Notes

THE PERSIANS

1.     <…> Angled brackets indicate that the words enclosed between them are a tentative restoration of words presumed to have been lost from the transmitted text, or a tentative correction of a passage which the manuscripts present in a badly corrupt form.

2.     Agbatana: The capital of Media, about 300 km north of Susa; usually called Ecbatana by Herodotus and later Greek authors (modern Hamadan).

3.     Cissia: Aeschylus seems to take this as the name of a city (cf. 120); it was in fact the name of the region (today Khuzestan, or al-Ahwaz, in south-western Iran) of which Susa was the chief city.

4.     Such were… Astaspes: Here begins the first of three long catalogues of leaders of the army (the others are at 302–28 and 957– 99). A substantial proportion of them are, certainly or probably, genuine Persian names; most of the others would give a Greek ear the impression of being Persian or at least exotic. There is, however, no reason to believe that the lists are based on any authentic information about the Persian army; it is striking that of the twelve principal commanders named by Herodotus, not one is mentioned in the play.

5.     dwellers in the marshes: Of the Nile delta.

6.     mainland: Here this means (western) Asia Minor, which had once been controlled by the kingdom of Lydia and was now governed from that kingdom’s former capital, Sardis, by a Persian satrap.

7.     with two poles and with three: We are probably meant to assume that, as regularly in Homer, two horses are yoked to each pole, so that these are four- and six-horse chariots. Greeks (who in any case had long abandoned the use of chariots in war) never yoked more than two horses to a chariot, any extra horses being controlled by traces.

8.     Tmolus: A mountain near Sardis.

9.     anvils of the spear: That is, men who no more flinch before the spear than an anvil flinches before the hammer.

10.   Mysia: An inland region of north-western Asia Minor, lying north of Sardis, around the later famous city of Pergamum.

11.   city-sacking: Greek perseptolis, the first of many puns linking the name of Persia with the verb perthein or porthein ‘to sack, devastate’.

12.   strait of Helle: That is, the Hellespont (now the Dardanelles).

13.   race begotten of gold: Alluding to the conception of Perseus when Zeus visited his mother, Danaë, in the form of a shower of gold; the Persians were believed by Greeks to be descended from Perses, son of Perseus and Andromeda.

14.   trusting… army: The first of many references to the bridge by which Xerxes’ army crossed the Hellespont from Asia into Europe. The bridge was later destroyed by a storm, but its cables were captured by the Athenian admiral Xanthippus (whose son Pericles financed the production of The Persians) and taken to Athens, where they were hung in temples.

15.   projecting spur: That is, the bridge, conceived as an artificial promontory which seems at one end like an extension of Asia, and at the other end like an extension of Europe.

16.   this ancient building: The building was probably left to the audience’s imagination, assisted by the presence of chairs.

17.   may make… the prosperity: A metaphor from wrestling; the dust rises because the tripped man has fallen heavily, probably on his back.

18.   For those… defend it: In other words, human and material resources are alike essential to the acquisition and maintenance of political power (cf. Sophocles, Oedipus the King 540–42), and a regime that is strong in only one of these respects may well be in danger.

19.   land of the Ionians: The Persians and many other peoples of western Asia called all Greeks ‘Ionians’, doubtless because the first Greeks with whom they came into contact, those of Asia Minor, mostly belonged to the Ionian branch of the Greek people.

20.   in Doric robes: This does not mean that the second woman is to be thought of as a Dorian Greek (a Spartan, say); both the ‘Doric’ and the ‘Ionic’ styles of dress were in use in contemporary Athens. Aeschylus doubtless chose the Doric style because it was the simpler of the two and would make a more effective contrast with Persian luxury.

21.   of the Orient: Frequently in this play Persians speak of themselves as barbaroi, properly a Greek term for those who did not speak the Greek language; I have translated this throughout as ‘Orient(al)’ or ‘Eastern(er)’ (but in other plays, where the term is used by Greeks, I have retained the traditional rendering ‘barbarian’).

22.   an eagle… altar of Phoebus: The omen is easy to interpret: that the mother of the greatest of human kings, full of anxiety about his fate, sees the ‘king of birds’ (Agamemnon 114) fleeing from a bird of lesser status and submitting without resistance to degrading treatment, speaks for itself. It is less obvious why the eagle is represented as seeking the altar of Phoebus (Apollo) in particular; I suggest that the point is that the eagle is going to the worst possible place – for the eagle was the bird of Zeus, not Apollo, and the latter, though his best-known avian connection was with swans, also had one with hawks (Iliad 15.237; Odyssey 15.526; Aristophanes, Birds 516). Has Xerxes too gone to the most unpropitious place he could have chosen?

23.   he is not accountable to the community: Unlike an Athenian general such as Miltiades, who not long after his victory at Marathon was nearly sentenced to death for failing to capture Paros, and eventually died in prison.

24.   Using my intelligence: Rather than any divine inspiration, or any training in seer-craft.

25.   Medes: The Medes and the Persians were actually distinct (though kindred) peoples, but in ordinary Greek usage, and in this play, the two names are treated as synonymous; what we call ‘the Persian wars’ Greeks normally called ‘the Median affairs’ (ta Mēdika).

26.   great deal of harm: Referring mainly to the capture and burning of Sardis in 498, and the victory of Marathon in 490.

27.   treasure in their soil: Referring to the silver mines of Laureium, where a rich new vein was discovered a few years before the Persian invasion – and exploited, by the advice of Themistocles, for the building of the fleet that won the battle of Salamis.

28.   The way this man runs: This has been seen as a reference to the Persians’ system of fast couriers (Aeschylus alludes to them at Agamemnon 282 – but they were mounted), or as a chauvinistic gibe, from a Greek point of view, at Persians’ alleged cowardice (they run very fast – away from the enemy); more likely it is simply based on observation of the actual running styles of Greeks and Persians respectively. It would not be surprising if these styles tended to differ, given that Greek running techniques had been honed by many generations of athletic competition.

29.   this old life… too long: That is, we wish we had not lived to hear this news.

30.   country of Zeus: Hellen, the eponymous ancestor of the Hellenes (Greeks), was often said to have been a son of Zeus.

31.   shrouded in mantles that drift in the waves: The Persians’ luxurious garments have become their funeral robes – except that they will have no funerals.

32.   when I remember Athens: This passage, and 824, suggest that the tale was already current of how, after the burning of Sardis, Darius ordered a slave to say to him thrice every day before dinner, ‘Master, remember the Athenians’ (Herodotus 5.105).

33.   how many… for nothing: Referring mainly to Marathon (cf. 236, 244).

34.   Sileniae: According to an ancient commentator, this name was given to a part of the coastline of Salamis near ‘Trophy Point’. Probably the reference is to one side of the long peninsula of Cynosura at the eastern extremity of the island.

35.   Bactrians: The region of Bactria corresponded roughly to what is now Tajikistan and northern Afghanistan.

36.   wanders: As a floating corpse.

37.   the island where doves breed: This may be another way of describing Salamis, or may designate a small island in its vicinity.

38.   Chrysa: Possibly the town of this name near Troy is meant, or possibly the place name (‘city of gold’) is an invented one.

39.   purple dye: That of blood.

40.   Lyrnaean: This adjective should derive from a place name, Lyrna; ancient scholars knew of no such place and could only suggest that it was an abbreviated form of Lyrnessus near Troy (cf. note 38 above).

41.   Syennesis: The only member of Xerxes’ expedition named in the play, except the king himself, who can be firmly identified with an actual person. This ‘name’ was the title of all the kings of Cilicia (in south-eastern Asia Minor), and its contemporary bearer led the Cilician contingent of Xerxes’ fleet (Herodotus 7.98).

42.   about three hundred ships: Herodotus gives the total of the Greek fleet as 385, of which 180 were Athenian. The Persian Messenger cannot of course give an exact figure, and Aeschylus rounds down rather than up so as to maximize the disparity between the two fleets.

43.   those of outstanding speed… two hundred and seven: The natural way of understanding this is to take the 207 extra-fast ships to be part of the total of a thousand, just as the ten ships of the Greek élite squadron are part of their total of three hundred. Herodotus seems to have read the passage otherwise, for he gives the total numbers of the Persian fleet, when it first reached Greece, as precisely 1,207; they suffered, however, according to his narrative, severe losses before Salamis (by storm, and in the battle of Artemisium), and at Salamis they did not greatly outnumber the Greeks (8.13 – though in 8.66 he implausibly claims that the losses were made good by reinforcements from subjugated Greek states).

44.   Pallas: Athena.

45.   While… secure: This either alludes to, or else it inspired, the story of Themistocles’ retort to the Corinthian Adeimantus at the Greek council of war which finally decided to stand and fight at Salamis. Adeimantus had tried to silence Themistocles, and prevent his proposal being put to a vote, because Themistocles was ‘a man without a city’, Attica having been evacuated by its population, its territory occupied by the Persians, and the city sacked and burned; to which Themistocles replied, ‘We have a city and a country greater than yours, while we have two hundred ships and their crews’ (Herodotus 8.61).

46.   A Greek man… Athenian fleet: This was the slave Sicinnus, bringing a message from his master Themistocles (Herodotus 8.75).

47.   exits: That is, the exits from the bay of Eleusis north of Salamis, especially the straits at the eastern end of the island (cf. Herodotus 8.76.1).

48.   surround the island… completely: And, in particular, to watch the western exit from the bay, in the direction of Megara (ibid.).

49.   man-at-arms: That is, a soldier serving as a marine.

50.   holy paean-song: A type of hymn (originally to Apollo) customarily sung before battle and on various other occasions.

51.   as if they were tunny: Tunny were caught in huge shoals, and, being a very large fish, had to be killed by clubbing or spearing after being netted.

52.   island in front of Salamis: This was Psyttaleia, on which, according to Herodotus (8.76.1–2), Xerxes stationed ‘many of the Persians’ with the same objective as is stated here; they were killed to the last man by an Athenian hoplite force, led by Aristeides, which crossed over from Salamis while the naval battle was in progress (Herodotus 8.95). In Aeschylus’ treatment, on the other hand, the Greek attack on the island is made immediately after the naval battle, and by the same men who had fought it. Psyttaleia has been identified in modern times, sometimes with the island now officially so named (formerly Lipsokoutali) between Cynosura and the Peiraeus, sometimes with the island of Aghios Georghios in the bay north of Salamis town.

53.   haunt of Pan: Pausanias, Guide to Greece 1.36.2, noted that there were many roughly carved wooden images of Pan on the island.

54.   The rest of the host: That is, the land army. The following passage traces their retreat northwards up the east coast of Greece and then eastwards through Macedonia and Thrace.

55.   Achaea: Not Achaea in the northern Peloponnese but Achaea Phthiotis on the north shore of the Malian Gulf.

56.   Magnesia: The north-eastern coastal region of Thessaly, dominated by Mt Ossa.

57.   river Axius: Flows across Macedonia into the Thermaic Gulf; it marks approximately the point at which the Persians’ line of march turned from north to east.

58.   Lake Bolbe: Formed part of the boundary between the Chalcidic region to the south of it, with its Greek colonies, and the Macedonian kingdom.

59.   Mt Pangaeum: Lies east of the Strymon, so the meaning must be that the army came in sight of it. The Strymon flows into the Aegean near Amphipolis.

60.   add some… suffered: Probably to be taken as a guarded hint that she fears that Xerxes in his humiliation may commit suicide.

61.   dark-faced, equal-winged: The ship’s ‘face’ is her prow, possibly an allusion to the eyes so often painted on ships’ bows; her ‘wings’ are her banks of oars.

62.   Cychreus: A Salaminian hero; during the battle of Salamis he appeared to the Athenians in the form of a serpent (Pausanias, Guide to Greece 1.36.1).

63.   voiceless children… of the Undefiled: A ‘kenning’ denoting fish; the ‘Undefiled’ is the sea, which washes away all ritual pollution and can never become polluted itself (cf. Euripides, Iphigeneia in Tauris 1193).

64.   pure: That is, (probably) never yoked.

65.   flower-worker: The bee.

66.   sweet-smelling produce: Oil, rather than olives.

67.   King of the Shades: Hades / Aidoneus / Pluto (who will be addressed by name at 650).

68.   Darian: Since this form of the king’s name is no closer than the regular Greek form Dareios to the Persian Dārayavahush, it may be based on the form used in some third language (of Asia Minor?); at any rate Aeschylus, in using it here and below, is clearly seeking to give the invocation a particularly exotic air.

69.   ballên: This word for ‘king’ is not Persian but apparently comes from the Phrygian language of north-western Asia Minor (Pseudo-Plutarch, On Rivers 12.3–4); in Sophocles’ Shepherds, whose setting is Troy, the Chorus use it in addressing (Priam or some other prince) (Sophocles fr. 515).

70.   your royal hat: The Persian noble’s headgear (tiara or kyrbasia) was a soft felt hat; the King wore a taller, stiffened, peaked version.

71.   this… twin failure: The loss of the fleet and of the land army.

72.   triple-oared ships: That is, triremes (ships with three banks of oars).

73.   the mighty Bosporus: In poetry, the Hellespont was sometimes referred to as the Bosporus, a name which properly, then as now, belonged to the other strait separating Europe from Asia, at Byzantium (Istanbul), some 240 km to the north-east.

74.   by the spear: Apparently Darius mistakenly supposes that the land army was destroyed in battle.

75.   he altered the nature of its passage: That is, he stopped up a sea-passage and created a land-passage instead.

76.   Medus: Probably to be taken as the (mythical) eponymous founder of the kingdom of the Medes (cf. on 236). Alternatively Mēdos may mean ‘a Mede’; in that case the reference will be to Cyaxares (reigned c. 625–585), the first Median king to extend his rule into Asia Minor, and his son will be Astyages, the maternal grandfather of (and eventually deposed by) Cyrus.

77.   Cyrus: The founder of the Persian Empire (which he ruled c. 550–529), the conqueror of Babylon, western Asia Minor and many other lands, and the first Middle Eastern monarch to rule over large numbers of Greeks. (He was also the father of Darius’ queen, Atossa, and the grandfather of Xerxes, but Aeschylus either was unaware of this or chose to ignore it.)

78.   The son of Cyrus: Cambyses (reigned 529–522), the conqueror of Egypt; Herodotus, relying largely on Egyptian sources, gives a very unfavourable portrayal of him (3.1–38).

79.   Mardus: In Herodotus (3.61–79) he is called Smerdis and is said to have been a usurper impersonating Cambyses’ brother of the same name (in Persian Bardiya); so too Darius himself in the Behistun inscription (sections 11–15; translated in M. Brosius, The Persian Empire from Cyrus II to Artaxerxes I (London 2000), pp. 23–4, 27–40) except that he calls the usurper Gaumata.

80.   Artaphrenes: Herodotus (3.70ff.) calls this man Intaphrenes, which is considerably closer to the Persian Vindafarnā; evidently Aeschylus has confused him with a man much better known to Greeks, Darius’ brother, the governor of Sardis at the time of the Ionian revolt (Herodotus 5.25.1 etc.), whose son of the same name had been joint commander of the Persian forces at Marathon.

81.   I gained… I desired: That is, we (either all the conspirators – so in effect Herodotus 3.84–8 – or Darius and Artaphrenes alone) drew lots for the kingship, and I won.

82.   the Asopus: The principal river of Boeotia, which separates Thebes from Plataea and Mt Cithaeron to the south. Aeschylus is here simplifying the course of events. Mardonius’ army actually wintered further north, in Thessaly (Herodotus 8.113–35), and in the spring he advanced on Athens, which was captured and later burnt for the second time (Herodotus 9.1–3, 9.13.2); only when it was clear that Athens would not come to terms, and that the Spartans were on the march, did he retreat into Boeotia and prepare to meet the enemy there (Herodotus 9.12–15).

83.   shed by the Dorian spear: It is worth noting that the entire credit for the victory of Plataea is here given to the Spartans.

84.   remember Athens: Cf. on 285.

85.   river Halys: Now the Kızılırmak, this river divides northern Asia Minor into an eastern and a western half, and had formerly been the boundary between the Median and Lydian empires.

86.   freshwater dwellings of the Thracians: The lake-villages of the Strymon basin (cf. Herodotus 5.16), which were well known to Athenians in 472 because of Cimon’s recent campaign on the lower Strymon, which included a large-scale clearance of the Thracians in the neighbourhood (Plutarch, Cimon 7.2).

87.   Propontis: Now the Sea of Marmara; the most important Greek cities on its shores were Cyzicus on the Asian side and Perinthus on the European.

88.   this land: Here means Asia as a whole.

89.   promontory that runs into the sea: The Ionian peninsula, which has Chios to its west, Lesbos to its north and Samos to its south. The five other islands mentioned in this stanza are not covered by the description, being in the Cyclades group in the south-western Aegean.

90.   two shores: Those of Europe and Asia; the lands ‘midway between’ them are the first two islands mentioned, Lemnos in the northern Aegean and Icaros in the southern.

91.   Salamis: Salamis in Cyprus (on the east coast, north of modern Famagusta) was traditionally founded by Teucer, Ajax’s half-brother, when he was banished from the other Salamis by his father after returning from the Trojan War without Ajax.

92.   The strength… aged citizens: Because (i) there are virtually no young men left, (ii) he has been responsible for the death of so many, and (iii) some of the victims must be sons of the old men he is facing.

93.   Mariandynian dirge-singer: The Mariandyni were a people of north-western Asia Minor (in the hinterland of the Greek colony of Heraclea Pontica), whose ritual laments were famous.

94.   your ever-faithful Eye: Greeks believed that one of the high officials in the Persian administration was called ‘the King’s Eye’ (cf. Aristophanes, Acharnians 91–125; Herodotus 1.114.2). There is no evidence in Persian sources of the existence of such an official.

95.   who counted the numberless tens of thousands: Possibly alluding to the story (Herodotus 7.60) of the Persian army being counted, ten thousand at a time, at Doriscus in Thrace.

96.   favourite son of Batanochus: The man’s own name is lost.

97.   ten thousand Mardians: The Mardi were a nomadic Persian tribe (Herodotus 1.125.4).

98.   Arians: Another Iranian people (Herodotus 7.66.1) living in what is now north-western Afghanistan (around Herat).

99.   wheeled tent: That is, a carriage with curtains (the normal Greek word was harmamaxa), to Greeks an emblem of Persian luxury (cf. Aristophanes, Acharnians 70). On his westward march to Greece, Xerxes travelled sometimes in a chariot, sometimes in a harmamaxa, with ‘a thousand of the noblest and bravest Persians’ following him, together with other picked troops (Herodotus 7.41.1–2). The Persian elders had expected that he would return in similar style, with his carriage and his escort: he has come back with neither.

100. black, violent blows: Presumably to the head (cf. The Libation-Bearers 427–8), since Xerxes’ next line shows that breast-beating has not yet been mentioned. The blows are ‘black’ because they will be delivered hard enough to raise bruises.

101. Persian ground is hard to tread on: Persia was thought of by Greeks as a land of rugged terrain (e.g. Herodotus 9.122); but why should the elders feel this specially now? Are they perhaps walking barefoot, having cast off their shoes as a further gesture of mourning? After this line, two lines have probably been lost, each of them beginning with yet another cry of woe.

THE PERSIAN WAR TETRALOGY

1.     The Persian War Tetralogy: On possible connections with the Persian war (and the simultaneous Carthaginian war) in the first and third plays, see pp. 5–6.

2.     ankle-supports: Greek pellytra, felt bandages which, according to an ancient lexicographer, ‘were wrapped around the ankles and heels of runners to reduce the risk of dislocations’.

3.     First of all… good journey: This passage (during or after which Glaucus presumably leaves the scene) is imitated by Aristophanes in the sendoff given to Dionysus and Aeschylus by the Chorus at the end of The Frogs (1528–33), when they have been asked to ‘escort [Aeschylus] on his way, hymning his praises with his own lyrics and melodies’ (1525–7).

4.     its fair streams: Those of the river Himeras, which flows past the city.

5.     Nysian delight: That is, euphoria induced by wine (with reference to Mt Nysa, Dionysus’ childhood home).

6.     Naiads: water-nymphs.

7.     like the best horses: That is, white; for the excellence of white horses cf. Pindar, Pythian 9.83; [Euripides], Rhesus 616–21; and the epithet leukippos ‘of the white horses’ applied to many gods and heroes, especially Castor and Pollux.

8.     round drop: Of boiling water, no doubt.

9.     He: The name of the author from whom the Hesiod commentator cites this story has been lost, but the story certainly comes from a satyr drama, and Aeschylus is the only dramatist who is known to have written a satyr play involving Prometheus.

10.   Epimetheus: Prometheus’ brother; whereas Prometheus means ‘Forethought’, Epimetheus means ‘Afterthought’.

11.   Staying… occasion: This line is almost identical with The Libation-Bearers 582, and very similar to Seven Against Thebes 619.

12.   thirty thousand years: In Prometheus Bound and Unbound, the duration of his bondage is much less, being equal to thirteen human generations (from Io to Heracles). The action of Prometheus the Fire-Bearer must be imagined as taking place before Prometheus’ arrest (since Pandora, the first mortal woman, has not yet, or has only just, been created), so Prometheus must have predicted his long ordeal. We cannot tell whether the prediction was meant to be taken as accurate or (as it well might be in a satyr drama) exaggerated; what the author of Bound and Unbound imagined (whether he was Aeschylus or another) is not decisive evidence of what Aeschylus imagined in an unconnected play.

SEVEN AGAINST THEBES

1.     Antigone… Herald: These three characters were added to the play when the spurious ending was created.

2.     controlling the helm at its stern: As often in poetry, the city is imaged as a ship.

3.     prophet: Since this prophet is said to use his ‘ears and mind’, he evidently does not see the flight of the birds, and the audience will readily identify him as the blind Teiresias.

4.     that shepherd of fowl: So called, presumably, because he knows the birds as well as a shepherd does his flock.

5.     without using fire: Contrasting divination by augury with divination from the manner in which sacrifices burn on an altar.

6.     Achaeans: The enemy army are so called again at 324; elsewhere they are ‘the Argives’.

7.     Enyo: A war goddess, mentioned together with Ares in Iliad 5.592–4.

8.     adorning the chariot of Adrastus: Adrastus, the king of Argos, is often himself said to have been one of the Seven (as in Euripides, Phoenician Maidens 1134); but he invariably survives the war, and Aeschylus evidently wanted to have all the Seven perish.

9.     mementos of themselves: Probably locks of hair, as in several vase paintings of the early fifth century.

10.   I will keep… scout’s eye out: Implying that his first scouting expedition had been in darkness or at least twilight.

11.   O mighty Curse and Fury of my father: The Furies (Erinyes) seem in early times to have been identified with curses, especially parental curses; cf. Iliad 9.454, 571; Odyssey 2.135; Hesiod, Theogony 472. In Eumenides 417 the Furies say that ‘Curses’ is their name in their homes beneath the earth.

12.   army… against the city: The enemy infantry have now joined the cavalry (80–84) in the attack.

13.   I see the noise: That is, it creates a vivid picture in my mind’s eye.

14.   Ares, ancient god of this land: Ares played a crucial role in the story of the founding of Thebes by Cadmus (the dragon that Cadmus slew and/or the spring which it guarded being sacred to him); he was the father of Cadmus’ wife Harmonia.

15.   their crests at an angle: The helmet-crests are ‘nodding’ as the warrior moves, a phenomenon that Homer formulaically calls ‘fearsome’ (e.g. Iliad 3.337). The expression is probably also designed to evoke the idea of waves breaking obliquely on the hull of a ship.

16.   lord of horses and ruler of the sea: Poseidon.

17.   Cypris: Aphrodite, who was the mother of Harmonia.

18.   Wolf-god: Apollo’s title Lykeios was popularly connected with lykos ‘wolf’, and Sophocles (Electra 6) calls him ‘the wolf-slaying god’.

19.   maiden born of Leto: Artemis.

20.   Child of Zeus: Most likely Ares; hardly Athena, who is identified with Onca (164) at 487 and 501.

21.   clean: Greek hagnon ‘holy, pure, free of pollution’, possibly hinting at a wish for the god to protect the lives of non-combatants like themselves (the killing of enemies in battle did not count as homicide and involved no pollution).

22.   Onca, dwelling before the city: The sanctuary of this local goddess was just outside one of the city gates (501–2).

23.   enemy of alien speech: The enemy, of course, spoke Greek (though a different dialect or dialects), and worshipped the very same gods; but Aeschylus seems to be inviting the audience to compare Theban fears to their own when facing the Persian invasion of 480.

24.   gods of a captured city leave it: The point seems to be that the gods will not defend a city that makes no real effort to defend itself.

25.   Saviour: That is, Zeus (who had ‘Saviour’ (Sōtēr) as one of his most important cult titles). To the kind of family relationships here posited between Zeus and two personified abstractions there is a close parallel in a fourth-century inscription (Inscriptiones Graecae ii² 4627), a dedication ‘to Zeus Epiteleios Philios, and the god’s mother Philia [Friendship, Affection], and the god’s wife Agathe Tyche [Good Fortune]’.

26.   to offer slaughtered sacrifices to the gods: The reference is to sacrifices (sphagia) offered immediately before going into battle. However, the fact that such sacrifices, in the nature of the case, could only be offered by men in no way shows that it was not proper for the women of a besieged city to offer collective sacrifice and prayer for its safety; Eteocles in effect concedes this at 265–70.

27.   You’re putting yourself into slavery: That is, you are making defeat, and therefore your enslavement, more likely.

28.   while touching the images: Words gained added force and effectiveness if their speaker was in contact with something sacred (a divine image, an altar, the parts of a sacrificial victim etc.), so ill-omened words uttered in such circumstances might be doubly damaging.

29.   that the gods should fight alongside us: That is, do not speak as if the gods were to do all the fighting themselves.

30.   customary Hellenic cry at sacrifices: The ololygmos, a cry of joy uttered (normally by women) at the slaughter of a sacrificial beast and on other occasions, often to hail a victory (e.g. Agamemnon 28, 1236; The Libation-Bearers 942).

31.   Dirce and… Ismenus: The two rivers of Thebes (which, like all rivers, were worshipped as gods).

32.   to combat: Literally ‘as rowers against’, another of the play’s ubiquitous nautical metaphors.

33.   <         >: The transmitted text means ‘in the big manner’, which gives no suitable sense; it is probably part of a note which has displaced the original text.

34.   children of Tethys: Tethys was the mother of all rivers (Hesiod, Theogony 337–45, 367–70).

35.   win glory for these citizens: This paradoxical expression is based on Iliad 16.84, where Achilles, who is not going out to fight, tells Patroclus, who is, to ‘win glory for me’; similarly here the Chorus expect that the gods will do the work and the Thebans will get the credit.

36.   dragged by their hair like horses: The comparison is to an unharnessed horse being led by its mane.

37.   those just reared: Adolescent girls, forced to leave their homes prematurely as slave-concubines instead of leaving them in due time for a lawful marriage.

38.   as if by a solid wall: This does not refer to the wall of the city itself; the enemy are envisaged as stationing troops to encircle the city after its capture and prevent the escape of survivors.

39.   having acquired unfriendly storekeepers: The new ‘storekeepers’ of the grain are the enemy soldiers – who let it go to waste.

40.   prophet: This must here mean Amphiaraus, of whom we will hear more later (568–619).

41.   snake hissing at midday: Snakes were thought to be most active in the noonday heat.

42.   someone’s folly: He means the folly of Tydeus in choosing such a device for his shield – but the words may eventually come to have an ironic application to himself.

43.   Sown Men whom Ares spared: The ‘Sown Men’ were the warriors who sprang from the dragon’s teeth which Cadmus sowed in the soil of Thebes (hence ‘a man of this land through and through’) at the time when he founded the city; they fought each other (hence the reference to Ares) until only five remained, and these became the ancestors of the noblest families of Thebes. See [Apollodorus], Library 2.4.1.

44.   mother that bore him: That is, the land of Thebes; cf. 16–20.

45.   giant: Implying both ‘of great size’ and ‘an enemy of the gods’.

46.   bigger than the man previously mentioned: Tydeus was a smallish man (Iliad 5.801).

47.   our first gain has given birth to yet another: Meaning that the self-defeating arrogance of Capaneus augurs as well for the Thebans as did its predecessor, the self-defeating arrogance of Tydeus.

48.   thunderbolt: Capaneus was killed by a thunderbolt from Zeus as he tried to scale the walls of Thebes. Cf. Sophocles, Antigone 127–37; Euripides, Phoenician Maidens 1172–86.

49.   Protectress: Greek Prostatēria, a title associated with shrines placed close to doors or gates (cf. Sophocles, Electra 637); Artemis and Hecate (who was sometimes partly or even wholly identified with her) were often worshipped at such spots. Probably there was a well-known sanctuary of Artemis under this title outside the Electran Gate of Thebes.

50.   bearing his boast in his hands: That is, expressing his pride not in words but in action.

51.   Creon: The same Creon (son of Menoeceus and brother of Iocaste) who figures in Sophocles’ three Theban plays and in Euripides’ Phoenician Maidens. In Sophocles, Antigone 1303–5, the death of Megareus is mentioned as if the audience would be familiar with the story, and it is implied that Creon was somehow responsible for it; Aeschylus is evidently not following that version (whatever precisely it was), but it is striking that Megareus is the only one of the defending champions (other than himself) whose death Eteocles mentions as a possibility (477).

52.   two men: Viz. Eteoclus himself and the man portrayed on his shield.

53.   Brag about another one: Eteocles speaks as if the Scout were himself making the boasts that he reports the attackers are making.

54.   Typhon: Typhon, also called Typhoeus or Typhos, was the last opponent whom Zeus vanquished before his rulership of the universe was finally established (Hesiod, Theogony 821–68). He was an earth-born monster, with a hundred fiery serpent-heads, but after a great battle Zeus defeated him with the thunderbolt and hurled him down to Tartarus (in Pindar, Pythian 1.15–28, and in Prometheus Bound 351–72, he lies under Mt Etna).

55.   round circle… coiling snakes: This expression is easily understood in the light of artistic representations of Typhon (including an Argive shield found at Olympia), in which he regularly has one or two coiling snakes where his legs should be.

56.   maenad: An ecstatic female worshipper of Dionysus.

57.   Hermes: Thought to be responsible for unexpected strokes of good luck.

58.   man is an enemy of the man he will face: It is not clear whether this means that the two men are personal enemies (if so, we know nothing of the mythical background) or whether the statement merely serves to point up what follows (‘not only are these two men going to fight each other, they also bear on their shields two gods who fought each other’).

59.   his Saviour: Alluding to one of Zeus’ most familiar titles; cf. on 225.

60.   Amphion: Together with his brother Zethus, Amphion built the walls of Thebes. His tomb was on a hill to the north of the Cadmea.

61.   his maidenish name: Partheno-paeus.

62.   offspring of Ares by a mountain-dwelling mother: Parthenopaeus’ mother was the huntress Atalanta. His father is usually named as Melanion (occasionally Meleager), but [Apollodorus], Library 3.9.2 gives Ares as an alternative.

63.   so that… at that man: When the Thebans throw their spears at Parthenopaeus, they risk hitting the Theban on his shield – a bad omen for their side.

64.   immigrant… his fine upbringing: This remark may be a later interpolation: if Parthenopaeus has travelled further than his colleagues to fight at Thebes (545–6), he can hardly have been brought up at Argos as here implied.

65.   to flood in through the gates: The ship image again.

66.   ‘murderer’: Tydeus had fled from his native Calydon to Argos after killing one or more kinsmen (early accounts vary widely as to the details); like Polyneices, he married a daughter of Adrastus. Amphiaraus’ ensuing words should not be taken to imply that Tydeus alone was the prime mover behind Adrastus’ decision to attack Thebes, since he also blames Polyneices for urging this course on Adrastus (585).

67.   ‘arouser of a Fury’: That is, inciter of an act that will incur certain and terrible vengeance.

68.   turning… its significance: Polyneices means ‘Much-strife’. The passage as transmitted is corrupt, and I suspect that several words that were originally annotations (including Polyneices’ name) have been incorporated into the text; I have omitted these in the translation.

69.   becoming a prophet… soil of the enemy: The oracular shrine of Amphiaraus near Thebes was famous throughout, and beyond, the Greek world (Herodotus 1.46, 49, 52; 8.134).

70.   for he desires not… good counsels grow: Plutarch (Aristides 3.5) says that on hearing this eulogy of Amphiaraus in the theatre, the whole audience turned their eyes to Aristides ‘the Just’; but his anecdote derives much of its point from a misquotation (making Amphiaraus desire not the appearance but the reality of justice – appropriate to Aristides but not to the Aeschylean context) and should be regarded as fictional.

71.   against his will: Amphiaraus’ wife Eriphyle was the sister of Adrastus; after an earlier quarrel with Adrastus, Amphiaraus had sworn that in any future dispute between the two men he would abide by her decision. When he was reluctant to join the expedition against Thebes (knowing through his prophetic power that it was doomed to disaster), Polyneices bribed Eriphyle with the necklace of Harmonia, and she, invoking Amphiaraus’ oath, instructed him to go on the expedition. The story was known in some form to Homer (Odyssey 11.326–7, 15.244–7); it is told consecutively by an ancient commentator on Odyssey 11.326.

72.   road on which it’s a long journey to come back: That is, the road to death.

73.   Loxias: Apollo.

74.   Seventh Gate: Both Aeschylus and Euripides (Phoenician Maidens 1104–40), in listing the Seven and the gates they attacked, give names to the first six gates but call the last simply ‘the seventh’. For Euripides this gate is of no particular importance (in his account no one is killed there), and he clearly regarded ‘Seventh’ as its name. In [Apollodorus], Library 3.6.6, and Pausanias, Guide to Greece 9.8.4, what seems to be the same gate is called the Hypsistan; if ‘Seventh’ was an alternative name for it, it may have been due to the presence nearby of a sanctuary of Apollo (cf. 800–801).

75.   what a fate… this city: Polyneices actually wants to rule Thebes (647–8), not to destroy it, and even expects its gods to be his allies (639–41); but the Scout, like Amphiaraus (582–3), evidently assumes that if the enemy are victorious Polyneices will not be able to prevent them from sacking and burning the city (cf. 427, 434, 467, 531, 549).

76.   command: Lit. ‘be ship-captain of’.

77.   this man so well named: See on 577.

78.   such blood purifies itself: Normally anyone who shed another’s blood, intentionally or not, became ritually polluted, but this did not apply to the killing of an enemy in war (Euripides, Ion 1334; Plato, Laws 869d).

79.   child: Compared with their earlier exchanges (180–286), the reversal in the positions of Eteocles and the Chorus is so complete that the young maidens even speak to him as if his superiors in age and wisdom.

80.   Cocytus: One of the rivers of Hades.

81.   with dry, tearless eyes: That is, without pity.

82.   dream-visions… our father’s property: This may refer back to something said by Eteocles in the preceding play, Oedipus; if it does not, its meaning will have been mysterious to many if not most of the audience until elucidated by 727–33 (cf. 788–90, 816–19, 906–9, 941–50).

83.   Chalybian migrant from Scythia: The Chalybians were famous as iron-workers (Prometheus Bound 714–15; Euripides, Alcestis 980–1). They are usually located in Asia Minor (e.g. Herodotus 1.28) rather than in Scythia (the region north of the Black Sea), but the early fifth-century geographer Hecataeus placed them north of the Armenians, and in Prometheus Bound they live between the ‘Scythian nomads’ and the Caucasus.

84.   as much as is given to the dead to possess: That is, just enough for a grave.

85.   who can release them: From pollution.

86.   who had told him thrice: Presumably we are to understand that Laius, being dissatisfied with Apollo’s response, repeated his question twice, only to receive the same answer each time; cf. Herodotus 7.141, where the Athenians force Apollo to modify his response by threatening an indefinite hunger strike in the temple.

87.   bridal couple: The bridegroom here is probably Laius rather than Oedipus: Oedipus had no way of knowing that he was marrying his mother (cf. 778–9; the story of his having been told by Apollo that he was destined to do so is unlikely to predate Sophocles), and ‘mindless madness’ describes not inappropriately an act by Laius which has already been called ill-counselled, a transgression and a defiance of Apollo.

88.   grievous reconciliation… long ago: This too (cf. 710–11) may refer to something said in Oedipus; for the idea of the brothers’ death as their reconciliation, cf. 884–5, 908–9, 941.

89.   their shared abode: Either their joint sanctuary on the Theban acropolis (cf. 93–281) or the palace of Zeus on Olympus where the gods of the Iliad regularly assemble.

90.   by the much-trodden meeting place of mortals: That is, by (those who frequented) the assembly place (agora) of Thebes.

91.   man-snatching demon: The Sphinx.

92.   he was robbed of his <         > eyes: The transmitted text describes his eyes as kreissoteknōn, which could conceivably mean ‘better than children’ but is a word of impossible formation; no proposed correction is convincing.

93.   their wretched maintenance of him: Possibly referring to the story in the epic Thebais (fr. 3 West) that Oedipus cursed his sons when they insulted him by sending him an inferior cut of meat from a sacrifice.

94.   awesome Master of Sevens: This title (hebdomagetas, lit. ‘seventh-leader’) is probably an ad hoc coinage; the number seven was sacred to Apollo because he was born on the seventh day of the month.

95.   <         >: The lost line spoken by the Messenger may have meant something like ‘not hesitating to fight each other’; the Chorus will have interjected another anxious, impatient or horrified comment.

96.   O great Zeus… impious thoughts: Abnormalities of language, metre and sense make it unlikely that Aeschylus was responsible for these lines.

97.   with ‘true glory’ and with ‘much strife’: The etymological meanings of the names Eteocles and Polyneices respectively.

98.   regular beating of hands on head: Head-beating, a common gesture of mourning, is here compared to the rhythmic beat of a ship’s oars.

99.   Acheron: The river, or lake, in the underworld, across which Charon was usually imagined as ferrying the souls of the dead. In the picture created here, it is the words and actions of the mourners that provide the motive power to take souls across the water on that final journey.

100. sacred mission… no return: Alluding to the sacred ship sent annually by the Athenians to Delos in honour of Apollo, in commemoration, it was said, of the ship that Aegeus sent to Crete with seven youths and seven maidens, destined as a tribute for the Minotaur, whom Theseus rescued (cf. Plato, Phaedo 58a–c). On the return voyage Theseus forgot to change the black sail for a red or white one, so that Aegeus thought he was dead and committed suicide. The ship of the dead always has black sails.

101. on which Apollo Paeon never treads: Mourning was abhorrent to Apollo (Agamemnon 1074–9).

102. But here come… from the heart: This passage was inserted, for the purpose of bringing Antigone and Ismene on stage, at the time when the end of the play was reshaped.

103. first semichorus: At certain points (877, 895, 933) the text makes it clear that this lament is sung by two (groups of) voices in alternation, and many manuscripts mark the change points fairly regularly (though none marks them all). Except at one point (933, where most name the singer as Ismene), they assign the lines to ‘Semichorus’ or ‘Chorus’.

104. their reconciler: Iron (cf. 727–33, 816–17, 884–5, 941–3).

105. Unhappy is she… mothers of children: This does not in itself imply that the mother is still alive.

106. parting: Greek diatomais, lit. ‘cuttings-apart’, alluding (i) to the anticipated friendly parting of Hector and Ajax after their duel at Troy (Iliad 7.302, using the related word dietmagen), (ii) to the division of Oedipus’ inheritance, and (iii) to the wounds the brothers inflicted on each other.

107. from the sea: (Greek pontios), or ‘from the Black Sea’ (Greek Pontios).

108. under their bodies… wealth of land: I.e. the real estate they will receive, though in length and breadth it is only so much as suffices for a grave, is of infinite depth!

109. Curses: Equivalent to ‘Furies’ (cf. 70). For the battle at the gates between the Thebans and the Argives there is substituted, in these lines, a battle between the House of Laius and the powers of destruction (the Curses, Ruin and the daimōn or ‘controlling power’) ending in decisive victory for the latter.

110. You struck… where he does: These brief responsive phrases may have been sung by individual voices from the two halves of the Chorus. In the manuscripts they are mostly ascribed to Antigone and Ismene, and this was doubtless the intention of the producer who introduced these characters.

111. You struck after being struck. – You were killed after killing: This implies a scenario like that narrated in Euripides, Phoenician Maidens 1404–22: brother A gives brother B a mortal wound, but B with his last strength kills A.

112. He did not come back… killed: This probably refers to Eteocles, who had gone out of the city to fight his brother; in the next line the reference is to Polyneices’ return from Argos.

113. thrice-hurled: Greek tripalta (which occurs only here) ought etymologically to mean something like ‘thrice brandished’, referring to a weapon; it may possibly refer to the three generations of suffering in the House of Laius (cf. 742ff.), which have been enacted in the three plays of the trilogy.

114. You know about it: That is, about the power of the Fury.

115. and the land: After this, in the transmitted text, come two lines which are appropriate only to Antigone and Ismene: ‘But above all to me. – And even more to me.’ They will have been inserted when the sisters were brought into the play; evidently (and rightly) the adaptor felt that it would be absurd to have them sing a sobbing antiphon like 961–1004 and yet make no reference whatever to their personal grief.

116. pain… where he does: The language irresistibly suggests that to bury Eteocles and Polyneices close to their father would be to inflict on him the same kind of injury that he inflicted on his father (to whom he gave pain, and whose bed he unknowingly usurped). Since the first suggestion as to where the brothers should be buried has thus been (at least provisionally) rejected, Aeschylus’ text cannot have ended here: once the question of their burial place has been raised, the bodies cannot be taken off until it has been settled.

117. I have to announce… city of Cadmus: The remainder of the text, from this point on, is not by Aeschylus; see pp. 63–4

118. carrying it: The text does not make it clear what she will be carrying (strictly interpreted, indeed, it ought to mean she will be carrying the body itself!), but the writer expected his audience to understand that she would bring earth to throw over the body (cf. Sophocles, Antigone 249–56).

119. Keres, Furies: The Keres are usually spirits of death and evil, distinct from the Furies, who are spirits of vengeance; however, in Hesiod, Theogony 217–22, the Keres are presented as spirits of vengeance, and Aeschylus in Eumenides gives his Furies the same pedigree (as children of Night with no father) that Hesiod gives the Keres.

THE THEBAN TETRALOGY

1.     And for the stranger a garland: Linguistic details show that this reward for ‘the stranger’ (Oedipus) is being contrasted with another reward which has apparently just been proposed for someone else. Is the speaker Silenus, suggesting to Creon that Oedipus should be given a token reward while he himself should get the substantive one (presumably the kingship of Thebes and the hand of Iocaste)?

2.     according to the tale of Prometheus: For the connection between Prometheus, bonds and garlands, see Prometheus Unbound fr. 202. Since the Prometheus plays, whether by Aeschylus or not, are almost certainly later than The Sphinx, our fragment shows that this aetiology is of pre-Aeschylean origin.

3.     The Sphinx… ill-fortune: This phrase is quoted by ‘Euripides’ in a parody of Aeschylean lyric in Aristophanes, Frogs 1287. The ancient commentator on that passage explicitly ascribes the words to The Sphinx, in which the most plausible place for them would be in a retrospective song after the monster’s destruction; but it has also been suggested that the ascription is erroneous and that the line actually came from Oedipus.

4.     bitch: The Sphinx is called a dog because she snatched up her prey; so in Seven Against Thebes (776–7) she is ‘the man-snatching demon’, and in Sophocles’ Oedipus the King (391) ‘the songstress-bitch’.

THE SUPPLIANTS

1.     land of Zeus: Egypt could be so called because it contained the famous oracle of Zeus Ammon at Siwa; but to the Danaids it is more important that Egypt was the place where Zeus miraculously begot their ancestor Epaphus.

2.     leader of our band: Greek stasiarkhos is also capable of meaning ‘originator of civil strife’ – which Danaus may have been in Egypt and may later prove to be in Argos (see pp. 152–5).

3.     like a gameboard: The game referred to is one of those that went under the generic name pessoi, games of mixed skill and chance based on the moving of pieces on a board according to the fall of dice.

4.     gadfly-driven heifer: Io.

5.     hand-held emblems: Greek enkheiridiois more usually means ‘daggers’ – which the Danaids will be using later in the trilogy.

6.     and, thirdly, Zeus the Saviour: The third libation after a meal was poured to Zeus the Saviour (the first going to the Olympian gods, the second to the heroes), and Aeschylus is fond of linking Zeus the Saviour with the number three (e.g. Agamemnon 245–7, 1386–7; The Libation-Bearers 1075–6; Eumenides 759–60).

7.     the vindicator: In the sense that Argive recognition that Epaphus was the Danaids’ ancestor will compel them to respect the Danaids’ claim to Argive aid.

8.     touch: Greek ephapsis (in line 17 it was epaphē), whence the child’s name Epaphus.

9.     and the destined time… derived from that touch: If the text here is rightly restored and understood, it implies that at the time of Epaphus’ conception Zeus told Io (as Gabriel told Mary) what name should be given to the child she would bear.

10.   Tereus’ wife… misery: The wife of Tereus (with or without the aid of her sister) killed their only child, Itys, and tricked his father into eating his flesh. In early versions of the story, the killing may have been accidental (as in the parallel story of Odyssey 19.518– 23, where the husband is Zethus); in Sophocles’ later Tereus it is a deliberate act of revenge for Tereus’ rape of his wife’s sister; in our passage it could be either. Both husband and wife were transformed into birds, the latter into a nightingale (who continues eternally to lament for Itys), the former into a hawk (in Sophocles a hoopoe). The wife’s name in archaic art, and in the mythographer Pherecydes (a contemporary of Aeschylus), is Aëdon or Aëdona (‘Nightingale’); in Sophocles and later Greek authors it is Procne.

11.   her unmotherly anger: If for Aeschylus the killing of Itys was deliberate, the object of his mother’s anger will have been Tereus; if accidental, then probably (as in Pherecydes) the mother’s (jealous) anger will have been directed against her prolific sister-in-law Niobe (she killed Itys by mistake for one of Niobe’s sons).

12.   lamenting in Ionian strains: The Ionian musical mode was particularly associated with laments.

13.   Land of Mists: A name for Egypt (Apollonius Rhodius, Argonautica 4.267), said to refer to the mist that often concealed its low-lying coastline from the approaching seafarer.

14.   Even for distressed fugitives… that gods respect: Fugitives from war, whose enemies are only trying to assert the accepted rights of the victor, are safe from seizure if they take sanctuary at an altar: how much more should the Danaids be protected, since their enemies are trying to claim something to which (according to the Danaids) they have no right whatsoever!

15.   It falls safe, not on its back: H. Friis Johansen and E. W. Whittle, in their commentary (Copenhagen 1980), plausibly take the metaphor to refer to a leopard (or feline predator of similar habits) springing from a tree and landing on its feet – appropriate here, where the stress is on Zeus’ power to punish and destroy.

16.   Everything gods do… holy abode: Cf. Xenophanes frr. 25, 26 Diels-Kranz: ‘[God] moves everything by mental will, without toil… He always remains in one place, without moving at all.’

17.   the kind of youthful stock that is sprouting: The ‘youthful stock’ consists of the sons of Aegyptus.

18.   hilly land of Apia: Apia was a name for Argos (cf. Agamemnon 256–7), explained in 260–70; by its similarity to the name of Apis, the Egyptian bull god sometimes identified with Epaphus (cf. Herodotus 2.153), it suggests a link between Argos and Egypt, just as bounis ‘hilly land’ suggests a link with the bovine Io.

19.   you understand well… my barbaric speech: Although, in accordance with the conventions of tragedy, the words that actually come out of the Danaids’ mouths are Greek, we are expected to imagine that they are speaking Egyptian (just as e.g. we are expected to imagine that the performers’ linen masks are human faces).

20.   Sidonian: That is, Phoenician; perhaps suggesting ‘richly coloured’; cf. Iliad 6.289–90.

21.   tearing its linen to rags: A gesture of mourning or grief; cf. The Libation-Bearers 27–8.

22.   rites: Greek telea, a word which in appropriate contexts often refers specifically to marriage or its consummation (e.g. Eumenides 835; Sophocles, Antigone 1240–41; cf. proteleia ‘prenuptial sacrifices’).

23.   are vulnerable… so long as death keeps away: That is, our self-mourning (116) is premature: if we do not abandon life, there is hope that the gods may save us from the fate we fear.

24.   flax-sewn house of wood: a poetic kenning for ‘ship’; ‘flax-sewn’ apparently refers to the stitching together of hull timbers, a common practice in south-west Asia and thought by later writers to have been referred to in certain Homeric passages (Iliad 2.135; Odyssey 14.383).

25.   most august mother: Io.

26.   chaste daughter of Zeus: Artemis.

27.   with a willingness matching mine: Artemis’ willingness to protect the Danaids will match their willingness to have her do so.

28.   she who dwells… façades: The point is: Artemis’ virginity is safe from all attack; ours is not; therefore let her protect us!

29.   untamed ones: The virgin female was often imaged as a wild animal, and marriage as taming, breaking-in or yoking.

30.   the ever-hospitable Zeus of the departed: Hades-Pluto; cf. 230–31; Agamemnon 1386–7; Iliad 9.457.

31.   after a stiff wind a storm will come: The Danaids fear that Hera may yet vent her hatred of Io on Io’s descendants. In the end this may have happened in an unexpected way (note the linking of Hera with Aphrodite in 1034–5).

32.   Assembled Gods: Outside this play, this term (Greek agōnioi theoi) is found only at Agamemnon 513 (also referring to Argos) and Plato, Laws 783a; it appears to refer to a common cult of all the major Olympians (cf. 222), like that of the ‘Twelve Gods’ in the Agora at Athens.

33.   in your left hands: The right hand of the suppliant is the one with which (s)he clings to an altar or image, or attempts to touch the person being supplicated (cf. e.g. Euripides, Children of Heracles 844).

34.   enforcer of respect: That is, the god who demands that suppliants be treated with respect.

35.   bird of Zeus: The image of Zeus apparently has an eagle perching on its head or hand (cf. Aristophanes, Birds 514–15); the Egyptian god Amun-Re, whom Greeks identified with Zeus, was often portrayed as, or with the head of, a hawk which represented the sun. Aeschylus and his audience evidently knew about the Egyptian sun-bird, and may well have been misled by the identification of Amun-Re with Zeus into supposing that the bird was an eagle: indeed later sources (Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library 1.87.9; Strabo, Geography 17.1.40) say that in Egyptian Thebes (the greatest centre of Amun’s cult) the eagle was worshipped.

36.   god exiled from heaven: For killing the Cyclopes, Apollo was sentenced to a period of servitude on earth, during which he herded the cattle of Admetus (Euripides, Alcestis 1–8).

37.   symbol of a god: The god is Poseidon.

38.   Hermes, according to the Greeks’ usage: Greeks identified the Egyptian god Thoth with their own Hermes. Danaus means that the image he sees is the Greek way of representing the god he knows as Thoth, but since by convention he is made to speak Greek (cf. on 119), he says not ‘Thoth’ but ‘Hermes’ – just as Latin writers quoting or inventing the words of Greeks make them speak of Hermes as Mercurius.

39.   May we receive proclamations… from him: In his capacity as the divine Herald.

40.   native sponsors: Greek proxenoi, citizens of one state (State A) who were recognized by another state (State B) as standing in a relationship of guest-friendship with State B as a community, and who could normally be relied on to render assistance to citizens of State B residing in, or visiting, State A.

41.   only in that respect… reasonable guess: A clumsy way (even clumsier in the original) of saying, ‘That’s the only thing about you that seems Greek.’

42.   how should I address you… the leader of the city: This is in effect a counter-question about Pelasgus’ attire, which (despite his sceptre, which the Danaids think may be a ‘sacred staff’) is evidently too plain, by their standards, for them to be sure that he is a king.

43.   master of all the land: Pelasgus’ kingdom, as here described, covers almost the whole of modern Greece, extending well beyond the regions inhabited by Greeks in Aeschylus’ time.

44.   on the side of the setting sun: That is, to the west of the river.

45.   Paeonians: A non-Greek tribe living in western Thrace and eastern Macedonia.

46.   Perrhaebians: In the fifth century Perrhaebia was the name of a district in north-eastern Thessaly (Herodotus 7.128.1; Thucydides 4.78.5–6); but in the Iliad (2.749–50) the Per(rh)aebi live ‘near Dodona’, and Sophocles (fr. 271) places them near Mounts Pindus and Lacmus, which separate Thessaly on the east from Epirus on the west and in which rise tributaries of those regions’ major rivers, the Peneus and the Achelous respectively.

47.   Dodona: The famous oracle of Zeus in the north-west of Greece (about 14 km south of modern Ioannina).

48.   land of Naupactus across the sea: On the north side of the Corinthian Gulf, near its western end.

49.   our city does not love long speeches: The Argives, as well as the Spartans, had a reputation for brevity of speech; cf. Pindar, Isthmian 6.58–9; Sophocles fr. 64.

50.   similar stamp… by male artificers: That is, Cyprian fathers, impregnating Cyprian mothers, procreate children whom you resemble.

51.   in India, near neighbours to the Ethiopians: Greeks gave the name Aithiopes not only to the black peoples of inner Africa but also to a people whom they called the ‘eastern Ethiopians’, straight-haired and living near the Indians (Herodotus 7.70). In Prometheus Bound 808–9 the two seem to be identified, as if there were continuous land linking south Asia directly to the upper Nile.

52.   keyholder: That is, priestess.

53.   royal pair: Zeus and Hera.

54.   watchman who could see everything: Because he had eyes all over his body (as often portrayed in contemporary art).

55.   oistros: A Greek, not an Egyptian, word; cf. on 119 and 220.

56.   Canobus and Memphis: Canobus was a town at one of the mouths of the Nile, just east of what was to become the site of Alexandria; in Prometheus Bound 846–9 it is prophesied that Io’s wanderings will end there. Memphis, the ancient capital of Egypt, was further inland, a little south of modern Cairo.

57.   vast <portion> of land: Presumably the whole of Africa, for the continent took its Greek name from her.

58.   are you talking about something wrongful: That is, are you saying that the Aegyptiads are demanding something to which they have no lawful right?

59.   Who would love… as an owner: For this equation of marriage with slavery cf. Euripides, Medea 232–4: ‘… we have to buy a husband at a high price and take him as absolute master of our person.’

60.   That is how people increase their strength: The Danaids have in effect rejected the principle of Greek social organization that marriage is the transfer of a woman, object-like, from one family to another; Pelasgus replies with the conventional wisdom – that arranged marriages enable families to build up alliances and strengthen their social position.

61.   when they fall… got rid of: That is, a marriage alliance between two families gives no security to the weaker, since the stronger can easily repudiate it.

62.   poop… garlanded as it is: The poop, where the steersman stood, was the most vital part of the ship (cf. Seven 2); and this shrine, claim the Danaids, is the most vital spot in Argos – all the more so now it has been ‘garlanded’ with their suppliant-boughs. There is an allusion to the garlanding of the sterns of ships on sacred missions (cf. Plato, Phaedo 58a–c).

63.   in shadow: Cf. 354–5.

64.   citizen-strangers: The Danaids are foreigners by birth and appearance but citizens by descent.

65.   servant: Or ‘daughter’; the Greek text merely describes Right (Themis) as ‘of Zeus’.

66.   Zeus Klarios: This title of Zeus is otherwise known only from Tegea (Pausanias, Guide to Greece 8.53.9), where, perhaps significantly, it is associated with ‘the elevated place on which stand most of the Tegeans’ altars’.

67.   You are not sitting at the hearth of my house: In other words, by taking sanctuary at a public shrine, the Danaids have made themselves supplicants, not to the individual Pelasgus but to the Argive state.

68.   If the sons… your nearest kin: That is, if it is the case that under Egyptian law a man is entitled as of right to demand a woman in marriage if he is her nearest kinsman. By evading an answer to this point, the Danaids virtually admit that this is indeed the legal position.

69.   neither may Battle seize her booty: This ‘booty’ will consist in Argive lives and possibly the city itself (cf. 401).

70.   sponsor: Greek proxenos (cf. on 239).

71.   impious expulsion: Elsewhere in the play the Danaids make it quite clear that they fled from Egypt by their own and/or their father’s choice; it is an ‘expulsion’ only in the sense that they could not have remained there without accepting the marriages they abhor.

72.   either against these or against those: Either against the gods or against the sons of Aegyptus.

73.   only restraining cables… at the shore: The ship represents Pelasgus’ decision, and its launching, now imminent, represents the moment when that decision will become irrevocable and its consquences unavoidable. The construction of the hull is now complete, but the vessel is still attached by cables to a windlass on shore; once the cables are let go, the ship will be waterborne.

74.   that kindred blood shall not be spilt: At first sight a surprising thing for Pelasgus to say, since the only bloodshed he currently fears is that of a war between Argos and Egypt. The likeliest explanation is that he is implying that in asking him to fight a war on their behalf against their cousins, the Danaids are in effect seeking to commit kindred-murder by proxy. He again stresses the kinship of the two hostile families at 474.

75.   pollution terrible beyond compare: The pollution which the Danaids’ dead bodies would bring upon the shrine.

76.   Inachus: The principal river of Argos.

77.   in case confidence gives birth to fear: Danaus’ apprehension is that if Pelasgus is overconfident of Danaus’ safety, and so fails to provide him with adequate protection, the result may be that Danaus finds himself in fear of his life.

78.   through ignorance: That is, mistaking him for an enemy: Danaus fears the Argives may take him for an enemy because of his alien appearance.

79.   you must not be talkative… at the gods’ hearth: Plainly implying that he wants the escorts to say nothing about Danaus except that he is a suppliant – which will be obvious anyway from the boughs. Pelasgus does not wish any further information about the affair to become public until he presents it himself at the forthcoming assembly meeting.

80.   move down to this level meadow: That is, leave the mound and descend to the orchestra.

81.   May you speak… spoken to you: That is, ‘Please follow my example and avoid speaking words of bad omen.’

82.   where my mother was watched: By Argus; cf. 303–5.

83.   she cleaved the waves… on its distant side: The strait (poros) across which Io swam came to be called the Bosporus (‘Strait of the Cow’) in memory of her passage, and regarded as the boundary between Europe and Asia.

84.   Mysian city of Teuthras: For Mysia, see on Persians 53; the city’s name was Teuthrania.

85.   speeding across the land of the Pamphylians: In classical times the part of southern Asia Minor called Pamphylia lay well to the west of Cilicia, and Io would have come to it first; but Sophocles too (fr. 180a) applied the name Pamphylia to (part of) the later Cilicia.

86.   land of Aphrodite: Phoenicia and Palestine, famous for the worship of Astarte (equated by Greeks with Aphrodite).

87.   plain of Zeus: Egypt (or perhaps, more specifically, the Nile delta); cf. 4–5.

88.   snow-fed meads: It was believed that the Nile’s floods were fed by melting mountain snow.

89.   untouched by the plagues of Typhos: That is, free from storms: Typhos (see on Seven 493) was father of the storm winds (Hesiod, Theogony 869–80).

90.   maenad of Hera: That is, driven into frenzy by Hera as bacchic maenads are by Dionysus.

91.   green fear: The pallor of intense fear was thought to be caused by a flow of bile; cf. The Libation-Bearers 183–4; Theocritus 23.13.

92.   <Zeus, who restrained her with his hand>: Another supplement that has been suggested is ‘<Zeus, who released her from her suffering>’.

93.   she was stopped: In other words, from her mad rushing; the following words further imply that Zeus’ touch changed her back into fully human form.

94.   Zeus who grants fair winds: He gave fair winds, literally, to speed the voyage from Egypt to Argos (134–7), and the Danaids hope he will give fair winds, figuratively, to see them safe hereafter.

95.   with no divided voice: That is, the vote was unanimous.

96.   their aptly named right hands: The point is probably that dexios ‘of the right hand’ also has the meanings ‘of good omen’ and ‘intelligent’.

97.   in relation both to foreigners and to citizens: Because the Danaids can be viewed either as foreigners or as Argives (cf. 356).

98.   without waiting to be called: That is, before the herald could say, ‘All those in favour raise their hands.’

99.   my kin: That is, the Argives.

100. in fields that are not arable: Lit. ‘in other fields’ (than those in which ordinary harvests are reaped).

101. Zeus’ avenger: A being similar, or perhaps identical, to the ‘god of Vengeance’ mentioned at 415. Here he is pictured as a bird who perches on the roof of a house and brings a curse on it.

102. our shaded lips: Probably referring to their veils (cf. 122).

103. sacred hearths where they gather: The reference is to altars at the city’s bouleutērion where its council of elders would meet.

104. Artemis Hecate: One of the functions of Artemis was to protect women in childbirth (cf. Euripides, Hippolytus 166–9). From the fifth century onwards, Hecate, originally a distinct goddess, was often identified with Artemis; the relevance of such an identification here may be that one of Hecate’s roles was as a ‘nurturer of boys’ (kourotrophos; cf. Hesiod, Theogony 450–52).

105. man-slaying destruction: The reference is specifically to civil strife (‘intestine violence in the community’).

106. Wolf god: Apollo Lykeios (cf. Seven 146–7), who is here being begged not to be wolf-like towards the young Argives.

107. may the best… bear many young: With the result that, over the years, the quality of the flocks as a whole will steadily improve.

108. And may the people… citizens’ privileges: That is, may the sovereign people as a collectivity protect the rights that citizens have as individuals.

109. may they offer… agreements: In Greek interstate relations, the phrase dikas didonai, used here, often means ‘go to arbitration’, so the Danaids’ wish is probably that the Argives will always, before resorting to war, seek to resolve the dispute by this means.

110. statutes of Justice the highly honoured: The reference is to a set of fundamental ethical principles sometimes called the ‘unwritten laws’, nearly always three in number; these are variously formulated in our sources, but in Aeschylus (cf. Eumenides 269–72, 538–48), perhaps under the influence of doctrines promoted in the mystery cult of his native Eleusis, they prescribe the giving of due honour to gods (704–6), to xenoi (both ‘foreigners’ and ‘those in a relationship of hospitality’) and to parents. The Danaids have prayed that the Argives may give due honour to xenoi (701–3) and to the gods, but they do not pray for them to respect their parents, and here apparently they are explaining why not – because this is only the third of the ‘unwritten laws’.

111. sailing gear: From a distance the ship’s sail would be its most conspicuous feature.

112. side-screens: These were often fitted on warships for the protection of the crew, especially from enemy missiles.

113. scans the way ahead with eyes: Greek warships regularly had large eyes painted on their port and starboard bows.

114. these gods: The ‘Assembled Gods’ of the shrine.

115. your protection here: That is, the sanctuary offered by the shrine.

116. like ravens… altars: Ravens, kites and other carrion-feeding birds were notoriously liable to ignore the sanctity of altars by stealing sacrificial meat.

117. wolves: The wolf was an emblem of Argos and appeared regularly on its coins.

118. papyrus fruit: It was actually the root and lower stalk of the papyrus plant that (some) Egyptians used as food (Herodotus 2.92.5); the implication in this sentence that they did not eat cereal foods is of course absurd.

119. running stern cables… ship safe: Danaus assumes that the ships will cast anchor in water of sufficient depth and then moor themselves with long cables from the stern.

120. even to land an army: Implying ‘much less to launch an attack’.

121. land that we rightly revere: Because it is the land of our ancestress Io (alluded to by the word bounis ‘hilly land’; cf. 117). There is an unstated implication that just as the land has a right to the Danaids’ reverence, they have a right to have their prayers to it heeded.

122. its flesh turned black: The heart and other internal organs could be spoken of as turning black when affected by powerful emotions (because blood flowed inwards from the surface regions, which went pale?). Cf. Persians 114–15; The Libation-Bearers 413–14.

123. impossible to point out: That is, invisible from any place ordinarily trodden by human feet.

124. <         >: It is tolerably certain, on the evidence of the ancient annotations, that the now corrupt text here had to do with ‘release’ and ‘freedom from troubles’, but its exact wording and syntax cannot be restored.

125. beam of the balance: The balance is that in which Zeus decides the fate of mortals (as in Iliad 22.209–12).

126. yugh: Greek ioph, according to the ancient commentator an onomatopoeic expression of disgust.

127. Lord of the land: Probably meaning Zeus rather than the absent Pelasgus (who is not otherwise mentioned until 905).

128. Off, off, to boat… chopping off head: These three lines, the first surviving full lines sung by the Egyptians, are the only place where it is hard to resist the conclusion that Aeschylus gave them broken Greek to sing.

129. barge: Greek amas; it is not known what kind of vessel this was, but since the word is attested only here and in a fragment of Proteus (fr. 214), a play set in Egypt, it was presumably an Egyptian type.

130. your bolt-bound timbers: That is, your ship.

131. not respected in a city of pious men: The Egyptians (profess to) believe that right is on their side (cf. 916–20) and therefore that the Argives, if they are pious, will not resist them on the Danaids’ behalf.

132. the water that rears cattle: The water of the Nile.

133. the blood that propagates life: The ancient commentator’s note is clumsily expressed, but his source appears to have correctly interpreted this passage to mean that Nile water promotes male fertility. If so, Aeschylus evidently believed (as Aristotle did later) that semen was a derivative of blood.

134. Sarpedon’s bank: At the mouth of the river Calycadnus in Cilicia; the coast at that point faces nearly due east, towards northern Syria, so a wind ‘blowing from Syria’ would drive the ship on to a lee shore. The ship is imagined to have sailed all along the south coast of Asia Minor; it would have continued to Egypt either along the Syrian coast or via Cyprus.

135. May great Destiny… that you are committing: That is (if this heavily emended text is correct), ‘May you perish before you can fulfil your impious plans’.

136. you won’t jump out of the Egyptian boat: It would in fact be perfectly easy, and an obvious move, for the Danaids to avoid the hated marriage by such a leap to a watery grave – unless they are to be chained or tied up during the voyage. Are the Egyptians who have come with the Herald perhaps holding ropes or fetters, which they brandish when the Herald speaks these words?

137. Zeus, child of Earth: Rhea, the mother of Zeus, was identified with the Asiatic mother goddess Cybele, who was in turn sometimes identified with Earth (e.g. Sophocles, Philoctetes 391–4). In the ordinary divine genealogy, Earth was mother of Cronus and grandmother of Zeus.

138. Help… I’m being overpowered: We may be meant to suppose that the Danaids have seen or heard the approach of the rescuing Argive force. It does not appear that the Herald or his men ever actually lay hands on them (cf. 925).

139. My lord: Probably addressed to the approaching Pelasgus.

140. What local sponsor have you spoken to: A foreigner, claiming that property or persons currently in Argos were his and ought to be surrendered to him, should not take the law into his own hands but should approach an appropriate Argive who would negotiate or litigate on his behalf.

141. Hermes the Searcher: ‘Searcher’ (Mastērios) is not otherwise known to have been a cult title of Hermes, but the Herald’s meaning is anyway clear: as a herald, under Hermes’ protection, he claims the right to search for and take ‘his property’ wherever it may be.

142. barleycorn brew: Egyptians drank beer (zythos) made from barley. Many Greeks today still regard beer, in contrast with wine, as a drink for women or the effeminate.

143. in separate dwellings: That is, in accommodation reserved for you alone (rather than being shared ‘with many others’). The Danaids thus have the choice (cf. 1009–11) between (i) non-exclusive accommodation in public dwellings and (ii) exclusive accommodation in the palace or another building owned by the king. No doubt we will discover, later in the trilogy, that Danaus has chosen the latter, which will minimize contact between his daughters and ordinary Argives and, in due course, facilitate the wedding-night murders.

144. I am your patron: At Athens every resident alien (metoikos) had to have a citizen patron (prostatēs); the legal duties of a prostatēs are not altogether clear, but he would no doubt normally in practice befriend the metoikos and help him in any business which a citizen could handle more effectively than a foreigner. The Danaids will be in the unique position of having the king and the entire citizen body as their prostatai.

145. feeling confident: Possibly a hint that Danaus should be sent with an escort (cf. 954–5).

146. even if a country… of alien language: Otherwise put, no country, however welcoming it tries to be to refugees, is free from xenophobia, which can be activated by almost any (real or fancied) misdemeanour by, or special favours conferred on, the incomers.

147. to their kin: That is, to you and me.

148. a burden it will never cast off: The guilt and pollution of having failed to protect the life of a suppliant and guest. The decreeing of an armed personal bodyguard to Danaus is a sinister development; at Athens, as elsewhere, it had in the past been the prelude to the establishment of a tyranny (cf. Herodotus 1.59.4–5).

149. inscribe this: On the tablets of your mind.

150. an unknown group… time: That is, it will take time and experience before the Argives know and esteem you.

151. Go: Grammatical details show that this is addressed by the Danaids to their father and to each other.

152. Erasinus: The Danaids will be crossing this small river en route from the coast to Argos. The other river of Argos, the Inachus (497), flows past the city on the far (north) side.

153. Cytherea’s consummation: ‘Cytherea’, like ‘Cypris’, is a by-name of Aphrodite.

154. Argive Soldiers: The manuscript marks no changes of speaker anywhere in 1018–73, but the text makes it clear that 1018–33 come from one group, 1034–51 from another group (or maybe individual), and 1052–61 is an altercation between the two. The dissenter(s) have been identified as half of the Danaids disputing with the other half, as the maidservants of 977–9, and even as Danaus; the currently favoured candidates are the escort of Argive soldiers. Yet another possibility is that Hypermestra, the future rebel, here for the first time (and in breach of normal tragic convention) takes a stand against her sisters.

155. together with Hera: Hera was a patron of marriage; cf. Eumenides 213–16.

156. awesome deeds: Referring probably to the sway that Aphrodite exercises over the whole living world (cf. 998–1005 and Danaids fr. 44).

157. they: The sons of Aegyptus.

158. That would certainly be best: ‘Certainly’ translates the Greek particle men which signals that a second, contrasting statement is to follow; from this the Danaids, it seems, infer that the Argives are about to urge them to be less uncompromising, and interrupt to insist that such advice will be wasted on them.

159. deprive us: The strained language (one does not normally pray to a god to be deprived of something) draws attention to the fact that the Danaids are praying for what was normally regarded as the worst fate that could befall a woman – to remain unmarried.

160. the two-thirds kind: This expression is based on an interpretation of Iliad 24.527–33 according to which Zeus has two jars of evil and one of good, and humans’ fortunes are either mixed equally from the three jars (and so are two-thirds evil) or else are entirely evil.

THE DANAID TETRALOGY

1.     she comes to her fulfilment: The adjective teleios ‘final, perfect, fulfilled’ was often used in reference to marriage, and, according to the lexicographer Pollux, the word could actually mean ‘married’.

2.     <         >: The verb (something like ‘despise’ perhaps?) will have had to be understood from the preceding line (spoken by someone else, very likely as part of a stichomythia, a dialogue composed of one-line speeches).

PROMETHEUS BOUND

1.     Power and Violence: This pair come from Hesiod, Theogony 385–401, where they are children of Styx who live permanently with Zeus, follow wherever he leads and embody his absolute power over the universe.

2.     son of Themis: This is an innovation; in Hesiod’s Theogony, Prometheus is the son of Cronus’ brother Iapetus and the Oceanid Clymene (507–11), while Themis has no children until she bears Dike, the Fates, the Seasons and others to Zeus (901–6).

3.     welcome to you… the early-morning frost: That is, the coming of night will temporarily end one kind of suffering (from the sun) only to bring another (cold) from which, in turn, you will long for relief; and vice versa.

4.     is not yet born: Hephaestus should no doubt be taken to intend this as an understatement for ‘will never be born’; the audience will probably detect an ironic allusion to Heracles (cf. Hesiod, Theogony 526–31), but they will later discover (757–68) that Prometheus knows of another sense in which a being not yet born could end his suffering.

5.     without bending your knee: ‘Bending the knee’ idiomatically means ‘resting’ (396; Iliad 7.118, 19.71); but Prometheus in his bonds will be literally unable to bend his.

6.     companionship: This expression may possibly foreshadow the cultic association in classical Athens between Prometheus and Hephaestus (they shared an altar in the Academy district); but this can hardly be imagined as existing at the time of the play’s action, and the poet may be thinking rather of Prometheus’ alliance with the Olympians in their war against Cronus and the Titans (cf. 214–21).

7.     your skills aren’t… the task you now have: Implying that the responsibility lies with Zeus (who gave the order) and / or with Prometheus (who brought his punishment on himself).

8.     harness is ready here: Prometheus’ ‘harness’ consists of metal bands clamping his arms (55–63), upper body (71) and legs (74– 81) to the rock, plus the wedge ostensibly driven through his chest (64–9).

9.     intellectual: Greek sophistēs ‘one who professes wisdom or expertise’.

10.   hammer in the pierced fetters: That is, drive nails into the rock through the nail-holes in the metal band(s).

11.   tough appraiser: Zeus.

12.   putting it into a fennel stalk: Cf. Hesiod, Theogony 565–7.

13.   Enter… vehicles: How was the Chorus’ entry staged? Not with the flying-machine (mechane): that could not carry a whole chorus, and it will be needed for Oceanus very shortly after the Chorus have left their ‘vehicle’. The car(s) must either have been (i) rolled out on to the flat roof-space of the skene or (ii) simply brought into the orchestra (pushed on by some of the Chorus, while others ride in it them?). Neither alternative is free of difficulties, but (i) makes better sense of 277–83.

14.   prolific Tethys: According to Hesiod, Theogony 364–8, Oceanus and Tethys had three thousand daughters and as many sons.

15.   sons of Uranus: That is, the Titans, children of Uranus (Heaven) and Gaea (Earth). For the statement to have any relevance, Prometheus must himself be one of them, though we are never directly told so in this play (cf. however Prometheus Unbound fr. 193.1–2).

16.   president of the immortals: Cf. Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, last paragraph: ‘… the President of the Immortals, in Æschylean phrase, had ended his sport with Tess.’

17.   one person under multiple names: This identification is almost certainly an ad hoc invention (there is no other trace of it before Roman times). The poet wanted Prometheus to be one of the Titans (cf. on 165) but also wanted his mother to be Themis, a prophetic goddess (cf. Eumenides 2–4) who, according to Pindar (Isthmian 8.30–45), alone had knowledge that the son of Thetis was destined to be mightier than his father. Traditionally Themis was daughter of Gaea (and Uranus) (Hesiod, Theogony 135).

18.   saying that it was destined… but in guile: Already in Hesiod (Theogony 626–8) Gaea gives crucial advice to Zeus and the Olympians on how to defeat Cronus and the Titans; but there the advice is given directly (not through Prometheus) and involves the use of force (not guile).

19.   he immediately assigned… various privileges: Cf. Hesiod, Theogony 885.

20.   rescued mortals from… going to Hades: Prometheus was the helper god in the Greek version of the Flood story; his role is first attested in Epicharmus’ comedy Prometheus or Pyrrha but must be older than that (cf. Hesiod fr. 2). Here, however, ‘shattered’ may indicate that we are to assume Zeus to have been planning a cataclysm of some other kind.

21.   foreseeing their death: That is, knowing in advance just when they would die.

22.   descending: If the Chorus have been on the skene roof (see on 128), they must presumably disappear into the skene, to re-enter later (after 396, there being no earlier opportunity) by a side-passage. This is a decidedly artificial arrangement but at least avoids having Oceanus and his daughters together on stage for 113 lines during which he takes no notice of them nor they of him.

23.   winged steed: Oceanus calls his mount a ‘bird’ at 286 and a ‘four-legged bird’ at 395, which suggests that it is not just a winged horse but, as the scholia assume, something like a griffin (gryps), which had the body of a lion and the wings and beak of an eagle.

24.   our kinship: Oceanus was the eldest child of Uranus and Gaea (Hesiod, Theogony 133).

25.   this land: Scythia (cf. 2 and Seven 728–30).

26.   Know yourself: That is (as this famous maxim often implies), ‘Know your limitations.’

27.   I judge that by facts: That is, if you had been ‘good at admonishing yourself’ and had behaved prudently, you would not be where you are now.

28.   my brother Atlas: In Hesiod (Theogony 507–9), Atlas, like Prometheus, is son of Iapetus and Clymene; here, presumably, he has been tacitly transferred to Prometheus’ new parents, Uranus and Gaea.

29.   earth-born inhabitant of the Cilician cave: The whole passage on Typhon (Typhos, Typhoeus) is closely parallel to, and probably based on, Pindar, Pythian 1.15–28, who also mentions a ‘Cilician cave’ as his original home; Homer (Iliad 2.783) had placed Typhoeus ‘in Arima’, and there appears to have been a mountain range called Arima in Cilicia.

30.   who once rose up against the gods: The revolt of Typhoeus (son of Tartarus and Gaea) is narrated in Hesiod, Theogony 821–68.

31.   narrows of the sea: The Strait of Messina (whose narrowest point is actually some 55 kilometres from Mt Etna as the crow flies).

32.   Hephaestus sits forging red-hot iron: For volcanoes as Hephaestus’ smithies, cf. Euripides, Cyclops 599 (Etna); Thucydides 3.88.3 (Hiera, now Vulcano, in the Lipari islands). The idea here is that Typhon breathes or vomits streams of fire (cf. Pindar, Pythian 1.25) which heat Hephaestus’ forge.

33.   from thence one day… with their fine crops: A prophecy (post eventum from the poet’s point of view) of the eruption of Etna which took place in the 470s (Thucydides 3.116; the Parian Marble dates it to 479/8), for only the second time since Greeks first colonized Sicily, and is vividly described by Pindar, Pythian 1.21–8.

34.   words are the healers of a sick temper: Oceanus still hopes that his words can soften the heart of Zeus.

35.   reduce the swollen spirit… when it is still firm: The angry spirit is compared to a tumour, which the doctor should not attempt to reduce until it has ripened and begun to soften of itself (‘Hippocrates’, Aphorisms 1.22).

36.   empty-headed naivety: That is, a reputation for empty-headed naivety.

37.   to be sensible… best policy: That is, I would rather be thought stupid (while actually being sensible) than actually be stupid (while being thought sensible).

38.   That shortcoming… mine: That is, I am determined that I, not you, shall be the one to be ‘thought stupid’. The implication, which Oceanus evidently perceives, is ‘I am determined you shall not intercede with Zeus.’

39.   Chorus: If the Chorus have been out of sight during the Oceanus scene (see on 283/4), they re-enter here and take up their normal position in the orchestra.

40.   maidens… Colchis: The Amazons, who are here unusually placed in Colchis (modern Georgia); similarly in 719–24 they are said to be living south of the Caucasus in Prometheus’ time (though destined to migrate elsewhere in a later generation).

41.   Lake Maeotis: The Sea of Azov, which Herodotus (4.86) believed to be ‘not much smaller’ than the Black Sea, and which he and his contemporaries must therefore have supposed to extend far into the interior of Russia.

42.   Arabia: There is significant though scattered evidence, from Xenophon (The Education of Cyrus 7.4.16, 7.5.14, 8.6.7) to the end of antiquity, that the name ‘Arabia’ was sometimes applied to a territory near the upper Euphrates, in what is now eastern Turkey.

43.   the hard-to-discern… stars: Any given star rises (and sets) four minutes earlier each day, and Greeks used as markers of the seasons the days when prominent stars or star groups (e.g. Sirius, Arcturus, the Pleiades) could first be seen rising (or, six months later, setting) before daybreak. These risings and settings are ‘hard to discern’ because knowledge of them presupposes the ability to pick out the marker stars from the thousands of others in the sky.

44.   is mother of the Muses: That is, facilitates the composition of poetry. There is a word-play on the traditional genealogy of the Muses, who were daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (Memory) (Hesiod, Theogony 915–17).

45.   beasts: Oxen (for ploughing) and asses (for transport); horses will be mentioned separately in 465–6.

46.   significant utterances and encounters on journeys: Words that a person happened to (over)hear, or individuals or animals that he happened to meet, might in certain circumstances be regarded as omens of predictive significance; see for example Aristophanes, Lysistrata 391–7 (women’s laments for the death of Adonis punctuating a speech advocating the despatch of the Sicilian Expedition) and Theophrastus, Characters 16.3 (a polecat crossing one’s path as a sign of bad luck).

47.   their mutual hatreds, affections and companionships: Knowledge of these was important for augury because it enabled the seer to relate the observed behaviour of a bird to (what was believed to be) its normal behaviour. Thus, when Xenophon was setting out from Ephesus to join Cyrus’ expedition, a sedentary eagle screamed on his right side (Xenophon, The Persian Expedition 6.1.23); the seer whom he consulted told him that while this omen foretold greatness and glory, it also betokened suffering (because ‘other birds mostly attack the eagle when it is sedentary’) and did not portend material gain (because ‘the eagle normally gets its food when it is on the wing’).

48.   smoothness of internal organs: This, and what follows as far as 499, refers to the drawing of omens from the appearance of the internal parts of sacrificed animals, and from the manner in which they burned on the altar.

49.   I wrapped the thigh-bones… and burnt them: Prometheus is said by Hesiod (Theogony 535–57) to have been the inventor of this Greek sacrificial practice, but there he does it in an attempt (unsuccessful, and disastrous for humanity) to deceive Zeus, whereas here his object is to enable mortals to use the flames for divination.

50.   who is the steersman of Necessity: Evidently expecting the answer ‘Zeus’.

51.   bath: The ritual bathing of bride and groom was an important preliminary to an Athenian wedding.

52.   my sister Hesione: The wife of Prometheus (and mother of Deucalion, the Flood hero) is variously identified in various sources; the fifth-century mythographer Acusilaus of Argos names her as Hesione the Oceanid, as here.

53.   the myriad-eyed cowherd: Argus; cf. 677–81 and Suppliants 302–5.

54.   noisy reed-pipe, fashioned with wax: The reference is to a herds-man’s pan-pipes, whose reed-stems were held together with wax (cf. Euripides, Iphigenia in Tauris 1125–7; Virgil, Eclogue 2.32–3).

55.   soporific: Hermes, in some accounts, played the pan-pipes to lull Argus to sleep before killing him (so probably Bacchylides 19.35– 6; later, Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.682–714).

56.   to open one’s lips to friends: Prometheus regards Io as a ‘friend’, though he has never met her before, either because he is a friend to all mortals (cf. 612, 613) or because her father, the river god Inachus, is a son of Oceanus (cf. 636) and therefore his own nephew.

57.   By explaining… done enough: Implying, apparently, that his promise at 617 was to answer just one question about himself.

58.   sisters of your father: See note on 611.

59.   Cerchnea (later Cenchreae) was a village south-west of Argos (Pausanias, Guide to Greece 2.24.7), not far from Lerna.

60.   travel over the uncultivated plains: Crossing northern Europe towards the Black Sea.

61.   Chalybes: Cf. Seven 728. From here to 728 we are apparently to the north-east and east of the Black Sea, between the Cimmerian ‘Bosporus’ (the Strait of Kerch, to the east of the Crimea) and Colchis (Georgia; cf. note on 415–16); yet it is after passing through this region that Io will cross the ‘Bosporus’ (729–35). This geographical confusion may be accidental or intentional. The poet has retained the tradition of Io’s crossing a strait that was thereafter named the Bosporus (cf. note on Suppliants 546), transferring it from the Thracian to the Cimmerian strait; but he wants this crossing to be a passage from Europe to Asia (734–5) and also from lands more or less known to Greeks (with violent but human inhabitants) to the realm of pure fantasy (populated mainly by monsters) described in 791–809. The boundary between Europe and Asia was sometimes said to lie at the Cimmerian Bosporus, sometimes (as in Prometheus Unbound fr. 191) at the river Phasis (Rioni) in Colchis (cf. Herodotus 4.45): either the poet has been misled into supposing these two watercourses to be one and the same, or he has deliberately shifted the location of the Bosporus in order to present it more strongly as a point of transition into a different and even more terrifying world.

62.   the Violent River: This river, flowing north-west from the Caucasus, may well be the Kuban, which rises on the slopes of Elbruz (the highest peak in the Caucasus) and flows into the Sea of Azov not far from the Strait of Kerch (see previous note).

63.   who will one day… stepmother of ships: This digression on the future abode of the Amazons is irrelevant, unless it foreshadows a mention (not directly attested) in Prometheus Unbound of Heracles’ battle with the Amazons at Themiscyra (cf. pseudo-Apollodorus, Library 2.5.9). It also involves a further geographical confusion. Themiscyra, at the mouth of the river Thermodon, was in northern Asia Minor, nearer the eastern than the western end of the Black Sea; Salmydessus was in Thrace, north-west of Byzantium and the (Thracian) Bosporus, and the danger to ships in that area arose not from a rocky promontory but from extensive shoals (Xenophon, The Persian Expedition 7.5.12). Possibly the poet was thinking of the cape near Themiscyra later called ‘Heracles Point’ (Strabo, Geography 12.3.17).

64.   Cimmerian isthmus: The eastern peninsula of the Crimea, ending at Panticapaeum (Kerch), capital of the Bosporan kingdom.

65.   this rugged rock: It appears that at some point (perhaps at 613) Io has ascended to the stage platform.

66.   She will bear a son superior to his father: This probably identifies the mysterious female, for the audience, as Thetis; cf. Pindar, Isthmian 8.36–8.

67.   the third in birth on top of ten other births: Io has no way of knowing whether this refers to her thirteenth child or (as it in fact does) to a descendant in the thirteenth generation. The descent line is (females in italics): Io, Epaphus, Libya, Belus, Danaus (and Aegyptus), Hypermestra (and Lynceus), Abas, Acrisius, Danaë, Perseus, Electryon, Alcmene, Heracles.

68.   waveless sea: An apt kenning to describe the south Russian steppe: see S. R. West, ‘Alternative Arabia’, Hermes 125 (1997), pp. 377–8.

69.   Phorcides: Also called the Graeae. Like the Gorgons, they belong to the story of Io’s descendant Perseus, who by seizing their shared eye and tooth forced them to tell him how to find the nymphs who possessed the equipment he needed to cut off Medusa’s head.

70.   of swan-like aspect: Presumably meaning ‘white-haired’ (cf. Euripides, Bacchae 1365; Aristophanes, Wasps 1064–5): the Graeae were white-haired from birth (Hesiod, Theogony 271).

71.   whom neither the sun… ever looks upon: The language echoes Odyssey 11.16, describing the Cimmerians, on whom the sun never looks because their country is ‘shrouded in mist and cloud’.

72.   Arimaspians: The poet’s ultimate source here is the epic Arimaspea ascribed to the semi-legendary figure Aristeas of Proconnesus, supposed to have lived in the seventh century. The griffins and Arimaspians were said to be at enmity, the latter trying to steal the gold which was guarded by the former. See Herodotus 3.116, 4.13–14; Pausanias, Guide to Greece 1.24.6.

73.   river Pluto: In this context the name will probably be associated with wealth (ploutos) rather than with the underworld.

74.   at the sources of the sun: That is, at the south-eastern extremity of the world, where Asia and Africa are evidently imagined as being joined together.

75.   the cataract: The First Cataract, near the cities of Syene (Aswan) and Elephantine in Upper Egypt; it was regarded as the boundary between Egypt and Ethiopia (Herodotus 2.17, 2.29). Herodotus (2.28) had heard, but did not take seriously, a story that at this place there were twin mountain peaks and between them two springs from which one river flowed north as the Nile, another south towards Ethiopia: do our poet’s ‘river Aethiops’ and ‘Bybline [i.e. Papyrus] Mountains’ reflect a version of this story?

76.   the three-cornered land of Nilotis: That is, the Egyptian Delta.

77.   the great gulf of Rhea: The Adriatic.

78.   in the opposite direction: That is, inland, crossing Europe towards the remote region where she now is.

79.   shall be called ‘Ionian’… a memorial to your journey: In fact the name was normally applied in antiquity, as now, only to the area of sea south of the narrows between the heel of Italy and what is now Albania.

80.   Canobus: See note on Suppliants 311.

81.   named after the manner in which Zeus engendered him: See notes on Suppliants 45–7.

82.   female brood of fifty children: The Danaids; the passage 853–69 is virtually a résumé of the Danaid trilogy.

83.   hawks following close behind the doves: Cf. Suppliants 223–6.

84.   So may the bridal night be for my enemies: Lit. ‘May such a Cypris come upon my enemies.’

85.   one of the girls: Hypermestra.

86.   Necessity: Greek Adrasteia, lit. ‘inescapability’. ‘I bow to Adrasteia’ was a formula used to apologize for a remark that risked offending some divine power; the apology was usually made in advance (e.g. Plato, Republic 451a; Menander, Samia 503), but sometimes in arrear (e.g. Menander, Perikeiromene 304). The Chorus are thus telling Prometheus that if he is wise, he will apologize at once for his rash remarks about Zeus.

87.   clever fellow: Greek sophistēs (see note on 62).

88.   You: Plural, referring to the whole Olympian family.

89.   two successive autocrats: Uranus and Cronus.

90.   <         >: The lost line must have contained words even more offensive to Hermes than those Prometheus has used to him already.

91.   Ah me: This exclamation by Prometheus seems to be triggered by Hermes’ mention, in connection with him, of the prosperity that is now so far away.

92.   which will turn black with gnawing: ‘Like any half-eaten piece of offal, dark from exposure to the air and from dried blood’ (M. Griffith, Prometheus Bound (Cambridge 1982), p. 267).

93.   until some god… depths of Tartarus: This condition (which Zeus / Hermes evidently suppose to be impossible of fulfilment) will surely have been fulfilled, in some unexpected way, in Prometheus Unbound. It is almost certainly to be linked with the story about the centaur Cheiron told in pseudo-Apollodorus, Library 2.5.4, 2.5.11. Cheiron, who was immortal, having been painfully and incurably wounded by Heracles’ arrow, longed to die but was unable to do so, thus becoming Prometheus’ ‘successor in suffering’ (in kind if not in degree) until ‘Prometheus gave to Zeus one who would become immortal in exchange for him’. The ‘one who would become immortal’ was not, as many have thought, Prometheus himself (who was immortal already) but Heracles: by making Cheiron confer on Heracles his own unwanted immortality, Prometheus, with typical ingenuity, will have enabled Cheiron to die (‘willing[ly]… go[ing] down to rayless Hades’), enabled Heracles to become a god, and himself fulfilled the condition laid down for his release. All this is likely to have occurred, as part of a general settlement, after Heracles had shot the eagle and after Prometheus had revealed the secret concerning Thetis.

94.   this threat is no invention… every word he speaks: The text does not make the structure of Hermes’ argument completely clear: his point is that (though he, Hermes, is a notorious liar and deceiver) the threats he has announced are not an ‘invention’ by him but have ‘all too certainly been uttered’ by Zeus, who never lies, and therefore they cannot be ignored.

95.   the double-ended tress of fire: The thunderbolt, often represented in art with a flame at both ends.

96.   I am willing… what I must: This does not necessarily imply that the Chorus intend to share all Prometheus’ sufferings themselves, only that they are resolved never willingly to desert him. That they do in the end flee (for to have them swallowed up together with Prometheus would be highly inconvenient, both from the theatrical point of view and from that of the story) bears witness not to their cowardice or feebleness but to the staggering display of Zeus’ power, which would numb any mind but that of Prometheus.

97.   The rock… its interior: The staging of this finale must be consistent with the text, must respect the limits of what was possible in the fifth-century theatre, and must avoid the anti-climax that would certainly be felt if, when the words and the music had ended and the Chorus had departed, Prometheus was seen bound to the rock as if nothing had happened. I have elsewhere suggested (Aeschylean Tragedy (Bari 1996), p. 313) that Prometheus ‘is attached to a board directly in front of, and indeed resting on, the central doors of the skene, and these doors are [now] suddenly opened (inwards…) [so that] the board with Prometheus on it will fall back into the dark interior… men [being] in readiness to stop the board hitting the floor and drag it back clear of the doors’.

PROMETHEUS UNBOUND

1.     Phasis: Now the river Rioni in Georgia. On inconsistencies and/ or confusions in the definition of the Europe–Asia boundary in the Prometheus plays, see note on Prometheus Bound 715.

2.     Red Sea: For classical Greeks this name denoted the whole Indian Ocean with its gulfs.

3.     the bay beside the Ocean… gentle water: Evidently at the place called in Prometheus Bound 808–9 ‘the sources of the sun’, at the south-eastern extremity of the world, where Asia and Africa are imagined as being joined together.

4.     193: This passage has survived in Latin, not in Greek – in a translation by Cicero, who quotes it in his Tusculan Disputations (2.23–5). Like all Roman writers, he latinizes the names of Greek gods – Uranus, Cronus, Zeus and Hephaestus become Caelum, Saturn, Jupiter and Mulciber (i.e. Vulcan); I have restored the conventional English renderings of the Greek names.

5.     from which fall drops: Drops of blood, or rather of its divine equivalent, ‘ichor’. According to Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica 3.845–66, these drops caused a plant to spring up, an ointment extracted from which was later used by Medea to make Jason invulnerable for a day. This tale may well go back to Sophocles’ play The Women of Colchis, which is known to have contained a narrative digression about Prometheus’ sufferings; we cannot tell whether The Women of Colchis was earlier or later than Prometheus Unbound.

6.     Caucasus: Cicero, like most who wrote about Prometheus in antiquity (including at least one ancient commentator on Prometheus Bound), thought that the Caucasus was the scene of his binding; it certainly was not so in Prometheus Bound (cf. lines 719–20 of that play, where Io must travel far to reach the Caucasus), and there is no reason to believe that it was so in Prometheus Unbound either. Cicero has doubtless added the word for metrical and/or stylistic reasons, unaware that he was introducing a geographical error.

7.     Gabians: Evidently the same as the Abioi of Iliad 13.6, who seem there to be envisaged as living somewhere north of the Black Sea.

8.     Apollonius of Rhodes says: Argonautica 4.282–7; Apollonius does not mention the Hyperboreans, so the author of Prometheus Unbound probably did. The Ister is the Danube; the Rhipaean Mountains were (usually) believed to be in the far north Europe, so mention of the Hyperboreans – the dwellers ‘beyond the North Wind’ – would be appropriate.

9.     to take any stones from the ground: For use as emergency weapons.

10.   cover it completely with a hail of round stones: This story provides an aetiology for the existence of the ‘Plain of Stones’ – the stony and arid (now partly irrigated) Plaine de la Crau, stretching east of the Rhône between Arles and the sea and once covering nearly 400 square kilometres, which will have been well known to Greeks through its proximity to the Phocaean colony of Massalia (Marseille).

11.   This son… my enemy: Plutarch (Pompey 1.1), when quoting this line, says that it is spoken by Prometheus ‘after being saved by Heracles’; and we can gather from its text (i) that he is addressing someone other than Heracles and (ii) that he has not yet been reconciled with Zeus. Perhaps then he is telling his mother (see pp. 199–200) about recent events?

12.   In honour of Prometheus: Cf. Sphinx fr. 235.