The Tragedies of Euripides Part 80

[89] There is much doubt about the reading of this part of the chorus. See Dind. and ed. Camb.

[90] I have partly followed Abresch in translating these lines, but I do not advise the reader to rest satisfied with my translation. A reference to the notes of the elegant scholar, to whom we owe the Cambridge edition of this play, will, I trust, show that I have done as much as can well be done with such corrupted lines.

[91] Achilles is supposed to lay his hand on his sword. See however ed.

Camb.

[92] Obviously a spurious line.

[93] I have punctuated with ed. Camb.

[94] See ed. Camb.

[95] e?f??sate here governs two distinct accusatives.

[96] The Cambridge editor here takes notice of Aristotle's charge of inconsistency, ??t? ??de? e???e? ?? ???ete???sa [Iphigenia] t?? ??ste?a?.

He well remarks, that Iphigenia at first naturally gives way before the suddenness of the announcement of her fate, but that when she collects her feelings, her natural n.o.bleness prevails.

[97] Cf. Lucret. i. 88. "Cui simul _infula_ virgineos _circ.u.mdata_ comtus, Ex utraque pari malarum parte profusa est."

[98] Read pa?a? with Reiske, Dind. ed. Camb. There is much corruption and awkwardness in the following verses of this ode.

[99] On the sense of e??e see ed. Camb., who would exclude d?' e??

???a.

[100] Cf. Soph. Ant. 806 sqq. The whole of this pa.s.sage has been admirably ill.u.s.trated by the Cambridge editor.

[101] There is much awkwardness about this epithet pat???a?. One would expect a clearer reference to Agamemnon. I scarcely can suppose it correct, although I do not quite see my way in the Cambridge editor's readings.

[102] Porson, Praef. ad Hec. p. xxi., and the Cambridge editor (p. 228 sqq.) have concurred in fully condemning the whole of this last scene. It is certain that in the time of aelian something different must have been in existence, and equally certain that the whole abounds in repet.i.tions and inconsistencies, that seem to point either to spuriousness, or, at least, to the existence of interpolations of a serious character. In this latter opinion Matthiae and Dindorf agree.

[103] An allusion to the celebrated picture of Timanthes. See Barnes.

[104] I have done my best with this pa.s.sage, following Matthiae's explanation, which, however, I do not perfectly understand. If vs. 1567 were away, we should be less at a loss, but the same may be said of the whole scene.

IPHIGENIA IN TAURIS.

PERSONS REPRESENTED.

IPHIGENIA.

ORESTES.

PYLADES.

HERDSMAN.

THOAS.

MESSENGER.

MINERVA.

CHORUS OF GRECIAN CAPTIVE WOMEN.

THE ARGUMENT.

Orestes, coming into Tauri in Scythia, in company with Pylades, had been commanded to bear away the image of Diana, after which he was to meet with a respite from the avenging Erinnyes of his mother. His sister Iphigenia, who had been carried away by Diana from Aulis, when on the point of being sacrificed by her father, chances to be expiating a dream that led her to suppose Orestes dead, when a herdsman announces to her the arrival and detection of two strangers, whom she is bound by her office to sacrifice to Diana. On meeting, a mutual discovery takes place, and they plot their escape. Iphigenia imposes on the superst.i.tious fears of Thoas, and, removing them to the sea-coast, they are on the point of making their escape together, when they are surprised, and subsequently detained and driven back by stress of weather. Thoas is about to pursue them, when Minerva appears, and restrains him from doing so, at the same time procuring liberty of return for the Grecian captives who form the chorus.

IPHIGENIA IN TAURIS.

IPHIGENIA.

Pelops,[1] the son of Tantalus, setting out to Pisa with his swift steeds, weds the daughter of nomaus, from whom sprang Atreus; and from Atreus his sons, Menelaus and Agamemnon, from which [latter] I was born, Iphigenia, child of [Clytaemnestra,] daughter of Tyndarus, whom my father, as he imagined, sacrificed to Diana on account of Helen, near the eddies, which Euripus continually whirls to and fro, upturning the dark blue sea with frequent blasts, in the famed[2] recesses of Aulis. For here indeed king Agamemnon drew together a Grecian armament of a thousand s.h.i.+ps, desiring that the Greeks might take the glorious prize of victory over Troy,[3] and avenge the outraged nuptials of Helen, for the gratification of Menelaus.

But, there being great difficulty of sailing,[4] and meeting with no winds, he came to [the consideration of] the omens of burnt sacrifices, and Calchas speaks thus. O thou who rulest over this Grecian expedition, Agamemnon, thou wilt not lead forth thy s.h.i.+ps from the ports of this land, before Diana shall receive thy daughter Iphigenia as a victim; for thou didst vow to sacrifice to the light-bearing G.o.ddess whatsoever the year should bring forth most beautiful. Now your wife Clytaemnestra has brought forth a daughter in your house, referring to me the t.i.tle of the most beautiful, whom thou must needs sacrifice. And so, by the arts of Ulysses,[5] they drew me from my mother under pretense of being wedded to Achilles. But I wretched coming to Aulis, being seized and raised aloft above[6] the pyre, would have been slain by the sword; but Diana, giving to the Greeks a stag in my stead, stole me away, and, sending me through the clear ether,[7] she settled me in this land of the Tauri, where barbarian Thoas rules[8] the land, o'er barbarians, [Thoas,] who guiding his foot swift as the pinion, has arrived at this epithet [of Thoas, i.e. _the swift_] on account of his fleetness of foot. And she places me in this house as priestess, since which time the G.o.ddess Diana is wont to be pleased with such rites as these,[9] the name of which alone is fair. But, for the rest, I am silent, fearing the G.o.ddess. For I sacrifice even as before was the custom in the city, whatever Grecian man comes to this land.

I crop the hair, indeed, but the slaying that may not be told is the care of others within these shrines.[10] But the new visions which the [past]

night hath brought with it, I will tell to the sky,[11] if indeed this be any remedy. I seemed in my sleep, removed from this land, to be dwelling in Argos, and to slumber in my virgin chamber, but the surface of the earth [appeared] to be shaken with a movement, and I fled, and standing without beheld the coping[12] of the house giving way, and all the roof falling stricken to the ground from the high supports. And one pillar alone, as it seemed to me, was left of my ancestral house, and from its capital it seemed to stream down yellow locks, and to receive a human voice, and I, cheris.h.i.+ng this man-slaying office which I hold, weeping [began] to besprinkle it, as though about to be slain. But I thus interpret my dream.

Orestes is dead, whose rites I was beginning. For male children are the pillars of the house, and those whom my l.u.s.tral waters[13] sprinkle die.

Nor yet can I connect the dream with my friends, for Strophius had no son, when I was to have died. Now, therefore, I being present, will to my absent brother offer the rites of the dead--for this I can do--in company with the attendants whom the king gave to me, Grecian women. But from some cause they are not yet present. I will go[14] within the home wherein I dwell, these shrines of the G.o.ddess.

ORESTES. Look out! Watch, lest there be any mortal in the way.

PYLADES. I am looking out, and keeping watch, turning my eyes every where.

OR. Pylades, does it seem to you that this is the temple of the G.o.ddess, whither we have directed our s.h.i.+p through the seas from Argos?[15]

PYL. It does, Orestes, and must seem the same to thee.

OR. And the altar where Grecian blood is shed?

PYL. At least it has its pinnacles tawny with blood.

OR. And under the pinnacles themselves do you behold the spoils?

PYL. The spoils, forsooth, of slain strangers.

OR. But it behooves one, turning one's eye around, to keep a careful watch.

O Phbus, wherefore hast thou again led me into this snare by your prophecies, when I had avenged the blood of my father by slaying my mother?

But by successive[16] attacks of the Furies was I driven an exile, an outcast from the land, and fulfilled many diverse bending courses. But coming [to thy oracle] I required of thee how I might arrive at an end of the madness that drove me on, and of my toils [which I had labored through, wandering over Greece.[17]] But thou didst answer that I must come to the confines of the Tauric territory, where thy sister Diana possesses altars, and must take the image of the G.o.ddess, which they here say fell from heaven[18] into these shrines; and that taking it either by stratagem or by some stroke of fortune, having gone through the risk, I should give it to the land of the Athenians--but no further directions were given--and that having done this, I should have a respite from my toils.[19] But I am come hither, persuaded by thy words, to an unknown and inhospitable land. I ask you, then, Pylades, for you are a sharer with me in this toil, what shall we do? For thou beholdest the lofty battlements of the walls. Shall we proceed to the scaling of the walls? How then should we escape notice[20]

[if we did so?] Or shall we open the bra.s.s-wrought fastenings of the bolts?

of which things we know nothing.[21] But if we are caught opening the gates and contriving an entrance, we shall die. But before we die, let us flee to the temple, whither we lately sailed.

PYL. To fly is unendurable, nor are we accustomed [to do so,] and we must not make light of the oracle of the G.o.d. But quitting the temple, let us hide our bodies in the caves, which the dark sea splashes with its waters, far away from the city, lest any one beholding the bark, inform the rulers, and we be straightway seized by force. But when the eye of dim night shall come, we must venture, bring all devices to bear, to seize the sculptured image from the temple. But observe the eaves [of the roof,[22]] where there is an empty s.p.a.ce between the triglyphs in which you may let yourself down.

For good men dare encounter toils, but the cowardly are of no account any where. We have not indeed come a long distance with our oars, so as to return again from the goal.[23]