.

250-51 There would have been no mystery ... The interpretation of these lines is disputed; the translation follows the explanation offered by Dawe, Studies in the Text of Sophocles, Vol. 1 (Leiden: Brill, 1973), pp. 217-19.

271 Never shelter him: since his identity is unknown this may sound like a singularly ineffectual measure. Yet exactly such a proclamation, against an unidentified murderer, is recommended in Plato’s Laws, and there are indications that it was standard practice in fifth-century Athens.

296 Wife who shares our seed: the Greek word homosporon is ambiguous; it can also mean “blood relation,” as it clearly does when Tiresias uses it to describe Oedipus’ relationship to Laius (522-23).

304-6 Son of Labdacus descended of Polydorus... Oedipus, an outsider who has not inherited but won the throne of Thebes, recites the full royal genealogy as if he were its legitimate successor, almost as if he were trying to include himself in the long procession of Theban kings. As he will soon learn to his sorrow, he is in fact the true heir to the throne. To underscore this point (which would not have been lost on Sophocles’ audience) the translator has added the words—“their power and mine are one” (306).

385 The one you live with: in the Greek the veiled reference to Jocasta is more forceful, since the word translated “the one” has a feminine ending (agreeing with the feminine noun orgê—“temper”).

428-30 Not your fate / to fall at my hands. Apollo is quite enough ... This translates a text printed by all editors but which has no manuscript authority. The manuscript reading would give us:

True, it is not my fate
to fall at your hands. Apollo is quite enough,
and he will take some pains to work that out.

This meaning is not ruled out by the preceding speech of Oedipus, since his lines (427-28), because of an ambiguity inherent in Greek syntax, could perfectly well mean: “Neither I nor anyone else who sees the light would ever raise a hand against you.” What tells against the manuscript reading is the idea that Tiresias would fall at the hands of his divine patron Apollo. These words could, however, be taken in a general sense: “You could not harm me; if anything is to happen to me, it will be Apollo’s work.” But since all editors accept the lines as emended (with only minor changes) by the German scholar Brunck in 1786, we have thought it best to present that version in the translation.

458 Witch-hunt: the Greek word means literally “driving out the pollution, the accursed object.” This was a familiar idea in fifth-century Athens. In the diplomatic maneuvers that preceded the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War in 431 B.C. the Spartans sent envoys to tell the Athenians to “drive out the accursed object”—they meant Pericles, whose remote ancestors had once committed a sacrilegious act. Pericles replied in kind: the Spartans, too, had past offenses against the gods to atone for.

507 TURNING HIS BACK ON TIRESIAS, MOVING TOWARD THE PALACE. There is of course no manuscript authority for this stage direction. But it seems to us that the logic of the situation demands it. The king has dismissed the prophet with contempt; why should he now listen to a long speech from him? And if he does stand still, listening to this long and terrifying prophecy, why does he make no reply? Why does he ask no questions? (He did before.) Worse still, how can the audience believe that he does not connect what Tiresias says with the prophecy that Apollo made to him at Delphi? Two scenes later he tells Jocasta about this prophecy (868-75) but speaks as if he has not heard what Tiresias said.

All these difficulties are resolved if he does not hear the crucial portion of Tiresias’ speech (520-23) and by the time these lines are delivered he is almost through the doors. Tiresias, then, is delivering his tirade to an actor who goes off stage without hearing him; this is in fact a recognized convention of the Greek stage, where menacing or mocking remarks, which in the dramatic situation must not be heard by their target, are often directed to the back of an actor on his way out. Tiresias is blind, but this need not mean that he does not know Oedipus is leaving; he can hear him—the acoustics of the Greek stage are extraordinary, as any visitor to Epidaurus knows. For a full defense of this stage direction see “Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannos 446: Exit Oedipus?” in Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 21.4 (1980): 321-32.

526-72 Who is the man... ? The chorus, in its first stasimon, imagines the unidentified murderer of Laius as an outcast in the wilds, pursued by Apollo and the Furies, the avengers of blood. He will not escape “the dread voices of Delphi ... the doom that never dies” (546-49); they mean the recent Apolline proclamation, but the audience thinks also of the prophecies made long ago to Oedipus. In the second half of their song they dismiss Tiresias’ repeated statements that the murderer is Oedipus himself. For one thing, they can think of no motive—no “blood feud between / Laius’ house and the son of Polybus” (554- 55)—for they think of Oedipus as the son of Polybus, king of Corinth. There seems to be no evidence which links a king whose “fame ... rings throughout Thebes” (558) and the murderer whose presence in Thebes is the cause of the plague. They are not rejecting divine foreknowledge and prophecy—“Zeus and Apollo know” (561)—only the fallible visions of a human prophet. This was a respectable position in fifth-century Athens, where there were many professional prophets, some of them exploiters of public credulity for their own profit. The chorus will not abandon Oedipus without proof; he was their savior from “the she-hawk” (569), the Sphinx.

653-90 Look at it this way first ... Creon’s speech, which sounds so reasonable to modern ears, may have made a different impression on the original audience. It is an argument from probability, from lack of motive, and this was a well-known fifth-century technique of argument, taught by professional rhetoricians, the sophists, as a defense to be used when evidence was lacking. So it may have sounded slightly glib and shopworn to Sophocles’ contemporaries. (Oedipus, of course, has no evidence or witnesses either; he is acting on mere suspicion.)

699 Just to show how ugly a grudge can ... The translation follows Pearson’s text. Other editors, finding stylistic difficulties in the lines, rearrange them or assume that a line—or more than one—has beet lost. We take phthonein not in the sense of “envy” (one reason for assigning this line to Oedipus rather than to Creon) but as meaning “bear a grudge,” “show malice, hatred.” We also follow Pearson’s suggestion that Creon is interrupted by Oedipus; he does not finish the sentence.

725-67 THE CHORUS ... BEGINS TO CHANT. From here to line 733 the chorus and Oedipus converse in sung lyric meters; at 735 the chorus sings until Oedipus at 741, in spoken iambic verse, resumes the dialogue with Creon. After Creon’s exit (750) the chorus and Jocasta are singing; Oedipus has two spoken lines at 760 and the chorus concludes the kommos (see Antigone n. 895-969) with a final lyric stanza (761-67). The recourse to song and to more emotional meters emphasizes the dramatic tension of the scene; it is only the impassioned appeal by the chorus which saves Creon from immediate execution.

736 By the blazing sun: since the sun, in his daily journey from east to west, saw everything that happened on earth, he was an appropriate god by whom to swear one’s innocence.

754 Loose, ignorant talk: the chorus is reluctant to speak clearly. They feel uneasily that something has gone wrong and wish to “end the trouble here, just where they [Oedipus and Creon] left it” (759).

792 Fastened his ankles: Jocasta, as we learn later (1133-34), is not telling the full truth—the scars on Oedipus’ feet must have come from some sort of metal fastening which pierced the flesh.

954-97 Destiny guide me always ... In the first stasimon (554-72) the chorus dismissed the accusations leveled at Oedipus by Tiresias, questioned the validity of pronouncements made by mere human prophets and expressed their firm belief in the innocence of their ruler, as well as confidence in his leadership. Since then, however, that belief and that confidence have been undermined. The chorus has seen Oedipus condemn Creon to death without any real evidence of wrongdoing on his part—an action more characteristic of a dictator, a “tyrant,” than of a king; they have heard of events which make it seem probable that Oedipus is indeed the killer of Laius, as he himself fears may be the case; they have just heard Jocasta dismiss with contempt a prophecy, not of Tiresias, but of Apollo himself. This second stasimon reflects their profound anxiety, as they seek to distance themselves from the king who may turn out to be the polluted killer, the cause of the plague, and the queen whose impious rejection of Apollo’s prophecy fills them with fear. As they pray that their own lives may be lived in reverence and purity, they invoke the great laws which lay down the norms of human action and which are the creation not of men but of the gods (957-62).

In the second stanza the chorus poses against the laws the figure of the tyrant, an all-powerful ruler on whose action there are no human curbs and who, scaling the heights of power and arrogance, crashes to his fall. But then, as if they wished to qualify this grim parable (which in the dramatic context can hardly refer to anyone but Oedipus), they single out for praise the vigorous action, the competitive energy “which makes the city strong” (969: again the reference to Oedipus, this time as the savior of the city, is inescapable).

But in the third stanza the emphasis is once more placed on the figure of the great transgressor, and this time his offenses are not so much political as religious: he shows no reverence for the gods, “laying hands on the holy things untouchable” (980). This last phrase is probably intended as a general image of impiety, but to the audience it suggests Oedipus’ incestuous marriage. As the song develops, it becomes clear that these images of pride and violence are provoked by Jocasta’s rejection of divine prophecy (a rejection which Oedipus condones). For the elders go on to call for the fulfillment of the prophecies, terrible though they are; if the “oracles sent to Laius” are not fulfilled (994), there is no reason to worship the gods, to go any more to the oracles at Delphi, Abae and Olympia, to “join the sacred dance” (984).

1012-14 Lead us ... Oedipus... you know where he is? In the original Greek these three lines rhyme: mathoim’ hopou, Oidipou, kalisth’ hopou. Rhyme is not a feature of Greek verse and such final assonances are extremely rare. That they are not accidental here is clear from the fact that the ending of the first line means “learn where” and of the third ‘know where”—both unmistakable reminders that part of Oidipous, Oidi, is almost identical with the verb “I know,” oida.

1046 Your father is no more—Polybus—he’s dead! The Greek suggests an ambiguity which has ironic force; until the final word “dead” is heard the sentence could mean: “come to tell you your father is not Polybus any more ...”

1188-89 Chance, / the great goddess: that Chance which Jocasta had named as the ruling principle of unpredictable chaos (1069-70) has become, for Oedipus, a patron deity which by a series of strange coincidences has brought him to the highest pinnacle of human prosperity. His illusion will not last long.

1195-1214 Yes—if I am a true prophet ... In this short (third) stasimon the chorus, fear and disapproval both momentarily forgotten as they are inspired by Oedipus’ heroic confidence and infected by his enthusiasm, speculates about the nature of the revelation to come. Clearly Oedipus will be proved not a foreigner but a citizen of Thebes; the Theban mountain Cithaeron is his “nurse, his mountain-mother” (1200). They go further still. Oedipus called himself the son of Chance, but the chorus, remembering the mythical tales of foundlings who turned out to be sons of gods, thinks of a higher birth: he may be the son of Pan, of Apollo himself, of Hermes or of Dionysus.

1026 Nymphs who seem to live forever: nymphs were not mortal creatures but, though they lived much longer than human beings, they were not, like the gods, immortal.

1248 Three whole seasons, six months at a stretch: the two men were following a migratory pattern still followed by shepherds in the north of Greece: in the summer months they move with their flocks from the plains to the high mountain pastures. Cithaeron is the highest mountain area (1,409 meters) between Corinthian territory to the south and Thebes to the north.

1249 The rising of Arcturus: Arcturus (the name means “Bear-watcher”) is the principal star in the constellation Boötes, which circles round the Bear (the constellation we call the Big Dipper). Its “rising” is its reappearance in the night sky just before dawn, in mid-September. To the ancient Greeks this was the sign that summer was over: it was time to gather the grapes, drive the flocks to winter pasture and beach the ships.

1307 O light—now let me look my last on you! At this stage (as we learn from the messenger’s speech later, 1387) Oedipus wished to kill himself, but the phrase is darkly prophetic of his self blinding.

1311-50 O the generations of men... The fourth stasimon is a somber and magnificent lament for the fall of Oedipus and, since he is a “great example” (1318, the Greek word is paradeigma, paradigm), for the fragility of all human prosperity and achievement. The language of the play has presented Oedipus as a calculator and the chorus now states the result of the great calculation: “adding the total / of all your lives I find they come to nothing ...” (1312-13). This is not the play’s last word on the human condition, however; the chorus is overly pessimistic now, just as it was overly optimistic in the previous stasimon.

1357 The Nile: the original names the Phasis, an eastern river flowing into the Black Sea. We have substituted an eastern river more familiar to the English reader.

1407-8 The ones you never should have seen: Laius as his victim and Jocasta as his wife. The ones you longed to see, to know: Laius and Jocasta as his father and mother.

1432-96 O the terror—Oedipius and the chorus engage in a dialogue which is mostly sung—a kommos. The emotional medium of song is appropriate for the blinded hero’s lamentations and self-accusations; as his passion exhausts itself he returns to the iambic meter of speech. It is clear from the words that the actor, coming out of the stage door, imitates the movements of a newly blind man, wandering aimlessly; the dramatic impact was heightened by the new mask he had put on for this entrance, one representing the blood streaming down from the eye sockets.

1671 I try to say what I mean; it’s my habit. It is not clear, however, exactly what he does mean. His previous line (1670), “You’ll get your wish at once,” could mean either: “Yes, I will drive you out of Thebes” or “Yes, the gods will tell me to drive you out,” i.e., he will consult the oracle, as he had decided earlier (1573-82). Sophocles leaves the matter ambiguous here: in Oedipus at Colonus we are told that Creon kept Oedipus in Thebes, but expelled him much later, when he had become content to stay.

1678-84 People of Thebes, my countrymen ... This concluding speech of the chorus has been condemned by some editors (including the most recent, Dawe) as a later addition. It presents some serious textual difficulties, and the first two lines also appear in a speech of Oedipus at the end of Euripides’ play The Phoenician Women. It was, however, normal Sophoclean practice to end a play with a short choral speech, and if this one is not genuine it probably replaced something similar.

OEDIPUS AT COLONUS

SCENE ... This opening stage direction is based on indications in the text. The grove is mentioned in lines 17-19, the statue of the hero Colonus in lines 70-71, the rocky ledge in line 22, and the large outcropping of rock in lines 211-12.

64 Hallowed ground: in the lines which follow, Sophocles credits his birthplace, Colonus, with a wealth of divine and heroic presences. The Greek word kolônos means “hill” and the hill in question was called Horse Hill (kolônos hippios) to distinguish it from another hill a mile or so away inside the city of Athens called Agora Hill (kolônos agoraios). The hero Colonus (70) was a “horseman” and the god Poseidon (65) was also connected with horses (though his main sphere of dominion was the sea). Athenian legend told of the contest between Poseidon and Athena for possession of Attica; Zeus decreed that it would go to the one who produced the gift most useful to man. Poseidon created the horse, and Athena (who won), the olive tree. This legend is the background of the great ode in praise of Athens which the chorus sings later in the play (761-817). The Titans (66) were the older generation of gods, overthrown by Zeus and the Olympians. Prometheus (67) defied Zeus and gave fire to mankind; from the shrine of the hero Academus, hard by Colonus, torch-bearers ran a ceremonial race into Athens. The Brazen Threshold (68) seems to have been the name for a cave or chasm which was thought to lead to the lower world; it is “brazen” because Homer so describes the entrance to Hades. Its designation as the bulwark of Athens (69) is puzzling; perhaps its connection with the underworld makes it a barrier against attack (it is mentioned in a prophecy of a Theban penetration into Attic territory).

73 All his people carry on his name: Colonus was one of the demes, the regional units of Attica, and an Athenian’s official name included that of his deme (Sophocles’ name was: Sophocles, son of Sophillus, from Colonus).

122 We who drink no wine: libations poured to the Eumenides might be of water, milk and honey, but never wine (540). Oedipus drinks no wine simply because a destitute beggar would get none and would have to be content with water.

142-268 Look for the man ... The entry song of the chorus, the parodos, is set in agitated, lyric rhythms appropriate for their excitement, as they search the stage for the trespasser on holy ground. Almost immediately, with the first words of Oedipus (160), the parodos becomes a long kommos, a lyric dialogue between actor and chorus, which continues as far as line 268. The grove is forbidden ground, reserved for those presences which are both terrible and kindly—Furies, queens of terror, daughters of darkness but also Eumenides, “Kindly Ones.” The people of Colonus go by the grove with eyes averted in silent prayer; the news that a foreign vagrant, a blind beggar, has entered the grove fills them with fear and indignation.

278 The only city on earth to save the ruined stranger: this image of Athens as the savior and protector of the oppressed and unfortunate reappears time and again in Attic tragedy. Athens was supposed to have sheltered the children of Heracles, persecuted by the tyrant Eurystheus, to have welcomed Heracles after he killed his whole family in a fit of madness, to have forced Thebes to bury the corpses of the Seven. It is to that great reputation (how far it was in fact deserved we do not know) that Oedipus here appeals.

339 Sleek colt: the original identifies it as a colt from Etna, in Sicily—a prized breed in the Greek world.

340 Broad brim of her hat: the original specifies a hat from Thessaly; it was a wide-brimmed felt hat, well adapted for travel under the fierce Greek sun.

366-71 Just like Egyptians ... In the Histories of Sophocles’ friend Herodotus we read: “the Egyptians ... in their manners and customs seem to have reversed the ordinary practices of mankind. The women go to market to buy and sell while the men stay at home and work the loom ...” (2.35). Herodotus goes on to list many more such “reversals” of “normal practice.”

477 Drummed off native ground: at the end of Oedipus the King (see n. 1671) it is not clear what is going to happen to Oedipus; he begs Creon to drive him into exile, as the oracle demanded, but Creon seems hesitant to do so. Here, as in other places, Sophocles has the earlier play in mind and establishes continuity between the two.

483 That first day ... when all my rage was seething: compare Oedipus the King 1571-72.

524 Appease those Spirits: the elaborate ritual instructions which follow will guide Oedipus as he conciliates the Furies in whose forbidden precinct he took refuge. But they also create a mysterious religious atmosphere which will surround Oedipus from now on as he moves toward his transformation.

576-616 A terrible thing, my friend ... At the end of the scene, as Ismene goes off stage, the audience must have expected a stasimon, at last. Instead they hear another kommos, as agitated and emotionally disturbed as the first. The chorus relentlessly presses Oedipus for the details of his horrendous past.

616 I came to this: i.e., the killing of his father. The text is corrupt at this point; we have followed Jebb (Mekler).

632-33 I too ... was reared in exile ... Theseus was the son of Aegeus, king of Athens, but was brought up in Troezen in ignorance of his father’s identity. When he grew up his mother gave him proofs of his paternity and sent him to Athens.

635 Grappled dangers pressing for my life: on the way Theseus fought with and killed many monsters and brigands.

683 Thebes is doomed to be struck down in this land. The prophecy of Apollo, as reported by Ismene (425-57) said that the Thebans would suffer from the wrath of Oedipus “that day they take their stand upon your tomb” (457). It is left to Oedipus to decide where that Theban defeat will take place; this is his gift to Athens.

717 He is our ally: this phrase, as well as the words “mutual rights” (718), seems to refer simply to the traditional courtesies exchanged between members of royal houses (not to a political alliance between Thebes and Athens).

761-817 Here, stranger ... For a discussion of the major themes of this great choral ode, see the Introduction, pp. 267-69; for details, see the Glossary and n. 64.

762 Horses are a glory: not only because Poseidon created the horse as a gift to Athens but also because the local hero Colonus is a horseman (and is so represented on stage).

770 Sacred wood of god: Dionysus, with whom the ivy and the wine (see 769) are closely associated.

779 Mother and Daughter: Demeter and Persephone; the two goddesses of the Eleusinian mysteries, which promised their initiates a blessed existence beyond the grave.

783 Cephisus: a river of Attica, famous for the abundance of its waters (most Attic rivers run dry in the summer).

788 Charioteer: Aphrodite was often represented driving a chariot drawn by sparrows, doves or swans; the chariot had golden reins.

792 Pelops’ broad Dorian island: the peninsula still known as the Peloponnese—literally, “Pelops’ island” (nêsos).

800 Guardian Zeus: literally, Zeus Morios. Certain olive groves were considered the property of the city, placed under the protection of Zeus Morios; it was a serious offense to cut down trees on such protected sites.

814-17 And your ship ... The Greek text of the final lines is disputed. We have followed the version printed by Dawe. The lines as printed by Jebb and Pearson could be rendered as follows:

and your long flashing oar, honed to the hand
whips the seas with wonder
mounting the white manes of the sea
racing the sea-nymphs dancing past the prow!

869 Where I would suffer most: not only would his wish to reward Athens be frustrated, he knows too that Creon will not bury him in Theban soil.

954-1008 O Athens! ... Lines 954 to 963 are, in the original, the first section of a short kommos (the corresponding second section, 999- 1008, comes immediately before the entry of Theseus). In both, the lyric meters and swift changes of speaker give formal expression to the excited emotion and action: in the first Antigone is dragged away by Creon’s guards and in the second Creon is about to seize Oedipus too, but is prevented by the arrival of Theseus.

975 Indulging your rage despite the pleas of loved ones: see Oedipus the King 722-50.

983-84 Unless, perhaps, / the king of the country blocks my way! Creon can afford to be sarcastic; so far he has been opposed only by the ineffectual chorus of old men. Some editors, however, change the pronoun and give this line to the chorus: “unless, perhaps, the king of the country blocks your way.”

1027 Where the two highways meet: a road junction on the way to Thebes where the main Theban force is waiting for Creon to rejoin them.

1063 A resident alien: the word is metoikos (see Antigone n. 977). Theseus is speaking ironically; he means “prisoner.”

1170 Others will ride them down: the cavalry dispatched by Theseus at 1024-31.

1193-1239 Oh god, to be there!... In this second stasimon the chorus wishes it could be present at the victory it foresees for the Athenian cavalry.

1197 Apollo guards the pass: there was a temple at the pass of Daphni, where a road from Athens goes through the Aegalean hills to the sea, to join the coastal road, which leads to Eleusis, site of the Eleusinian mysteries.

1201 Golden key of silence: initiates in the mysteries were sworn never to reveal the nature of the rites and in fact no one ever did; we do not know more than a few details.

12O7 Or soon they’ll clash ... The chorus is thinking of a different route to the coast road, one running round the northern end of the Aegalean range. In that case the cavalry, after rounding the hills, will turn west through a plain to the coast.

1264 The journey I’ve been through: Oedipus means his mental agony while he waited, alone and blind, for news of his kidnapped daughters.

1378-1410 Show me a man ... For some remarks on the tone of this third stasimon see the Introduction, p. 273.

1444 Suppliant of the god: Poseidon (1314).

1460 I am an outcast: for the mythical background of what follows see the Introduction, pp. 28-29.

1467 Bribed the people: the Greek word Polynices uses, peisas, means literally “persuade” but often has the sense of “bribe.” Here it seems necessary to assume that meaning, since Polynices has already said that Eteocles won out “not by force of argument.”

1468 The work of... your Fury: Polynices, with typical insensitivity, puts the blame for the quarrel between the brothers on his father’s dreadful destiny.

1482-98 Seven columns, seven spearheads: the Seven against Thebes. See the Glossary.

1490 Capaneus: compare Antigone 147-51.

1527 Ring of my response: Oedipus describes his own voice with a word (omphê) which is often used of divine oracles.

1646-95 Look, new agonies now ... Another kommos. The choral songs are distributed over the ensuing scene in short units: lines 1646 to 1655 correspond metrically to lines 1661 to 1669, and at line 1675 a second unit begins, echoed metrically by lines 1688-95. In between the short bursts of choral song Oedipus and Antigone speak in regular iambic meter.

1712 Thunder: this was one of the signs specified in the original prophecy (116); it heralds Oedipus’ death and transfiguration.

1739 Sprung from the Dragon’s teeth: see Antigone n. 117-79.

1766-89 Now, if it’s not forbidden ... The fourth stasimon is a prayer to the dread gods of the underworld.The chorus prays that Oedipus’ death will be swift and painless.

1780 The huge beast: the three-headed dog, Cerberus, who guarded the entrance to Hades.

1802 Great brazen steps: see n. 64.

1805-8 Pact sealed by Theseus and Perithous ... these local details, which were familiar to Sophocles’ audience, are very puzzling to us. Theseus and Perithous went down to Hades to carry off Persephone; failing in the attempt, they were imprisoned there (and rescued later by Heracles). What the “pact” was, we do not know (perhaps just an oath to stand by each other in their mad enterprise); as for what was “cut in stone” (1806), it is generally thought that there must have been some unintelligible marks cut on the rock which were popularly believed to be the “pact.” As for other details, Jebb has the appropriate words. “The power and beauty of this passage are in no way lessened for us because we know nothing of the basin [bowl] or the stone, the tree or the tomb.... Their significance is essentially local.... They show us how the blind man, who had never been at Colonus before, placed himself at precisely the due point in the midst of its complex sanctities.”