Libation Bearers
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Original / primary: Perseus Eng2
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Besides the god’s command, my keen grief for my father, and also the pinch of poverty—that my countrymen, the most renowned of mortals, who overthrew Troy in the spirit of glory, should not be subjected so to a pair of women.
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For he has a woman’s mind, or if not, it will soon be found out.
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Chorus
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You mighty Fates, through the power of Zeus grant fulfilment in the way to which Justice now turns. For a word of hate let a word of hate be said,
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Justice cries out as she exacts the debt, and for a murderous stroke let a murderous stroke be paid. Let it be done to him as he does, says the age-old wisdom.
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Orestes
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O father, unhappy father, by what word or deed of mine can I succeed in sailing from far away to you, where your resting-place holds you, a light to oppose your darkness?
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Yet a lament in honor of the Atreidae who once possessed our house is none the less a joyous service.
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Electra
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Hear then, O father, as in turn we mourn with plentiful tears. Look, your two children mourn you
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in a dirge over your tomb. As suppliants and exiles as well they have sought a haven at your sepulchre. What of these things is good, what free of evil? Is it not hopeless to wrestle against doom?
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Chorus
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Yet heaven, if it pleases, may still turn our utterance to more joyfully sounding strains. In place of dirges over a tomb, a song of triumph within the royal halls will welcome back a reunited friend. νεοκρᾶτα, newly-mixed. As friendship, when begun, was pledged by a loving-cup, so Orestes, after his long absence, is to be welcomed as a new friend.
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Chorus
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In this, my child, your wish is better than gold. It surpasses great good fortune, even that of the supremely blesssed;The Hyperboreans, a fabulous people dwelling beyond the North wind, were imagined to live longer and in greater felicity than other mortals. for it is easy to wish.
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But now the lash of this double scourgeThe lash of this double scourge refers to the appeal to the dead, lashing him to vengenace, to the beating of the head and breast, and to the stamping open the ground, which, like the invocation of the dead, were intended to arouse the nether powers. The scourge is double (cp. Agam.647) because the participants in the scene are the two children (l. 334) and the Chorus. comes home: our cause already has its champions beneath the earth, while the hands of our loathsome opponents, though they have the mastery, are unholy. The children have won the day.
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Chorus
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And it is the eternal rule that drops of blood spilled on the ground demand yet more blood. Murder cries out on the Fury, which from those killed before brings one ruin in the wake of another.
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Chorus
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O you blessed powers below, hear this supplication of ours, and with a favorable will send forth to these children your aid for victory!
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Orestes
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O father, who perished by a death unbefitting a king,
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grant in answer to my prayer the lordship over your halls!
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Electra
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And I too, father, have a like request of you: to escape when I have wrought great destruction on Aegisthus.
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Orestes
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Yes, for then the customary funeral feasts of men would be established in your honor. But otherwise, at the rich and savory banquet
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of burnt offerings made to the earth, you will be without a portion of honor.
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Electra
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And I will likewise at my wedding offer libations to you out of the fullness of my inheritance from my father’s house, and before all else I will hold this tomb of yours in the highest honor.
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Orestes
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O Earth, send up my father to watch my battle!
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Electra
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O Persephone, grant us indeed a glorious victory!
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Orestes
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Father, remember the bath where you were robbed of life.
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Electra
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And remember how they devised a strange net to cast about you.
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Orestes
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You were caught, my father, in fetters forged by no smith’s hand.
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Electra
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And in a fabric shamefully devised.
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Orestes
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Father, are you not roused by taunts such as these?
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Electra
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Are you not raising that dearest head of yours?
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Orestes
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Either send Justice to battle for those dear to you, or grant us in turn to get a similar gripOrestes prays that, as Clytaemestra and Aegisthus had got grip of Agamemnon by deception, so he may get like grip of them and kill them. on them, if indeed after defeat you would in turn win victory.
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Electra
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So listen, father, to this last appeal of mine as you behold these fledglings crouching at your tomb. Have compassion on your offspring, on the woman and on the man as well, and let not this seed of Pelops’ line be blotted out: for then, in spite of death, you are not dead.
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For children are voices of salvation to a man, though he is dead; like corks, they buoy up the net, saving the flaxen cord from out of the deep. Hear! For your own sake we make this lament. By honoring this plea of ours you save yourself.
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Chorus
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In truth you have drawn out this plea of yours to your own content in showing honor to this unlamented tomb. As for the rest, since your heart is rightly set on action, put your fortune to the test and get to your work at once.
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Orestes
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It will be so. But it is in no way amiss to inquire how, from what motive,
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she came to send her libations, seeking too late to make amends for an irremediable deed. They would be a sorry gift to send to the senseless dead: I cannot guess what they mean. The gifts are too paltry for her offence.
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For though a man may pour out all he has in atonement for one deed of blood, it is wasted effort. So the saying goes. If indeed you know, tell me: I wish to learn.
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Chorus
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I know, my child, for I was there. It was because she was shaken by dreams and wandering terrors of the night
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that she sent these offerings, godless woman that she is.
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Orestes
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And have you learned the nature of the dream so as to tell it properly?
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Chorus
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She dreamed she gave birth to a serpent: that is her own account.
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Orestes
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And where does the tale end, and what is its consummation?
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Chorus
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She laid it to rest as if it were a child, in swaddling clothes.
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Orestes
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What food did it crave, the newborn viper?
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Chorus
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In her dream she offered it her own breast.
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Orestes
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Surely her nipple was not unwounded by the loathsome beast?
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Chorus
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No: it drew in clotted blood with the milk.
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Orestes
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Truly it is not without meaning: the vision signifies a man!
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Chorus
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Then from out of her sleep she raised a shriek and awoke appalled, and many lamps that had been blinded in the darkness flared up in the house to cheer our mistress. Then she sent these libations for the dead in the hope that they might be an effective cure for her distress.
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Orestes
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Well then, I pray to this earth and to my father’s grave that this dream may come to its fulfilment in me. As I understand it, it fits at every point. For if the snake left the same place as I; if it was furnished with my swaddling clothes;
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if it sought to open its mouth to take the breast that nourished me and mixed the sweet milk with clotted blood while she shrieked for terror at this, then surely, as she has nourished a portentous thing of horror, she must die by violence. For I, turned serpent,
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am her killer, as this dream declares.
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Chorus
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I choose your reading of this portent. Let it be so. As for the rest, give your friends their parts. Tell some what to do, others what to leave undone.
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Orestes
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It is a simple story. My sister must go inside, and I charge her to keep concealed this pact with me,
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so that as by craft they killed a worthy man, so by craft they may likewise be caught and perish in the very same snare, even as Loxias decreed, lord Apollo, the prophet who has never before been false.
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In the guise of a stranger, one fully equipped,I will come to the outer gate, and with me Pylades, whom you see here, as a guest and ally of the house. Both of us will speak the speech of Parnassus, imitating the accent of a Phocian tongue. And in case none of the keepers of the door will give us a hearty welcome
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on the plea that the house is afflicted with trouble by the gods, then we will wait so that anyone passing the house will consider and say: Why then does Aegisthus have his door shut on his suppliant, if in fact he is at home and knows?
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But if I indeed pass the outermost threshold of the gate and find that man sitting on my father’s throne, or if then coming face to face with me he lifts and casts down his eyes, know well:
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before he can even say Of what land is this stranger? I will skewer him with my swift sword and lay him dead. The fury that has no fill of slaughter shall for her third and crowning drink drink unmixed blood! Now you, Electra, keep strict watch over what happens inside the house,
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so that our plans may fit together well. You addressing the Chorus had best keep a discreet tongue: be silent when there is need and speak only what the occasion demands. As for the rest, I call on himApollo, his champion (lines 269, 558), whose statue stood before the palace (cp.Aesch. Ag. 513). to cast his glance this way and direct the contest of the sword for me. Exeunt Orestes, Pylades, and Electra
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Chorus
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Many are the horrors, dread and appalling, bred of earth, and the arms of the deep teem with hateful monsters. Likewise between heaven and earth
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lightsMeteors. hung high in the air draw near; and winged things and things that walk the earth can also tell of the stormy wrath of whirlwinds.
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Chorus
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But who can tell of man’s overweening spirit,
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and of the reckless passions of women hardened of soul, partners of the woes of mortals? Inordinate passion, overmastering the female,
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gains a fatal victory over the wedded unions of beasts and humans alike.
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Orestes
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Boy! Boy! Hear my knocking at the outer door! Who is inside? Boy! Boy! I say again, who is at home?
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Again for the third time I call for some one to come out of the house, if by Aegisthus’ will it offers welcome to strangers.
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Servant
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Yes, yes, I hear. Of what land is the stranger, and whence?
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Orestes
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Announce me to the masters of the house, for it is in fact to them that I come bearing news.
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And hurry, since the chariot of night is speeding on with darkness, and it is time for wayfarers to drop anchor in some house friendly to all guests. Tell some one to come forth who has authority over the house, the mistress in charge. But the master would be more fitting,
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for then no delicacy in speaking makes words obscure: man speaks boldly to man and reveals his meaning without reserve. The Servant withdraws. Clytaemestra appears at the door with a maid-servant in attendance
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Clytaemestra
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Strangers, you have only to declare your need, for we have everything that suits this house: warm baths, beds to charm away fatigue,
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and the presence of honest faces. But if there is another matter requiring graver counsel, that is the concern of men, and we will communicate with them.
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Orestes
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I am a stranger, a Daulian of the Phocians. As I was on my way, carrying my pack on business of my own to Argos,
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just as I ended my journey here,Literally I have been unyoked, his feet being his horses. a man, a stranger to me as I to him, fell in with me, and inquired about my destination and told me his. He was Strophius, a Phocian (for as we talked I learned his name), and he said to me,
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Stranger, since in any case you are bound for Argos, keep my message in mind most faithfully and tell his parents Orestes is dead, and by no means let it escape you. Whether his friends decide to bring him home or to bury him in the land of his sojourn, a foreigner utterly forever,
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convey their wishes back to me. In the meantime a bronze urn contains the ashes of a man rightly lamented. This much I tell you as I heard it. Whether by any chance I am speaking to those with whom the question rests and whose concern it is,
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I do not know. But his parent should know the truth.
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Clytaemestra
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Oh no! Your story spells our utter undoing. O curse that haunts this house, so hard to wrestle down: how far forward you look! Even what was laid well out of harm’s way you bring down with your well-aimed shafts from far off,
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and you strip me of those I love, utterly wretched as I am. And now Orestes: he was indeed prudent in keeping his foot out of the mire of destruction, but now mark down as having abandoned us what was once the one hope in our house of a cure for its fine revelry.Clytaemestra’s outward meaning is that, with her son alive and far from the blood-stained house, she had hoped that there has been an end of the carousing of the Curses (cp. Agam.1188). That hope is gone—they still hold their fairfine revelry, as she ironically calls it. Her inner emotion is joy that the hope of Electra is crushed—the hope that her brother would return and end the unseemly revelry. Reading παροῦσαν (so M) ἐγγράφῃ the meaning is thou dost inscribe it present in thy list.
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Orestes
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As for me, I am sure that with hosts so prosperous I would rather have been made known and welcomed for favorable news. For where is goodwill greater than from guest to host? Yet to my mind it would have been irreverent
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not to fulfill for friends a charge like this when I was bound by promise and hospitality pledged to me.
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Clytaemestra
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Rest assured you will receive no less a reward than you deserve nor be the less welcome to this house: someone else might just as well have brought your message.
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But it is the hour when strangers who have been travelling on a long day’s journey should have their proper entertainment. To an attendant Conduct him to the rooms where the men are hospitably lodged, him and his attendants here and his fellow-traveller, and let them be tended to there as is proper in our house.
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I command you to do this as you shall be held to strict account. Meantime we will communicate this matter to the master of the house, and since we have no lack of friends we will confer on this occurrence.
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Chorus
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Ah, loyal handmaidens of the house,
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low long will it be before we display the power that lies in our mouths to do Orestes service? O hallowed earth, and hallowed barrow raised high that now lies on the royal form of the commander of the fleet,
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now hear me, now lend me aid! Now is the hour for Persuasion with her guile to join forces with him, and for Hermes of the nether world, who works in stealth, to direct this encounter of the deadly sword. Enter Orestes’ Nurse
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Our stranger, I think, is working mischief: for over there I see Orestes’ nurse all in tears. CilissaSlaves were commonly named from their native country! Where are you going? Why as you set foot in the palace gate do you have a grief as an unhired companion?
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Nurse
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My mistress commands me to summon Aegisthus for the strangers
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in all haste, so that he may come and learn more clearly, from man to man, these tidings that have just arrived. Indeed, before the servants, behind eyes that feigned grief she hid her laughter over what has occurred fortunately for her.
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But the news so plainly told by the strangers means utter ruin for this house. I expect that when he hears it he will rejoice in his heart to know the story. Miserable woman that I am! How the old unbearable troubles of every sort
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that occurred in this house of Atreus have always made my heart ache within my breast! But never yet have I endured a blow like this. For all the other troubles I bore patiently, but my beloved Orestes, on whom I spent my soul,
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whom I took from his mother at birth and nursed, and the many and troublesome tasks, fruitless for all my enduring them, when his loud and urgent cries broke my rest.... For one must nurse the senseless thing like a dumb beast, of course one must, by following its humor.
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For while it is still a baby in swaddling clothes, it has no speech at all, whether hunger moves it, or thirst perhaps, or the call of need: children’s young insides work their own relief. I would anticipate these needs. Yet many a time, I think, having to wash the child’s linen because of my own errors,
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laundress and nurse had the same function. It was I who, with these two handicrafts, received Orestes for his father. And now, wretch that I am, I hear that he is dead. But I am on my way to fetch the man who wrought destruction on
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our house, and he will be glad enough to hear this news.
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Chorus
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Then arrayed how does she tell him to come?
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Nurse
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Arrayed how? Say it again so that I may catch your meaning better.
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Chorus
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With his guards or perhaps unattended?
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Nurse
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She tells him to come with his retinue of spearmen.
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Chorus
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Well, do not give this message to our loathed master, but with all haste and with a cheerful heart tell him to come himself, alone, so that he may be told without alarm. For in the mouth of a messenger a crooked message is made straight.A proverbial saying, meant for the Nurse, and not for Aegisthus: In passing through the mouth of its bearer a message may be changed as he pleases.
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Nurse
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What! Are you gladdened at heart by the present news?