The Agamemnon of Aeschylus
by wrong, is no new subject selected by Aeschylus. It forms both the
commonest burden of the moralising lyrics in Greek tragedy and even of
the tragic myths themselves; and recent writers have shown how the same
idea touches the very heart of the traditional Greek religion. “The
life of the Year-Daemon, who lies at the root of so many Greek gods and
heroes, is normally a story of Pride and Punishment. Each year arrives,
waxes great, commits the sin of Hubris and must therefore die. It is
the way of all Life. As an early philosopher expresses it, “All things
pay retribution for their injustice one to another according to the
ordinance of Time.”[1]
To me this consideration actually increases the interest and beauty of
the _Oresteia_, because it increases its greatness. The majestic art,
the creative genius, the instinctive eloquence of these plays—that
eloquence which is the mere despair of a translator—are all devoted to
the expression of something which Aeschylus felt to be of tremendous
import. It was not his discovery; but it was a truth of which he had an
intense realization. It had become something which he must with all his
strength bring to expression before he died, not in a spirit of
self-assertion or of argument, like a discoverer, but as one devoted to
something higher and greater than himself, in the spirit of an
interpreter or prophet.
[1] See my _Four Stages of Greek Religion_, p. 47. Cornford, _From
Religion to Philosophy_, Chapter I. See also the fine pages on the
Agamemnon in the same writer’s _Thucydides Mythistoricus_, pp. 144,
ff. (E. Arnold 1907). G. M.
AGAMEMNON
CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY
AGAMEMNON, _son of Atreus and King of Argos and Mycenae;
Commander-in-Chief of the Greek armies in the War against Troy._
CLYTEMNESTRA, _daughter of Tyndareus, sister of Helen; wife to
Agamemnon._
AIGISTHOS, _son of Thyestes, cousin and blood-enemy to Agamemnon, lover
to Clytemnestra._
CASSANDRA, _daughter of Priam, King of Troy, a prophetess; now slave to
Agamemnon._
A WATCHMAN.
A HERALD.
CHORUS of Argive Elders, faithful to AGAMEMNON.
CHARACTERS MENTIONED IN THE PLAY
MENELÂÜS, _brother to Agamemnon, husband of Helen, and King of Sparta.
The two sons of Atreus are called the Atreidae._
HELEN, _most beautiful of women; daughter of Tyndareus, wife to
_MENELÂÜS_; beloved and carried off by Paris._
PARIS, _son of Priam, King of Troy, lover of Helen.
Also called_ ALEXANDER.
PRIAM, _the aged King of Troy._
_The Greeks are also referred to as Achaians, Argives, Danaans; Troy is
also called Ilion._
_The play was produced in the archonship of Philocles_ (458 B.C.). _The
first prize was won by Aeschylus with the “Agamemnon”,
“Libation-Bearers”, “Eumenides”, and the Satyr Play “Proteus”_.
THE AGAMEMNON
_The Scene represents a space in front of the Palace of Agamemnon in
Argos, with an Altar of Zeus in the centre and many other altars at the
sides. On a high terrace of the roof stands a_ WATCHMAN. _It is night_.
WATCHMAN.
This waste of year-long vigil I have prayed
God for some respite, watching elbow-stayed,
As sleuthhounds watch, above the Atreidae’s hall,
Till well I know yon midnight festival
Of swarming stars, and them that lonely go,
Bearers to man of summer and of snow,
Great lords and shining, throned in heavenly fire.
And still I await the sign, the beacon pyre
That bears Troy’s capture on a voice of flame
Shouting o’erseas. So surely to her aim
Cleaveth a woman’s heart, man-passioned!
And when I turn me to my bed—my bed
Dew-drenched and dark and stumbling, to which near
Cometh no dream nor sleep, but alway Fear
Breathes round it, warning, lest an eye once fain
To close may close too well to wake again;
Think I perchance to sing or troll a tune
For medicine against sleep, the music soon
Changes to sighing for the tale untold
Of this house, not well mastered as of old.
Howbeit, may God yet send us rest, and light
The flame of good news flashed across the night.
[_He is silent, watching. Suddenly at a distance in the night there is
a glimmer of fire, increasing presently to a blaze._]
Ha!
O kindler of the dark, O daylight birth
Of dawn and dancing upon Argive earth
For this great end! All hail!—What ho, within!
What ho! Bear word to Agamemnon’s queen
To rise, like dawn, and lift in answer strong
To this glad lamp her women’s triumph-song,
If verily, verily, Ilion’s citadel
Is fallen, as yon beacons flaming tell.
And I myself will tread the dance before
All others; for my master’s dice I score
Good, and mine own to-night three sixes plain.
[_Lights begin to show in the Palace_.]
Oh, good or ill, my hand shall clasp again
My dear lord’s hand, returning! Beyond that
I speak not. A great ox hath laid his weight
Across my tongue. But these stone walls know well,
If stones had speech, what tale were theirs to tell.
For me, to him that knoweth I can yet
Speak; if another questions I forget.
[_Exit into the Palace. The women’s “Ololûgê” or triumph-cry, is heard
within and then repeated again and again further off in the City.
Handmaids and Attendants come from the Palace, bearing torches, with
which they kindle incense on the altars. Among them comes_
CLYTEMNESTRA, _who throws herself on her knees at the central Altar in
an agony of prayer._]
[_Presently from the further side of the open space appear the_ CHORUS
_of_ ELDERS _and move gradually into position in front of the Palace.
The day begins to dawn._]
CHORUS.
Ten years since Ilion’s righteous foes,
The Atreidae strong,
Menelaüs and eke Agamemnon arose,
Two thrones, two sceptres, yoked of God;
And a thousand galleys of Argos trod
The seas for the righting of wrong;
And wrath of battle about them cried,
As vultures cry,
Whose nest is plundered, and up they fly
In anguish lonely, eddying wide,
Great wings like oars in the waste of sky,
Their task gone from them, no more to keep
Watch o’er the vulture babes asleep.
But One there is who heareth on high
Some Pan or Zeus, some lost Apollo—
That keen bird-throated suffering cry
Of the stranger wronged in God’s own sky;
And sendeth down, for the law transgressed,
The Wrath of the Feet that follow.
So Zeus the Watcher of Friend and Friend,
Zeus who Prevaileth, in after quest
For One Belovèd by Many Men
On Paris sent the Atreidae twain;
Yea, sent him dances before the end
For his bridal cheer,
Wrestlings heavy and limbs forespent
For Greek and Trojan, the knee earth-bent,
The bloody dust and the broken spear.
He knoweth, that which is here is here,
And that which Shall Be followeth near;
He seeketh God with a great desire,
He heaps his gifts, he essays his pyre
With torch below and with oil above,
With tears, but never the wrath shall move
Of the Altar cold that rejects his fire.
We saw the Avengers go that day,
And they left us here; for our flesh is old
And serveth not; and these staves uphold
A strength like the strength of a child at play.
For the sap that springs in the young man’s hand
And the valour of age, they have left the land.
And the passing old, while the dead leaf blows
And the old staff gropeth his three-foot way,
Weak as a babe and alone he goes,
A dream left wandering in the day.
[_Coming near the Central Altar they see_ CLYTEMNESTRA, _who is still
rapt in prayer_.]
But thou, O daughter of Tyndareus,
Queen Clytemnestra, what need? What news?
What tale or tiding hath stirred thy mood
To send forth word upon all our ways
For incensed worship? Of every god
That guards the city, the deep, the high,
Gods of the mart, gods of the sky,
The altars blaze.
One here, one there,
To the skyey night the firebrands flare,
Drunk with the soft and guileless spell
Of balm of kings from the inmost cell.
Tell, O Queen, and reject us not,
All that can or that may be told,
And healer be to this aching thought,
Which one time hovereth, evil-cold,
And then from the fires thou kindlest
Will Hope be kindled, and hungry Care
Fall back for a little while, nor tear
The heart that beateth below my breast.
[CLYTEMNESTRA _rises silently, as though unconscious of their presence,
and goes into the House. The_ CHORUS _take position and begin their
first Stasimon, or Standing-song,_]
CHORUS.
(_The sign seen on the way; Eagles tearing a hare with young_.)
It is ours to tell of the Sign of the War-way given,
To men more strong,
(For a life that is kin unto ours yet breathes from heaven
A spell, a Strength of Song:)
How the twin-throned Might of Achaia, one Crown divided
Above all Greeks that are,
With avenging hand and spear upon Troy was guided
By the Bird of War.
’Twas a King among birds to each of the Kings of the Sea,
One Eagle black, one black but of fire-white tail,
By the House, on the Spear-hand, in station that all might see;
And they tore a hare, and the life in her womb that grew,
Yea, the life unlived and the races unrun they slew.
_Sorrow, sing sorrow: but good prevail, prevail_!
(_How Calchas read the sign; his Vision of the Future_.)
And the War-seer wise, as he looked on the Atreid Yoke
Twain-tempered, knew
Those fierce hare-renders the lords of his host; and spoke,
Reading the omen true.
“At the last, the last, this Hunt hunteth Ilion down,
Yea, and before the wall
Violent division the fulness of land and town
Shall waste withal;
If only God’s eye gloom not against our gates,
And the great War-curb of Troy, fore-smitten, fail.
For Pity lives, and those wingèd Hounds she hates,
Which tore in the Trembler’s body the unborn beast.
And Artemis abhorreth the eagles’ feast.”
_Sorrow, sing sorrow: but good prevail, prevail_!
(_He prays to Artemis to grant the fulfilment of the Sign, but, as his
vision increases, he is afraid and calls on Paian, the Healer, to hold
her back_.)
“Thou beautiful One, thou tender lover
Of the dewy breath of the Lion’s child;
Thou the delight, through den and cover,
Of the young life at the breast of the wild,
Yet, oh, fulfill, fulfill The sign of the Eagles’ Kill!
Be the vision accepted, albeit horrible….
But I-ê, I-ê! Stay her, O Paian, stay!
For lo, upon other evil her heart she setteth,
Long wastes of wind, held ship and unventured sea,
On, on, till another Shedding of Blood be wrought:
They kill but feast not; they pray not; the law is broken;
Strife in the flesh, and the bride she obeyeth not,
And beyond, beyond, there abideth in wrath reawoken—
It plotteth, it haunteth the house, yea, it never forgetteth—
Wrath for a child to be.”
So Calchas, reading the wayside eagles’ sign,
Spake to the Kings, blessings and words of bale;
And like his song be thine,
_Sorrow, sing sorrow: but good prevail, prevail_!
(_Such religion belongs to old and barbarous gods, and brings no peace.
I turn to Zeus, who has shown man how to Learn by Suffering_.)
Zeus! Zeus, whate’er He be,
If this name He love to hear
This He shall be called of me.
Searching earth and sea and air
Refuge nowhere can I find
Save Him only, if my mind
Will cast off before it die
The burden of this vanity.
One there was who reigned of old,
Big with wrath to brave and blast,
Lo, his name is no more told!
And who followed met at last
His Third-thrower, and is gone.
Only they whose hearts have known
Zeus, the Conqueror and the Friend,
They shall win their vision’s end;
Zeus the Guide, who made man turn
Thought-ward, Zeus, who did ordain
Man by Suffering shall Learn.
So the heart of him, again
Aching with remembered pain,
Bleeds and sleepeth not, until
Wisdom comes against his will.
’Tis the gift of One by strife
Lifted to the throne of life.
(AGAMEMNON _accepted the sign. Then came long delay, and storm while
the fleet lay at Aulis._)
So that day the Elder Lord,
Marshal of the Achaian ships,
Strove not with the prophet’s word,