Euripides' Escape-Tragedies: A Study of Helen, Andromeda, and Iphigenia among the Taurians

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EURIPIDES’ ESCAPE-TRAGEDIES

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Euripides’ Escape-Tragedies A Study of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia among the Taurians MATTHEW WRIGHT

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Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With oﬃces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Matthew Wright 2005 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2005 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Wright, Matthew Ephraim. Euripides’ escape-tragedies : a study of Helen, Andromeda, and Iphigenia among the Taurians / Matthew Wright. ISBN 0–19–927451–7 (alk. paper) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Euripides—Criticism and interpretation. 2. Helen of Troy (Greek mythology) in literature. 3. Andromeda (Greek mythology) in literature. 4. Iphigenia (Greek mythology) in literature. 5. Euripides. Iphigenia in Tauris. 6. Euripides. Andromeda. 7. Escape in literature. 8. Euripides. Helen. 9. Tragedy. I. Title. PA3978.W75 2005 882'.01—dc22 2004025239 ISBN 0–19–927451–7 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Typeset by Regent Typesetting Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddles Ltd, King’s Lynn, Norfolk

Acknowledgements

It is easy to ignore the ‘Acknowledgements’ section in academic books. This is because they all too often resemble acceptance speeches at the Oscars (prolix, lachrymose). In the hope, however, that this paragraph will not be overlooked, I shall not test the patience of the reader, eager to get to Chapter 1, by dwelling at length on every act of kindness which I have ever experienced. Rather, I hope that it will suﬃce to list the people who have helped me to write this book, either by reading and criticizing its earlier drafts or by inﬂuencing my thinking about Euripides and his world. Chris Gill, John Wilkins, Judith Mossman, James Diggle, Richard Seaford, David Braund, Norman Postlethwaite, Peter Wiseman, Lynette Mitchell, †Don Fowler, Gregory Hutchinson, Oliver Taplin, Edith Hall, Malcolm Davies, Nicholas Purcell, Bob Cowan, David Fearn, Isabelle Torrance, Jean Lee and Graham Robertson have each played a vital role (they know what), and I oﬀer my profound thanks to them all. M.E.W. Exeter November 2003

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Contents

Notes on Conventions Prolegomena

viii 1

1 Escape-Tragedies 1.1 Escape-TRAGEDIES 1.2 ESCAPE-tragedies

6 6 43

2 Myth, Fiction, Innovation 2.1 ‘Use of myth’ 2.2 ‘Myths’ and ‘plots’ 2.3 Old and new elements: inheritance, adaptation, innovation 2.4 Metamythology

56 56 58 80 133

3 A Tragic Landscape 3.1 A sense of place 3.2 Exotica 3.3 Ethnicity 3.4 The imaginary landscape

158 158 163 177 202

4 Tragedy of Ideas 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Philosopher of the stage 4.3 Tracing philosophical threads 4.4 Reality, illusion, delusion

226 226 235 260 278

5 The Tragic Universe 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Tragedies as ‘religious’ texts 5.3 Making sense of the universe

338 338 339 362

Afterword

385

Bibliography Index Locorum General Index

389 415 425

Notes on Conventions

Abbreviations used in the Bibliography and in the main text generally follow the practice of S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth (eds.), The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd edn., Oxford 1996, with the following exceptions: Davies

Nauck TGF FGH

M. Davies, Epicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (1988) and Poetarum Melicorum Graecorum Fragmenta post D. L. Page (1991– ) A. Nauck, Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta, 2nd edn. (1889), with Supplement of B. Snell (1964) B. Snell, R. Kannicht, and S. Radt, Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta (4 vols., 1971–85). F. Jacoby, Fragmente der griechischen Historiker (1923– )

All Euripidean quotations and references (except fragments) are taken from the Oxford Classical Text of James Diggle (1981– 94). In the case of Andromeda, the edition cited is the Budé text of Jouan and Van Looy (1998), which uses the numbering of Kannicht’s forthcoming volume 5 of TGF. All other Euripidean fragments are cited according to Nauck (above). Following the practice of Aristotle, I shall use the title Iphigenia throughout this book to stand for Iphigenia among the Taurians; the Iphigenia at Aulis, where mentioned, will be named in full. I hope that this book will be of use to the student and the interested general reader as well as to the professional scholar. With this in mind, I have translated or paraphrased all quotations in the text and footnotes, so that the argument will be at all times intelligible to the non-reader of Greek. (Unless otherwise attributed, these translations are my own.)

Prolegomena

The three plays which I shall call ‘escape-tragedies’—Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia among the Taurians—were, at diﬀerent times, among Euripides’ most popular tragedies. Aristotle, in whose opinion Euripides was ‘the most tragic’ of the Athenian dramatists,1 held the Iphigenia in high esteem, seemingly using it as an example of how to write good tragedies.2 The Andromeda, often mentioned by ancient writers, was an enormous success for many years after its ﬁrst production: not only was it said to be a particular favourite of Dionysus, god of the tragic theatre,3 but also selected excerpts from it were performed from memory by Alexander the Great,4 and it was reputedly the cause of an episode of Euripides-mania in Abdera.5 The escape-tragedies made such an impact on ﬁrst production that they were the subject of an elaborate parody by Aristophanes the following year; this seems to testify to their immense popularity or notoriety.6 Similarly, the large number of vase-paintings based on scenes from these tragedies (especially Iphigenia) indicates that they remained well-known for a long period of time, possibly through revivals at the City Dionysia and other Attic or Italian festivals.7 1

Arist. Poet. 1453a29–30. This important passage is discussed below (§1.1). Arist. Poet. 1452b6–7; 1454a7, b32; 1455a7–18, b3. Discussed by Belﬁore (1992) 359–78: she argues that the Iphigenia was a favourite of Aristotle on account of its well-constructed plot, emotional power and its ‘universal tragic signiﬁcance’ (375). 3 Ar. Frogs 52–4. 4 Athenaeus, Deipn. 12.537d–e. 5 Lucian, De Conscrib. Hist. 59.1. 6 Ar. Thesmophoriazusae (411 bc); see below (§1.2) for discussion. 7 See Trendall and Webster (1971) 78–82, 91–4; Webster (1967) 154–60. IG II2 2320 (col. 2) records that Iphigenia was revived at the City Dionysia in 341 bc: this probably refers to the Tauric Iphigenia, to which Aristotle could refer by the name ‘Iphigenia’ alone (n. 2 above). Euripides’ Helen is not represented on any surviving vase or monument, and receives no subsequent mention in the critical-historical record (see LIMC IV.1. 500). Since this play was so memorable in terms of plot and of theatrical and visual eﬀects, this paucity of 2

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Prolegomena

The matter of subsequent reception of the escape-tragedies is more obscure. At any rate, the ‘deﬁnitive selection’ of Euripidean tragedy, made during the third century ad, did not include them, and consequently, along with the other plays, they disappeared from view.8 Were it not for the accidental survival of part of a complete ‘alphabetical’ collection of Euripidean tragedy (the ancestor of the fourteenth-century codex Laurentianus), we would not now have Helen and Iphigenia.9 Sadly, Andromeda survives only as a handful of jejune fragments. The early popularity of the escape-tragedies contrasts with their more recent unpopularity. Today the escape-tragedies (or what remains of them), along with certain other Euripidean tragedies, occupy an unenviable position in tragic scholarship. Far from being admired or seen as exemplary dramas, Helen and Iphigenia (along with Orestes, Ion, Electra and most late plays of Euripides) are generally held to be unsatisfactory or fundamentally problematic. Many critics seem to feel that they are undeserving of serious interest. In particular, Iphigenia has been largely neglected: despite the appearance, during the last few years, of Martin Cropp’s new Aris and Phillips edition of the text and a handful of articles, which indicate that interest may be reawakening, there is still room for a lot more work on this play.10 evidence might seem to be disturbing: for instance, Verrall (1905, 43–133), notoriously, believed that Helen was never produced at the Dionysia but at a private festival of Demeter, entry to which was restricted to women. But it is probably better to attribute the diﬃculty to the incomplete nature of the surviving evidence. 8 The ten selected plays were: Hec., Or., Phoen. Hipp., Med., Andromache, Alc., Rhes., Tro., Bacch. The principles of selection (suitability for educational use? popularity? perceived status as ‘best plays of Euripides’?) are unknown. 9 On textual transmission see Zuntz (1965), Dale (1967) xxix–xxxiv, Kannicht (1969) 1.78–133. 10 When I began thinking about this project in 1997, the literature on Iphigenia was very thin indeed. The last scholarly commentary was that of Platnauer (1938), which is still of considerable philological interest, despite its almost total failure to discuss matters of literary or historical importance. Cropp’s (2000) admirable edition is far fuller than any of the other volumes in its series: I presume that this is due precisely to the large gap which it has to ﬁll. Commentaries aside, apart from a chapter in Burnett (1971, 47–75), no substantial study of the play as a whole exists. The articles (by Sansone, Caldwell, Wolﬀ and a few others) cited in my bibliography show that the Iphigenia has been perceived to be of interest chieﬂy for its treatment of ritual, and is regarded as a repository of ideas and topoi rather than a work of any great literary value.

Prolegomena

3

Helen has fared a little better, in terms of the number of published discussions, but it is diﬃcult to ﬁnd anyone who takes the play seriously.11 So it often seems more diﬃcult to begin discussing the escape-tragedies than (say) Oedipus the King or Agamemnon, because, in addition to writing about the literary and dramatic qualities of the plays, one inevitably has to engage with some fairly serious methodological problems raised by existing criticism. This book is a critical study of the escape-tragedies, based on the belief that they are to be taken seriously as a major dramatic and intellectual achievement. It has two speciﬁc aims. The ﬁrst is to read the plays together, arguing that they were produced as a trilogy in 412 bc. I am not the ﬁrst to make this suggestion; but no one has previously followed up the suggestion and attempted a sustained, connected reading of all three plays. One could not hope, of course, to cover every aspect of the plays in a work of this scope. If I had more time and space at my disposal, no doubt I should have given more attention to such areas as characterization, rhetoric, music and staging, textual criticism, the plays’ Nachleben, and so on. I make no claim to completeness, then; but the areas on which I have chosen to concentrate were not plucked out of the air at random. What I have tried to give is a coherent and (in a sense) self-contained reading of the escape-tragedies, which addresses the more important of the ‘big’ issues raised by such a reading. These areas—myth and innovation, geography and landscape, philosophy, theology and ritual—are all indispensable, and all closely linked. Throughout the book, I have tried to bring the fragmentary Andromeda into the discussion as much as possible, while keeping speculation to a judicious level; but there are, clearly, severe constraints on the extent to which this is possible. This means that no very ﬁrm conclusions can be drawn about the relationship of Andromeda to the other two plays. Nevertheless, I am encouraged by the number of connections and parallels which can be seen. 11 At least Helen does not lack adequate commentaries: that of Kannicht (1969) is unlikely to be superseded, while Dale’s (1967) addition to the Oxford series, despite the same sort of failings as Platnauer’s Iphigenia, is likewise excellent on philological matters. However, there are few discussions which deem Helen worthy of serious, prolonged consideration: Podlecki (1970), Segal (1971) and Wolﬀ (1973) are notable exceptions.

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Prolegomena

However, any study of Helen and Iphigenia must, before it even gets oﬀ the ground, deal with a further problem, which does not arise in the case of (say) Medea or Hippolytus. This is the problem of genre. As we shall see, the tone of most modern criticism of the escape-tragedies, as well as being largely negative, is based on the notion that these plays are not tragedies; that they should be categorized as something generically diﬀerent (tragicomedy, romance, comedy, melodrama, or similar). My second speciﬁc aim, then, is to argue that the escapetragedies are deﬁnitely, unambiguously tragic. I am aware that it will not be immediately clear exactly what I am claiming with this statement—just as it is unclear exactly what critics are claiming when they complain that Helen and Iphigenia are not ‘tragic’. This lack of clarity is due in part to the complexity of meaning in the words ‘tragedy’ and ‘the tragic’. Therefore, in the ﬁrst chapter (1.1), I attempt to make it plain exactly what it means to say that a play is, or is not, ‘tragic’, and to assess the way in which genre aﬀects one’s understanding of the plays. Clearly deﬁning the questions which we ask about tragedy, and examining the ways in which we approach the business of criticism, is more important than the formulation of a set of generic rules. The main fault (as I perceive it) with much of what is written about Greek tragedy is a lack of explicit deﬁnition of method and meaning. My own approach, not only to the speciﬁc question of genre but more broadly, has been to react against the unchallenged, unexamined preconceptions on which much criticism is based; to challenge, to deﬁne, to make the implicit explicit. Even if my critical opinions are found wanting, I hope that this method itself has something to commend it. In all of what follows, I have tried to strike an appropriate balance between general discussion and detailed commentary on the texts. In order to understand the escape-tragedies (or, indeed, any tragedies), it is necessary to examine other areas of Greek thought, religion, culture and myth. Without adopting a single or explicitly ‘theorized’ perspective, I have tried to interpret the escape-tragedies in their original cultural and intellectual context: a combination, that is, of literary history and literary criticism, exploring how broad questions can aﬀect close reading. The result is a new interpretation of the escapetragedies which also has important implications for Euripidean

Prolegomena

5

tragedy as a whole (including the other ‘problematic’ late plays) as well as for the way in which we read tragedies in general.12 Having discussed, in Chapter 1, the issue of genre and the arguments in favour of an escape-trilogy, in the remainder of the book I shall apply this approach to the plays in detail. Chapter 2 is concerned with the relationship of the escape-tragedies to their myths, arguing for a serious purpose behind plots which might seem prima facie to be provocative, playful or perverse. Chapter 3 investigates several diﬀerent levels on which a ‘sense of place’ is important to the plays, including its role in the creation of personal and cultural identity. Chapter 4 attempts to erode the (Platonic and Nietzschean) distinction between ‘literature’ on one hand and ‘philosophy’ on the other; I argue that the escapetragedies constitute an ambitious intellectual project, with clear connections to Presocratic and sophistic theories of ontology and epistemology. A short ﬁfth chapter continues to explore the theme of (mis-) understanding in the events of the plays, this time from a theological perspective. On my reading, far from being (as some would like to think) untragic, light, or whimsical entertainments, the escapetragedies emerge as being serious, dark, pessimistic plays which raise some very disturbing questions about the audience’s knowledge of their myths, their gods, and their very existence. 12

For this general approach, compare William Allan’s recent book (2000a), and its title: The Andromache and Euripidean tragedy (my underlining).

1 Escape-Tragedies

EURIPIDHS πstin kakÎn moi mvga ti propefuramvnon. KHDESTHS po∏În ti;1

1.1 escape- TRAGEDIES We shall begin with a few representative opinions which illustrate the problems of the escape-tragedies. The plays’ (undeniably odd) plots and settings have caused critics to overreact, expressing themselves, in general, in terms of baﬄement or dissatisfaction. For example, the only substantial commentary in English on Helen begins, almost wearily one might think, with the question: ‘What are we to make of this play?’2 Two diﬀerent (but closely related) types of answer to this question are to be encountered. In the days before it became unfashionable to describe texts as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, it was common for critics to write that the escapetragedies are simply unsatisfactory—that is, botched, artistically imperfect works whose structure, plot and substance are deﬁcient in some looked-for quality. This was Gilbert Murray’s view: ‘The Helena . . . is, if we understand it rightly, a rather brilliant failure.’3 Likewise Platnauer: ‘The Iphigenia in Tauris has never been ranked as among its author’s great plays. It has neither the moving pathos of the Hecuba nor the stark tragedy of the Hippolytus, nor can its heroine compare as a dramatic character with Alcestis or Medea.’4 Kitto and Grube detailed manifold ‘imperfections’ in both plays, holding that all other details were subsidiary to brilliant plotting.5 Most people would, 1 Ar. Thesm. 75–6. ‘Euripides: There’s some terrible trouble brewing for me. Relative: What sort of trouble?’ 2 Dale (1967) vii. 3 Murray (1913) 146. 4 Platnauer (1938) v. 5 Kitto (1961) 311–29; Grube (1961) 315, 329–30.

Escape-Tragedies

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if pressed, agree that writers do from time to time produce work of varying quality, and that certain literary works are (judged by some criteria) ‘better’ than others. Nevertheless, the scholarly move, more recently, away from qualitative judgements reﬂects the serious problems with this type of view. It is easy to argue that a play which prima facie seems inexplicable is ‘bad’, but this is usually an unproﬁtable approach to literary criticism. It is better (if more diﬃcult) to attempt to explain each unexpected feature—unless, that is, we really believe that ‘Euripides did not think very closely about it’.6 In any case, the question of what makes a literary work comparatively ‘good’ or ‘bad’, even if one makes scrupulously clear one’s criteria, is highly subjective. Critics of the last few decades have been less prone (at least less explicitly prone) to making perfunctory value-judgements on the problematic plays. But far more serious—and almost universal in the critical literature—is the second type of reaction.7 This is the view that these tragedies are somehow not tragic; in other words, that they lack some important quality of tragedy ‘proper’, or that they exhibit features which belong not to tragedy but to some other genre. The majority of critics attach other labels—if these plays are not tragedies, then what are they? Murray draws a distinction between the ‘true tragedies’ (such as Medea) and the ‘works of pure fancy or romance’ (which include the escape-tragedies and several other plays composed after 415);8 similarly, Conacher’s inﬂuential book on Euripides separates the ‘properly tragic plays’ from ‘the other kind of Euripidean play which we may conveniently call romantic tragedy’.9 Platnauer explains that ‘in the ﬁrst place, the Iphigenia is not a tragedy at all . . . not so much a tragedy as a romance—a romance, it may be added, with some of the elements of a thriller’.10 Patin calls Helen, Iphigenia and Ion ‘tragédies romanesques’,11 while Verrall (followed by many others) uses the 6

Dale (1967) 69 (on Helen 1). It is easy (one might object) to ﬁnd questionable opinions or methodology in the works of obsolescent critics such as Murray and Kitto; but the range of views quoted here shows that the approaches which they used, and the faulty assumptions which they made, are still alive and kicking. 8 Murray (1913) 142. 9 Conacher (1967) 14. 10 Platnauer (1938) v; cf. Lesky (1972) 15. 11 Patin (1883) 2. 75. 7

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Escape-Tragedies

term ‘tragicomedy’.12 Kitto’s comment is typical: ‘intellectual profundity is as alien to this tragi-comedy as moral profundity; we look in vain for any serious purpose beyond the serious purpose of creating such elegant drama.’13 Knox describes the escape-tragedies as ‘romantic intrigue-plays’,14 having earlier referred to them and other late Euripidean plays, in an inﬂuential article, as fully-ﬂedged ‘comedy’ characterized by a light, domestic tone. ‘The only thing that puts these plays in the tragic category,’ he writes, ‘is the fact that they were entries in the tragic competition at the festival of the Dionysia.’15 Oliver Taplin’s relabelling of Euripides’ tragedies, which sits somewhat uneasily alongside his later arguments about the separateness of tragedy from other genres,16 again reﬂects a feeling that Euripides’ plays are of fairly low quality.17 Taplin refers to Iphigenia and Helen, along with Ion, as ‘curious “romances” with happy endings’; he also classiﬁes Orestes, Phoenician Women and Iphigenia at Aulis as ‘sagas of melodrama and pathos’. It is usually assumed that these ‘untragic’ plays have nothing important or serious to say, but are essentially nugatory, lightweight pieces of theatrical entertainment. T. B. L. Webster, for instance, advised that ‘the Helen should not be taken too seriously’.18 Vellacott, like Kitto, believed that tragic status depends on a play’s success in treating a ‘tragic theme’, and that the ‘tragicomedies’ (or ‘melodramas’) of Euripides fail in this respect.19 Zuntz found Helen a jolly play, full of ‘light relief’, a ‘superior pa≤gnion’.20 M. L. West (discussing the Orestes) writes that Orestes, Iphigenia, Helen and Ion are ‘concerned more with emotional ups and downs . . . than with profound tragic issues’, and he concludes that Orestes is simply ‘a rattling good play’.21 12 Verrall (1895) 43–133; Vickers (1973) 299; Seidensticker (1978) 320 and 13 (1996) 393; Dunn (1989) 250–1. Kitto (1961) 316. 14 Knox (1985) 318. 15 Knox (1979) 256–7; cf. Lee (1997) 37. E. Segal (1995, 49), oddly, describes the Helen and Iphigenia as ‘proto-comedy’, as if comedy did not yet exist (presumably, he means New Comedy). 16 Taplin (1986) and (1996): see below. 17 Taplin (1978) 28: ‘I will not disguise the fact that I ﬁnd Euripides the least great of the three tragedians. His oeuvre is very uneven in quality . . .’ 18 Webster (1967) 201. 19 Vellacott (1975) 56; Kitto (1961) 190, 315–22. 20 Zuntz (1960) 201–9. 21 West (1987) 27–8.

Escape-Tragedies

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Very recently, Conacher writes that Helen is ‘a comedy of mistaken identity’,22 while Hall maintains that ‘of all Greek tragedies, including the not dissimilar Iphigenia in Tauris, [Helen] is by far the lightest and funniest’.23 Sommerstein’s new introductory book on Greek drama distinguishes the ‘tragic’ from the ‘melodramatic’ plays of Euripides, and adds that ‘the lighter plays are pure, often exhilarating entertainment’.24 Michelini describes Andromeda as ‘an openly romantic tale complete with magic, monsters and a happy ending’.25 The problem lies, basically, in the fact that the critics quoted above, along with many others, confuse several diﬀerent issues. The issues at stake are, ﬁrst, the genre of the plays; second, the serious or unserious tone of the plays; third, the quality of the plays as literature. Any attempt to defend or to criticize Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia should make it clear which of these issues is being confronted, but this is often not the case. The section which follows is all about deﬁnitions: what does it mean to argue that the escape-tragedies are or are not ‘tragic’? If we want to use labels, then we must be rigorous about their application and explain just what these labels mean. In the latter part of this opening section, I oﬀer a deﬁnition of what I understand by ‘tragedy’; but there are several important preliminaries to be dealt with ﬁrst. Let us begin by examining the defects of the ‘relabelling’ approach to Euripidean tragedies. One serious drawback of such a tendency is that it eﬀectively diverts attention away from the texts themselves: a disproportionate amount of time is spent trying to decide what type the plays are, with the result that their literary qualities, art and meaning are neglected. But, far more seriously, to call the escape-tragedies ‘comedies’, ‘melodramas’, ‘tragicomedies’ or ‘romances’ is a misuse of these terms, each of which has a speciﬁc generic meaning. The ﬁrst term, ‘comedy’, 22

Conacher (1998) 75. Hall (1997) xxiii. 24 Sommerstein (2002) 22, 58. 25 Michelini (1987) 77. One wonders how she can make so conﬁdent a pronouncement on the basis of the fragments. Klimek-Winter (1993, 199) also detects a comic tone in Andromeda, particularly the point at which Perseus mistakes Andromeda for a statue (fr. 125: discussed at more length in Ch. 4 below). Gibert (2000, 86–9) ponders, inconclusively, the subject of Andromeda’s ‘generic aﬃnities’. 23

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may be fractionally less improbable than the others, because at least it is a genre contemporary with tragedy. Nevertheless, it is obvious that Helen and Iphigenia were not comedies, because they were put on in the tragic competition, as well as having distinct formal diﬀerences (for which see below). None of the other genres, however, existed in 412 bc. ‘Tragicomedy’, although the word seems to have been invented by Plautus to describe a mixture of comic and tragic plot-elements,26 was ﬁrst used as a generic term in the early seventeenth century ad by Giambattista Guarini (in his Compendio della Poesia Tragicomica of 1601), and later by other European dramatists including Corneille and Molière.27 The term ‘melodrama’ was invented by Jean-Jacques Rousseau for his Pygmalion (1770), and originally denoted a form of musical drama distinct from opera, characterized by excitement, suspense, lovers, long-lost children and so on. English ‘melodramas’ of the nineteenth century, including Thomas Holcroft’s A Tale of Mystery (1802), altered the meaning of the word to something resembling its standard modern deﬁnition, ‘a dramatic piece characterized by sensational incident and violent appeals to the emotions, but with a happy ending’.28 ‘Romance’ was ﬁrst used in the twelfth century ad of heroic narrative poetry, such as The Romance of the Rose and Arthur and Merlin, before acquiring, several centuries later, the sense of ‘a ﬁctitious narrative in prose of which the scenes and incidents are very remote from those of ordinary life’.29 Even if one protests that these terms are helpful (in the sense that they seem to tell us something important about our own texts), the practice of attaching modern labels to ancient plays is a totally anachronistic and misleading exercise, the eﬀect of which is to squeeze the texts into inappropriately constructed categories. The ﬁfth-century Greeks, unlike modern audiences, did not have as wide a choice of dramatic genres by which to classify their plays. A dramatic performance at a ﬁfth-century Attic festival was either a comedy, a tragedy or a satyr-play, and 26 Plautus, Amphitryo 59: ‘faciam ut commixta sit; sit tragicomoedia’. However, note that the 5th-cent. comic poet Dinolochus may have written a play called Kwmwidotragwid≤a (PCG I, p. 79: T3). 27 Brief histories of the term and its uses are given by Seidensticker (1982) 9–27 and Hirst (1984) 3–17. 28 OED2 (1989), s.v. ‘melodrama’ (I.1). Cf. Smith (1973) 1–14. 29 OED2 (1989), s.v. ‘romance’ (II.2).

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the context of the festival would have left the audience in no doubt as to what type of play they were watching.30 The assessment of genre and the attaching of labels is part of today’s theatre because of (crucially) the lack of ﬁxed performance contexts, and because of the frequency with which elements from diﬀerent genres are mixed together in modern dramatic or literary works. However, watching a play in the ﬁfth-century theatre of Dionysus was a diﬀerent activity, requiring the audience to evaluate the drama within a given, deﬁned generic framework. Despite change and development, ﬁfth-century genres remained separate from each other. One of the strongest arguments against Euripides’ supposed generic impurity is Aristotle’s failure to mention it. Given the ‘taxonomical’ approach to genre in the Poetics, if Euripidean plays had transgressed the generic limits of tragedy, Aristotle would, surely, have classiﬁed such plays as special cases.31 This is not to deny that certain features of Euripidean tragedy, and the escape-tragedies, were later to become features (even, perhaps, deﬁning features) of other genres. (This observation has been made of, in particular, Euripides’ inﬂuence on New Comedy.32) However, such similarities do not provide much illumination. Charles Segal’s inﬂuential and thought-provoking article on Helen may be used as just one example of this anachronistic approach. As Segal writes:33 In addition to its setting in the Egyptian never-never land, the play also includes the reunion of long-separated lovers, the loss and recovery of identity, the supernatural knowledge of a magician-like princess, and (like Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing and Cymbeline) a calumniated heroine whose virtue will carry her and her beloved through the perils of delusion and restore them to their own kingdom to live happily ever after . . . Euripides has intertwined these hoary and popular themes of the romantic plot with the sophistic intellectualism of his own day. 30 There may have been possible exceptions, such as Euripides’ Alcestis: see below (at n. 58). 31 Aristotle’s theory of tragedy in the Poetics is arranged by quasi-scientiﬁc ‘taxonomic’ principles, reﬂecting an interest in biological science and anatomy—and, seemingly, a belief that a work of literature may be dissected and made to correspond to an empirical reality. See Dale (1969) 139–41. 32 Satyrus’ Life of Euripides (P. Oxy. 1176 §10, fr. 39 VI = Kovacs (1994) 19) is an early source to note this inﬂuence, in terms of shared motifs such as recog33 nitions, rapes and reversals of fortune. Segal (1971) 556–7.

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Segal’s process of reasoning is back-to-front. All the features which seem to him to mark out Helen’s genre as ‘romance’ are ‘romantic’ only in the literature of substantially later periods: these themes were not ‘hoary and popular’ in 412 bc. The plotelements outlined here may indeed have become characteristic features of romance, which means that any history of the development of the romantic genre may include Helen (along with the Odyssey and other Greek poems from a variety of genres) among a list of antecedents of the form. However, while we can use Euripides to understand romance, we cannot properly use romance to understand Euripides. (The same is true of Shakespeare, whom Segal adduces, unconvincingly, as a parallel.) In other words, to label the escape-tragedies ‘romances’ because they have certain features in common with later romantic ﬁction is comparable in value to labelling them ‘pantomimes’ (because they contain songs and men dressed as women) or ‘soap-operas’ (because they are family sagas aimed at a mass audience). There are other imprecisions here. What, for instance, is a ‘never-never land’? The phrase was certainly not in use in classical Greece; and, in any case, Egypt is a perfectly real location, not an imaginary one. Even if one concedes that an Egyptian setting is unusually exotic for tragedy, the way in which Euripides uses that setting in Helen is quite diﬀerent from the use of landscape in Heliodorus, Apuleius, Lucian, Shakespeare and others.34 Other features which Segal takes to be characteristic of romance—recognitions, the disguise and recovery of identity, magic and the supernatural—are equally characteristic of tragedy, comedy, and epic, so cannot be said to be exclusively romantic. ‘Calumniated heroines’, too (if one wants to use such an expression), may be found in virtually all tragedies which feature female characters. Perhaps it is the reunion of lovers, in particular, that Segal sees as romantic; but here, too, he is wrong. Helen and Menelaus are not young lovers of the type found in romance, but a middle-aged, married couple.35 34 See Ch. 3 below for a discussion of the landscape and ‘sense of place’ in the escape-tragedies. 35 In other words, this is not erotic love but conjugal loyalty—a point well made by Konstan (1994) 177. Compare too Iphigenia, which is sometimes described as romantic: in that play, the reunited pair are brother and sister.

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If the genre of romance existed in 412, or if the characteristics of romance could be shown to correspond more closely to Euripides’ plots, then it might perhaps be acceptable to discuss the tragic texts as romances. But, as it is, the ‘romantic’ label (like the ‘melodramatic’ and the ‘tragicomic’) is not only anachronistic but vague and ill-deﬁned; it is used as a sort of metaphor to add rhetorical force to shaky arguments. Vagueness and lack of deﬁnition are, as I have said, the main faults of much existing criticism, especially the ‘relabelling’ approach. But, in this respect, we must return to our original label, ‘tragedy’. At the root of the problem is the fact that the words ‘tragedy’ and ‘the tragic’ may be used in three quite distinct senses, without its being at all clear which of those three senses is intended. The ﬁrst, original meaning—and the only one which should be used by scholars in connection with Greek literature—is rigorously historical: ‘tragedies’ are tragwid≤ai, those plays which were exhibited in the Athenian festival of Dionysus in the classical period. The second meaning is transhistorical but still broadly literary: a ‘tragedy’ is any work of (not necessarily dramatic) literature, from any period or context, which, by choosing to call itself a tragedy, deliberately identiﬁes itself with the high artistic tradition in Western literary and intellectual culture. The third sense is colloquial: a ‘tragedy’ is a sad event, usually perceived to be undeserved. The same terminology can be used, indiscriminately, to describe a play by Aeschylus, a play by Euripides, a play by Shakespeare, a play by Brecht, an opera by Wagner, a poem by Tennyson, a novel by Heine, an accident at Beachy Head, or the death of a breakfast television presenter. If it were the case that professional classicists used the term only in the ﬁrst sense, the problem would be less profound; but this is not the case. It may be that there has been so much slippage in the meaning(s) of ‘tragedy’ and the ‘tragic’ that it is impossible to avoid ambiguity when using these words. A more important factor is that many critics have found it attractive to align themselves with ‘high-brow’ culture for a variety of social and political, as well as intellectual, reasons. That is, critics of ‘tragedy’ can be perceived as the purveyors of high culture, the intellectual élite, working within a tradition which includes not just Greek antiquity but two and a half millennia of literature, philosophy and art. In this

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case, imprecise use of terminology may have considerable rhetorical eﬀect. (What depth of meaning can be added to the simplest of sentences by the addition of the word ‘tragic’! How much more weighty is ‘a tragic dilemma’ than a plain, commonor-garden ‘dilemma’; how many times more complex is ‘a tragic ﬂaw’ than any other sort of ‘ﬂaw’ . . .) Awarding or denying texts the appellation of ‘tragedy’ is tied up with the creation of ‘literature’, of a ‘canon’—a process which is inﬁnitely more complex, in social, historical, political and intellectual terms, than the study of a few texts from a speciﬁc point in Greek antiquity. The history of ideas in Western culture is a fascinating subject, but ultimately irrelevant to my topic. My concern is to understand Greek tragedy on its own terms. At this point, let us discard the notion that an entity called ‘the Tragic’ exists in, and characterizes, Greek tragedy.36 It is usually supposed that ‘the tragic’ is a particular type of Weltanschauung—a view of the human condition, or a distinctive theological or philosophical system. Because suﬀering and death loom so large in most tragedies, the popular conception of ‘the tragic’ is deeply pessimistic, even nihilistic. A ‘tragic vision’ of life might resemble (let us say) the words of the chorus in Oedipus the King: j° genea≥ brot0n, „ß Ëm$ß ÷sa ka≥ tÏ mhd†n z*saß ƒnariqm0. t≤ß g3r, t≤ß ån¶r plvon t$ß eÛdaimon≤aß fvrei ∂ tosoıton Òson doke∏n ka≥ dÎxant’ åpokl∏nai; tÏn sÎn toi par3deigm’ πcwn, tÏn sÏn da≤mona, tÏn sÎn, _ tl$mon OjdipÎda, brot0n oÛd†n makar≤zw.37 Alas, you generations of men!—I count your life as next to nothing! Who is there, what man is there who enjoys anything more than the mere semblance of happiness, and, after the semblance, the loss of it? Taking you as an example, your fate—yes, yours, wretched Oedipus— I say that no mortal is happy. 36 37

For variations on this view, see the essays in Silk (1996). Soph. OT 1186–96.

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This vision is found in at least one tragedy—in fact, moralizing sentiments of a similar tone can be located in a number of tragedies—but why assume that this, or something like it, is the underlying message of the whole genre? In fact, the construction (or postulation) of ‘the tragic’ should be seen as a product of the trend in intellectual history which I have just been describing; it is a tool to be used in the creation of the ‘canon’. The ancient critics did not discuss tragedy in terms of ‘the tragic’, just as they did not look for something called ‘the comic’ at the heart of comedy. (However, if Plato and Aristotle had been more preoccupied with comedy than tragedy, no doubt the critical tradition would have been correspondingly diﬀerent.38) On the (infrequent) occasions when ancient writers used the adjective tragikÎß, it generally bore the sense ‘of, or pertaining to, tragedy or tragic poets’, without any perceptible overtones.39 This is very disappointing for those who would look for ‘essences’.40 A notable occurrence of the word (and, seemingly, a unique occurrence of the superlative form) is found in Aristotle’s Poetics: he describes Euripides as tragik*tatÎß ge t0n poiht0n, ‘the most tragic of the poets’.41 However, this passage implies that ‘tragicness’ is directly related to sad endings—a suggestion which, as we shall see, does not hold water. It is incorrect to postulate ‘the tragic’ as something along the lines of a general philosophy which each play attempts to express in its own way. If that were the case, one could measure each tragedy as if on a sliding scale, measuring how thoroughly or how 38 Note that Aristophanes can be seen as engaging with, or reacting against, a tradition, active even in his own time, that tragedy is a more valid or important art form than comedy. See Taplin (1983); Bowie (1993) 217–27; Silk (2000). 39 tragikÎß as ‘pertaining to tragedy or the high style’: Hdt. 5.67, Ar. Peace 136, Isocrates 6.3, 48.6, 136.9, 168.6, Arist. Rhet. 3.3, 1406b8, Polyb. 5.26.9, Isaeus 5.36.2, 6.60.6–9, Andoc. Alc. 23.7, 42.5. In the rare sense of ‘sad’ (no 5thcent. uses): Xen. Eph. 3.1.4, Plut. Quaest. Conv. 8.1 (Mor. 717c). 40 According to Halliwell (1996), Plato’s view of ‘the tragic’ was a nihilistic philosophy of life which he repudiates; Halliwell has to resort to laborious archaeological work on the text, since as he admits (333–4) there is nowhere any explicit or fully worked-out statement of such a philosophy, either in Plato or elsewhere. Later he claims that ‘this vision need not be discoverable in all de facto members of the genre of tragedy’ (346); but, once again, if this ‘meaning’ may be separated from some of the thirty-two tragedies, how can we properly call it ‘the tragic’ ? 41 Arist. Poet. 1453a29–30: discussed by Lucas (1968) ad loc.

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successfully it expounds this philosophy of ‘the tragic’. This is what some critics explicitly try to do (see below); in others it is implicit. But one should not see the tragic as a sort of ‘ideal’ or quasi-Platonic ‘form’, with some plays being more or less ‘tragic’ than others. On the contrary, ‘the tragic’—if it exists at all—should be seen simply as a deﬁning feature which is either present or absent. All tragwid≤ai are ‘tragic’. Many critics who believe in the existence of ‘the tragic’ adopt an anachronistic way of reading the texts. Their implied model of ‘the tragic’, or ‘a typical tragedy’, is based on a few Greek tragedies, but also later so-called ‘tragedies’ from other traditions, as well as ethical, philosophical and psychoanalytic writing from a period of many hundreds of years. Few, then, would dispute that Agamemnon, Oedipus the King, Antigone, Medea and Hippolytus (for example) are tragic, because they seem more closely to resemble later ‘tragedies’, but there is less consensus on the ‘tragic’ status of many other tragwid≤ai. Page, in his introduction to the commentary of Denniston and Page on the Agamemnon, arranges Greek tragedies in a hierarchy reﬂecting the extent to which they correspond to a mid-twentieth-century conception of ‘the Tragic’.42 George Steiner lately takes an extreme line, talking about ‘tragedy pure and simple’—which for him means a bleakly nihilistic sort of vision to be found expressed, in varying degrees of concentration, by plays calling themselves ‘tragedies’: Sophocles’ Antigone, Euripides’ Bacchae, Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens, Racine’s Bérénice and Büchner’s Wozzeck are among Steiner’s few ‘pure’ tragedies.43 Such a broad model of ‘the tragic’, with its profound implications for life and literature in general, might appeal to some deep human instinct in us, but I would argue that it has only an indirect connection with Greek tragedy itself. Familiarity with the works of Shakespeare, Racine, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard and Freud (etc.) may make possible rich and fascinating discussion about comparative literature—but it can only hinder an understanding of Greek tragedies. It is simply unacceptable to deﬁne Greek tragedy by reference to one’s dozen or so favourite examples while regarding the rest as somehow deviant. An important point emerges from a discussion, in M. S. Silk’s 42 43

Denniston and Page (1950) xx–xxii. Steiner (1996) 535–42.

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volume Tragedy and The Tragic,44 between A. M. van Erp Taalman Kip and A. F. Garvie. ‘I am fairly convinced,’ writes the former, ‘that Aristotle would not have denied to Iphigenia in Tauris the predicate “tragic” (tragikÎn).’45 So Garvie: ‘If one were to ask Euripides himself to classify Iphigenia in Tauris, no doubt he would reply that of course it is a tragwid≤a (“tragedy”).’46 Yet both critics are uneasy because the Greeks seem to have been unaware of ‘what seems obvious to the modern reader’, that Greek tragedies included ‘very diﬀerent kinds of plays’—including those which modern readers ﬁnd untragic.47 This is essentially a restatement of an old problem. Compare Dale’s remark: ‘The Helen, though not tragic in our sense, is a Greek tragedy.’48 We can say with reasonable certainty that Helen, Iphigenia, Andromeda, Orestes and the rest were all produced at the City Dionysia as tragwid≤ai. Therefore no one would dispute that they are ‘tragedies’ in some sense— although (it is implied) not a very important sense. But why should ‘our sense of the tragic’—that manifold, complex, contradictory mass of received opinion—be of primary importance in a discussion of Greek tragedies? On the contrary, the most relevant sense in which the escape-tragedies, or any tragedies, were ‘tragic’ is the contemporary Greek sense. The plays exhibited by Euripides (and others) at the City Dionysia, which might now appear to be a disparate collection, were all called tragwid≤ai. If the tragwid≤ai do not correspond to ‘our’ notion of tragedy, that is too bad. ‘Tragedy’, and (if we persist in trying to locate the concept) ‘the tragic’, must be seen as identical to tragwid≤a—that is, as speciﬁcally historicized entities. Of course, twenty-ﬁrst-century critics cannot read the plays as ﬁfth-century Athenians did, however much we might try to discard preconceptions and anachronistic ‘baggage’; but it is worth making the attempt to get as close as possible to the historical context. In the remainder of this section, I give (for what it is worth) a historical deﬁnition of ‘tragedy’, attempting, as far as possible with the limited evidence, to show what 44 45 46 47 48

Silk (1996). Van Erp Taalman Kip (1996) 132. Garvie (1996) 139–40. Garvie (1996) 140. Dale (1967) ix. This is also the view of Knox (1979) 256–7 et al.

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Euripides’ audience understood by tragwid≤ai and how genre can aﬀect our reading of the escape-tragedies. A number of handicaps face anyone who wants to deﬁne Greek tragedy. One is that tragedy is perceived as being an entity too alarmingly big to deﬁne, or as something which perhaps, by its very nature, eludes deﬁnition.49 This is a refuge of the cowardly. Although there may be a grain of truth in such views, I think we can see that, in essence, they are a direct consequence of the critical opinions that I have been discussing. To stress the point: I am not trying to engage with ‘the tragic’ and the huge ediﬁce of the intellectual tradition, but only with Greek tragedies. The really important handicap, however, is that nearly all of the plays are lost, along with the whole experience of the ancient festivals—which means that no deﬁnition can be more than tentative and provisional. One modern theorist writes that a major problem of generic deﬁnition inheres in a certain circularity of approach: ‘one establishes such a deﬁnition on the basis of a few examples, and yet the choice of those examples from the multitude of possible ones implies a prior decision about the characteristics of the genre’.50 This method of working typiﬁes much writing about tragedy, as we have already seen. But the problem vanishes when we are dealing with tragedy in a historical, ﬁnite sense. Here it is not a matter of assigning specimen plays to a genre, because it is already known that they are tragwid≤ai. ‘Tragedy’ as we now have it is a tangible (and rather small) body of thirty-two plays by three playwrights:51 a careful reading of all those thirty-two plays will tell us something—although by no means everything—about the genre of which they were examples. My method, then, has been broadly empirical: that is, I have read all the extant plays and tried to ﬁnd elements which are common to them all. Since the 49 e.g. Mason (1985) 1: ‘It is of the essence of Tragedy that there can be no cut-and-dry propositions about it.’ Kirkwood on Sophocles (1958, 28) describes the deﬁnition of tragedy as ‘a pleasant but frustrating game’. 50 Dubrow (1982) 46. 51 This takes for granted that Rhesus is Euripidean and Prometheus Bound Aeschylean—matters which are far from certain. Perhaps we have the work of four or ﬁve tragedians instead of three; it is still only a fraction of the total. The problems of working with fragments are so great that, in the interests of space, I exclude them from this brief survey.

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thirty-two plays are actually quite heterogeneous, it should not come as a surprise that the results are not particularly interesting or illuminating. Another factor to take into account at the beginning is that the tragic genre underwent change and development over the course of a couple of centuries. It seems certain that for a tragedian writing in, say, 412 bc, more things were possible, or permissible, than for his counterpart eighty years before—a wider range of eﬀects, and increased freedom and ﬂexibility in the use of actors and chorus. The supposed position of Euripides in this process of development is another ‘fact’ which has had a serious inﬂuence on dramatic criticism. The current orthodoxy can be represented roughly as follows: Euripides, the last of the ‘great’ Athenian dramatists, was endlessly experimenting with the generic limitations and the dramatic possibilities of tragedy: his work must be seen in relation to its socio-political context of crisis, disillusionment and fragmentation. His later works in particular exhibit features which would have had no place in earlier tragedies, and which one should properly call romantic (vel sim.). These selfconsciously ‘late’ plays are not only generically impure but also inferior in quality; they ought not to be considered on the same terms as the more serious tragedies of old.52 This ‘received view’ of Euripides seems to derive ultimately from the views of ancient critics—including Aristophanes—and of Nietzsche, whose description of tragedy’s Todeskampf in the hands of Euripides has been excessively inﬂuential.53 However, there is no good reason to adopt that view. For the ancient biographical tradition is often demonstrably wrong; the bulk of it derives from the ‘evidence’ of comic playwrights who had their 52 This is a composite (but not, however reductive, entirely a caricature) of views contained in the majority of critical writings on Euripides over the last hundred years, including all the writers so far quoted. For a fuller survey of the critical tradition, see especially Collard (1981) and Michelini (1987). 53 Nietzsche (1872): see §4.2.1 below for more discussion. ‘Aeschylus’ in Aristophanes’ Frogs criticizes Euripides on several accounts (which notably do not include generic impurity): his dubious morality, his presentation of religion, his cleverness, the wantonness of his female characters, his sordid or ‘bourgeois’ subject-matter and his experimentation with new verse-forms and music; these are recurring criticisms throughout Aristophanes’ plays. Other ancient sources are quoted by Kovacs (1994) 82–9. It may be relevant to enquire why out of all the tragedians only Euripides, Aeschylus and Agathon appear in Aristophanes (perhaps it is simply that their style is more easily parodied).

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own particular and far from straightforward objectives.54 While old jokes about Euripides must reveal some basic truths about his work and its reception, the picture given in the comedies is exaggerated and distorted in ways that one cannot hope entirely to appreciate. Even if one were to accept the ancient evidence as literal truth, there is another reason not to subscribe unquestioningly to the standard view. It may be imprudent to deny that there is at least some value in this appraisal; but it is miguided to allow one’s views to be falsely patterned. Why should one conceptualize ‘development’ in terms of a triad consisting of Aeschylus–Sophocles–Euripides? Why perceive Euripides as a problematic and destructive tragedian, explaining all his idiosyncrasies and seeming irregularities as ‘products of their times’? In the ﬁrst place, as Mastronarde points out, change and development are signs not of a moribund, obsolescent genre but of a healthy, lively one.55 Furthermore, a teleological reconstruction of tragedy’s development based on a small, perhaps unrepresentative sample of plays is hazardous. One cannot chart patterns of change and pronounce on reasons behind them, except in a tentative, cautious way. A comparison of the extant tragedies of Euripides with those of Aeschylus and Sophocles does suggest that his were the most varied and innovative (to begin with, there are so many more of them). But it does not follow from those descriptions that they were heterodox or iconoclastic. The numerous lost tragedies of Sophocles and Aeschylus may have been equally varied and surprising as those of Euripides. Nor were these three writing in a vacuum. There were many other contemporary tragedians whose success and prominence was comparable—Phrynichus, Ion, Nicomachus, Aristias and Agathon, to name but a few—but whose characteristics and contribution to tragedy’s development are virtually unknown. In any case, there was no neat evolution.56 The surviving plays of Euripides do not correspond to a simple model of progressive experimentation or deconstruction. We 54 See Lefkowitz (1981) and Kovacs (1990) on uses of ancient ‘critical’ material. 55 Mastronarde (2000b) 27. 56 The problems associated with a teleoscopic model of tragedy’s development can be seen in the case of Aeschylus’ Suppliants, the ‘primitive’ features of which were once wrongly thought to date its production several decades too early: see Easterling (1997b) 151–2.

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have nothing from the ﬁrst twenty years of his career—his ﬁrst production was Daughters of Pelias in 455 bc57—but his earliest surviving play, Alcestis (438 bc), is found by critics to be most perplexing in terms of generic classiﬁcation and development.58 And what of Bacchae, produced after Euripides’ death (along with Alcmaeon in Psophis and Iphigenia at Aulis), and so possibly his last play of all? This contains some bizarre features, but no one denies that it is a tragedy. Can we believe that Euripides, having irrevocably altered, even ‘destroyed’, tragedy, returned to the straight and narrow at the end of his life?59 This seems a somewhat unnatural perspective. 57 Suda (s.v. EÛrip≤dhß); Gvnoß EÛrip≤dou ka≥ b≤oß (Kovacs (1994) 3–11) §15. The Rhesus has been considered to be a work of Euripides’ youth, but this (as, indeed, its authorship) is far from certain: S Rhes. 575; cf. Grube (1961) 439; Ritchie (1964). 58 The Alcestis is sometimes labelled ‘pro-satyric’ (e.g. Sutton (1980) 180–90). This nomenclature derives from the Hypothesis of Aristophanes of Byzantium, which ﬁrst states that Alcestis is rather akin to satyr-play, on account of its ‘happy ending’ (saturik*teron, Òti ejß car¤n ka≥ Ódon¶n katastrvfei par¤ tÏ tragikÎn), but continues that it is more like comedy (‹ ƒsti m$llon kwmwid≤aß ƒcÎmena). The value of this self-contradictory summary is questionable. Alcestis cannot be both satyric and comic. In fact, either description seems inappropriate. It cannot be a satyr-play because there is no chorus of satyrs, and it cannot be a comedy because comedies were not exhibited along with tragedies at the Dionysia. ‘Happy’ endings are found in several tragedies and are not, as Aristophanes of B. supposes, an invariable feature of comedy. One might be tempted to see Alcestis as generically a ‘special case’ because of its circumstances of production: we know that Alcestis was produced as the fourth play in a tetralogy consisting of Cretans, Alcmaeon, Telephus, Alcestis. Such a play was usually, but not always, a satyr-play (see n. 76 below), a fact which may have confused Aristophanes. However, its ﬁnal position in the tetralogy may not have been what caused Aristophanes to liken Alcestis to comedy or satyr: his Hypothesis to the unquestionably tragic Orestes uses the same terminology. Alcestis seems to me to be a tragedy which was produced instead of the satyrplay, which had become dispensable by this date (Seaford (1984) 24–5). It is not ‘pro-satyric’—a label with no good provenance—and it contains little of ‘satyric’ quality (cf. Dale [1954] xi–xii) except, perhaps, for the drunkenness of Heracles (drunkenness is listed by Seaford [1984, 33–44] and Sutton [1980, index s.v.] as a satyric motif). Nevertheless, for its comparatively early date it seems an innovative tragedy. 59 Dodds (1960, xl) asks: ‘Why did Euripides, tireless innovator and experimenter as he had always been, leave as his ﬁnal legacy to his fellow-countrymen this topical yet deeply traditional miracle-play, “old-fashioned” in style and structure as in the incidents it depicted?’ The common explanation (until the 19th cent.) used to be that Euripides was ‘recanting’ his earlier atheism—in other words, that Bacchae was a death-bed palinode. Dodds (xlvii) supposes that ‘the renewed contact with nature in the wild country of Macedonia . . . had

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Unless a substantial amount of new information should come to light, it is better to abandon teleoscopic models of tragic evolution—and to stop seeing Euripides as a problematic ﬁgure. Although his plays are undeniably inventive, clever (which need not be understood in a pejorative sense60) and often unexpected, Euripides can nevertheless be seen as doing the same sort of thing as his contemporaries did—that is, writing tragedies of various sorts.61 Euripidean tragedies should be interpreted along the same lines as any other Greek tragedies, rather than from an initial preconception that they are bound to be outré. ‘Tragedy’ incorporates what might seem to us to be a wide assortment of plays. This is, in part, due to the small number of possible genres in existence in classical Athens. Because every play had to be either a tragedy or a comedy or a satyr-play, each of those three genres inevitably had a broad range. Yet whatever it was, tragedy was not comedy or satyr-drama. Now it may be argued that an inverse deﬁnition is of limited practical usefulness;62 but nevertheless the genres were always distinct, and therefore in many areas it can be illuminating to compare and contrast the conventions of the diﬀerent genres (as, for instance, Aristotle does at various points in the Poetics).63 What resources were available to comedy, which to tragedy—and which to both released some spring in the aged poet’s mind, re-establishing a contact with hidden sources of power which he had lost in the self-conscious, over-intellectualized environment of late-ﬁfth-century Athens’. But this seems a rather questionable application of old-fashioned biographical criticism. See also Vellacott (1973) 29–38, Knox (1985) 318, etc., for the view that Euripides returned to writing ‘genuine’ tragedies at the end of his life. One ought at least to point out that Bacchae cannot be a ‘death-bed’ composition, unless one supposes that the poet knew he was going to be torn apart by dogs (or as it might be women . . .). 60 As Aristophanes (Knights 11–20, Lysistrata 368–9), Winnington-Ingram (1969) and Conacher (1998), for example, do. On the question of Euripidean sof≤a, see §4.2.2 below. 61 Kovacs (1987, 9–21) also argues for a ‘straight’ reading of Euripides. 62 When Violet Elizabeth Bott composes a crossword puzzle for William Brown, her clue for ‘dog’ is: ‘Oppossit of cat’ (Richmal Crompton, William in Trouble, London 1927, 80–2). As Silk (2000, esp. 42–97) argues, comedy and tragedy may deﬁne themselves in relation to each other, but there is no reason to see them as polar opposites. 63 It will be clear from what follows how much I have been inﬂuenced by Taplin’s (1986) synkrisis of tragedy and comedy, without ﬁnding myself in agreement with him on every point.

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genres? What could comedy and satyr-drama include that tragedy could not?64 It is clear that there are certain features in comedy and satyrdrama (use of less elevated or colloquial language, certain plot features, etc.) which are also to be found in tragedies of various dates. These features are sometimes used to ‘prove’ that certain tragedies—including the escape-plays—are not properly, or purely, tragic.65 But if certain elements appear in two or three genres, then they cannot be said to be deﬁning characteristics of only one genre—cannot be said, for example, to be ‘comic elements incorporated into tragedy’66—but must rather be seen as cross-generic features which tragedies, comedies or satyrdramas may include without sacriﬁcing their respective natures. It is what remains apart from these cross-generic features that deﬁnes comedy or tragedy.67 It is worth observing that, although the competitors were expected to produce both tragedies and satyr-drama, no one in the ﬁfth century wrote both tragedies and comedies. Nor did any tragic actors play in comedies, or vice versa.68 Socrates at the end of the Symposium, chatting with the tragedian Agathon and the comic poet Aristophanes, endeavoured to make them agree that the same man could write comedy and tragedy; but he was advancing a characteristically unorthodox and provocative viewpoint, not representing a current practice.69 That Euripides or Aeschylus might have written a successful comedy is not intrinsically ridiculous or impossible; after all, Shakespeare 64 Loss of material is again a problem, especially with satyr-plays, for which it is hard to ﬁnd a deﬁnite set of characteristics. Generally satyr is thought to be a sort of ‘playful tragedy’ (Demetr. de Eloc. 169: oÛd† g¤r ƒpino&seien £n tiß tragwid≤an pa≤zousan, ƒpe≥ sat»ron gr3yei ånti tragwid≤aß); cf. Seaford (1984, 1–7), who goes on to list some characteristics of satyr-drama based on the fragments and Cyclops; Taplin (1986) 163. 65 e.g. Sutton (1980) 185–90: he actually believes that Helen was the fourth play in its set and as such ‘burlesque’ or ‘prosatyric’. 66 Seidensticker (1978) and (1982). 67 Mastronarde (2000a, 17) asks a similar question: ‘even if the non-tragic (or extra-tragic) feature was identiﬁable as such by the intended audience, did its very presence and its juxtaposition with heterogeneous elements constitute a perceptible challenge to generic identity, or would the impurity be accepted as naturalized within the tragic genre?’ 68 Pl. Rep. 395a–b1. However, one Simus combined the profession of tragic actor with that of chef (Alexis, Linus fr. 140 PCG): cf. Sommerstein (2002) 154. 69 Pl. Symp. 223d1–6.

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composed both ‘tragedies’ and ‘comedies’ (albeit in the modern sense of the words).70 So there was presumably some not entirely literary reason behind it. (After all, there were strong political and religious elements to the City Dionysia: might the idea of being both a tragedian and a comedian have been in some way comparable to that of being, say, both a Methodist and a Catholic, or both a Socialist and a Tory?) Whatever the underlying reason, it is preferable to follow the ancients and to view comedy and tragedy as ‘mutually exclusive’ genres.71 Because the Athenian theatre was as agonistic as a chariot-race or discus event, it is interesting to wonder if there was ever a set of regulations governing the City Dionysia. Surely there must have been rules of a sort; in order to ensure a fair competition, the poets must have known what was expected of them.72 But what would the rules have looked like? (‘Competitors must each submit three ‘tragedies’, which are 〈?〉, and one ‘satyr-drama’, which is 〈?〉; they are forbidden to do the following things: 〈?〉. A chorus will be awarded to three candidates of merit. The competition will be judged on the following criteria: 〈?〉 . . .’) It is unlikely that anyone will ﬁnd out—just as we shall never discover the rules for deciding just who was allowed to compete in the Olympic Games—but there must have been a consensus on the matter, even if there was not a set of written regulations posted somewhere in Athens. Conventions and habits are not, of course, the same thing as ﬁxed generic rules, and there may have been a number of reasons why certain types of play and certain eﬀects were more common than others, including considerations of what worked in front of an average audience, what seemed to appeal to the judges, the fashion of the moment, reaction to one’s predecessors, and so on. Note also that the rules never seem to have altered over time: the number of categories and the organization of the competition remained the same (although there was later a prize for actors). 70 Nevertheless, it is hard to think of many other examples of playwrights who were successful in both genres. 71 The phrase of Taplin (1986, 163), who rightly emphasizes the polarity and lack of ‘blurring’ between tragedy and comedy—in disagreement with Knox, Seidensticker et al. 72 Sets of regulations do survive for the organization of certain (later, nonAttic) dramatic festivals: these relate not to the plays themselves but to the proceedings at the festivals, payment of participants and value of prizes. For example, CIG 2758–9 (Aphrodisias), SEG 38.1462b (Lycia), SEG 19.335 (Tanagra); cf. Csapo & Slater (1994) 186–206.

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Elements in generic deﬁnitions tend to correspond roughly to the dichotomy of form and content. Similarly, I shall arrange what follows under three headings. The ﬁrst heading (a) relates to all the formal, stylistic external features shared by the plays, and characteristics grouped under this heading appear as a set of deﬁnite, tangible features. The second heading (b) relates to the internal features of the plays themselves, and can be subdivided—on one hand (b1), their events, plot, characters and settings, and on the other hand (b2), ‘what the plays are about’: their meanings and the ways in which they aﬀect the audience.73 Nearly all available deﬁnitions of tragedy are concerned with the content—in particular, the ‘tone’ and ‘meaning’— rather than with the form of the plays. This reﬂects the perception that these qualities are the most obscure, diﬃcult and elusive. But a representative deﬁnition must take all areas into consideration. (a) Form. First of all, tragedy’s mode is dramatic (as opposed to, say, prose narrative or lyric), and tragedies are not properly ‘texts’ but performances on the stage, as the bulk of recent tragic criticism makes plain.74 Tragedies were exhibited competitively at the City Dionysia, the Athenian festival of Dionysus which took place annually in the month of Elaphebolion (March). It seems that there were three competition-days, each of which was given over to the work of a single playwright.75 On each day three tragedies (sometimes with a connected narrative or subjectmatter, sometimes unconnected) were usually followed by a satyr-play, but there were occasional divergences from this pattern.76 Tragedies were performed by either two or (by the time of Sophocles77) three male actors and a chorus of perhaps 73 Aristotle (Poet. 1447a16–18) says that genres diﬀer in three respects, what he calls ‘medium’, ‘materials’ and ‘mode’ (diafvrousi d† åll&lwn tris≤n, ∂ g¤r t0i gvnei ‰tvroiß mime∏sqai ∂ t0i 1tera ∂ t0i ‰tvrwß). ‘Medium’ and ‘mode’ correspond roughly to my ‘form’, ‘materials’ to my ‘content’. 74 e.g. Taplin (1977) and (1978), Rehm (1992), etc. 75 Pickard-Cambridge (1968, 64–74) gives the known information about the competition-days. Cf. Ar. Birds 786. 76 Euripides’ Alcestis (438 bc), the fourth play in its group, was a tragedy (but see n. 58 above); Aristias’ Wrestlers (467 bc), a satyr-play, seems to have been third in its group; Pratinas, according to the Suda (s.v.), exhibited ﬁfty plays of which thirty-two were satyric. 77 Arist. Poet. 1459a18–19; Csapo and Slater (1994) 221–4.

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nine, twelve or ﬁfteen.78 All the performers wore masks and grand costumes.79 It is likely that the acting and stage-presentation was very stylized, formal and un-naturalistic. There was little in the way of stage-decoration, scenery or props; thus ‘special eﬀects’ were limited.80 Tragedies were always composed in verse, using a mixture of iambic and lyric metres, divided into prologue, parodos, episodes, stasima, exodos, lyric exchanges or sung monodies by the actors.81 As for stylistic norms, the dialogue was formal and elevated: a feature which comedy found ripe for parodying. There seems to have been a growing tendency, as time progressed, towards a higher ratio of spoken to sung lines, greater naturalism in tragic dialogue, freer and more ﬂuid use of the chorus and more actors’ songs.82 In general, there is great variety of arrangement of episodes and lyrics, and there does not seem to have been a normative structure. The average length of plays may have increased with time.83 Comedy and satyr-drama, on the other hand, while they shared some of these external features (the dramatic mode, theatre, stage-properties, masked actors and chorus, iambic dialogue, lyric songs), had important formal diﬀerences. The performance conditions were diﬀerent (diﬀerent days or times at the festivals).84 In comedy, the costumes were more elaborate, sometimes incorporating huge phalluses; the use of metres was more widely varied;85 the chorus does not feature until 78

Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 135–231. Euripidean costumes were, seemingly, more striking—notably, the naturalistic clothing and props with which war-torn heroes were equipped (e.g. Menelaus, Phoenix, Oeneus, Telephus etc.). This tendency was mocked by Aristophanes (Ach. 393–489), who also depicted Euripides’ house as being full 80 See §3.1 below. of props and set-dressings. 81 Arist. Poet. 1452b14–27 lists all these ‘component parts’ (mvrh) as one would list parts of the body. 82 On colloquialism, see Stevens (1976), esp. 64–65; on song, Hall (1999) 96–122. 83 On the basis of the extant tragedies, the average length seems to have increased—e.g. Helen (1692 lines), Ion (1622), Phoen. (1763), Or. (1690), Oed. Col. (1779), compared with Pers. (1077), Seven (1078), etc. The partial nature of the surviving evidence prevents ﬁrm conclusions, as often. (Why might playwrights consciously have written longer plays? Possible reasons include a reaction to changing tastes or a move towards more complex plots.) 84 Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 69, 82–3. 85 See L. Parker (1997). 79

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comparatively late in each play, and plays a more prominent role in the stage action; the arrangement of dialogue and sung sections included a parabasis, not found in tragedy; the dialogue was more colloquial, often obscene, and funnier—there are virtually no jokes in tragedy.86 One criticism often made of the escape-tragedies is that their diction and mood is not suﬃciently ‘heavy’ for tragedy—meaning ‘sombre’ or ‘grim’. Some critics say that they are, wholly or in part, even ‘comical’.87 This supposed hilarity is often exaggerated by wilfully misrepresentative translations in English.88 However, there is virtually no stylistic diﬀerence between the escape-tragedies and other tragedies. It can be seen that the dialogue in Helen contains fractionally more colloquial expressions on average than other tragedies, but the evidence is hardly overwhelming (Iphigenia, on the other hand, contains slightly fewer colloquialisms).89 The tone is never exactly merry, and certainly not bawdy or burlesque (as comedy and satyr invariably were). The presence of ‘lighter’ moments in tragedy is harder to deny (partly because of the subjective judgement involved): from the escape-tragedies one calls to mind the scene between Menelaus and the portress in Helen, in which Menelaus is verbally and 86 Tragedy may perhaps have ‘light’ or even amusing lines or whole scenes (a characteristic, it is often alleged, of the escape-tragedies and Ion), but there seems to be only one joke (as such) in extant tragedy. The following bizarre exchange (Eur. Tro. 1049–50) takes place between Menelaus and Hecabe just as Menelaus prepares to take Helen away from the captured Troy: EK. m& nun ne°ß so≥ taÛtÏn ƒsb&tw sk3foß. | ME. t≤ d’ πsti; me∏zon br∏qoß ∂ p3roiq’ πcei; But is this a joke? Surely only Menelaus will be laughing. For diﬀering views on the matter, see S Tro. 1050, Seidensticker (1982) 90–1, Barlow (1986b) ad loc., Gregory (2000) 63 n. 22. 87 Vellacott (1973), Knox (1979), E. Segal (1995), Seidensticker (1978) and (1982), Hall (1996), Sutton (1980). 88 e.g. Vellacott’s translation (1973) of Helen; E. Segal’s (1995, 47) of Ion; West’s (1987) of Orestes (criticized in this regard by P. G. Mason in JHS 109 [1989] 220–2). Gregory (2000) is rightly critical of ‘comical’ mistranslations. See also §4.1 below for more on this aspect. 89 Stevens (1976) investigates the matter rigorously. See pp. 66–7 in particular for a statistical summary of the distribution of colloquialisms in all Euripidean plays. The percentage of lines containing a colloquial expression in relation to the total number of lines varies from 0.9 per cent (Rhesus) to 4.4 per cent (Heracles); the average is between 3 and 4 per cent; the ﬁgures calculated for Helen and Iphigenia, respectively, are 4.1 per cent and 2.4 per cent. Stevens admits (66–9) that the evidence is largely inconclusive.

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physically abused by the old woman.90 But before passing a judgement on this one must ask, ﬁrst, how ‘funny’ this really is; second, how diﬀerent it is from any other ‘light-hearted’ moments in tragedy; and third, what its purpose might be (assuming that it is not a momentary lapse from taste). First of all, then, the scene (and others like it) is not exactly as hilarious as some critics would have one believe. In fact, its implications for Menelaus’ heroism, and the meaning of the play, are grave.91 Nor—crucially—is the ‘humour’ of the same sort as that of comedy (or satyr-drama): neither Menelaus nor the portress is drunk, no one farts, no one suﬀers violence, and there is not a phallus in sight. One can compare Euripides’ scene with Aristophanes’ comic version of the same scene to observe the diﬀerences in content and linguistic register.92 Then there may be various other ‘light’ moments in the undisputed tragedies: compare the famous scene in Aeschylus’ LibationBearers, which has the nurse Cilissa describing the infant Orestes’ toilet-training; or the speech of the dithering Guard in Sophocles’ Antigone; or Menelaus’ remark about Helen’s weight in Trojan Women (see n. 86 above). However, as Gregory says, it is diﬁcult to decide what the ﬁfth-century Greeks would have found funny. Even when an ancient commentator identiﬁes an element, line or scene from tragedy as being gelo∏on (which is not often), the meaning of this adjective may vary: ‘funny’, ‘strange’ or ‘incongruous’ are all possible translations.93 It would be wrong to suppose that humour in tragedy is a distraction or an aberration; in fact, humorous elements, far from inhibiting the ‘correct’ response to a tragedy (if there is such a thing), may enhance it. This is, in essence, the view taken by Seidensticker in his Palintonos Harmonia. First of all, Seidensticker makes a very important and necessary distinction between ‘comical’, i.e. humorous, elements (‘komische Elemente’) and elements belonging to the genre of comedy (‘Komödienelemente’):94 his interest is with the former type. 90

Helen 437–82. See §4.4.2 below. 92 Ar. Thesm. 874–88. See Rau (1967) 53–65. 93 See Gregory (2000) 62–72, castigating Seidensticker (1978) and (1982) for not being suﬃciently rigorous in his identiﬁcation of what is ‘funny’. 94 Seidensticker (1982) 44. 91

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He believes that, in Helen and other plays, certain ‘comical’ elements or eﬀects exist in a fruitful tension with their context, which enhances the tragic eﬀect of the whole work.95 Seidensticker is probably right, though I think he is too inclined to ﬁnd humour where there is none: and again, how do we know which features the original audience (all of them? some of them?) would have perceived to be ‘komische Elemente’? Laughter is out of place in tragedy when it is untimely, but when it is deliberately evoked by the play it may be a valid response. It may be (as Taplin suggests, closely following Seidensticker) that the eﬀect is rather like chiaroscuro, in that moments of comparative light-heartedness both provide a momentary release from tension and also cast the grimmer, darker moments into sharper relief.96 Or perhaps the eﬀect is more unsettling, caused by a mixture of shock and horror as well as amusement—related, even, to fear and pity? This is akin to what we would call black comedy, a type of humour ‘marked by the use of morbid, ironic or grotesquely comic elements’ which have a bearing on the human condition and its awful predicaments.97 But however one might view the purpose of humour or ‘light’ elements in tragedy, their presence here and there (not just in the ‘problematic’ plays) means that we cannot call them anomalous. We simply cannot talk of such a thing as a ‘tragic tone’ of unrelenting grimness. Tragic language and expression in general were stylized and stately, but variations certainly existed. These external features, as well as prior knowledge of the performance context, give an unambiguous signal of a play’s generic status. Yet it is the internal features which tend to be thought to provide a more satisfactory deﬁnition. (b1) Content. The setting of tragedies is invariably what might be called a special ‘tragic world’, which has a far from straightforward connection with the ‘real’ world of contemporary classical Athens. The imagined time is the heroic past, and the precise setting is often a non-Athenian polis, although it might just as normally be a tent in one of the camps before Troy, a cave near 95 Seidensticker (1982): see esp. pp. 9–13 and 244. His title, referring to the attunement of opposite tensions (as of a bow or a lyre) is taken from Heraclitus (DK 22 B51: pal≤ntonoß [or pal≤ntropoß] Årmon≤h). Cf. Gregory (2000) 61–2. 96 So Taplin (1996). One might compare for this eﬀect, perhaps, the 97 ‘Drunken Porter’ scene from Macbeth. Charney (1978) 105–6.

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the Caucasus or a desert island.98 The escape-tragedies still belong to the distant mythological past of the Trojan War, but they are set in bizarre and exotic non-Greek locations. This is, admittedly, an unusual feature, but it is far from unique, and does not alter their tragic status (as some critics have maintained),99 since there was no ‘standard’ setting for plays of any genre. Contemporary Athens is never a setting; historic Athens only rarely.100 Nor are there are ever any real-life Athenian characters in tragedy. This provides another contrast with comedy, in which the dramatis personae often include real, living individuals (especially politicians, philosophers and poets— Cratinus was even a character in his own play Pytine (WineFlask) of 423 bc) and the normal setting is, at least ostensibly, the present-day city of Athens, though some comedies were not even set on earth (e.g. Birds, Frogs). A further diﬀerence between the genres lies in their respective relationships with their own created ‘world’. Comedy deliberately and regularly refers to its own ﬁctive status: the chorus and actors may at any time seem to speak in ‘the poet’s voice’,101 and attention is drawn to the actors, audience, costumes and theatre: one could never believe for long in the reality of the comic ‘world’. In particular, the parabasis of comedy is a formal way in which the dramatic illusion is ruptured. Such consistent selfconsciousness is quite foreign to tragedy.102 Both tragedy and comedy have an unusual relationship with real life. Aristotle describes tragedy as a mimetic art-form, in that it ‘represents’ reality;103 the precise way in which reality is represented is important if we are to understand tragedy’s 98

See §3.1 below for more discussion of tragic settings. e.g. Sutton (1980) 185; E. M. Hall (1997) xxiii. In fact, I shall argue below (Ch. 3) that the geography of the escape-tragedies contributes substantially to their meaning. 100 Eumenides is the only extant tragedy to be set (partially) in Athens; incidentally, it is the only tragedy incorporating a scene-change, the ﬁrst half being set in Delphi. Some titles of lost tragedies indicate an Athenian setting (e.g. 101 Theseus, Erechtheus). Cf. Goldhill (1991). 102 The essential contrast is explored at length by Taplin (1986) 165–73. However, tragedies could occasionally—though rarely—have moments of metatheatricality. An example is Eur. El.: see Davies (1998). Segal (1982) also ﬁnds a certain amount of metadramatic play in Bacchae. 103 Arist. Poet. 1449b24–29. The term m≤mhsiß is very problematic indeed: see Lucas (1968) ad loc. (with his ‘Appendix I’). 99

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‘world’ and the type of actions or words which were possible within it. As Aristotle puts it, tragedy is a representation not of what did happen (that would be history), but of what might happen, under special conditions with a close similarity to real life.104 It seems that tragedy was further away than comedy from the reality of everyday Athenian life (not that comedy’s ‘Athens’ is an accurate representation of the real city, either), and yet its ‘world’ is not exactly ﬁctional. It is to be seen as somehow analogous to the real world, since one of its purposes is to explore and problematize current concerns about the real polis and real human behaviour in social, political and religious spheres. What is it about tragedy’s ‘world’ and its subjects which makes this almost paradoxical purpose possible? The subject-matter and characters of tragedy will help to explain it. They are taken, almost without exception, from the ‘traditional, widely-known stories’ of Greek mythology—what Aristotle calls the pareilhmmvnoi mıqoi.105 The Greeks’ attitude towards their myths—treating them as not only historical but also as highly meaningful in terms of their own lives—is crucial. However, not every mıqoß (‘myth’) was suitable for tragedy, and there is a deﬁnite pattern to be seen. Tragedy uses a limited range of myths with certain features in common: these features may tell us something about what tragedy was ‘about’. Most simply, all tragedies show a constant preoccupation with death, suﬀering and grief. Sometimes there is a high body-count; or sometimes (as in the escape-tragedies and several other plays) none of the main characters dies, or the anticipated catastrophe fails to materialize, but nevertheless death and anguish are always in the foreground.106 The characters and the chorus of all tragedies spend a great number of lines discussing the reasons for their (actual or foreseen) death and suﬀering, and giving expression to the grief aroused by their various situations. 104

Arist. Poet. 1451a36–b5. Ibid. 1453b22. Discussed at length in §2.2 below. 106 The extant tragedy with the highest number of deaths is Euripides’ Heracles (ﬁve), closely followed by Medea and Phoenician Women (four). In ten of the extant tragedies (Aesch. Pers., Suppl., Eum., Soph. Phil., Eur. Andromache, Ion, Or., Helen, Iphigenia, Iphigenia at Aulis) all of the main characters survive death. The average body-count per play is 1.34: Euripides kills oﬀ the most characters (1.44 per play), compared with Sophocles (1.43) and Aeschylus (1). 105

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Speciﬁcally ‘tragic’ myths, then, must in some way contain elements of death and suﬀering; but they can also be summarized under a limited number of headings. Many tragic plots centred on war. A particularly common subject was the Trojan War;107 this is signiﬁcant in view of the similarity which Aristotle sees between the genres of tragedy and epic.108 But, more strikingly (as Aristotle also recognizes),109 most tragic plots are concerned with suﬀering which occurs within philia-relationships: that is, when family members or friends harm each other. On one calculation, only six extant plays do not have plots centring on harm to friends or family,110 while the other twenty-six dramatize destructive or painful acts (including the threat or attempt of such acts) inﬂicted against blood-kin, or within other reciprocal relationships (marriage, suppliancy or guest-friendship). Aristotle says that the best (not all) tragic plots centre on ‘a few families’.111 Chief among those ‘few families’ ﬁgured the house of Atreus,112 the house of Oedipus,113 and the house of Heracles;114 other popular ‘tragic’ families included that of Alcmaeon, Meleager and Telephus. It is clear that the escape-tragedies ﬁt into this group: the violation of philia-relationships in Pelopid family history is prominent throughout Iphigenia, and the threat that Iphigenia will kill her brother is frighteningly real; Helen too contains an episode of narrowly averted kin-killing, where Theoclymenus attempts to murder his sister Theonoe; Andromeda’s heroine was very nearly sacriﬁced, like Iphigenia, by her own father. Tragic plots include certain recurrent motifs or patterns: for example, sacriﬁce, supplication, slavery, revenge, usurpation 107 Fourteen of the extant plays (Aesch. Ag., Eum., Ch., Soph. Ajax, El., Phil., Eur., Andromache, Hec., Tro., El., Or., both Iphigenias, Rhes.) and numerous other known titles are in some way connected to the Trojan War theme. 108 Arist. Poet. 1449b9–10, 1459a17–1462b19. 109 Ibid. 1453b19–25. 110 These six are: Aesch. Pers., Soph. Ajax, Eur. Alc., Tro., Andromache, Rhes. Belﬁore (1998) 151–3 presents a complete schematic summary of the 111 Arist. Poet. 1453a18–22. plays’ fil≤a relationships. 112 The subject of eight extant plays (Aesch. Ag., Ch., Eum., Soph. El., Eur. El., Or., Iphigenia, Iph. Aul.) and various other known titles. 113 The subject of ﬁve extant plays (Aesch. Seven, Soph. Ant., OT, Oed. Col., Eur. Phoen.). 114 The subject of three extant plays (Soph. Trach., Eur. Her., Hcld.).

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and recognition.115 Many plot-motifs involve philia-relationships, especially the perversion of normal relationships, marriage, childbirth and so on: incest, parricide, matricide and infanticide ﬁgure large. Then there is violence—suicide, hanging, stabbing, blinding, mutilation—not to mention madness, sickness and disease, often described in terms of divine punishment. Other themes are, again, related to the waging of wars: victory and defeat for individuals and cities, and the cruel aftermath of war. One might well be tempted to deﬁne tragedy as (simply) the dramatization of a range of traditional stories from mythology. This would apply to almost all the plays (with the exception of a few ‘historical’ tragedies, such as Aeschylus’ Persians and Phrynichus’ Sack of Miletus, and a few oddities such as Agathon’s ‘ﬁctional’ Antheus).116 An important consequence of this fact is that many of the audience will already have known before they watched a tragedy more or less what was going to happen in it. This feature of tragic plots is not simply an interesting curiosity: it is an absolutely essential integral feature of the genre. It may be apposite to quote a classic interview with Alfred Hitchcock to illustrate what I mean. Let us suppose that three men are sitting in a room in which a ticking bomb has been planted. It is going to go oﬀ in ten minutes. The audience does not know it is there, and the men do not know it is there either. So they go on talking inanely of the weather or yesterday’s baseball game. After ten minutes of desultory conversation the bomb goes oﬀ. What is the result? The unsuspecting audience gets a surprise. One surprise. That’s all. Suppose the story were told diﬀerently. This time, while the men still do not know the bomb is there, the audience does know. The men still talk inanities, but now the most banal thing they say is charged with excitement. The audience wants them to get out of the room, but they talk on, and when one ﬁnally says, “Let’s leave,” the entire audience is praying for them to do so. But another man says, “No, wait a minute. I want to ﬁnish my coﬀee,” and the audience groans inwardly and yearns for them to leave. This is suspense.117 115

Compare Burian (1997) 181–91 for a ‘typology of plot’ in tragedy. I discuss tragedy’s myths and plots in more detail in §2.2 below. 117 Alfred Hitchcock, ‘A Master of Suspense explains his Art’, Life, 13 July 1959 (repr. in Gottlieb [1995] 45–9). An interesting discussion of suspense (die Spannung) in tragedy is given by Fuchs (2000). 116

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Hitchcock might almost be describing the reactions of the audience sitting in front of Oedipus the King or Medea . . . they know more or less exactly what is around the corner, and it is fearful. When Agamemnon at last returns to Argos, we groan inwardly as we yearn for him not to step into the bathroom; we pray that Oedipus will not after all undertake his investigation into the murder of Laïus . . . but in vain. Tragedy is about suspense rather than surprise; it is about groaning, yearning and praying. The response called for by a tragedy is not to wonder what is going to happen, but rather to consider, to go over the implications of, what is certainly going to happen. This general rule, then, can be seen to have important implications in terms of the interpretation of meaning. What types of characters are depicted in the traditional myths of tragedy? They are ‘better than us’,118 mostly men and women of royal or aristocratic status, Greek or barbarian, from the heroic age; but they also include slaves. It is interesting to note that women and slaves, who in the real city of Athens had little social or political inﬂuence, in tragedy are presented in a provocative way, with an articulate voice and distinctive views. (As Hall writes, discussing the ‘sociology of Athenian tragedy’, the plays do their thinking ‘in a form vastly more politically advanced than the society which produced them’.119) The characters of comedy, by comparison, are more lowly, representing ‘typical’ Athenians, farmers, jurymen, tradesmen and so on.120 Gods are characters in both genres; but they are treated rather diﬀerently, as one might expect. The gods of comedy are very similar to the human characters: they have power, but not dignity or unfathomability. The gods of tragedy are more like the gods of the Iliad: they may have some human characteristics, but essentially they are irreconcilably diﬀerent. Whether drunk and disorderly (as Heracles in Alcestis), conspiratorial (as Athena in Rhesus), or terrifying (as Aphrodite in Hippolytus), they remain immune from harm, dangerous, wilful, unfathomable entities with immense power over human lives.121 118

Arist. Poet. 1448a1–5. E. M. Hall (1997) 125. 120 See Ehrenberg (1943). 121 I return to the divine world-view of tragedy (in a somewhat speciﬁc sense) in Ch. 5 below. 119

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A word on the choruses of tragedy. Their identity varies widely—they may be citizens of the polis in which the tragedy is set, sailors, Bacchants, young women, eﬀete old men, and so on—but they are generally people with no more than a tangential connection with the main characters or the events (although—as in the escape-tragedies—they usually stand to be aﬀected, for good or evil, by the outcome). They oﬀer comment and occasional advice, they may perform the function of witnesses or keepers of secrets, they sing lyric songs connected to the action and themes of the play, but they never obtrude signiﬁcantly into the action or decisively aﬀect the plot. The chorus may be hostile to the principal characters (for example the Theban elders in Antigone) or sympathetic (like the young women in Helen and Iphigenia, who share the nationality and various other interests of the heroines). In one extant play only—Aeschylus’ Suppliant Women—the chorus (of Danaids) is the principal character.122 By contrast, the choruses of comedy are more active and more vociferous; they may express views as if through the mouthpiece of the poet himself (usually in the parabasis), and they may be theriomorphic (birds, frogs, ants, storks and others are attested). There is something else which might usefully be said about the plots and events of tragedy: that virtually nothing happens in most Greek tragedies. (Not only that, but there is also virtually no detail which can be described as incidental or ﬁctional: everything seems to have some point, or some meaningful connection with real life or myth.) The bulk of the lines consist of attempts to make sense of what has happened, speculation about what is yet to happen, and the expression of grief, sorrow and horror. What Aristotle described as the representation of action is really no more than the words of characters standing, without much movement, on a small stage. Most of the signiﬁcant actions in each tragedy are imagined to have taken place oﬀ-stage and are reported in messenger-speeches or in the course of dialogue—a narrative rather than mimetic presentation.123 The strangely non-active nature of tragedy is remarkable, and one might well 122 This, a supposedly ‘primitive’ feature, used to be taken as evidence placing this play at a very early stage in the development of tragedy, but now it must be described simply as ‘uncommon’, following the discovery of a papyrus fragment (P. Oxy. 2256.3) deriving from the didaskaliai, which securely places the production of Suppl. at a date around 463. See TGF 1 (Snell) 44; Garvie 123 (1969) 1–4; Kitto (1961) 1–3. See de Jong (1991).

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wonder why hardly anything happened on stage. One reason might have been the technical limitations of the theatre of Dionysus. Some of the events of Greek mythology and tragedy—ﬂying horses, maritime battle-scenes, sieges and so on—could only be represented convincingly by the resources of big-budget modern cinematography; so perhaps the formal, non-realistic acting and lack of ‘action’ proper represented a means to avoid representing more than was practicable: it was to be left to the imagination rather than run the risk of seeming ridiculous.124 Nor was it usual to show deaths on stage, perhaps for reasons of delicacy (although Ajax, for example, does, so it must not have been unknown). Nevertheless, it would have been possible to show much more on stage; and some of the actions which did make it into the theatre—divine epiphanies, ﬂying horses and suchlike from the mechanical crane (mhcan&)—were faintly absurd and (literally) creaky. So the limitations on stage action must have been, at least to some degree, a matter of conscious choice or convention rather than necessity. Then there is the matter of tragic closure: is there a characteristic way in which tragedies tend to end? ‘Happy’ and ‘unhappy’ endings are often mentioned in deﬁnitions: it might be that tragedies have ‘unhappy’ endings and comedies ‘happy’ ones. But as soon as one begins to deﬁne what is meant by ‘happy’ or ‘unhappy’, it becomes clear that the antithesis is too problematic to be useful.125 Suppose that an ‘unhappy’ ending is one which involves death or catastrophe for the main characters. Aristotle’s opinion was that the best sort of tragic plot had a character like ourselves passing from good to bad fortune.126 But Aristotle is talking not of tragic plots in general, but about one type of tragic plot which appeals to his own personal tastes: he makes it clear that there are other tragedies with quite diﬀerent reversals of fortune, including situations where characters passed from bad to good fortune.127 In a signiﬁcant number of extant tragedies (as 124 Arist. Poet. 1459a22–9 and 1460a11–17 discusses the choice of events which can properly be represented on stage and the means of doing this. 125 Dunn (1996) is concerned with tragic closure in a more nuanced way. 126 Arist. Poet. 1453a. 127 Since the tradition contained myths with both positive and negative outcomes, it is not at all surprising that tragedies based on these myths had both positive and negative outcomes: a point well made by Mastronarde (2000b) 29–33.

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I noted above), no main character dies and no catastrophe occurs: Aeschylus’ Suppliant Women and Eumenides, Sophocles’ Philoctetes, Euripides’ Ion, Orestes, Helen and both Iphigenias ﬁt this description. Aristotle’s discussion of Euripides refers approvingly to his penchant for ‘unhappy’ endings, which people had criticized—this implies that many people expected ‘happy’ endings. So it is clearly inaccurate to say that tragedy was characterized by ‘unhappy’ endings of this type. It is not even certain whether the concept of peripeteia is particularly apt in the case of all tragedies.128 But are the tragedies in which no death or disaster occurs to be described as ‘happy’? Helen and Iphigenia, as their detractors frequently note, have ostensibly ‘happy’ endings, in that the heroines and their rescuers all get away from their places of captivity and (literally) sail oﬀ into the sunset; but I would argue that few audience members would have failed to be deeply disturbed by the events leading up to these conclusions, the strangely unsatisfying nature of the imposed ‘resolutions’ and the worrying implications of what they had seen. No main character dies in Helen or Iphigenia, but the threat of death, and of familial murder, is real enough; and lots of minor characters die at the end of Helen, which I believe we are meant to take seriously. A properly ‘happy’ ending is what one ﬁnds at the end of a Savoy Opera, a P. G. Wodehouse novel or (perhaps) a Shakespearean ‘comedy’, where all the characters are thoroughly contented and there is a marriage or a party of some kind. Some Aristophanic comedies have happy endings of this type, but not all—Clouds, for example, disintegrates into arson and violence—so it cannot be said without reservation that comedy’s endings are all ‘happy’. It seems, then, that notions of ‘happy’ versus ‘unhappy’ are inappropriate. However, Taplin believes that, with a slight change in terminology, a closural contrast may still be drawn between tragedy and comedy. His antithetical deﬁnition contrasts comedy’s ‘closed, wrapped-up, reassuring’ endings with 128 Burnett’s (1971) discussion of Euripides’ later plays is based on a reﬁnement of the Aristotelian categories. She identiﬁes a pattern of ‘mixed reversal’ in several plays, including the escape-tragedies: this pattern is made up of a mixture of major and minor peripeteiai from good to bad fortune and vice versa. (On the escape-tragedies, see especially Burnett’s discussion on pp. 47–100.)

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tragedy’s ‘open, disturbing, unsettled’ ones.129 This is better than previous deﬁnitions, but is not entirely accurate. Tragedies are arguably unsettling, but that is not the same as an ‘open’ or partially resolved closure. Nor is it true to say that comedy’s endings are always completely ‘closed’. Another consideration is the trilogic arrangement of certain tragedies: in connected sequences, the closure of the ﬁnal play would have been more ‘wrapped-up’ than that of the preceding two. This is suggested by the only surviving trilogy, the Oresteia, in which the ﬁrst and second plays end disastrously (or, as one might say, on a question mark), but the ﬁnal play has a celebratory closure. It is, then, important to remember apropos of closure that one may be dealing with only part of a complete work of art (and that, of course, real closure would have been provided by the satyr-play in any case).130 (b2) Meaning. Most tragic criticism, whatever its particular slant, represents a basically hermeneutic approach: it wants to discover what tragedy is about. Nevertheless, ‘meaning’ is a slippery thing. What sort of ‘meaning’ might one expect from a serious play? (For tragedy, as Aristotle observed, is unquestionably a serious genre.131) Tragedies often have an explicitly intellectual content. Indeed (as I shall argue in a later chapter), the plays could be used as vehicles for the presentation of serious philosophical ideas. One would not expect that all tragedies would have been comparably (or at all) philosophical; but there is ample evidence from antiquity that serious poetry in general, and tragedy in particular, was thought to be concerned with moral or ethical issues. Take, for example, the argument of Plato in the Republic, which is based on the power of (especially tragic) poetry to inculcate the wrong as well as the right moral values in its audience.132 Others in antiquity took tragedies as being ‘about’ ethical or political issues. It seems to have been an accepted practice in forensic oratory to use passages from tragedies by way of illustrating an argument on a theme. This is seen, for example, in 129 130 131 132

Taplin (1996) 196. I return to the question of connected trilogies in §1.2 below. Arist. Poet. 1449b24. Pl. Rep. 595c1–2; 606e1–5. See further §4.2.1 below.

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Demosthenes’ On the False Accusation. Because Aeschines had been unable to produce witnesses in support of his accusations, he had quoted poetry to the jury; Demosthenes retaliated by quoting lines from Sophocles’ Antigone to make a point against Aeschines, saying: ‘it is the enviable privilege of third-rate actors to come on as tyrants, carrying their royal sceptres. . . . Now you shall weigh the merits of the verses which were specially written by the poet for the character of Creon–Aeschines.’133 Demosthenes’ listeners were, evidently, expected to have a conception of Antigone as being ‘about’ tyranny, if his rhetoric was to have been eﬀective. Similarly, Aristophanic comedy represents a belief that tragedies were ‘about’ underlying issues. The character ‘Aeschylus’ in Frogs reveals that his Persians was ‘about’ (in fact, that it taught) patriotism,134 and to Strepsiades in Clouds the Aeolus of Euripides was ‘about’ sibling incest.135 Euripides’ perceived unpopularity in antiquity may be partly due to his perceived immorality or heterodoxy (and, therefore, his unsuitability as a moral teacher). An inﬂuential modern critic, Malcolm Heath, argues forcefully for the idea that tragedy was not there to provide an intellectual, cognitive or didactic function, but simply to give pleasure and emotional stimulus through the Aristotelian evocation of fear and pity—although ‘ideas’ might be an ‘ancillary pleasure’.136 Heath quotes a variety of texts to support the view that tragedy was primarily aesthetic:137 he notes, particularly, that Aristotle’s Poetics does not include an intellectual dimension in his deﬁnition of tragedy.138 There is perhaps something to be said for Heath’s interpretation. It is true that the ‘meanings’ found by ancient readers of tragedy are often elementary or banal 133

Demosth. De Falsa Leg. 246–9. Ar. Frogs 1026–7: AI. e”ta did3xaß Pvrsaß met¤ toıt’ ƒpiqume∏n ƒxed≤daxa | nik$n åe≥ toŸß åntip3louß (‘and after this, when I put on my Persians, I taught them always to be eager to defeat their adversaries’). 135 Ar. Clouds 1371–2: Aeolus is also mentioned at Frogs 1081 as an example of the perceived immorality of Euripidean tragedy. 136 Heath (1987), esp. 1–36. 137 Heath also cites Pl. Grg. 501e–502d (for the view that poetry is in essence no diﬀerent from the titillating skills of the pastry-cook, and that moral aims come second to pleasure); but this view, rather than being characteristic of Plato in general, does not sit easily alongside the argument in the Republic, which is clearly based on the premise that tragedy—unlike cakes—did alter its audience’s 138 intellect or moral outlook. Heath (1987) 3–39. 134

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(as above), and that, ultimately, any ‘meaning’ may simply depend on the ‘uses’ made of a text by its various motley readers, or the contexts which one might choose to emphasize.139 Furthermore, the fact that many tragedies struck their audience as being full of ideas does not prove that those ideas were a deﬁning feature of tragedy as a whole. I think it is probably better to say simply that tragedy is many things to its diﬀerent audiences. It seems fairly obvious that the plays were written to provide pleasure and to advance intellectual, political and religious ideas. One’s individual approach to a particular play may privilege one aspect over another, but there is no need to disregard any aspect when looking for deﬁnitions. The inﬂuence of ‘French school’ structuralism has been an impetus to examine and question the way in which meaning is conveyed by a text. Rather than relying on a surface literalism or a (perhaps naïve) intentionalism, this type of criticism relies on a combination of methods, linguistic and anthropological. For such critics, tragedies (and speciﬁcally tragic myths) are seen as one expression of a deep structure or framework of codes which make up the society in which they were written: it is those underlying patterns rather than the surface literalism which are of interest. Tragedy has been inﬂuentially described, by Vernant, Lévi-Strauss and others, as a system of tensions and opposition. This is diﬀerent from the ‘tragic conﬂict’ which earlier critics found to be an essential feature of the genre: the ‘conﬂict’ of Goethe, Murray, Kitto, Lesky and others was the clash between humans and gods. But, for the structuralists, the ‘conﬂict’ is seen as being speciﬁcally a product of the ﬁfth century in Athens, a society in ﬂux. Vernant describes the ‘historical moment of tragedy’ as a period of tensions, conﬂicts and development in society, politics and law; a time when a gap was widening between the mythological-historical tradition and evolving political-legal thought.140 I wrote above that speciﬁcally ‘tragic’ myths embody a particular attitude towards society. A major achievement of structuralist criticism is to identify this typically tragic attitude as a problematic vision of the world: tragedies, like other texts, produce their meaning through a system of linguistic and social structures and codes, but, crucially, they are 139 On fourth-century ‘uses’ of tragedy for rhetorical or didactic reasons, see 140 Wilson (1996). Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1988) 23–7.

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seen as problematizing the structures themselves, paradoxically both embodying and questioning the normative codes. The endproduct may be a form of justiﬁcation, or redeﬁnition, of the established code and values, or perhaps a negation of those values (depending on whether one prefers a positive or negative interpretation). These plays came into being as part of the festival of Dionysus, which naturally might lead one to wonder whether Dionysus, or ‘the Dionysiac’, ﬁgures in the subject-matter or ‘meaning’ of tragedy. The matter has been endlessly debated, with no ﬁrm conclusion, and has been revived in the light of the structuralist criticism mentioned above.141 Apart from Bacchae, tragedy does seem to have nothing to do with Dionysus in particular: that is, he is largely absent from the imagery, myth and dramatis personae of the plays.142 Therefore, if tragedy really has something to do with Dionysus, it will have to be found ‘beneath the surface’, on the basis of a metaphorical, allegorical or structuralist reading. Vernant and others see the ‘Dionysiac’ in tragedy as an element of ambiguity and transgression: ‘one of Dionysus’ major characteristics is constantly to confuse the boundaries between illusion and reality, to conjure up the beyond in the here and now, to make us lose our sense of selfassurance and identity.’143 This corresponds very closely with his own interpretation of tragedy as an ambiguous, questioning genre, but is it correct? Can it really be maintained with certainty that Dionysus stood for all of that in classical Greece, or that there was a widely held notion of something called ‘the Dionysiac’? A modern (or even postmodern) Dionysus might well embody characteristics of ‘otherness’ and unanswered questions, but the vagueness of this concept of the Dionysiac will cause concern to many critics.144 141 Plut. Quaest. Conviv. 615a is often quoted in relation to this problem: he represents the view that tragedy had nothing to do with Dionysus (oÛd†n prÏß tÏn DiÎnuson). Also see: Winkler and Zeitlin (1990); Easterling (1997b) 43–53; Friedrich (1996); Seaford (1994) and (1996); Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1988) 181–8. Scullion (2002) now gives a radically negative view of this problem, arguing, against Seaford and others, that tragedy had nothing whatsoever to do with Dionysus or ritual; the connection came about (he says) largely because of the name of the theatre in which the plays were held. 142 Scullion (2002, 110–12) gives a full summary of the available evidence. 143 Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1988) 187–8. 144 Also, as Seaford (1994, 363–6) points out, the ambiguity of Dionysus and

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If all this is true, then a search for meaning must take the form of literary excavation-work, going ‘beneath the surface’ of the texts and looking for codes. But one might well feel uneasy at a type of interpretation which is so imprecise, even impressionistic, and which pays little attention to the ‘surface’ of the texts themselves. As I have already made clear, the extent to which one can really ﬁnd overarching patterns and hermeneutic essences (whether or not we actually refer to them as ‘the Tragic’) in our heterogeneous collection of plays is limited. If we still want to ﬁnd a single ‘message’ common to all thirty-two plays, it will have to take a form so simple as to seem almost banal: tragedies explore human suﬀering. Of course, this basic truism is nothing so elaborate as a Weltanschauung or a philosophical vision. There is no reason, indeed, why one should expect plays about suﬀering to have the same outlook on the world. The range of possible eﬀects may extend from profound pessimism to a more healthy outlook on life and the world. Tragedies might teach one to ‘know one’s place’, in social or cosmic terms, thus ﬁtting into the general pattern of Greek ethical maxims such as ‘knowing oneself’ and ‘not succumbing to excess’ (maxims which also have a place in many tragic plays). Tragedies were performed as the centrepiece of a major civic festival, attended by thousands of people from many other states outside Athens—a festival which in every other major aspect seems to have drawn attention to the glory of human (speciﬁcally Athenian) achievement. So it would be strange if these tragedies were an institutionalized form of mourning for the futility of mankind, a negation of human achievement. The alternative, an opportunity for a salutary examination of life, seems just as possible. But we must be aware that the plays are, simply, diverse.145 One ought to get away from generalities and progress to the particular: the meanings of each individual play and trilogy are of far more interest than ‘the irresolution should not be privileged: often, he says, one does get resolution and aﬃrmation. For Seaford, one of the most important types of plot involves the ‘Dionysiac self-destruction of the ruling house’, which leads to communal cohesion of polis-ritual: but he is careful to emphasize that this is ‘an important feature’ of tragedy, and not ‘a formula that illuminates every tragedy’ (1994, 344). 145 Vickers (1973) 41: ‘Once you’ve seen (or read) one Greek tragedy, you have thirty-one to go.’

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tragic’ would be, even if it existed. Indeed, if the major purpose of each tragedy were to express an unchanging ‘basic message’ of the genre, they would be very dull dramas. It is time for a brief conclusion. I have oﬀered a deﬁnition of Greek tragedy into which the escape-tragedies do comfortably ﬁt; but, as I warned at the outset, this deﬁnition has told us very little. Does this mean, then, that it makes little diﬀerence whether we call our plays escape-tragedies or not? On the contrary: there is a crucially important point still to be made. Although the terms ‘tragedy’ and ‘the tragic’ in themselves may not have very much meaning, it makes all the diﬀerence to call Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia ‘tragedies’. Genre will not provide us with magical elucidation of the plays, but it will profoundly aﬀect the way in which we look at them. The critical tradition, as we have seen, has consistently failed to take the escape-tragedies seriously. Tragedies are (as Aristotle says) serious dramas: and the relabelling as ‘un-tragic’ of plays which one does not like is simply an excuse to dismiss them without giving them substantial, profound consideration. But the escape-tragedies are worth prolonged, serious attention. This, and perhaps this alone, is the reason why it is worth making a fuss about genre. 1.2 ESCAPE -tragedies I should explain why I have chosen to discuss Andromeda, Helen and Iphigenia among the Taurians all together, calling them the ‘escape-tragedies’. The discussion above will have made it obvious that this nomenclature does not reﬂect anything in the way of a distinct generic status or a classiﬁable type, or subcategory, of tragedy. Rather, it seemed natural to examine the three plays as a group simply because of their similarity in subject-matter. It is not often observed that captivity and escape are highly unusual subjects for tragedy. In fact, the escape-theme is almost unparalleled in extant tragedy. While it is true that (as we have seen) tragedies were always greatly varied in their subject matter, and that a motif of ‘catastrophe survived’ characterizes

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several Euripidean tragedies,146 nevertheless escape from imprisonment or oppression is a remarkable subject for a tragedy even of this sort. It is necessary to add the qualiﬁcation that other lost works may have been concerned with escape,147 but it seems likely that these three tragedies were outré in their very conception.148 Euripides evidently became interested in this unusual subject at a particular point towards the end of his career, and the three escape-tragedies were certainly composed very close together. It would be desirable to know the exact circumstances and date of production for all three plays; but as it is, it seems extremely unlikely that more than a couple of years separated them. For Helen and Andromeda, at least, the dating seems certain, thanks to the evidence of Aristophanes and the Aristophanic scholia, which indicate that both plays were produced as part of the same trilogy in 412 bc.149 However, we know neither the title of the third play of that trilogy (as well as its accompanying satyr-play) nor the date of Iphigenia. Since very few points in Euripidean chronology can be ﬁxed by external evidence, and since there are never any precise references in tragic texts themselves to contemporary persons or events, stylistic dating is regarded as the only method of determining the date of a play’s composition. Zielinski’s analysis of those few plays with known dates, and the intervals separating them, revealed that Euripides’ style developed over time towards a freer, more resolved iambic trimeter. The resolutionrate and the variety of types of resolution can be charted as a fairly steady linear increase: thus metrical calculations can give a rough estimate of any play’s date.150 Zielinski’s technique has more recently been applied to all the plays and fragments, using advanced statistical techniques from mathematics, by Martin Cropp and Gordon Fick:151 their work makes clear that one has 146 The term coined by Burnett (1971) to describe Helen, Iphigenia, Alcestis 147 and Ion. Cf. Mastronarde (2000b) 32. 148 See §2.3.5 below for further examination of the escape-theme. 149 Ar. Thesm. 850, 1060; S Frogs 53; S Thesm. 1012, 1040. 150 Zielinski (1925), liber II. 151 Cropp and Fick (1985) use the same basic technique but oﬀer exhaustive statistical analysis of the data using methods unavailable to Zielinski. The problems posed by the fragments are more profound: therefore the margin of error must be far greater than for the complete surviving plays.

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to admit of a large margin of error in estimating dates.152 Whereas Zielinski estimates that Iphigenia (resolution-rate: 26.5 per cent) was written in 414 or 413, slightly earlier than Helen (resolution-rate: 27.4 per cent), Cropp and Fick’s calculations show that the relatively tiny margin of diﬀerence makes it impossible to make a mathematically persuasive statement about their respective priority. Their calculation of the date of Iphigenia is between 416 and 412. (When Cropp and Fick apply the same formulae to Helen and the fragments of Andromeda, the ‘calculated’ dates are, respectively, 412–406 and 425–408!) It is probable, therefore, that Iphigenia was written either shortly before or in the same year as Helen and Andromeda; but one can be no more deﬁnite than that. It is perhaps salutary to observe also that metrical dating has never been conclusively proved.153 Kjeld Matthiessen attempts to establish a sequence of late Euripidean plays using not only metrical data but also an analysis of the structure of the plays.154 He concludes that the plays were written in the order Electra—Heracles—Trojan Women— Iphigenia—Ion—Helen, and believes that Ion, not Iphigenia, was the third play in the 412 trilogy.155 But, as with metrical dating, it is hard to be convinced by such evidence, especially when the plays in question are so close in date. Not only that, but the structure and design of the plays, since it can be measured with far less accuracy than the behaviour of the trimeter, is intrinsically a less convincing index of date than that of Zielinksi. Furthermore (as Lucas observes in his review of Matthiessen’s book), it is overschematic, or simply wrong, to assume that ‘the structure of plays is like a mould which is made continuously more elaborate, so that the more intricate work is always later than the less intricate’.156 152

Cropp and Fick (1985) 22–23, 70 and Tables 3.4, 3.5, 5.1. No new external evidence has surfaced since 1925. It is just possible— though admittedly improbable—that Euripides adopted a freer form of trimeter not as a (conscious or unconscious) yearly progression, but in order to achieve a speciﬁc eﬀect (‘naturalism’ vel sim.) from time to time in selected plays of scattered date. In any case, the resolution-rates do not conform to a wholly regular pattern (Orestes poses a notable problem: see Cropp and Fick (1985) 22–3), nor are we able to compare the resolution-rates of two complete plays from the same year. 154 Matthiessen (1964) 1–92. 155 The view also of Webster (1967a, 192) and E. Segal (1995, 49). 156 Lucas (1968) 161. 153

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Nevertheless, others apart from Matthiessen ﬁnd an indication that Iphigenia was the earlier play in the similarity of the play’s structure and plot—yet at the same time its comparative ‘weakness’—to Helen.157 Their view is that Iphigenia lacks Helen’s reiteration of ‘underlying’ themes and, therefore, its unity. Representative of this type of view is Podlecki, who states that ‘the dominant motifs of Helen, like the basic situation, are adumbrated in I.T. in a tentative and even unsure way. . . . They are then left to work their wonder in the poet’s mind until they blossom more perfectly in Helen.’158 There are two objections to this. First, one cannot assume that two (possibly unconnected) plays share precisely the same motifs, themes or underlying purpose; nor can one be certain that one has identiﬁed these supposed ‘shared themes’ correctly—especially if one ﬁrst tries to identify them (as Podlecki does) by reference to only one of the plays. Second, even if Iphigenia were a weaker play than the Helen this would not necessarily lead to the conclusion that it is also an earlier play. Others discussing the question of relative date have attempted to place Iphigenia before Helen by other, less convincing, arguments based on internal factors. For example, Platnauer invokes what he calls ‘contextual evidence’ to support the view that Iphigenia came ﬁrst: perceiving that the play is shot through with bitterness and disillusionment (particularly—he says—against oracles), he believes that the play contains direct allusion to the disaster in Sicily. He reads the ﬁnal lines of the play as ‘a pathetic prayer for the salvation of the city faced with some overwhelming disaster’, concluding that the play dates from spring 413.159 This type of close, quasi-allegorical, politicizing reading of tragedies is currently unfashionable. Although works of literature written during time of war (particularly those, like tragedies, with an undeniably strong civic context) will obviously bear a certain relationship to external events, it is impossible to tell how much of a play’s content can be read as implicit political comment. The connection which Platnauer 157 Murray (1913) 72–3; Platnauer (1938) xv; Podlecki (1970) 417–18, Hall 158 (1989b) 41. Podlecki (1970) 418. 159 Platnauer (1938) xiii–xv (cf. Thuc. 8.1.1). He fails to take into account that a problematic attitude to prophecy is a recurrent feature of many tragedies throughout the ﬁfth century, including Aesch. Oresteia, Soph. OT, Phil., etc. This feature is discussed by Nock (1972) 542 and Dover (1974) 64.

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perceives between the text and the events is in any case hopelessly vague; therefore, as a basis for dating, this is unacceptable. So there is nothing to indicate the priority of Iphigenia to Helen. On the contrary, I suggest that they belong to the same year—in other words, that the Euripidean trilogy presented at the City Dionysia of 412 was an escape-trilogy consisting of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia among the Taurians. Unless some new external evidence should surface, this hypothesis is impossible to prove, but I believe that it is, at least, likely to be true. On the basis of metrical calculations (as we have seen) a date of 412 for all three escape-tragedies is possible; in addition, a number of other arguments might be adduced to support the idea of a trilogy. First, there is the uniqueness of the escape theme and the absence (as far as we can tell) of escape-plots from the tragedies of other years. Escape is not just an exciting plot motif but an important central subject of the plays which is explored as an essential concern of the plays. At least two of the plays in 412 were of this type—why not the third? Euripides’ preoccupation with escape seems to have been closely tied to a particular short period of time, for he wrote no other plays of the same type: why not a single year? In asking these questions, perhaps it is appropriate to look at the historical context: just why might Euripides have been interested in plays about escaping in 412 bc? It is perhaps signiﬁcant that the 412 Dionysia was the ﬁrst since the news that the Sicilian expedition had disastrously failed; the general mood in Athens was one of growing desperation, disillusionment and political subversion, with the prospect of defeat in the Peloponnesian War more immediate than before. It may be that this was an impetus for ‘escapism’; compare the Birds of Aristophanes, from a couple of years earlier, which seems to reﬂect a diﬀerent kind of ‘escapism’ altogether, a mood of optimism following the dispatch of the ﬂeet to Sicily in 415.160 However (as I said before, apropos of Platnauer’s ‘contextual’ dating of Iphigenia), this sort of historical factor, though undoubtedly of importance for appreciating the reaction of the original audience, cannot be used as evidence for dating.161 160

See Sommerstein (1987) 4–5. Zuntz (1958, 155–62) and Kannicht (1969, 1. 53–7) link the theme of disillusionment in Helen to the political situation in Athens of 412. 161

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Similarity of plots and interlocking motifs suggest a very close connection between the three plays—another feature which might support the single-year view.162 In each play, a beautiful, helpless heroine, trapped in a far-ﬂung barbarian country as the result of some divine act, hopes and prays for rescue and escape back to Greece. The chance to escape is oﬀered by a heroic male character who arrives, seemingly by coincidence, at the place of captivity; but a threat to the rescuer’s own life soon follows. Eventually the rescue is eﬀected—despite a number of seemingly impossible obstacles including a supernatural, man-eating sea-monster, a lust-crazed or potentially violent Oriental despot and the active hostility of the gods—by means of an elaborate plot. The thwarted captor threatens to commit some terrible act of revenge, but is prevented by a god, and ﬁnally the heroines and their rescuers leave by sea or air, with the gods’ approval.163 There are also certain idiosyncratic formal and structural similarities between the plays. Each begins with a prologue spoken by the distressed heroine, who outlines the details of her present situation;164 there is a lyric lament between the heroine and the chorus (who are also expatriated Greek women sharing a deep aﬃnity with the heroine); a series of questions-and-answers leading up to a recognition-scene; scenes of stichomythia or distichomythia preparing the scenes of intrigue. In general, the chorus is used in a similar way, and the number of sung lines is higher than normal, reﬂecting the important monodizing role for the protagonist who played the respective heroines.165 An article, by Graham Ley, on the stagecraft of Helen makes a further practical point which could also be adduced in favour of an escape-trilogy. The distribution of roles between the three actors in Helen and (as far as one can tell) Andromeda exactly corresponds to that in Iphigenia: the conﬁguration is that of 162 What follows is based largely on Helen and Iphigenia, though it seems likely that Andromeda’s plot and structure was at least similar. A possible reconstruction is oﬀered by Webster (1967, 192–9) and Bubel (1991, 45–63). 163 Similarity of plot-structure between the plays is noted also by Platnauer (1938) xv–xvi; Burnett (1971) 1–14; Wolﬀ (1973) 67–8. 164 Andromeda, however, began not with the more usual iambics but with an anapaestic song by the heroine («W nŸx Èer3, fr. 114; cf. S Ar. Thesm. 1065). Cf. the (mutilated?) opening of Iphigenia at Aulis. I return, brieﬂy, to Euripidean prologues in §3.1 below. 165 Hall (1999) 99, 112–17.

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two linked performers (Helen–Menelaus, Andromeda–Perseus, Iphigenia–Orestes) and a third performer (playing a barbarian king, among other supporting roles). As Ley argues, ‘the distinct possibility that we may here be detecting format composition would not only associate these plays closely in time . . . but might also reveal some of the characteristics of a group of particular performers, perhaps gathered and retained by the playwright for their relative strengths.’166 An escape-trilogy seems perfectly plausible, but (as far as I have been able to ascertain) the suggestion has seldom been made. Those few who have hinted at an escape-trilogy have rejected the idea immediately, on the grounds that such a grouping would have been monotonous for the audience.167 However, this objection is not actually very persuasive. Three identical plays produced one after another would no doubt have been intolerable; but, while Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia may have certain similarities, they are very far from being identical. The three plays are suﬃciently dissimilar from each other, and they are so packed with diverse and unusual material, that they are unlikely to have induced tedium. In any case, we need to make more of an eﬀort to imagine the eﬀect made on the audience by a set of plays with very similar plots. Similarity and repetition of central elements between three plays need not be seen as a negative feature, detracting from the quality of the set. On the contrary, it can be seen as a positive feature, deliberately calculated by Euripides to make a certain point. I have already noted tragedy’s signiﬁcant tendency to rehearse and re-enact familiar stories. But this did not usually happen in quite the same way as this. The production of three plays which closely resembled each other would stimulate the audience to consider the similarities and diﬀerences between them, and to explore the subject of escape: the circularity and repetition of the situations is very 166

Ley (1991) 32–3. Wilamowitz (1875, 153) and Steiger (1908, 236–7) hint at the possibility of an escape-trilogy; the idea is rejected, for similar reasons, by Schmid and Stählin (1940) 520: ‘gegen die Vermutung . . . spricht aber die Einförmigkeit, die durch die Wiederholung desselben Motivs innerhalb einer Trilogie entstanden wäre.’ Cf. Grégoire (1968) 106: ‘on a quelquefois pensé que l’Iphigénie fut jouée en 412, avec l’Hélène et l’Andromède. Il faut rejeter cette idée: car le public n’aurait pas supporté, dans une même trilogie, deux pièces aussi exactement pareilles.’ 167

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important. Also, situations which seem very similar but which are in reality diﬀerent are closely linked to the philosophical ideas at the heart of all three plays—the theme of deceptive appearances and the confusing nature of reality.168 The theatrical impact would have been immense: and it seems that Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria, produced the following year, is a direct reaction to the strangeness and the repetitiveness of the escape-tragedies—an indication that 412 was a remarkable year at the Dionysia. One might examine just what is going on in Aristophanes’ play. Euripides was a common enough ﬁgure in Aristophanic comedy,169 so there is perhaps nothing so out-of-the-ordinary about his being lampooned in 411 in particular: but here Euripides and his Relative are in the position of having to escape from a group of hostile women. They hit on the idea of using stratagems from Euripidean tragedy as a means of escape: ﬁrst the Relative kidnaps a baby with the idea of holding it to ransom, a motif from Telephus (689–764), then he tries sending secret messages on oar-blades, a motif from Palamedes (768–75); but both these stratagems fail. Eventually the Relative, now held in chains by a Scythian archer, says: ‘Which of his plays will really fetch him? I know! I’ll pretend to be his new-style Helen!’ (t¶n kain¶n }Elvnhn mim&somai, 849–50). There follows a long scene of paratragedy based on the Helen. This too fails; later, Euripides appears as Perseus, which prompts the Relative to say: ‘I have to become Andromeda now!’ (de∏ me g≤gnesq’ !ndromvdan, 1011–12). Another paratragic scene, this time based on the Andromeda, follows. It seems that the whole play was designed to lead up to these Euripidean scenes of escape, which rely on the same situations—and the same jokes— being repeated again and again. Explicit verbal references in the text make it certain that Helen and Andromeda are being parodied; but I believe that one can also see a parodic reference to Iphigenia in the last section of the play.170 Admittedly, there are no unambiguous verbal clues, as 168

This theme is explored at length in Ch. 4 below. Ar. Frogs, Ach. 393–489, Kn. 11–20, Cl. 1364–78, Wasps 54–61, 1412–14, Peace 146–8, 528–34, Lys. 283–4, 368–9, in addition to Thesm. 170 Ar. Thesm. 1160–225. A convincing case is made by Bobrick (1991), although (perhaps strangely) she does not follow it up with the natural suggestion that Iphigenia was part of the same trilogy as the other two. MacDowell 169

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before, but (as Bobrick argues) in this last scene that is entirely the point. The escape-stratagems based closely on Helen and Andromeda having failed, Euripides is at a loss what to do in order to bamboozle the Scythian captor: ‘Alas! What to do!’ he cries.171 ‘What speeches shall I turn to now? . . . but no, his barbarian nature would not understand them. It would be a waste of eﬀort to use clever new ideas on fools. No—some other stratagem, one suitable for this fellow, must be used.’ The signiﬁcance lies in the move away from words: ‘for the ﬁnal scene, Euripides borrows a mhcan& but avoids lÎgoi.’172 The stratagem is still of the same kind—a Euripidean escape-plot— and it still involves a level of metatheatrical role-playing and illusion; but whereas the previous two plans were rather more subtle, with the characters consciously using the same words to step into the role of diﬀerent characters and play out the action of the other tragedies, this new and ﬁnal plan is to be brought into eﬀect in a non-verbal way. In other words, the Scythian is to be lured into playing the role of Thoas without even realizing it. The stratagem which follows involves Euripides adopting the role of a procuress, an old woman called Artemisia, and the introduction of a new character, a dancing-girl called Elaphion. ‘Artemisia’ tricks the Scythian by letting him have Elaphion while Euripides’ Relative makes good his escape. Finally ‘Artemisia’ allows Elaphion to escape, bringing the play to a close. Nowhere is it said, as it was before of Helen and Andromeda, that this is ‘a ruse from the Iphigenia’; but nevertheless there are some verbal clues in the names of the characters. Euripides’ ‘Artemisia’ has an obvious connection with the goddess Artemis, who rescued Iphigenia from sacriﬁce at Aulis and replaced her with a deer.173 And ‘Elaphion’ means ‘little deer’—the diminutive of πlafoß, the word used for a deer in that play. The events themselves do not exactly recall that of the Iphigenia—at the end of that play Athena rescues Iphigenia from Thoas. But there is still a rescue: and there is enough similarity and allusion to the general situation and plot motif for this scene (1995), however, ﬁnds Bobrick’s theory far-fetched, seeing in the ﬁnal part of Thesm. only crude sexual innuendo. 171 Ar. Thesm. 1128–32: aja∏: t≤ dr3sw; itself recalls Medea 1042. 172 Bobrick (1991) 71. 173 Iphigenia 28–30: on Artemis’ role, see §3.3 below.

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to be highly suggestive of that play. At the end of the play the Scythian shouts that he has lost Artemisia (he mispronounces the name as !rtemoux≤a, 1216–25)—again, this is reminiscent of Thoas’ loss of the cult statue of Artemis at the end of the Iphigenia. There is a further similarity between Iphigenia and the end of Aristophanes’ play, not seen by Bobrick but noted by others.174 In Iphigenia (1294–301), the barbarian messenger who brings Thoas news of the Greeks’ escape is deceived by the Greek chorus leader in an attempt to delay Thoas’ pursuit; similarly, in Thesm. (1218), the chorus leader dupes the Scythian archer. There is another argument in favour of a trilogy, provided by an odd line in the prologue of Iphigenia which can be seen as a self-conscious reference to Helen.175 In the course of the usual Euripidean ‘scene-setting’ there, Iphigenia, describing her sacriﬁce at the hands of Agamemnon, says: that her father slew her for the sake of Helen—so it seems („ß doke∏). Why does Iphigenia say this? Surely the most important reason for Agamemnon’s sacriﬁce of his daughter was not Helen as such, but Artemis’ command. In addition, the comment „ß doke∏ is not required and seems odd in the immediate context. But the line makes sense if one understands it in relation to Helen, as a deliberate allusion to that play. This is not just a self-conscious reference to Helen’s outrageous plot, in which it emerged that Helen was not to blame for the events at Aulis or Troy, but also a signal that Iphigenia will, like Helen, be concerned with the philosophical relationship between what is true and what only seems to be so.176 If a reference is intended, it follows that Helen must have preceded Iphigenia. Another reason, in other words, to view Iphigenia as part of the 412 trilogy (unless, as seems less likely, its date is 411 or even later); and also—if the escape-plays are a trilogy—an argument for placing Helen as the ﬁrst or second play in the set, and Iphigenia as either second or third. The order and connection of the three plays, assuming they 174

Hall (1989b) 52 n. 71; Sommerstein (1994) 237. Iphigenia 8: πsfaxen ’Elvnhß o\nec’, „ß doke∏, pat¶r. It is possible that there is a further reference to Helen six lines later in the prologue: Menvlewi c3rin fvrwn (‘for Menelaus’ sake’, 14) may recall the frequent and prominent use of the word c3riß in Helen (see §4.4.6 below). 176 See §4.4 below for extended discussion of the reality-illusion theme in all three escape-tragedies. 175

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are a trilogy, is worth considering. However, it has to be admitted that very little is known about the principles which governed the tragedians’ connection of individual plays within trilogies and tetralogies, since we possess only one complete trilogy, the Oresteia. Aristotle, unhelpfully for us, ignores trilogies in his analysis of tragic plot in the Poetics.177 The patchy evidence of didascaliae and other surviving records of production tells us little, while the loss of most of the plays themselves means that one is almost always working with titles and meagre fragments.178 It seems that some trilogies (such as the Oresteia) had a single, consecutive narrative, while some trilogies (such as Euripides’ ‘Trojan’ trilogy of 415) were thematically connected; but in the case of many trilogies and tetralogies it is hard to discern any obvious link between the individual plays. All that can be said for certain is that at all periods there were both connected and unconnected trilogies. In addition, the fact that Euripides produced Alexander, Palamedes, Trojan Women and Sisyphus together a few years earlier suggests that he was interested in thematic connection at around this time.179 The escape-tragedies are not ‘connected’ in the same sense 177 It is possible that Aristotle’s other works discussed the trilog≤a or tetralog≤a: see fr. 618–9 Rose. 178 Useful evidence is collected by Snell: TGF I. 22–58. Pickard-Cambridge (1968, 80–1) summarizes some of the evidence for connected and unconnected trilogies, arguing against an earlier view that in the late ﬁfth century trilogies moved progressively away from narrative connection. Sommerstein (1996, 53–70), though his main concern is with Aeschylean tragedy, has many interesting remarks on the general question of trilogies/tetralogies. 179 Scodel (1980) explores at length the connections between the plays of this ‘Trojan’ trilogy/tetralogy: Others, including Koniaris (1973), are more sceptical. Cf. Dale (1956, viii), for instance, who ﬁnds no obvious connection between the four Euripidean plays of 438 (Cretans, Alcmaeon, Telephus, Alcestis), writing: ‘only excess of zeal has enabled scholars to discern in these four plays some common underlying theme, or specially signiﬁcant correspondences and contrasts; any four plays of Euripides taken at random could with a little goodwill be made into as signiﬁcant a group’. Webster (1967) makes an attempt to arrange almost all of Euripides’ known plays into trilogies, often on questionable principles (he is criticized in this regard by Scodel [1980] 19). He suggests (8–9 and 163–5), without any evidence, that the competition rules of the Dionysia changed at various points in the mid- to late 5th-cent.—a suggestion which he uses as the basis for his grouping of plays. Webster’s suggestion for Euripides’ trilogy of 412 consists of Helen, Andromeda and Ion: ‘here we can see a kind of strophe, antistrophe, epode pattern: two plays about the rescue of a woman from an exotic country followed by a third play which is much less lighthearted.’

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that (say) the Oresteia is a connected trilogy, yet they are very closely linked in ideas, themes and motifs and their various developments. Rather than following the same closed circle of family-related characters over the course of three consecutive plays, the escape-tragedies follow diﬀerent, unrelated characters in a variety of bizarre locations, all playing out the same sort of actions. So their connectedness, though not that of chronological or causally linked narrative, is still important, and the order therefore is of interest. Women at the Thesmophoria has implications for the order of the escape-tragedies. Assuming that the plays were a trilogy, it seems unlikely that Thesm. varied the order—what would have been the point, dramatic or artistic?— which implies that the order was probably Helen—Andromeda— Iphigenia.180 The ‘tail-pieces’ at the plays’ endings might perhaps be important: Iphigenia’s is an address to the judges asking for Victory, which would ﬁt in with its being the last play in a set. But this may be a later addition, tied to another production of the play in diﬀerent circumstances unrelated to its original place in a trilogy, so it cannot be said to tell us very much.181 As it would happen, there is another self-conscious verbal reference, this time to Andromeda, contained in the satyr-play Cyclops, another drama about escapes. There Polyphemus’ ﬁrst words upon seeing the Greeks are: πa: t≤n’ Ôclon tÎnd’ Ør0 prÏß aÛl≤oiß; (‘Ah! What is this crowd that I see . . .?’, 202). This seems to be a deliberate reminiscence of the striking line spoken by Perseus on ﬁrst seeing Andromeda (fr. 125): πa, t≤n’ Ôcqon tÎnd’ Ør0 (‘Ah! What is this rock that I see . . .?’). Like the Helen reminiscence above, the line has seemingly little point in its immediate context: and, since the verbal closeness is so marked, it seems that a sort of joke is intended. But Aristophanes in Women at the Thesmophoria also includes the same line (1105) in his parody of Andromeda. So who is parodying (or ‘alluding to’) whom here, and in what order? Adam Parry’s opinion was that ‘Euripides is here answering Aristophanes’ mockery by mocking himself’,182 which would mean that Cyclops was produced after 180 Helen is arguably the most outrageous of the set, and its impact as the ﬁrst play in the trilogy would have been substantial. Iphigenia is the most ‘restrained’ and least ﬂamboyant, so perhaps more naturally suited to forming a conclusion to the set? 181 See Roberts (1987). 182 Parry (1971) 319; followed by Seaford (1984) 49 and Bubel (1991) 122.

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Thesm., that is, in or shortly after 410. But one need not assume that the line in Cyclops was written in response to Aristophanes. Would the joke not be more pointed, in fact, if the satyr-play immediately followed the trilogy of which Andromeda was part? If Cyclops does in fact belong to 412 (a date which stylistic and metrical considerations would support), there is an important consequence. For, if at least two of the tragedies and the accompanying satyr-play were about escapes, then it would be even more attractive to suppose that the whole tetralogy of 412 was escape-related, and that Iphigenia completes the group.183 For all their attractiveness, all these arguments are, admittedly, speculative and (worse still) unprovable. A possible counterargument (apart from our lack of knowledge about trilogies in general) is that there is no surviving mention from antiquity of a trilogy (or tetralogy) of escape: if it really was so extraordinary, this lack of critical attention might be seen as suspicious. The Aristophanic scholiast who mentions that Helen and Andromeda were put on in the same year does not mention Iphigenia, nor does he say that Iphigenia is the subject of parody in the last scene of Thesm. But, on the other hand, perhaps the lack of positive evidence is not so suspicious. Most contemporary information, after all, is lost, and ancient commentators, writing many years after the original productions, are often unreliable, to say the least. The external, contextual and metrical evidence for dating the escape-tragedies is far from watertight. However, the internal evidence, in the form of coherence and connections between the three plays, is more satisfying. Whether or not one can accept that Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia were a trilogy, it is still possible to see these extraordinary plays as a distinct group somewhat diﬀerent from any other tragedies, very closely connected in the poet’s mind. The rest of this book will examine the extent of that connection. Seaford (1982), however, argues for a date of c.408 for Cyclops, based (largely but not exclusively) on metrical criteria. 183 I do not propose to discuss Cyclops in this book, but it is worth noting that several of the themes of the satyr-play correspond to themes in Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia. There one encounters not only the escape-theme, but (for instance) the provocative use of Homeric and tragic myth, the motif of disguise and intrigue, the exploration of geography and cultural identity, and questioning of the relationship between the gods and chance (t»ch). On these and other aspects of Cyclops see Seaford (1984).

2 Myth, Fiction, Innovation

EURIPIDHS e”t’ oÛk ƒl&roun Ò ti t»coim’ oÛd’ ƒmpes°n πfuron, åll’ oËxi°n pr*tista mvn moi tÏ gvnoß e”p’ #n eÛqŸß toı dr3matoß— AISCULOS kre∏tton g¤r Án soi, n¶ D≤’, ‡ tÏ sautoı.1

2.1 ‘use of myth’ Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia are certainly tragic, but it is clear that they are also unusual, startlingly original dramas. This is particularly to be seen in their plots—which (broadly speaking) are the subject of this chapter. Earlier I discussed the uniqueness of the escape-theme which marks out these three plays as a distinct group (if not, in fact, a trilogy);2 now I want to examine the extent of Euripides’ invention, and his handling of pre-existing material from myth and literature. I believe that a characteristic feature of the escape-tragedies is an extraordinary attitude to traditional myths. This attitude has been described by some critics in terms of self-consciousness, scepticism or disbelief, which is true to a certain extent;3 but no one has yet, I think, fully explored the subject of myth, ﬁction and ﬁctiveness, and its eﬀects on the meaning of the drama. Novelty, innovation and surprise have rightly been recognized as distinctive features of the escape-tragedies, but I shall continue to argue against the widely held notion that they characterize these plays as somehow ‘un-tragic’. There is no reason why tragic plots cannot embrace novelty and innovation, 1 Ar. Frogs 945–7. ‘Euripides: What’s more, it was never my habit to prate on about whatever came into my head, or to rush in and get into a muddle—rather, the ﬁrst character to come on would immediately explain the background to the play. Aeschylus: It was a damn sight better than your own background!’ 2 §1.2 above. 3 Segal (1971) 562; Stinton (1976a) 75–9; Eisner (1979); Arnott (1990) 3–4, Barlow (1986b) 27–9, etc.

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without implications for their generic category. However extraordinary the plays may seem, they are still within the normal conventions of tragedy (and what, in any case, is an ordinary tragedy?). To appreciate this, it is necessary to deﬁne one’s terms of reference clearly and (as I have been trying to do so far) to discard anachronisms and preconceptions. Starting with the undeniable fact that these plays have outré stories, I shall examine the ways in which the escape-tragedies are similar to and diﬀerent from other tragedies. ‘Myth’, ‘ﬁction’, ‘innovation’, ‘originality’—these and related terms pose certain problems of deﬁnition and interpretation. To begin with (§2.2), then, I shall examine the plays in the context of tragic myths and plots in general. Exactly what constitutes a traditional myth, and how much freedom did poets and playwrights have to adapt and invent material in their individual ‘treatments’? Next (§2.3), I shall examine the literary sources for the myths of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia, and attempt to determine which elements in Euripides’ versions are new. Inevitably, some of the information here will merely summarize the ﬁndings of others, but I have some new interpretations to oﬀer. In some books and commentaries, the sections on ‘use of myth’ (vel sim.) are disappointingly arid. They often provide little more than an annotated list of literary antecedents, which is presented as a necessary preamble but largely peripheral to the main business of criticism. What I shall try to do in the following sections is to suggest a conceptually more ambitious way of treating this material, which will lead to a reinterpretation of the plays. Studying Euripides’ ‘use of myth’ is not a peripheral but an absolutely essential activity. What Euripides has done with the material at his disposal, and the techniques and strategies which he has employed to do this, is what makes each play a unique artistic and intellectual achievement. This is true of all tragedies—but in the escape-tragedies, however, I would argue further (§2.4) that Euripides has not simply ‘made use of’ myth, but has written plays which are, in an important sense, actually about myth and ﬁction. The choice of subjects itself, the particular versions of the myths which have been adopted, the alterations and innovations which have been made, and the manner of presentation—all these are crucially important, and

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all contribute intellectual ‘meaning’ to the plays, as well as (ultimately) giving rise to disturbing implications not only about myths but about life itself. 2.2 ‘myths’ and ‘plots’ 2.2.1 Counterfactuals Imagine a new history of the causes of the Second World War, which revealed that everyone had been wrong about Adolf Hitler. During the 1930s and 1940s, at the time when he was said to be engaged elsewhere, Hitler was in fact managing a bicycleshop in Aberdeen: those who remember him describe him as a thoroughly delightful chap, a paciﬁst and a Judaeophile. This revised account shows conclusively that the ‘Hitler’ who led the Fascist movement in Germany and invaded Poland was a Doppelgänger . . . Alternatively, imagine a ﬁlm version of Titanic in which RMS Titanic arrived safely in New York harbour on 15 April 1912; or an account of the Passion in which Christ was not, after all, cruciﬁed. Each of these scenarios may usefully be described as counterfactual: that is, ‘pertaining to, or expressing, what has not in fact happened, but might, could, or would happen in diﬀerent conditions’.4 We know that Hitler did invade Poland and that the Titanic did sink, but it is interesting to imagine what might have been the consequences if they had not done. Counterfactuals may be an intellectually diverting game, but they may also serve a serious purpose: this is reﬂected by recent scholarship in modern history and (in particular) political analysis.5 The counterfactual scenarios above are (in slightly diﬀerent ways) comparable to Euripides’ oﬀering at the festival of Dionysus in 412 bc. There cannot have been very many Athenians in the audience who did not know that Helen caused the Trojan War by eloping with Paris,6 and that Iphigenia had to be sacriﬁced by Agamemnon in order for the Greek ﬂeet to sail. 4

As deﬁned in the OED (2nd edn., 1989). See esp. the bibliography in Tetlock and Belkin (1996); cf. Ferguson (1997) on counterfactual versions of modern history. As far as I can see, counterfactual experiments have not yet (September 2002) been made in ancient history . . . 6 Cf. Gorgias, Encomium of Helen (DK 82 B11) §5: Gorgias claims that he does not need to tell his audience the myth, since they know it already. 5

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But in Euripides’ tragedies, Helen did not elope with Paris, and Iphigenia was not sacriﬁced at Aulis. It is often said that mythical novelty and experimentation are particularly Euripidean characteristics;7 but, while elsewhere Euripides’ alterations to myths tend to be comparatively minor, the plots of Helen and Iphigenia are based on quite extraordinary changes, which amount to a complete overturning of the ‘usual’ myths—they are, indeed, counterfactual, in a way diﬀerent from any other tragedy.8 It is clear that Euripides’ aims, in the escape-tragedies and elsewhere, included the creation of surprise and shock-eﬀects,9 and indeed one possible source of such eﬀects is plot. Because tragedies always treated the same range of mythical subjects,10 audiences would have held certain expectations, even before the plays began, about what was likely to happen. It may be that there were additional sources of advance information about the plot or other details of tragedies, apart from inherited knowledge of myth;11 but at any rate it seems likely that the audience in 412 7 Eisner (1979) 153: ‘Nearly every critic and literary historian agrees that Euripides is diﬀerent’; cf. Snell (1960) 132; Conacher (1967) 12; Collard (1981); Burian (1997) 183–6, etc. 8 For example: in Euripides’ Electra, the heroine marries a yokel; in Phoenician Women, Jocasta lives on in Thebes, the functions of Eteocles and Polyneices are radically diﬀerent from other versions (Aesch. Seven and Soph. Antigone), and Oedipus remains in the Theban palace, locked in the attic; in his Antigone, the heroine survived to bear Haemon a son (S Soph. Ant. 1351; cf. Webster [1967] 182; Burian [1997] 185). Such innovations are still far less outrageous than the alternative Helen- and Iphigenia-myths. 9 Arnott (1973) is concerned with ‘the unexpected’ in Euripidean drama. See below (passim) for surprise as a feature of the escape-tragedies. 10 See §2.2.2 below for detailed discussion. 11 Some advance information was presented in the proagon, an event which took place in (from c.440 bc) the Odeon, a few days before the beginning of the contest: see Csapo and Slater (1994) 80, 104–11; Pickard-Cambridge (1968) 67–8; Baldry (1971) 26. It seems that the playwrights and their company of actors appeared on stage, garlanded but without costumes or masks, and introduced the plays which they were exhibiting (Plato, Symp. 194a–b; S Ar. Wasps 1109; Aesch. in Ctes. 66–7 [with S]). The form which this introduction, or discussion, took is unclear. I believe that it was a largely ritual occasion (comparable to, say, the opening ceremony at the Olympic Games), and oﬀered nothing more elaborate than an announcement of the titles, or subjects, of the plays; any additional information would, surely, reduce the impact of the play and ruin by anticipation any ‘surprises’. (Of course, playwrights could not have relied on all their audience members having attended the proagon.) Very full

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got a shock (Aristophanes’ Women at the Thesmophoria, produced the following year, seems to conﬁrm this). What I want to explore is precisely what kind of shock-eﬀect was aimed for in the escape-tragedies, and to what degree Euripides was responsible for these outrageous counterfactual myths. 2.2.2 Aristotle’s Poetics and poetic licence An important feature of my deﬁnition of the tragic genre in the last chapter (§1.1) was that tragedies almost invariably dramatize pre-existing subjects from Greek mythology.12 This fact has frequently been discussed by ancient and modern writers: for example, a fragment of Antiphanes’ lost comedy Poetry runs: ‘Tragedy is a fortunate type of poetry in every respect, since its material is already well-known to the audience even before any word is spoken; consequently the poet need only remind them . . .’.13 A well-known passage in Aristotle’s Poetics, also, highlights the role of traditional myths: he observes that in prologue-speeches (especially in Euripides) are perhaps the strongest argument against an expository proagon. It is a matter for regret that we know nothing for certain about the tragedies’ original titles. We cannot say whether the plays’ titles as given in their manuscripts are contemporary with the original production dates or later additions; nor whether they were given to them by their playwrights; nor whether, in fact, titles were perceived to be very important in pre-Alexandrian literature. Aristotle refers simply to Sophocles’ ‘Oedipus’ (Poet. 1452a24–33, 1453b31, 1454b8, 1455a18, 1462b2) without additional designation; and he calls the Tauric Iphigenia simply ‘Iphigenia’ (Poet. 1454a7, 1454b32, 1455a18–b3), distinguishing the other Iphigenia-play with the title Ó ƒn AÛl≤di (1454a32)—but this may mean nothing except that Oedipus the King and Iphigenia among the Taurians were the more popular and widely-known by the 4th cent. (as well as each being the earlier of two tragedies about the same character). Note that alternative titles occur: the Catalogue of Aeschylus’ plays, for instance (TGF III [Radt] T 78), lists ﬁve such plays (Argo or Copastes; Theoroi or Isthmiastai; Carians or Europe; Semele or Water-Bearers; Phrygians or The Ransoming of Hector). If titles were signiﬁcant, there may have been a dramatic point in calling the plays Helen (and not Helen in Egypt) and Iphigenia (and not Iphigenia among the Taurians), i.e., to increase the shock-eﬀect of the revelation of these exotic settings. But it is impossible to know. 12 Of almost 600 known tragedies, over half have repeated titles: see TGF I [Snell]; cf. Burian (1997) 183–6 and 193–8 on ‘the pressure of precedents’. 13 Antiphanes, Poetry (PCG fr. 189.1–5): mak3riÎn ƒstin Ó tragwid≤a | po≤hma kat¤ p3nt’, e÷ ge pr0ton oÈ lÎgoi | ËpÏ t0n qeat0n ejsin ƒgnwrismvnoi, | pr≥n ka≤ tin’ ejpe∏n: ¿sq’ Ëpomn[sai mÎnon de∏ tÏn poiht&n ktl.

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Greek tragedy ‘one cannot alter the traditional stories—for example, one must have Clytemnestra killed by Orestes and Eriphyle by Alcmaeon—but one ought to be creative and use the traditional material well’.14 Compare Peter Burian’s observation that ‘it would make no more sense to show an Oedipus who did not kill his father and marry his mother than it would to show a Napoleon who triumphed at Waterloo’.15 It might seem that the unusual, counterfactual plots of Helen and Iphigenia do not correspond to this general rule—another reason which certain critics give for maintaining that there is something not quite tragic about these dramas.16 But I want to argue that, while there are certain innovative elements in the plots of the escape-tragedies, they still largely conform to generic norms. A useful starting-point is the Aristotelian passage quoted above. Perhaps, like many authoritative-seeming statements from the Poetics, it raises more questions than it succeeds in answering. One could point out that Aristotle elsewhere directly contradicts himself, saying that one need not try to stick at any cost to the traditional stories.17 And, in general, it is certainly diﬃcult to interpret Aristotle’s pronouncements (are they to be seen as dogmatic? descriptive? prescriptive?).18 Nevertheless, Aristotle knew and admired Iphigenia, to which he refers more 14 Arist. Poet. 1453b22–6: toŸß m†n oˆn pareilhmmvnouß m»qouß l»ein oÛk πstin, lvgw d† oÍon t¶n Klutaim&stran åpoqanoısan ËpÏ toı ∞ Orvstou ka≥ t¶n E ∞ rif»lhn ËpÏ toı !lkmvwnoß, aÛtÏn d† eËr≤skein de∏ ka≥ to∏ß paradedomvnoiß cr[sqai kal0ß. 15 Burian (1997) 185. 16 Murray (1913); Dale (1967); Vellacott (1973); Whitman (1974); E. M. Hall (1997) 23–5, etc. 17 Arist. Poet. 1451b23–4: oÛ p3ntwß #n e÷h zhthtvon t0n paradedomvnwn m»qwn, per≥ oÙß aÈ tragwid≤ai ejs≤n, åntvcesqai. He also mentions having enjoyed Agathon’s Antheus, an extreme case of a tragedy in which the plot and characters were completely invented (ibid. 1451b21). 18 Quite apart from the problem of the work’s ‘unﬁnished’ feel and lack of obvious organization, we do not know what sort of work the Poetics was intended to be. Aristotle may have been oﬀering advice for would-be tragedians on how to write the ‘best’ tragedies, based on a classical model, not dictating a set of regulations to be observed rigidly; or he may be describing tragedy as it was in general in the ﬁfth century (or his own time), without cataloguing all the exceptions to every rule. On the likely purpose and nature of the Poetics, see Lucas (1968) ix–xiv; Halliwell (1986) 7–19. Of course, Euripides had not read the Poetics; and there is no reason why one should automatically accept Aristotle’s judgement on tragic matters. But a 4th-cent. view is, still, nearly contemporary—and, in the absence of other good evidence, better than nothing.

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than once as an example of a well-constructed tragedy.19 Are we to attribute this apparent inconcinnity to an instinctive liking for the play despite its failure to conform to Aristotle’s own rules? This may be true; but I believe that his remarks on plot can in fact be read as an illuminating description of tragic plots in general (and, more importantly, one which embraces Helen and Iphigenia). If this is true, however, Aristotle’s terminology will require careful deﬁnition and clariﬁcation. Failure to deﬁne crucial expressions is one feature which makes Aristotle diﬃcult to decipher.20 In the passage above, he represents the fact that the tragedians treated the traditional stories with a certain amount of ﬂuidity; but he does not go on to specify just what constitutes a ‘traditional story’. The (practically synonymous) terms pareilhmmvnoi mıqoi and t¤ paradedomvna refer to something that has been ‘handed down’ from earlier times in a literary or oral tradition, but what precisely is a mıqoß? This is the most important question, but it eludes a simple answer. It seems that the Greeks were not concerned to distinguish between ‘story’, ‘myth’, and ‘plot’—that is, they employed the same word, mıqoß, in each of these senses—but these three terms bear signiﬁcantly diﬀerent meanings in today’s critical vocabulary. In fact, a distinction between ‘myths’ and ‘plots’ (in particular) is absolutely essential for an adequate discussion of tragedy, and a failure to make this distinction reduces the value of many discussions. First of all, then, ‘myth’. The word is deﬁned in the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘a purely ﬁctitious narrative usually involving supernatural persons, actions, or events, and embodying some popular idea concerning natural or historical phenomena’.21 Fritz Graf’s slightly more reﬁned ‘provisional’ deﬁnition will appear familiar from the viewpoint of modern classical studies: according to Graf, myths are traditional tales; they do not coincide with particular texts or genres; they are transmitted from generation to generation without anyone knowing who created them; they contain information about the world, culture, society and institutions.22 19 20 21 22

Arist. Poet. 1452b6–7; 1454a7, b32; 1455a7–18, b3; cf. Belﬁore (1992). Cf. Halliwell (1986) 23. OED (2nd edn., 1989) s.v. ‘myth’ (1.a). Graf (1993) 1–8. The role played by ‘myth’ in recent (especially

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It seems fairly obvious that, in the passage quoted, Aristotle uses pareilhmmvnoi mıqoi and t¤ paradedomvna to refer speciﬁcally to ‘myths’—the part which the individual poet inherits from the narrative tradition. Because these ‘myths’ were transmitted in a variety of forms, they should be seen as entities which underlie, and (in some sense) exist independently of, individual texts. But how to identify a ‘traditional myth’ from the various texts in which it is found? One might begin by identifying the earliest extant version, but this will not necessarily be deﬁnitive. It is perhaps unsurprising that myths should become progressively more elaborate with subsequent tellings. Primitive myths might acquire additional elements which were later to become widely accepted: certain versions of myths might even gain priority over other, earlier ones. For example, the popularity of Sophocles’ treatments of the myths of Oedipus (in Oedipus the King) and Antigone (in Antigone) led to their becoming, in later antiquity, the dominant versions, despite antecedents which diﬀer in certain particulars. In such cases, which is to be seen as the more ‘traditional’ myth? It seems more reasonable (though not unproblematic) to attempt to isolate a ‘basic version’. In other words, by examining as many tellings of a myth as possible and extracting only those elements found in all, one will emerge with a ‘basic’ version, boiled-down as one might say to a collection of bare, unembellished facts. (This type of exercise has been taken to an extreme by, for example, M. R. Cox of the British Folk-Lore Society, who painstakingly analysed 345 versions of the Cinderella story.23) One might compare the narratologist Génette’s view that any narrative text is an expansion of a single, extremely basic verbal form. For example, the Odyssey is (he says) a ‘monstrous development’ of the basic verbal statement ‘Odysseus comes home to Ithaca’; in the same way, Proust’s A la récherche du temps perdu (Génette’s exemplary text) is an ‘ampliﬁcation’ of the basic statement ‘Marcel becomes a writer’.24 In the same structuralist-inﬂuenced) classical studies scarcely needs stating: cf. Burkert (1979) 23; Vernant (1983) 203–8; Bremmer (1987b) 1–7; Bremmer’s entry in the OCD (3rd edn., 3, 1996) s.v. ‘mythology’; Buxton (1999). 23 Cox (1893). 24 Génette (1980) 30.

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way, ‘Orestes kills Clytemnestra’, ‘Agamemnon sacriﬁces Iphigenia’ and so on might be said to be the basic verbal forms, the myths, which may be developed or ampliﬁed into narratives.25 There are, admittedly, diﬃculties inherent in this approach as well. Not only is it impossible to recover every single telling of a myth, but also to obtain a ‘basic’ myth along the lines suggested by Génette is, in fact, far from simple. In the ﬁrst place, it is unclear at just what point the process of elaboration or ampliﬁcation from myth into narrative plot begins. Which elements are intrinsic or necessary, and which are peripheral? Orestes’ oracle from Apollo; Agamemnon’s dilemma; the role of Artemis; the characters’ motivations and moral colourings: all are, surely, of importance. Just how basic, or elaborate, does a ‘basic’ version of a myth have to be? Second, it might be argued that the process of identifying and presenting the ‘basic’ (underlying) version can never be entirely objective. No version of a myth is ever not narrated: every single story has to be made by someone with a particular set of interests and motives, which means that no telling can be absolutely ‘basic’. Another related question is this: when are two narratives telling the same story? The question may be answered in diﬀerent ways. For example, Raymond Quéneau’s famous Exercices de Style narrates ‘the same’ short story in ninety-nine diﬀerent ways.26 This assumes that a single underlying story exists (somewhere) and that the narration is a matter of form (récit) diﬀerently representing content (histoire).27 Quéneau gives no ‘basic’, unstyled version of the story, because he believes that this would be impossible. (By comparison, reception theorists would claim that the narratives which diﬀerent readers construct from identical words may be very diﬀerent; 25 For the purposes of this discussion, I shall assume that tragic drama is a form of narrative, although this is, in fact, a debated point. A narrative, deﬁned simply, is ‘anything which recounts a story, a series of events in a temporal sequence’ (Cohan and Shires [1988] 1). Tragedies, whatever else they do, certainly tell stories, but they also have other functions. Génette (1980, 41) denies that drama is narrative, but see Goward (1999) and Gould (2001) 319–34 26 for the opposite view. Quéneau (1947). 27 Génette (1980) and others distinguish between récit (the presentation of events in a narrative) and histoire (the order in which these events occurred in real life, or imagined ‘real’ life). This is reminiscent of the Formalist distinction between sjuzhet and fabula.

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structuralist criticism is based on the assumption that many stories are ‘the same’ by reference to a perceived underlying structure, and so on.28) Because myths ‘underlie’ their diverse tellings, certain essential elements may be said to be implicitly present in any version, even when they are not explicitly narrated. That is, since elements such as Helen’s beauty and duplicity, the judgement of Paris, the murder of Laius, etc. are so central to the story and so widely known to their audience, they are often to be taken for granted. In what follows, I have made the commonsensical assumption that the same basic elements ‘underlie’ any telling which assumes them or (at least) does not explicitly contradict them. A little should be added about the elements that make up a myth. These consist of, roughly, characters and events.29 ‘Characters’ should be seen to include not only people and gods but also their characteristics, gender, age, and personality traits, as well as the relationships between characters.30 ‘Events’ are slightly less simple to deﬁne, because they admit of diﬀerent interpretations. In order to progress from a narrative into its constituent ‘events’, it is necessary to subject it to a process of analysis, to separate it into its smallest units and examine how these units ﬁt together.31 But ‘events’ in a myth are not always neatly segmentable, and the very act of segmentation must (again) be a subjective process, relying on the attitudes of each individual interpreter. Just as there may be as many narratives as readers, so there may be as many ways of segmenting myths (or plots) into events and sequences.32 Neither Aristotle nor any 28 In particular, recurring story-patterns in myth may be of importance: see Lattimore (1964) 8–9, 52–3; O’Brien (1988) 99–101; Burian (1997) 180–98 (on the ‘typology’ of tragic plots); Achilles Tatius 3.6–7. 29 This description might seem to be somewhat jejune to those who, following Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1988), Segal (1983) and others, ﬁnd it illuminating to view Greek tragic myth as a semiotic and structural system. But for the present purpose I should prefer to class structural features not as ‘elements’ but as ‘interpretations’. See Kirk (1970) for a summary of approaches to myth. 30 Cf. Easterling (1990) 99; Goldhill (1990) 109. 31 Cf. Barthes (1988) 103: ‘Every system being the combination of units whose classes are known, we must ﬁrst segment the narrative and determine the segments of the narrative discourse which can be distributed into a small number of classes; in a word, we must deﬁne the smallest narrative units.’ 32 A recurrent feature of structuralist attempts to deﬁne an event is the notion

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other ancient writer gives explicit guidance in this area, although the Poetics does suggest that ‘Orestes kills Clytemnestra’, ‘Alcmaeon kills Eriphyle’ and so on may be suitable expressions of ‘smallest possible units’. All of this means that any attempt to identify the ‘basic’ elements in a myth should be seen as an approximation and a (necessarily) subjective process. But the exercise may, nevertheless, be of some practical use, if one bears these qualiﬁcations in mind. In Figures 2.1–3 I have tried to give semi-graphic summaries of the main elements in the myths of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia, in terms of the important events as narrated in texts before and after Euripides’ time.33 These summaries (in which the ‘smallest units’ are quite broadly deﬁned) are meant to give nothing more than a sense of the major variants: I have not attempted to be exhaustive or comprehensive. Such a laborious task would yield only limited reward, since the comparative scarcity of surviving material (see §2.3 below) means that even a complete summary of every extant text which mentions Helen and Iphigenia would give only a very partial reconstruction of ‘the tradition’. What this collection of information shows is that the three myths consisted of a variety of elements, which may or may not have been in circulation in the late ﬁfth century.34 of change: ‘one situation moves to another’ (Todorov [1977] 11); or, alternatively, ‘an action . . . always demonstrates a triadic structure whose diﬀerent components consist of the existing situation, the attempt to change it and the new situation’ (Pﬁster [1988] 199). This deﬁnition implies a discernible sequence governed by temporal or causal factors. Yet this gives rise to more problems. How can one tell the diﬀerence between a sequence and an event? How much overlap is there? For example, one might treat ‘Orestes kills Clytemnestra’ as a single event, or one might separate it into a series of smaller events: the motivation of Orestes, the raising and plunging of the weapon, the scream, the spurt of blood, Clytemnestra’s falling to the ground, etc. 33 This manner of summary was suggested by a tabulation of variants in the Callisto myth by Henrichs (1987, 256–7). Like Henrichs, I oﬀer an assorted and unsystematic collection of references: all I am aiming to do is to represent the main events, rather than giving a list of sources. More detail can be found in LIMC (s.vv.) in all cases. 34 The use of post-Euripidean sources is problematic: it is of course possible that the variants which they contain evolved at a later stage and that the 5thcent. tradition was less multifarious. Even the fragments and reports of writers from the ﬁfth century and before which are preserved in later sources may have undergone change and distortion (see particularly Stesichorus—§2.3.2 below).

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Figure 2.1: Variants on the Helen myth in some literary sources 1 BIRTH Zeus/Leda Hom. Il. 3.418–426 Zeus as swan/Leda Apollodorus 3.10.7, Hyginus Fab. 77, Lactantius 1.21 Born from egg Herodorus (FGH 31 F21), Pausanias 3.16.1, Apollodorus 3.10.7, Hyginus Fab. 28 Zeus as swan/Nemesis as goose Cypria fr. 7 Davies, Cratinus, Nemesis (fr 113–27 PCG), Apollodorus 3.10.7 Zeus plants Nemesis’ egg in Leda’s womb Hyginus Fab. 28 Helen seen as Tyndareus’ daughter Hesiod fr. 176 MW, Stesichorus fr. 223 Davies, Gorgias Hel. 3. 2 VARIOUS SUITORS Hesiod fr. 197, 204 MW, Hellanicus (FGH 4 F29), Apollodorus 3.10.8, Hyginus Fab. 81 3 MARRIAGE TO MENELAUS

Stesichorus fr. 189–91 Davies, Apollodorus 3.10.6, 3.11.2

4 CHILDREN From Menelaus: Hermione Hom. Od. 4, Acusilas (FGH 2 F41), Apollodorus 3.11.1 Nicostratus Apollodorus 3.11.1 From Paris: Corythus Hellanicus (FGH 4 F29: incl. variant that Corythus was Trojan suitor of H!) Bunomus, Aganus, Idaeus, Helen Tzetzes ad Lycophr. 851. 5 RAPED By Paris; cause of Trojan War Hom., Il., Od., Sappho fr. 16, Alcaeus fr. 283, Herodotus 1.1–4, Gorgias, Hel., Apollodorus Epit. 3.1–5, Pausanias 3.22.2

By Theseus Pherecydes (FGH 3 F153), Plutarch Thes. 31.1, Apollodorus 3.10.7, Pausanias 1.18.5, 1.41.5, Hyginus Fab. 79

6 NO RAPE phantom Stesichorus fr. 192 Davies (?) Apollodorus Epit. 3.1–5 flown to Egypt Stesichorus fr. 192, Davies (?), Apollodorus Epit. 3.1–5 Helen on isle of Leuke with Achilles Pausanias 3.19.11, Philostratus 10.32–40

Or protected by Theseus from rape by Idas and Lynceus Hellanicus (FGH 4 F168), Plutarch Thes. 31.1, Apollodorus Epit. 1.24

Which causes war between Athens and Peloponnese Plutarch Thes. 29 Helen bears Iphigenia to Theseus Duris (FGH 76 F92), Pausanias 2.22.7, Tzetzes ad Lycophr. 183 7 HELEN SAILED TO EGYPT With Paris Herodotus 2.112–20, Hom. Il. 6.289–92 (Phoenicia) With Menelaus Hom. Od. 4, Hecataeus (FGH 1 F307), Hellanicus (FGH 4 F153) 8 ATTEMPTED RAPE BY THONOS

Hellanicus (FGH 4 F153)

9 AFTERWARDS Deified Herodotus 6.61, Pausanias 3.7.7 Back to Sparta with Menelaus; eternity in Isles of Blest Hom Od. 4 Sacrificed in Tauric land by Iphigenia Photius Bibl. 479 Hanged by servants of Tlepomenus’ widow Polyxo Pausanias 3.19.10

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Figure 2.2: Variants on the Andromeda myth in some literary sources 1 BORN TO CEPHEUS AND CASSIOPEIA (Cassiepeia, Cassiope) Herodotus 7.61, Ovid, Met. 4.663–5.249, Apollodorus 2.4.3–5, Eratosth. Catast. 15–17 2 BETROTHAL TO PHINEUS Catast. 15–17

Ovid, Met. 4.663–5.249, Apollodorus 2.4.3–5, Eratosth.

3 EXPOSED TO MONSTER Herodotus 7.61, Conon (FGH 26 F1.40), Soph. Andromeda (fr. 126–36 TGF), Ovid, Met. 4.663–5.249, Pausanias 4.35.9, Strabo 16.2.28, Philostratus, Imag. 1.29, Josephus, BJ 3.420, Lucian, Dial. of Sea-gods 14.3 because of Cassiopeia’s boasts to the Nereids Catast. 15–17

Apollodorus 2.4.3–5, Eratosth.

4 RESCUED BY PERSEUS Herodotus 7.61, Pherecydes (FGH 3 F12), Conon (FGH 26 F1.40), Soph. Andromeda (fr. 126–36 TGF), Ovid, Met. 4.663–5.249, Pausanias 4.35.9, Strabo 16.2.28, Philostratus, Imag. 1.29, Josephus BJ 3.420, Lucian, Dial. of Sea-gods 14.3 5 DUEL BETWEEN PERSEUS AND PHINEUS 2.4.3–5, Eratosth. Catast. 15–17 6 PERSEUS MARRIES ANDROMEDA Eratosth. Catast. 15–17

7 ANDROMEDA GIVES BIRTH TO PERSES Herodotus 7.61, Apollodorus 2.4.3–5, Eratosth. Catast. 15–17 9 CATASTERISM

Ovid, Met. 4.663–5.249, Apollodorus

Ovid Met. 4.663–5.249, Apollodorus 2.4.3–5,

8 ANDROMEDA ABANDONED BY PERSEUS Pherecydes (FGH 3 F12)

Apollodorus 2.4.3–5, Eratosth. Catast. 15–17

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Figure 2.3: Variants on the Iphigenia myth in some literary sources 1 NAME Iphigenia Cypria fr. 1 Davies, Stesichorus fr. 215 Davies, Soph. El. 156–7 (≠ Iphianassa) Iphimede(-a) Hesiod fr. 23a MW, Apollodorus 1.7.4 Iphinoe Acusilas (FGH 2 F28: ≠ Iphianassa) Iphianassa Hom. Il. 9.144–5, 286–7 (Iphianassa, Chrysothemis and Electra only), Pherecydes (FGH 3 F114), Acusilas (FGH 2 F28), Soph. El. 156–7 (≠ Iphigenia), Apollodorus 2.2.2 (≠ Iphinoe) 2 PARENTS Helen and Theseus Stesichorus fr. 191 Davies, Duris (FGH 76 F92), Pausanias 2.22.7 Agamemnon and Clytemnestra Hom. Il., Cypria, Soph. El., Apollodorus Epit. 2.16, Hyginus Fab. 120 Proetus and Stheneboea (Iphinoe/Iphianassa) Acusilas (FGH 2 F28), Apollodorus 2.2.2 Triops (Iphimedea) Apollodorus 1.7.4 3 IMPIETY AGAINST HERA (Iphianassa) Pherecydes (FGH 3 F114) 4 BETROTHED TO ACHILLES

Hesiod fr. 131 MW, Acusilas (FGH 2 F28),

Eur. Iph. at A., Apollodorus 3.13.8

5 AGAMEMNON COMPELLED TO SACRIFICE IPHIGENIA Because of Artemis’ jealousy Cypria fr. 23 Davies, Apollodorus Epit. 3.21 Because of non-fulfilment of a vow Apollodorus Epit. 2.10 In obedience to prophecies Plutarch Ages. 6

6 IPHIGENIA SACRIFICED AT AULIS Hom. Il. 9. 144–287, Cypria fr. 23 Davies, Aesch. Ag., Soph. fr. 726–30 TGF, Xen. Hell. 3.4.3, Plutarch Ages. 6, Apollodorus Epit. 2.10, 3.21

7 IPHIGENIA NOT SACRIFICED AT AULIS Cypria fr. 19 Davies, Hesiod fr. 23, 358 MW, Phanodemus (FGH 325 F14), Eur. Iph. at A., Apollodorus Epit. 3.21

8 LAST-MINUTE SUBSTITUTION By hind Cypria fr. 23 Davies, Apollodorus Epit. 3.21 By calf Antoninus Liberalis 27 By bear Phanodemus (FGH 325 F14), S Ar. Lys. 645 (?) By phantom double Hesiod fr. 23a MW (?) 9 IPHIGENIA GOES TO THE BLACK SEA Cypria (Proclus) p. 32 Davies, Hyginus, Fab. 120–1 And sacrifices Helen and Menelaus Photius Bibl. 479 10 IPHIGENIA IS DEIFIED Herodotus 4.103, Soph. fr. 726–30 TGF, Strabo 9.1.22, Apollodorus Epit. 3.21 As Hecate Pausanias 1.43.1 As Artemis Hesiod fr. 358 MW.

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The most important thing to emerge from Figures 2.1–3 is that each myth incorporates contradictory features. In no case can there be said to be ‘a single myth’, but rather a number of (often widely divergent) strands. Helen’s birth and parentage were described in a number of diﬀerent ways; her relationships with various suitors, including Theseus, Odysseus and Paris, were unclear; her exact whereabouts during and after the Trojan War was a moot point, as was her eventual fate. The details of Iphigenia’s family—even her name—were not ﬁxed;35 the reason why her father had to sacriﬁce her was not clearly known; a number of conﬂicting accounts existed to explain what happened to her at Aulis; and her subsequent history, like Helen’s, was obscure. There is a greater uniformity in the diﬀerent versions of the Andromeda myth, which (not insigniﬁcantly) is far less commonly found in extant authors than the other two myths; but even that is not without discrepancies as regards the details of Andromeda’s life and death following her dramatic rescue from the monster. So the idea of extracting only those elements which are common to all tellings is less feasible in practice than in theory. But this in itself reveals something very important about myths. Detailed examination of any myth uncovers many inconsistencies of detail, major and minor.36 This is due partly to the fact that there was no single canonical, authorized version of Greek 35 Multiple names cause a particular problem. The four similar names (Iphigenia, Iphimede[a], Iphinoe and Iphianassa) are sometimes used interchangeably to refer to the same person, but in some versions it is clear that Iphianassa, Iphigenia and Iphimede are quite distinct. In Apollodorus, for example (1.4.7), Iphimedea is the daughter of Triops who fell in love with Poseidon, and is not to be identiﬁed with Iphigenia; but in Hesiod (fr. 23 M–W) Iphimede is indeed the daughter of Agamemnon who was sacriﬁced (possibly even as a phantom) at Aulis. It seems likely that the similar-sounding names caused confusion, with the result that (up to) four characters became three, two or one. 36 ‘Everybody knows’ the myth of Oedipus—according to Aristotle (Poet. 1453b5–6), they shudder at the mere mention of the name—but even that tradition contained important diﬀerences. In Odyssey 11, Oedipus’ mother’s name is not Jocasta but Epicaste, nor is there any mention of his ignorance or self-blinding (both of which were important motifs in Sophocles’ inﬂuential version); and in the ancient epic Oedipodeia, his sons were fathered on Eurygania, rather than Jocasta or Epicaste (Pausanias 9.5.10 = Oedipodeia fr. 2 Davies). On this lack of homogeneity (and many other aspects of myth) see now Fowler’s (2000) collection of early Greek mythographers.

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myths, but a vast, diverse, unsystematic tradition. Reinach’s comment (apropos of the Iphigenia), ‘il faudrait dire les légendes, et non la légende’, is particularly apt.37 Aristotle (among others) might discuss the traditional stories in such a way as to imply that there existed something like a ‘bible’ of mythology, but in fact there was no mythical orthodoxy. It is possible that the Homeric poems come fairly close to being an authoritative source of myth;38 and it may also be true that epic and tragic myths, since they reached a wider audience through performance, were de facto more authoritative than others. Nevertheless, though we may talk of the oldest-established or most commonly attested versions (which, as we have seen, may often be quite diﬀerent things), it is never accurate to talk of a version of myth which possesses deﬁnitive status. It is probable that the Greeks’ knowledge of these traditional myths, even the ‘major’ myths like those of Helen and Iphigenia, was comparatively hazy.39 But, despite the presence of plural, rival versions of myth, the same people believed in the myths and worshipped the gods and heroes on whom they centre. To ﬁfth-century Athenians, myths were not just fairy-stories (albeit fairy-stories with social signiﬁcance), but they were to a large degree inseparable from history.40 In addition, they were a source of religious belief, on 37

Reinach (1915) 6. See Graf (1993) 142–3; Mossman (1995) 20–1; cf. also e.g. Athenaeus 8.347e (the tragedians serving up ‘slices from Homer’s great banquet’); TGF III (Radt) T112a–b (Aeschylus’ claim that his writings represented the ‘crumbs from Homer’s table’); S Soph. El. 445 (on disagreements with Homer). 39 Aristotle (Poet. 1451b25–6) says that even the well-known stories were well-known only to relatively few people in the audience of tragedy (ƒpe≥ ka≥ t¤ gn*rima øl≤goiß gn*rim3 ƒstin). This presents another problem, and another contradiction with evidence which suggests that people did widely know tragic myths (e.g. Arist. Poet. 1453b5–6, and the quotations at the beginning of this section). Perhaps Aristotle is exaggerating, in order to make the point that ‘nonmythical’ tragedies such as Agathon’s Antheus are permissible. Or perhaps (because of the imprecision in his terminology) he may be taken to mean that people knew the ‘basic’ myths of Oedipus, Orestes and so on, but did not possess more intimate knowledge of speciﬁc (or contrasting) treatments of these myths by diﬀerent poets. 40 Burian (1997) 185: ‘Myth is subject to interpretation and revision, but not to complete overturn, because it is also history’; see also Knox (1979) 10–15 on myth as history in the sense of ‘collective memory’ and Eisner (1979) 153 on myths as ‘ancient history’ in Herodotus and Thucydides; cf. Bowie (1993) 11. One might also compare the statement of S Pind. Ol. 4.31b that Pindar’s account of the Hypsipyle myth is contrary to history (par’ Èstor≤an), although, 38

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which contemporary ritual practices were based.41 This curious paradox is central to Greek religious belief and historical thought, and does not seem to have troubled any ancient writers on the subject, who discuss myth as if it were really ﬁxed and immutable. In addition, Aristotle’s remarks on the limitations of poetic invention reveal another ‘blind spot’ in ancient thinking: it was not suﬃciently taken into account that poetry and drama, as well as ‘using’ myths, must have played a substantial role in creating and altering them.42 It is these inconsistencies and contradictions inherent in ‘myth’ and the mythical tradition that are of particular importance for understanding the myths of Helen and Iphigenia and what Euripides has done with them in the escape-tragedies. Nevertheless, as I said above, it remains important to distinguish between ‘myths’ and ‘plots’, that is, between the inheritance and the invention of material. Aristotle’s advice is that the tragedian should not ‘alter’ (l»ein)43 myths but ‘invent’ (eËr≤skein) for himself, as well as making ‘good use’ of (cr[sqai kal0ß) myths. At ﬁrst sight, this might seem rather a contradictory set of instructions—how can there have been freedom to invent material, if alterations were forbidden? But if the concepts of ‘myth’ and ‘plot’ are understood to be quite separate, then Aristotle’s meaning becomes quite clear. paradoxically, the scholiast implies that a very large degree of poetic licence is permissible (πxesti pl3ttein to∏ß poihta∏ß 4 bo»lontai). A similar point is made by Plutarch (Quomodo Adul. 20c). 41 In particular, the cult aetiologies and genealogies with which many tragedies end show the importance of myth in everyday religion, as well as of the continuity between the past and contemporary ﬁfth-century life: see esp. Conacher (1967) 304; Wolﬀ (1992) [on Iphigenia]; Seaford (1994). However, one should note also the opposite view: Mikalson (1991) believes that tragic and ‘lived’ religion were conceptually separate; and Veyne (1988, 17) writes that ‘Greek mythology, whose connections with religion were very loose, was basically nothing but a popular literary genre.’ Of course one cannot deny the diverse and unsystematic nature of Greek religion in general, but there was no other ‘religious’ literature available: in that case the importance of myth and mythological texts must, surely, extend far beyond (simply) literature. (See §5.2 below on tragic ‘religion’.) 42 Plut. Mor. 346f–348d, for example, expounds the view that the proper function of poetry is to ‘compose’ myths (poe∏n m»qouß . . . Ò t[ß poihtik[ß πrgon); cf. Mor. 14d–18a (muqopo≤hma ka≥ pl3sma); Plato, Phaedo 61b (poetry, myths, and ‘truth’). See Morgan (2000) on all these aspects. 43 A diﬃcult word to translate. ‘Loosen’, ‘dissolve’, ‘unravel’ (etc.) would also be possible meanings.

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Myth is the traditional, inherited material. But far more prominent in the Poetics is plot, the other sense of mıqoß: ‘the plan or scheme of any literary creation, as a play, poem, or work of prose ﬁction’.44 Plot is Aristotle’s principal interest: indeed, he believes it to be the most important feature of tragedy.45 As one inﬂuential critic observes, mıqoß in Aristotle becomes ‘a virtually technical term’ for ‘the plot-structure which is both the organized design and the signiﬁcant substance or content of a poem’.46 He discusses mıqoß in a broadly literary and aesthetic sense, but is not greatly concerned with the social, political or religious (‘mythic’) functions which modern critics highlight.47 Although the Poetics contains no programmatic deﬁnition of mıqoß, certain scattered remarks at diﬀerent points throughout the text add up to a partial clariﬁcation and expansion of meaning. Having said that mıqoß is a ‘representation of an action’ (pr3xewß . . . m≤mhsiß),48 Aristotle proceeds to explain that ‘by mıqoß, I mean the composition of events’ (lvgw g¤r mıqon toıton, t¶n s»nqesin t0n pragm3twn).49 A little later, Aristotle more or less repeats this idea, saying that the ﬁrst and most important thing in tragedy is the ‘arrangement of events’ (s»stasiß . . . t0n pr3gmatwn).50 44

OED (2nd edn., 1989), s.v. ‘plot’ (III.6). Arist. Poet. 1450a4–5, 38–9. It may be interesting to compare an anecdote about the comic poet Menander, which also reﬂects the prime importance of plots to playwrights: when asked about the state of completion of his new play, he replied that it was practically ﬁnished—the plot was made, but he just had to write the lines (Plut. Mor. 347b). 46 Halliwell (1986) 23: he contrasts this with Plato’s mıqoß, which is ‘a story or fable which embodies and asserts, without qualiﬁcation, a set of propositions about the world’—in other words, a ‘myth’ in a modern sense (cf. Graf [1993] 1–8) rather than a ‘plot’. 47 On the ‘failure’ of Aristotle to address the concerns of modern critics see, for example, Hall (1996) and Belﬁore (2000). 48 Arist. Poet. 1450a4. Earlier (1459b36), Aristotle has deﬁned tragedy itself as pr3xewß . . . m≤mhsiß, which, presumably, gives emphasis to his view of the centrality of plot. 49 Arist. Poet. 1450a4–5. This is ‘not the most obvious sense, which was simply “story”’: Lucas (1968) ad loc. 50 Arist. Poet. 1450b22–3; cf. Ó t0n pr3gmatwn s»stasiß at Poet. 1450a15. Lucas (1968, 100) translates this as ‘structure’. The same terminology is used also of epic (Poet. 1459a17–19: de∏ toŸß m»qouß kaq3per ƒn ta∏ß tragwid≤aiß sunist3nai, ‘one must put together plots just as in tragedy’); one can ‘put together’ plots, but not myths. 45

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Aristotle also explains what he means by cr[sqai kal0ß: he does not mean that the myth has to be interfered with, but that the poet has to make certain decisions as to which parts of it he should include. Which characters from the myth, for instance, will appear as characters in the tragedy? Should he insert plot elements such as ignorance, peripeteiai, pity and fear (and in what order)? Plot is not what the poet inherits, but just how he deals with it—the selection and arrangement of a limited amount of material, to make a coherent, uniﬁed play of about ninety minutes’ length with a neat beginning and ending.51 Plots, as one critic wrote, are ‘slices out of a larger whole’;52 in general, they deal with only a small number of events from the myths, to be imagined as taking place during a single day in the lives of their characters. What happens on-stage—the entry and exit of characters; their dialogue, physical actions, movements and gestures; recognitions; supplications; lamentations; rituals—is often peripheral to the main events of the myth. The rest of the myth (as a whole) is usually either implicit in the action of the play or explicitly referred to at diﬀerent points during the play, especially in the prologue-speeches, the choral odes and the speeches of gods ex machina.53 Therefore, plots must be compatible with myths, but they are not identical with them. Sometimes the precise order and mixture of events included in a plot would seem more familiar than in others,54 but usually the composition of the plot and the selection of events and characters 51

Cf. Arist. Poet. 1450b–1451b. Stinton (1986) 74. 53 On prologue-speeches, see Segal (1992) 85–92; Austin (1994) 141; Goward (1999) 9–20. 54 This seems to be acknowledged by Aristotle when he writes that the poet, when writing his tragedy, should ﬁrst set out his story—even if it is readymade—in general terms (to»ß te lÎgouß ka≥ toŸß pepoihmvnouß de∏ ka≥ aÛtÏn poioınta ƒkt≤qesqai kaqÎlou: Poet. 1455a34–b1). In other words, some plots had been used before. (This seems the most natural reading of that passage; Lucas [1968] ad loc. points out that elsewhere in the Poetics pepoihmvnoß means ‘fabricated’ or ‘contrived’ as opposed to ‘traditional’ [Poet. 1451b20, 1454b30, 1457b2], but if that were the sense here it would be hard to see Aristotle’s point.) Aristotle goes on (Poet. 1455b3–15) to summarize the plot of Iphigenia, but the text gives the bizarre impression that he thinks Euripides came up with the events—the sacriﬁce, the recognition, and so on—before he had even decided on the myth or the characters! (In Aristotle’s defence, however, one could read him as implying that an author might be drawn to a myth because of its potential for dramatic plotting.) 52

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from the myth relied on the creativity of the individual playwright.55 One of Dio of Prusa’s rhetorical exercises illustrates the distinction. It takes the form of a synkrisis of the tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides on the same subject, Philoctetes.56 Dio ﬁrst describes, in the simplest terms possible, what one might call the part of the myth on which the tragedies were based, the element which all three plays have in common: ‘the theft or seizure of Philoctetes’ bow’.57 Then he describes the individual plots of the three tragedies in more detail, as well as commenting on other areas in which the tragedians demonstrated their individuality and original invention (characterization, use of the chorus, language, ethical content). The ‘basic’ myth is the same in all cases, but the plots are diﬀerent. We learn from Dio that in Aeschylus’ plot, Odysseus was not disguised by Athena (as in Homer and Euripides); the chorus did not apologize for their neglect of Philoctetes (as in Euripides); and Odysseus’ character was not guileful. In Euripides’ plot, Odysseus was in disguise and practised deceit, inventing the story of a false embassy to ensnare Philoctetes; there were certain new characters (Diomedes and a Lemnian neighbour of Philoctetes), and the story was ‘more complicated’ (poikil*teron). In Sophocles’ plot, Odysseus arrived with Neoptolemus; the characters were more digniﬁed; the chorus was composed of sailors and not native Lemnians; the bow was returned; and Heracles appeared at the dénouement. Dio writes of Sophocles’ version with especial approbation, saying that his management of the plot is excellent and most convincing (t[i . . . diaskeu[i t0n pragm3twn år≤sthi ka≥ piqanwt3thi kvcrhtai). We could compare the tragedies by the same three tragedians on the subject of Electra: again, they use approximately the same part of the Electra myth but have quite diﬀerent plots. 55 On the type of activity that constituted poetic freedom—selection, adaptation, ‘cut-oﬀ’ points, the ‘engineering’ of character, motivation, paradeigmata, and so on—see March (1987) xi; Lattimore (1964) 5–6; Stinton (1986) 70–5. 56 Dio Chrys. Or. 52; discussion in Russell and Winterbottom (1972) 504–7. Only Sophocles’ version survives, making an up-to-date synkrisis impossible. 57 Dio Chrys. Or. 52.1.20–1. He does not use the word mıqoß either of the myth or the plot(s), but refers to the three plays as being per≥ t¶n aÛt¶n ËpÎqesin, ¬n g¤r t¶n t0n Filokt&tou tÎxwn e÷te klop¶n e÷te Årpag¶n de∏ lvgein (‘on the same subject, which one must call either the theft or the snatching of Philoctetes’ bow’).

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To clarify the distinction further, with speciﬁc reference to the escape-tragedies, I oﬀer below an analysis of the main events in all three plays. Events marked with the symbol m are taken from the inherited myth, and those marked p make up Euripides’ invented plot. A prime (´) denotes that there is some signiﬁcant doubt, to be discussed later on—but of course, in theory, there may be far more m than we can know. That is, if more Greek poetry had survived, we might be able to identify more inherited material.58 Inevitably, then, this analysis is somewhat provisional; but it is still possible to distinguish with some conﬁdence between the sort of events which happen on the stage and the sort of events which are transmitted in tellings of myths of all kinds. (In the case of the Andromeda, I have listed only those fragments which seem to contain a discernible ‘event’: the results are, inevitably, partial, but even there it is possible to distinguish myth from plot.) Helen (lines 1–3) Helen is in Egypt m´ (4–22) Genealogy m (23–30) The beauty contest on Ida m (31–6) Hera made a phantom-double of Helen m´ (37–43) The Trojan War was fought for a phantom m´ (44–55) Hermes brought Helen to Egypt m´ (56–67) Helen chastely resists Theoclymenus’ advances p (68–163) Teucer arrives and questions Helen p (83–122) Teucer reports news of the Trojans p (123–32) Menelaus and ‘Helen’ are reported dead in a shipwreck p (133–43) Leda and the Dioscuri are reported dead p (144–50) Teucer requires help to ﬁnd his way home p (151–63) Teucer leaves, warned of Theoclymenus’ violence p [parodos 164–251: lamentation over deaths of Leda, Dioscuri and Menelaus p] (255–305) Helen bewails her beauty and her life p, m (306–29) The Greek women cause Helen to doubt Teucer’s reports p (330–85) Helen prepares to ask advice of the omniscient Theonoe p 58

See the section which follows (§2.3).

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(348–61) Helen threatens to kill herself if Menelaus is really dead p (362–85) Helen laments p (386–436) Menelaus arrives, shipwrecked and lost p (437–82) Menelaus argues with the Portress p (483–514) Menelaus’ confusion when he learns that Helen is here p (515–40) Helen learns that Menelaus is alive p (541–96) Helen meets Menelaus: no recognition p (597–615) Servant reveals that the phantom has vanished p (616–733) Recognition p (734–57) Menelaus sends servant away to the shore p (758–776) Helen questions Menelaus p, m (777–804) Menelaus learns that Theoclymenus is a threat p (805–18) Plan to kill Theoclymenus or escape p (819–841) The Greeks plan to win over Theonoe p (842–64) Menelaus hides behind tomb p (865–93) Theonoe recognizes Menelaus and warns him oﬀ p (894–997) Helen and Menelaus supplicate Theonoe p (998–1029) Theonoe oﬀers her allegiance p (1030–1106) The Greeks plan escape by means of a bogus ritual p [stasimon 1107–64: Troy’s suﬀerings revisited m] (1165–83) Theoclymenus threatens to kill Menelaus p (1184–1300) Helen dupes Theoclymenus p [stasimon 1301–68: Demeter m] (1369–1450) A ship is prepared for the bogus ritual p [stasimon 1451–511: anticipates the escape p] (1512–620) Messenger reports that Helen and Menelaus have escaped p (1621–41) Theoclymenus makes to kill Theonoe p (1642–end) Dioscuri prevent murder and send Helen and Menelaus on their way p (1662–end) Helen and Menelaus’ distant future: deiﬁcation; the isle of Helene m´ Andromeda (fragment 114) Andromeda watches the night sky p (115, 122) Andromeda laments her misfortune p, m (118) Andromeda speaks to Echo p

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(120–2) Andromeda has been exposed for the sea-monster by Cepheus m (123–5) Perseus arrives [in Ethiopia?] with the Gorgon’s head m (125) Perseus mistakes Andromeda for a beautiful statue p (127–32?) Dialogue between Perseus and Andromeda; he pities her p (129, 136–8) Perseus falls in love with Andromeda (?) m, p (139) [Perseus] clashes with a barbarian p, m´ (145) The monster rushes from the sea towards Andromeda m, p Iphigenia (lines 1–5) Genealogy m (6–27) The sacriﬁce at Aulis m (28–9) Iphigenia replaced by a hind m´ (29–30) Artemis brings Iphigenia to the Tauric land m´ (31–2) Thoas rules the Taurians m´ (33–41) Iphigenia is a priestess who performs human sacriﬁce m/p´ (42–66) Iphigenia’s dream: Orestes is dead p (67–103) Orestes and Pylades arrive in search of Artemis’ image m/p´ (104–22) Orestes and Pylades hide in a cave p [parodos 123–43] (144–235) Iphigenia and the Greek women lament their suﬀerings p (236–339) The herdsman tells Iphigenia what he has seen at the shore p (284–305) Orestes slaughters cattle in a frenzy p (306–339) The herdsmen capture Orestes and Pylades p (340–91) Iphigenia resolves to sacriﬁce Orestes and Pylades p (358–77) Iphigenia recalls her own sacriﬁce p, m [stasimon 392–466: the Greek women’s trip to the Black Sea p] (467–577) Iphigenia questions Orestes and Pylades about Greece and Troy p, m (578–642) Iphigenia asks Pylades to take a letter to her family p (643–668) Lamentation p (669–722) Orestes and Pylades discuss what should be done p (723–68) Iphigenia gives the letter to Pylades p (769–771) Iphigenia begins to read the letter out loud p (772–899) Mutual recognition of Iphigenia and Orestes p

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(800–938) Orestes recounts family history p, m (939–88) Orestes recounts his wanderings p, m (989–1055) The siblings start to plan their escape p (1056–88) The complicity of the chorus is obtained p [stasimon 1089–1152: the chorus recount past misfortunes m, p] (1153–202) Thoas questions Iphigenia about the sacriﬁce p (1203–21) Iphigenia tricks Thoas p (1222–33) Preparations for the bogus sacriﬁce p [stasimon 1234–83: Apollo and Delphi m] (1284–389) A servant reports the Greeks’ attempted escape . . . p (1390–410) . . . and that a violent wave has trapped them p (1411–34) Thoas’ servants attempt to capture the fugitives p (1435–41) Athena appears and orders Thoas to quell his anger p (1442–61) Athena ordains Orestes’ future: Athens and Halae m´ (1462–74) Athena ordains Iphigenia’s future: Brauron m´ (1475–85) Thoas ceases to entertain violent thoughts p (1489–end) The Greeks escape safely p It is clear from the above that the myth is found largely in the prologue, choral odes and epiphany-speeches, but that the plot accounts for the larger share of events. In this respect, the escape-tragedies correspond to the normal pattern of other tragedies. Another, crucial thing which emerges (from the items marked with a prime) is that it is more diﬃcult than usual to distinguish ‘myth’ from ‘plot’ in the escape-tragedies. The ambiguous elements, in Helen, are Helen’s phantom-double, her airborne trip to Egypt, Menelaus’ arrival in Egypt, and the closing aetiologies; in Iphigenia, the heroine’s replacement by a hind at Aulis, her transportation to the Tauric land in human form, the arrival of Orestes, and the closing aetiologies. Euripides’ presentation and treatment of these counterfactual versions of the Helen and Iphigenia stories is precisely in keeping with tragic myths elsewhere: he includes them in the prologue speeches (etc.) along with other inherited elements and continually refers to them in the same manner as other episodes from mythical history. Whether or not Euripides actually invented these counterfactual stories, he makes them seem identical to other myths in normal tragic usage. But did he invent them?

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The extent of Euripides’ so-called heterodoxy depends on the answer to this question. If it could be shown that Euripides had invented these revised myths (as well as his plots), then these tragedies must be seen as deviant from the norm. But that would be diﬃcult to prove. It is more likely, as I shall argue in the following section, that Euripides did not invent the phantomdouble of Helen or the substitution at Aulis, but inherited them from a complicated and contradictory tradition. In other words, Euripides’ plots do, as in other tragedies, largely correspond to traditional myths. It is the myths themselves which are unusual—i.e., the fact that the mythical tradition was able to accommodate both the ‘standard’ Helen and Iphigenia stories as well as their ‘counterfactual’ alternative versions. And Euripides’ purpose in the escape-tragedies seems to have been to exploit the inconsistencies and paradoxes of these particular myths. 2.3 old and new elements: inheritance, adaptation, innovation 2.3.1 The basic problem Before moving on to the speciﬁcs of these myths and plots, the ﬁrst and most crucial observation to be made is that sourcecriticism of Greek poetry is very much more diﬃcult than its practitioners generally admit. Only the tiniest fraction of Greek literature survives—perhaps one or two per cent., at a generous estimate.59 In this case, therefore, it is impossible to know just what were the inﬂuences on Euripides, how extensively he used his sources, and what that ‘use’ of sources actually entailed. A recent book on allusion and intertextuality in Greek poetry 59 Most early poetry is represented only by titles or fragments. Consider the genre of tragedy, for example: Snell (TGF I, vi) lists ﬁfty-two tragedians who are known to have worked in the 5th cent., but there will certainly have been others. We may assume that during the 5th cent. about 900 plays were exhibited at the City Dionysia in Athens; then there would have been plays exhibited at other festivals, and even plays which were not performed. But all that survives is thirty-two complete plays, the work of three (or possibly four or ﬁve) tragedians, and a quantity of meagre fragments. Tragedy, moreover, was a popular genre with a wide (geographical and chronological) reception. By contrast, other poetic genres (lyric, dithyramb, etc.) are even more underrepresented.

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discusses in its introduction some of the unanswered, and perhaps unanswerable, questions which assail the critic.60 Allusion is unprovable, not just because of the loss of material but because we do not know whether ﬁfth-century poets thought in terms of (inter-)textuality as such. Surviving ancient criticism relating to the period does not discuss this subject (but that does not prove or disprove anything). Clearly, poetry and drama were available in the ﬁfth century in the form of written texts,61 but the fact that texts were well known does not allow us to say exactly how poets made use of these texts when writing new works. Also, although all that survives of the mythical-literary tradition is a collection of literary texts, these texts were not the only vehicle for ancient myth and storytelling. Oral, active, nonrecorded means of dissemination will have been equally important; nor should we forget about the iconographic tradition. So, although a modern discussion of ‘myth’ is, basically, restricted to the realm of intertextuality and narratology,62 one should remember that the business of allusion was more complex than ‘intertextuality’ implies. One is forced to make much—perhaps too much—of little. It may be that we are dealing with only the tip of the iceberg. Who is to say that Euripides’ escape-tragedies do not make highly complex allusions to a hundred lost, unknown and irrecoverable sources, both oral and written? Consequently, I believe that one should beware of making conﬁdent pronouncements about Euripides’ (or any classical Greek poet’s) sources. Any conclusions which one might reach about supposed inﬂuence, allusion and intertext must be regarded as tentative and provisional, subject to this insuperable shortage of information. In particular, I believe that one should be wary of claiming that Euripides was radically inventive in his 60 Garner (1990) seems to be the only book of its kind in English. The absence of other such studies, no doubt, indicates the diﬃculty of the subject. In contrast, intertextual studies of Latin poetry proliferate: see for example the survey of Hinds (1998), esp. 1–16 and 145–50. 61 Internal evidence from tragedy and comedy includes: Eur. Med. 423, Hipp. 451–5, Iph. at A. 794–800; Ar. Clouds 1355–72, Frogs 52–4; cf. Harris (1992) 92–3; Garner (1990) 18–19. 62 Cf. Mossman (1995) 19: ‘A “myth” can often seem to us to consist almost entirely of individual literary instantiations of a story . . . and in that case one is almost inevitably talking about the relationship of one text to another.’

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handling of myth. The absence of obvious sources and parallels for ‘odd’ features should not necessarily lead us to conclude that Euripides was the originator of such features. No ﬁrm statements, no deﬁnite answers, are possible. Nevertheless, I do not mean to imply that inquiry into inﬂuences is without use. In the ﬁrst place, even if it is impossible to get the whole picture, one can still identify some of Euripides’ likely sources and some probable allusions in the text of the plays. Second, it is salutary to underline the hazards of making ﬁrm statements about Euripides and his predecessors, and to modify or correct the accounts given by certain, less cautious, scholars. It may seem that my view of source-criticism is rather pessimistic; but pessimism may have a positive beneﬁt, if it can allow one to progress beyond shaky and unreliable inferences towards a realistic, relatively informed view of Euripides’ attitude to myth. What follows, then, is a tentative attempt to determine just which features of the escape-tragedies would have seemed novel and which more familiar. 2.3.2 That tale is not true . . . Euripides’ ‘use of myth’ should not be understood in terms either of invention or of direct inheritance of motifs from speciﬁc individual authors. Rather, I suggest that the myths of the escape-tragedies represent an original combination of pre-existing but disparate elements, and that the plays’ meaning results from the odd manner in which these elements have been combined, as well as the choice of mythical subjects itself. What is important—as I shall go on to argue—is Euripides’ attitude to myth in general, rather than his relationship to any poet or poets in particular. Ultimately, as I have already said, it would be impossible to prove this suggestion. It may be that numerous (now lost) poems also treated the myths of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia along exactly the same lines as Euripides, and that Euripides recycled these myths—what Aristotle would have called pareilhmmvnoi mıqoi—without signiﬁcant alteration. Nevertheless, it seems fairly clear that Euripidean invention (as such) can be ruled out. It is highly probable, at any rate, that each of the ‘ambiguous’ counterfactual elements (§2.2.2 above)—the substitutions

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and the transportations to exotic lands—already existed in the mythical tradition by the ﬁfth century or earlier. Whether these elements existed separately or in combination is more obscure. A tradition of Helen in Egypt was deﬁnitely in existence before Euripides’ time, although the reason for her sojourn there diﬀered from that given by Euripides. Herodotus depicts Helen as having travelled to Egypt with Paris (by ship) en route to Troy.63 Other writers had Menelaus as Helen’s travelling partner: Homer’s Odyssey, Hecataeus and Hellanicus all record that couple’s accidental visit to Egypt on the way home to Sparta from Troy.64 The motifs of miraculous substitutions, images fashioned from clouds and phantom-doubles also existed from a very early period in Greek literature.65 The nature and purpose of these cloud-images varied:66 sometimes invisibility was the aim, but more often phantoms (e÷dwla) were intended to be indistinguishable from their human originals. (Helen’s phantom was of the second type, since its speciﬁc purpose was to deceive Paris into thinking he held the real Helen in his arms.) For example, Apollo in the Iliad replaced Aeneas on the battleﬁeld with a phantom (e÷dwlon) in order to protect him;67 Athene in the Odyssey made Odysseus invisible with aether;68 Pindar’s Zeus made a phantom of Hera to delude Ixion;69 Hesiod’s Zeus made 63 Hdt. 2.112–20. In the Iliad (6.289–92) Paris and Helen land up in Phoenicia, another ‘beyond’ place. The idea that people could end up in Egypt ‘en route’ from Greece to Troy (or vice versa) is surprising: but one must remember that sea-travel was a dangerous and unpredictable means of transport, susceptible to storm, gods and shipwreck (see §3.4 below). 64 Hom. Od. 4.220–569; Hecataeus (FGH 1 F307–9); Hellanicus (FGH 4 F153). 65 The motif persisted in post-Euripidean literature also: e.g. Verg. Aen. 10.633–52 (Aeneas); Sil. Ital. 17.522–33 (an Italian soldier); Paus. 6.11.2 (a priest who uses a f3sma of Timosthenes in order to have sex with Timosthenes’ wife—I don’t at all understand how that worked). 66 Hartigan (1981, 24 n. 5) feels the problem deeply: ‘If we look at cloud images too closely we become rather unclear ourselves.’ But perhaps she is echoing the sentiments of Achilles in the Iliad, who reminds us of the insubstantial nature of these phantoms: he says that existence in Hades is nothing but an insubstantial phantom (yuc¶ ka≥ e÷dwlon, Il. 23.99; cf. Od. 10.490–5, 11.474–6, for the notion that skia≤ live in Hades). See §4.4.6 below for more on phantoms. 67 Hom. Il. 5.443–54. 68 Hom. Od. 7.13–17. 69 Pind. Pyth. 2.33–48.

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a phantom of Endymion when Hera had conceived a love for him;70 an apparition (f3sma) in Herodotus assumed the appearance of Ariston;71 and in Euripides’ Bacchae Zeus gave Hera an image made from aether in exchange for the infant Dionysus.72 There was even a (perhaps later) tradition that Helen herself was deceived by Aphrodite by means of a similar trick, whereby she made Paris resemble Menelaus—another ingenious example of the phantom-motif being used to exonerate Helen from blame.73 The question of whether the phantom-double of Helen herself appeared in any pre-Euripidean poem is unanswerable, not only because of the shortage of evidence but also because the story of the phantom became extremely well known, and extremely confused, in later antiquity. It is impossible to extract the version of any single poet, or to chart the origin or development of the phantom-theme, from the chaotic and contradictory collection of references. If we are to take the evidence of the fragments at face value, it could be that either Hesiod or Stesichorus (or both) wrote about Helen’s phantom-double. But it is impossible to conclude either who introduced the phantom or whose phantom it was. It may even be that the original phantom was not Helen’s, but Iphigenia’s (another suggestive connection between the two heroines?). Clues have been found in two Hesiodic fragments. The ﬁrst, from the Catalogue of Women, relates the events leading up to the sacriﬁce of Iphimede (= Iphigenia) at Aulis: Ifimvdhn m†n sf3xan ƒ”kn&[m]ideß !caio≥ bwm0[i πp’ !rtvmidoß crushlak]3. t[ou] keladein[ß, ‡mat[i t0i Òte nhus≥n ånvpl]eon. “Ilion e.[÷sw poin¶[n teisÎmenoi kallisf»rou !rgei*. [nh]ß, 20 ejdw[lon: aÛt¶n d’ ƒlafhbÎ]lo. ß jocvaira Âe∏a m3l’ ƒxes3w[se, ka≥ åmbros]≤hn [ƒr]at. e. [in¶n st3xe kat¤ kr[[qen, Jna oÈ c]r. °ß [πm. pe[d]o. [ß] e. [÷h, q[ken d’ åqanato[n ka≥ åg&r]aon ‡ma[ta p3nta.74 The well-greaved Achaeans sacriﬁced Iphimede on the altar of clearvoiced Artemis of the golden distaﬀ, on the very day that they sailed to Troy in order to exact retribution for the Greek woman with the 70 72 74

Hesiod fr. 260 M–W. Eur. Bacch. 288–97. Hesiod, fr. 23(a) M–W, 17–24.

71 73

Hdt. 6.69.5–6. Eustathius ad Hom. Od. 23.218.

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beautiful ankles, a phantom: the arrow-showering deer-slayer saved her with great ease, and sprinkled lovely ambrosia over her head, so that her ﬂesh might not decay, and made her immortal and perpetually ageless.

If we adopt the conjecture of Merkelbach, the e÷dwlon (line 21) is that of Iphimede: it seems to be a reference to the tradition in which Agamemnon’s daughter escaped sacriﬁce at the last minute, although it is only here that her escape is explained away by means of a phantom, rather than (as elsewhere) a transformation into a young animal of some sort.75 But another possibility is to read not e÷dw[lon but ejd*[lou, with March.76 In that case, the phantom must be that of Helen. ‘If this is the case,’ writes March, ‘then presumably the death of Iphimede here in Hesiod would be the same as in the Cypria, where Artemis replaces her with a deer and thus saves her; so the epithet ƒlafhbÎ[loß would have particular meaning at this point’.77 Another consideration may be that no other writer mentions the phantom of Iphigenia. The second relevant Hesiodic fragment is from a scholion on Lycophron 822, which reads: pr0toß }Hs≤odoß per≥ t[ß ∞Elvnhß tÏ e÷dwlon par&gage (‘Hesiod, writing about Helen, was the ﬁrst to introduce the phantom’).78 But there is a problem. Usually this is taken to be an unhelpful contradiction of the above fragment 23(a), by a negligent scholar. The fragment is thought to be of doubtful value (categorized among fragmenta dubia vel spuria by Merkelbach and West),79 and it later contains incorrect information about Herodotus’ account, saying, wrongly, that Helen’s phantom is to be found there also. Nevertheless, if March’s conjecture is right, fragment 358 could still be correct in attributing the e÷dwlon of Helen to Hesiod. No matter which of the above suggestions is right, I think that one should be suspicious of the manner in which the phantom is mentioned in fragment 23(a). Austin observes, without further comment, that the odd enjambement ‘allows the poet to add a qualiﬁcation, an afterthought to a thought already 75 Cypria fr. 23 Davies; Apollod. Epit. 3.21; Ant. Lib. 27; Phanodemus (FGH 325 F14). 76 March (1987) 88–9: ejd*[lou: ko»rhn d’ ƒlafhbÎ]loß jocvaira. 77 March (1987) 89. 78 = Hesiod fr. 358 M–W (but see West [1985] 134). 79 I note also that it is rather odd grammatically: the meaning of per≥ is hard to decipher unless one supplies 〈lvgwn〉 vel sim.

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completed’.80 But the oddest thing is that the reference consists of just a single word (e÷dwlon or ejd*lou) standing on its own as if in parenthesis. If this word stands for the rescue and substitution of Iphigenia, it is elliptical in the extreme; in addition, the interval of four lines between e÷dwlon and I∞ fimvdhn (with which it is in apposition) seems undesirable. If, on the other hand, it refers to the myth that Helen’s phantom, and not Helen herself, was the ultimate cause of Iphigenia’s sacriﬁce, it seems syntactically more natural but even more oblique. Either way, a parenthetic, single-word ‘afterthought’ is simply not explicit enough to bear the required weight of meaning if this passage really were the ﬁrst occurrence of the radical new myth. Rather, it looks like a casual, brief allusion to another, more explicit version of the myth. This might have been narrated earlier in the Catalogue— or perhaps Hesiod expected his audience already to be familiar with the myth from a diﬀerent source? In other words, this cannot be the ﬁrst appearance of the phantom: so there is no ﬁrm proof that Hesiod was the inventor of the phantom of either Iphigenia or Helen. What these fragments do show is that the phantom of either Helen or Iphigenia was in existence by Hesiod’s time. But whose idea was it? Another possible candidate has been identiﬁed in Stesichorus of Himera, author of some twenty-eight works including an Oresteia and a Helen. Indeed, it seems to be an accepted ‘fact’ that one of his (now lost) poems, the Palinode, was the direct or principal source for the plot of Euripides’ Helen.81 However, I believe that this ‘fact’ is completely mistaken, and a serious distraction to anyone who really wants to understand what Euripides was trying to do in Helen. To demonstrate this, it will be necessary to examine at some length what is known about the Palinode. 80

Austin (1994) 108. Virtually every commentator claims that Euripides recycled the ‘counterfactual’ Helen-myth directly from the Palinode. For example (a full list would ﬁll pages): Burnett (1971) 76–100; Conacher (1998) 74; Dale (1967) xvii–xxiv; Davison (1968) 221–2; Griﬃth (1953) 36–41; Kannicht (1969) I.26–31; Segal (1971) 561; Webster (1967) 199–204, etc. Farina (1968) 28 even lists passages from Helen which he claims, highly unconvincingly, to be allusions to the Palinode. Austin’s (1994, 138–99) version of Euripides’ sources is more complex but still identiﬁes Stesichorus as the principal inspiration. A notable exception to this trend is Bowra (1934, 115–19), who writes that ‘statements which imply that Stesichorus told the same story as Euripides’ Helen are not based on a real knowledge of his text’. 81

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It is not intrinsically unlikely that Stesichorus’ poem should have provided a model for Euripides. He was clearly an inﬂuential writer, sometimes ranked alongside Homer and Hesiod;82 and several sources suggest that his approach to myth was, like Euripides’, innovative or provocative.83 But this can scarcely be said to prove anything. Both Euripides’ Helen and the Palinode seem to have used extraordinary versions of the Helen myth, but there is no reason to assume that the versions were identical, or that Euripides borrowed directly from the earlier poet. Even if the Palinode did describe more or less the same events as Euripides’ Helen, there would still be nothing to show that Stesichorus was the originator of this version or the only writer to feature such a myth. But there is no evidence that Stesichorus was a source for Euripides. It may be that Stesichorus was one among many sources dealing with the myth of Helen; but it may be (for whatever reason) that Euripides never used the Palinode at all. If one examines the evidence closely, one begins to doubt the ‘fact’ that Helen is directly based on the Palinode. The problem is not just that Euripides’ plot only imperfectly matches up with what is recorded about the Palinode, but rather (far worse) that the evidence of the testimonia eludes any sort of coherent reconstruction. This evidence, as I shall show, is a complete muddle of obscure and contradictory information. Most scholars who have been suﬃciently brave, or optimistic, to tackle this material have expended great amounts of labour and ingenuity on attempting to reconcile the various chaotic elements into a coherent, meaningful picture. But the truth is that these ‘facts’ (such as they are) simply do not add up. Our sources, taken separately or together, make it impossible to tell anything for sure about the content of 82 On Stesichorus’ high status or perceived similarity to Homer in antiquity, see Anth. Pal. 7.75, 9.184; Longinus 13.3; Dion. Hal. Comp. 24; Hor. Carm. 4.9.8; Quint. Inst. 10.1.62; Dio Chrys. 2.33; Suda s.v. Sths≤coroß; Austin (1994) 90–3; Campbell (1982) 253–6. 83 Evidence of mythical innovation, or (at least) a commitment to presenting a more ‘truthful’ version of myths, in competition with diﬀering or inaccurate versions, may be detected at (for example) Stesichorus fr. 191, 193 (the diﬃcult ‘Chamaeleon papyrus’, P. Oxy. 2506), 194–5, 199, 216. Nevertheless, fr. 217 states that in general Stesichorus tends to agree in detail with Homer and Hesiod. It may be added, for what it is worth, that deﬁnite evidence of Euripidean borrowing from Stesichorus elsewhere is scant: see Sider (1989), 429–30 and n. 29.

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the Palinode or the form which it took. About one fact, however, there is no doubt: the Palinode and its legend became extremely famous in antiquity, acquiring almost proverbial status. The lost work is mentioned, in one way or another, in a large number of sources (of somewhat diﬀering interest and value).84 It seems likely that many of the inconcinnities in the evidence are the result of unacknowledged guesswork and fabrication on the part of the ancient scholars, whose fascination with the Palinode story was, unfortunately, accompanied by complete ignorance of the text itself. According to one old proverb, the mark of an uneducated man was that he did not even know tr≤a t¤ SthsicÎrou. ‘The three of Stesichorus’ is thought to refer to the three-line quotation of the Palinode by Plato.85 The passage in question, Phaedrus 243a, is the conventional point from which to begin one’s Stesichorean inquiries. It is the most substantial of the fragments (fr. 192 Davies), as well as (possibly) the earliest surviving mention of the Palinode. Here we read that Stesichorus was blinded as a punishment for reviling Helen’s character in his poetry,86 but that he realized his mistake and composed some verses—which Plato refers to as the Palinwid≤a—to correct his former views. Plato quotes: oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß, oÛd’ πbaß ƒn nhus≥n ƒ”ssvlmoiß oÛd’ Jkeo pvrgama Tro≤aß. It is not true, this tale; 84 See Davies (1982b) and Cingano (1982). Davies omits many of these testimonia from his edition of the fragments (frr. 192–3), on the grounds that they simply duplicate the information that is found in earlier citations but show no independent knowledge of the Palinode. 85 Suda s.v. tr≤a t¤ SthsicÎrou and palinod≤a (sic); Hor. Epod. 17.42, Odes 1.16; Macarius, Paroem. 2.210; cf. Campbell (1982) 256. For fuller discussion see Davies (1982a). 86 Not enough of Stesichorus’ Helen (fr. 187–91 Davies) or other poems survive to give much of an impression of his original portrait of Helen. It seems likely that he followed the ‘standard’ (i.e. Homeric) version of the myth (see SA Hom. Il. 2.339 = Stesichorus fr. 190) and that he presented her in the familiar guise of treacherous husband-deserter and causer of war (cf. S Eur. Or. 249; Hesiod fr. 176 M–W, in which it is reported that, in Stesichorus, Aphrodite made all Tyndareus’s daughters lipes3noreß). See Davison (1968) 198–201 for a reconstruction of the likely content of Stesichorus’ Helen.

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You did not travel on well-benched ships, Nor did you reach Troy’s citadel.

Evidently, the goddess Helen was gratiﬁed by this act, for we read that the poet’s sight was quickly restored. Obviously, there is not very much here; nevertheless, if we compare the information given here to Euripides’ plot, it is immediately clear that there are certain diﬀerences. To illustrate these diﬀerences, it may be helpful to separate the variant Helenstories into their component parts. Euripides’ plot diﬀers from the usual (that is, Homeric) myth in three ways: (1) Helen did not go to Troy; (2) Helen was spirited to Egypt in a cloud; (3) a phantom Helen was fought for at Troy. But the main elements in the Palinode, as quoted by Plato, are: (1) Helen did not travel by ship; (2) Helen did not go to Troy. This is compatible with Euripides’ version, but it does not say the same thing. The most unusual features of Euripides’ plot—the phantom double and the trip to Egypt—are not mentioned. There are other matters which Plato leaves tantalizingly unclear. First of all, what exactly was the Palinode? No other ‘palinodes’ exist from antiquity. It seems clear what the word palinwid≤a means (a ‘recantation’);87 but Plato (among others) calls it ‘the so-called (t¶n kaloumvnhn) palinode’. This means that the word was probably a neologism and probably the title of a particular poem, rather than a generic name for a type of poem (although it did, later, assume this second meaning).88 Nevertheless, one could also take kaloumvnhn to mean that Palinwid≤a was not the actual name of the poem: perhaps one should refer to the ‘palinode’ rather than the Palinode.89 The Palinwid≤a may not even have been a single, distinct composition: Plato makes it impossible to tell. Another possibility is that it was not a new, separate work but a later addition to a longer poem which criticized Helen.90 Or perhaps Palinode was an alternative title for 87 Woodbury (1967) 157–62 discusses the use of p3lin with polemical or depreciatory connotations (LSJ s.v. p3lin I.2 [cf. pal≤gglwssoß, pal≤gkotoß]; Eur. Ion 1096 pal≤mfamoß åoid3, etc.). See also Hackforth (1952) and Rowe (1986) ad loc. 88 For example, the Suda (s.v. palinod≤a [sic]) discusses the literal and proverbial uses of the word (including the verb palinwid0). 89 See Kannicht (1969) I.29. 90 This may be suggested by the wording of Aristid. Or. 2.572, mvteimi d’ ƒf’ 1teron proo≤mion kat¤ Sths≤coron. But proo≤mion may refer to a complete work

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Stesichorus’ poem Helen (‘correcting’ an earlier version of Helen in, say, the Oresteia).91 The second unanswered question is: how much of the Palinode is being quoted in the Phaedrus? Were these the ﬁrst three lines? Or an extract, chosen to give the ‘gist’? The manner in which the lines are quoted does not make it clear. Plato writes only that Stesichorus ‘realized the cause of his blindess and immediately composed (πgnw t¶n ajt≤an ka≥ poie∏ eÛq»ß)’, which might be taken to mean that oÛk πst’ πtumoß ktl. was the ﬁrst line, but this is not necessarily true. Certainly oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß does not seem like a usual opening: o˜toß, in particular, eﬀectively rules out the possibility of its being the ﬁrst line.92 It might even be thought, less plausibly, I think, that these three lines constituted the entire palinode. However, Plato (at least) does not support that view, since he continues: ‘when Stesichorus had written the whole palinode (p$san t¶n kaloumvnhn palinwid≤an)’. This wording suggests a longer poem, of which these three lines are an excerpt. So far, then, no deﬁnite fact has emerged about the Palinode. It may or may not have been a complete poem; it told that Helen did not sail by ship (but did she travel by some other means?); it told that Helen did not go to Troy (but did she go somewhere else?). Plato does supply a reason for Stesichorus’ having composed it; but (as I shall explain below) it is unsatisfactory. Although he tells us hardly anything, it might have been better if Plato had been the only writer to mention the Palinode, because the other sources which add potentially relevant (Thuc. 3.104.4; Plut. Mor. 1132d). Stesichorus fr. 189 (= Argum. Theocr. Id. 18) describes a feature of Theocritus as being taken ƒk toı pr*tou SthsicÎrou E } lvnhß: from ‘the ﬁrst book’ or ‘the ﬁrst section’ of the Helen? Hor. Epod. 17, which seems to be inﬂuenced by Stesichorus, combines elements of abuse and recantation in a single poem. Sider (1989) suggests that the ‘abuse’ of Helen, the ‘blinding’ and the ‘recantation’ were all elements acted out in a single, semidramatic work. On the form and length of the palinode, see further Woodbury (1967) 157–77; Kannicht (1969) 1.21–48; Campbell (1982) 258–9. 91 As suggested by Davison (1968) 204–8. 92 Davison (1968) 207–8, thinks that before these lines stood ‘a personal explanation of the circumstances in which the Palinode had come to be written’. Willink (2002) suggests emending the opening to ‘the rhetorically more eﬀective’ oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß: | oÛk πbaß . . . oÛd’ Jkeo . . . In this case, it might be easier to accept o˜toß in the opening line. On the normal conventions for beginnings in Greek poetry, see Woodbury (1967) 171–2 and Race (1992).

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information turn out to confound rather than clarify matters.93 These sources, while not diﬀering signiﬁcantly in type from other testimonia, exhibit a couple of suggestive features. First, the Palinode is very seldom quoted, and the few quotations either repeat the same three lines or are spurious. Second, there is much confusion and contradiction. In fact, none of the writers who discuss the Palinode seems to have known what form it took or precisely what its content was. For example, the Palinode is quoted by two sophists of the second century ad. Philostratus writes about ‘the wisdom of the man from Himera, who composed a lyric poem in honour of Helen, revising the earlier version, and called it the palinode: “That tale is not true . . .” ’.94 The version given by Maximus of Tyre is almost identical: ‘ “That tale is not true,” says the poet of Himera, presumably of his own verses, as he revokes the former poem in which he says he spoke untrue words about Helen.’95 Each of these writers gives only the words oÛk πst’ (or πstin) πtumoß ktl., directly from Plato. Neither oﬀers any new detail about the form or content, except for what Plato had already written—that Stesichorus changed his mind about Helen. (The phrases ƒnant≤on t0i protvrwi lÎgwi, ƒxomn»menoß t¶n πmprosqen ∑id¶n and ånam3cetai . . . tÏn πmprosqen yÎgon do not necessarily refer to a distinct earlier poem). It seems unlikely, then, that Philostratus or Maximus had any ﬁrst-hand, non-Platonic evidence for the Palinode. Isocrates (Helen 64) has been taken, rightly or wrongly, as giving evidence that the Palinode was an addition, or continuation, to original ‘blasphemous’ verses: Òte m†n g¤r årcÎmenoß t[ß ∑id[ß ƒblasf&mhsv ti per≥ aÛt[ß, ånvsth t0n øfqalm0n ƒsterhmvnoß, ƒpeid¶ d† gnoŸß t¶n ajt≤an t[ß sumfor$ß t¶n kaloumvnhn palinwid≤an ƒpo≤hse, p3lin aÛtÏn ejß t¶n aÛt¶n f»sin katvsthse. Since at the beginning of his poem Stesichorus had made some 93 Most of the sources quoted here are listed by Davies (fr. 192, pp. 177–80). He does not include the Suda entry (see below), which Bowie (1993, 27–8) believes to be an important piece of evidence. 94 Philostr. Vit. Apoll. 6.11: sof≤a I} mera≤ou £ndroß, ß £idwn ƒß t¶n E } lvnhn ƒnant≤on t0i protvrwi lÎgwi palinwid≤an aÛtÏn ƒk3lesen, oÛk πstin πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß. 95 Maxim. Tyr. 21.1: oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß, lvgei pou t0n aËtoı åism3twn Ó I} mera∏oß poiht¶ß ƒxomn»menoß t¶n πmprosqen ∑id¶n ƒn ¬i per≥ t[ß E } lvnhß ejpe∏n fhsin oÛk ålhqe∏ß lÎgouß.

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blasphemous reference to Helen, he stood up to ﬁnd himself blinded. But he realized the cause of his misfortune, and when he had written the so-called Palinode Helen restored him to normal.

But Isocrates does not really have anything to add about the form of the composition. All he says is that Stesichorus made his mistake årcÎmenoß t[ß ∑id[ß (‘at the beginning’, whatever that might mean) and that he composed the palinode later. The word ånvsth (‘stood up’) in Isocrates’ account has been seen, by Bowie,96 as an oblique clue to how Stesichorus knew he had erred. He wrote the original poem, then got up to ﬁnd himself blind—this may or may not correspond to the Suda’s story that Helen appeared to Stesichorus in a dream.97 None of this helps to solve the problem. Nor does Dio of Prusa, who refers to what Stesichorus said ƒn t[i \steron ∑id[i—‘later in the poem’ or ‘in the later poem’.98 So much for the Palinode’s form. But what about the question of its content? Isocrates is similarly unhelpful in this regard. Unlike Plato, he does not quote any of Stesichorus’ lines; nor does he describe the Palinode’s substance, except to record that it was intended as a correction to ‘some blasphemous reference’. This lack of detail is vexing; but we should not simply shrug it oﬀ and move on to the next piece of evidence. If one examines Isocrates’ words a little more closely, it becomes clear that his evidence is seriously problematic in other ways. It is the phrase ƒblasf&mhsv ti that strikes an odd note: it could be interpreted in two ways, each of which suggests that Isocrates’ version is unsatisfactory. On one hand, one could understand the phrase as being unacceptably vague: Stesichorus ‘committed some blasphemy or other’. Now if his recantation was to have any eﬀect (either as a work of literature or as an appeal to the goddess), Stesichorus would have had to make it clear what his blasphemy was and (crucially) just how the Palinode was aiming to set the record straight. If Isocrates had read the Palinode, it is almost inconceivable that these facts could have escaped him; but why does he not mention them? Could it be that Isocrates is attempting to gloss over the fact that he did not know the Palinode or its contents at all? 96 97

Bowie (1993) 26–8. Suda s.v. Sths≤coroß (4.433).

98

Dio Chrys. 11.40.1.

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On the other hand, we can read ƒblasf&mhsv ti as being rather casual in tone: ‘he committed some blasphemy’. If we follow Plato, the ‘blasphemy’ in question is, in eﬀect, the whole of the traditional, Iliadic myth which represented Helen as the cause of the war—which Stesichorus ‘recanted’ by completely refuting that myth. But ƒblasf&mhsv ti seems far too weak to be a reference to the telling of an entire story. The phrase is more naturally taken as referring to a lesser, or (at least) more speciﬁc, error. Furthermore, if we examine the wider context in which this passage is quoted, it becomes hard to see why Isocrates would have wanted to refer to a story which denied Helen’s responsibility for the war. The overall argument of his Encomium of Helen is based on a full recognition of her divine nature and her power over men. Isocrates argues not only that Helen did indeed cause the Trojan War—a sure sign of her potency—but also that the war was a good thing, since it united the West against the barbarian East.99 It is made clear, in the lines immediately following the passage just discussed, that Isocrates’ Helen not only approves of, but is personally responsible for, the Homeric version of her myth: lvgousi dv tineß ka≥ t0n O } mhrid0n „ß ƒpist$sa t[ß nuktÏß O } m&rwi prosvtaxe poie∏n per≥ t0n strateusamvnwn ƒp≥ Tro≤an, boulomvnh tÏn ƒke≤nwn q3naton zhlwtÎteron ∂ tÏn b≤on tÏn t0n £llwn katast[sai: ka≥ mvroß mvn ti ka≥ di¤ t¶n O } m&rou tvcnhn, m3lista d† di¤ ta»thn o\twß ƒpafrÎditon ka≥ par¤ p$sin ønomast¶n aÛtoı genesqai t¶n po≤hsin. Some of the Homeridae also say that Helen appeared to Homer by night and commanded him to write a poem about the men who went on the expedition to Troy, because she wanted to make their death more envied than that of anyone else. They also say that it is partly because of Homer’s art, but chieﬂy because of Helen, that his poem is so charming and has become so universally famous.100

The standard editions of the fragments are wrong to omit this passage, since it has a crucial bearing on the way in which one 99 Particularly relevant sections of Isoc. Hel. include 22 (Helen is so excellent a woman that those who pursued her are more worthy of admiration than other men); 38, 54, 61, 64–7 (Helen’s immense power to control events); 43–8 (Paris’ motivation for wishing to marry Helen was by no means ill-advised); 50, 67 (the positive beneﬁts of the Trojan War). 100 Isoc. Hel. 65.

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interprets the reference to Stesichorus. Since Isocrates’ Helen retained, and gloried in, her responsibility for events at Troy, she would scarcely have rewarded Stesichorus for denying it!101 If the Palinode was really an exoneration or a rejection of Helen’s behaviour, as Plato represents it, Isocrates could not have cited it in the way that he does without making nonsense of his own argument. And so it emerges that Isocrates and Plato each assume completely diﬀerent versions of the contents of the Palinode—they cannot both be right. It seems more likely, on the basis of the three-line quotation, that Plato’s version is the correct one—in which case we must conclude (for the moment) that Isocrates made a mistake. There is more to be said about the inconsistency of detail between Plato’s Phaedrus and Isocrates’ Helen; but for the moment let us investigate some other testimonia for further clues about the Palinode’s content. In particular, did the Palinode mention Egypt or a phantom-Helen? On this point the (mainly late) sources diﬀer. Aristides records that ‘some poets’ (poiht0n . . . tineß) say that Paris took away a phantom (e÷dwlon) instead of Helen.102 He does not mention these poets by name, but the scholia name Stesichorus as the source of the myth,103 as does Aristides himself in another speech.104 However, this does not explain why Aristides ﬁrst uses the plural ‘poets’ (is he thinking of Euripides as well?); nor do any of these testimonia explain the precise function of the e÷dwlon within Stesichorus’ poem. We must bear in mind that the motif of the phantom-double (in a variety of guises) is quite well attested in Greek poetry from Homer onwards. Even if Stesichorus did introduce an e÷dwlon 101 As a few highlighted phrases from the closing section of Isoc. Hel. (67) show, there can be no doubt that Isocrates conceived of Helen as being responsible for the war: cwr≥ß g¤r tecn0n ka≥ filosofi0n ka≥ t0n £llwn ∑felei0n, 4ß πcoi tiß #n ejß ƒke≤nhn ka≥ tÏn pÎlemon tÏn Trw∫kÏn ånenegce∏n, dika≤wß #n ka≥ toı m¶ doule»ein Óm$ß to∏ß barb3roiß }Elvnhn ajt≤an e”nai nom≤zoimen. eËr&somen g¤r toŸß E ﬁ llhnaß di’ aÛt¶n Ømono&santaß ka≥ koin¶n strate≤an ƒp≥ toŸß barb3rouß poihsamvnouß ktl (‘apart from art, philosophy, and the other beneﬁts which one could attribute to her and to the Trojan War, we might well say that it is because of Helen that we are not enslaved to the barbarians. For we shall ﬁnd that it was because of her that the Greeks became united and organized a common expedition against the barbarians . . .’). 102 Aristid. 1.128. 103 S AC/BD Aristid. 1.212. 104 Aristid. 2.234.

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into his poem, it may not have been in order to engineer an outrageous overturning of the myth, as in Euripides.105 Perhaps Stesichorus’ Helen just became temporarily invisible, like Aeneas in the Iliad? Indeed, one of the scholia to Aristides, which purports to be describing the contents of the Palinode, actually quotes, inaccurately, from the Iliad’s description of Aeneas’ phantom, which suggests that the writer is confused about the purpose of Stesichorus’ e÷dwlon (and that, in general, this information is of very little value).106 The scholia to Aristides also contain an odd, ‘rationalizing’ explanation of Stesichorus’ e÷dwlon: they claim that, when Paris and Helen were visiting Pharos, Proteus stole Helen and gave Paris a painted picture of his wife (ƒn p≤naki) in return, so that he could assuage his passion by looking at it. This version of the motif is not seen in any of the other reports of Stesichorus. Note that the scholia (not Aristides himself) link the e÷dwlon with the Egyptian strand of the myth: this may be a sign that the Palinode contained both elements. However, there is another problem: this version directly contradicts the quotation in Plato, in which it is said that Helen did not sail anywhere (sc. with Paris). And, if Helen still sailed away with Paris, how could the Palinode possibly have absolved her from blame for the war? In summary, then, the evidence of Aristides and the scholia lacks coherence, and we are no closer to discovering the real facts about the Palinode. Herodotus’ version of Helen’s sailing to Egypt (in this instance, with Paris and without the complication of the e÷dwlon) does not mention Stesichorus as a source, saying instead that the story came from ‘priests’.107 This has been seen as an indication that Herodotus did not know the Palinode, or that the Palinode did not mention Egypt.108 Perhaps so; but one must beware of relying too heavily on the argument ex silentio. Even though Herodotus does not acknowledge Stesichorus as his source, the Palinode might still have mentioned Egypt; and, moreover, 105 A variety of phantoms: Hom. Il. 5.443–54, Od. 7.13–17; Hesiod fr. 23, 260 M–W; Pind., Pyth. 2.33–48; Hdt. 6.69.5–6; Eur. Bacch. 288–97; Eustathius ad Hom. Od. 23.218. 106 S BD Aristid. 1.212: åmf≥ d’ ejd*lwi Tr0eß ka≥ d∏oi !caio≥ m3conto (cf. Il. 5.451–2: åmf≥ d’ £r’ ejd*lwi Tr0eß ka≥ d∏oi !caio≥ | d&ioun ktl). 107 Hdt. 2.112–20. 108 Vürtheim (1919).

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Herodotus’ purposes in writing his Egyptian narrative might have led him to exclude Stesichorus for other reasons.109 (There can scarcely be any doubt, I think, that Herodotus was familiar with the famous Stesichorus.) Another source to attribute both the e÷dwlon and Egypt to Stesichorus is the Byzantine scholar Tzetzes, but, like the scholia just quoted, he still includes the damning detail that Helen sailed oﬀ with Paris.110 To the same commentator is attributed a quotation from Stesichorus about the e÷dwlon, but this is almost certainly bogus, since it is almost identical to the wording of Aristides 2.234 (and the other quotations from the palinode are not in hexameter).111 It is worth remarking, too, that in general the value of Tzetzes’ evidence has been severely doubted.112 Nevertheless, Dio of Prusa seems to contradict all these other writers. He says emphatically that, although in the work of ‘others’ (£lloi dv tineß) Helen was brought to Egypt after being snatched by Paris, Stesichorus’ Helen did not go anywhere at all (oÛd† ple»seien Ó < Elvnh oÛdamÎse).113 This reading is compatible with the line quoted by Plato, oÛd’ πbaß ƒn nhus≥n ƒ”ssvlmoiß. Some, however, interpret the passage diﬀerently, focusing their attention on oÛdv ple»seien. Helen (they argue) may not have sailed anywhere at all, that does not necessarily mean that she never went anywhere, as it might be on foot or by ﬂight. This may just be true, at a pinch: but it seems to me that, in Dio at least, the 109

See Davison (1968) 213. Tzetzes ad Lycophr. 113: lvgousin Òti diercomvnwi !lex3ndrwi di’ Ajg»ptou } lvnhß aÛt0i dvdwken ka≥ o\twß πpleusen ejß Ø PrwteŸß E } lvnhn åfelÎmenoß e÷dwlon E Tro≤an, ¿ß fhsi Sths≤coroß (‘it is said that when Paris was passing through Egypt, Proteus took Helen away from him and gave him a phantom-Helen in her place; and so Paris sailed to Troy—as Stesichorus says’). 111 Tzetzes, Antehomerica 149: gr3fei g¤r Ø Sths≤coroß: Tr*ess’, oÊ tÎt’ ÷san E } lvnhß e÷dwlon πconteß (‘S. writes: “the Trojans, who then saw that they had the phantom of Helen” ’). Cf. Aristides 2.234: ¿sper oÈ SthsicÎrou Tr0eß oÈ tÏ t[ß E } lvnhß e÷dwlon πconteß „ß aÛt&n (‘just like Stesichorus’ Trojans, who have the phantom of Helen, believing it to be Helen herself’). 112 Davies (1982c). 113 Dio Chrys. 11.40–1: the passage is quoted at length in what follows. In another oration (80. 4), Dio makes a brief reference to a version of the myth in which the Trojans fought to the death for Helen, ignorant of the fact that she was in Egypt. However, he does not mention the name of Stesichorus, introducing the fact with the imprecise fasi (‘they say’), and there are other sources— including Euripides—from which Dio could have taken this detail. 110

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point at issue is whether or not Helen left Greece (hence Dio’s use of tÏ par3pan oÛd† . . . oÛdamÎse); the mode of transport is irrelevant. However, it all depends on what one judges to be the more natural interpretation of this sentence.114 While Dio may not tell us as much as we would wish to know about Helen’s (non-)travels, his account of the Palinode is obliquely revealing in another sense. Here, again, it is worth looking in a little more detail at the text from which the testimonium has been extracted, since the overall themes and preoccupations of Dio’s Trojan Oration are clearly relevant to our inquiry. Like Euripides, Dio presents us with an outrageous revision of the myth of the Trojan War which contradicts the Homeric version of events. This time, however, it is not Helen’s role that is important, but the very fact of the war itself. Dio claims that the Trojan War never happened! Unlike the scholiasts, who are simply recording details as best they might, Dio presents us with a piece of epideictic oratory which aims to be entertaining as well as learned. The ironical, tongue-in-cheek manner in which he unfolds his argument makes it diﬃcult to know how much of it, if any, is to be taken seriously.115 In the passage quoted by the fragment-collectors, Dio describes a conversation which he purports to have had with an Egyptian priest who made fun of the Greeks for valuing ignorance as highly as wisdom. This passage, quoted at somewhat greater length, runs as follows: o\twß dv, πfh, gelo≤wß åpÏ to»twn di3keisqe Ëmeiß ¿ste poiht¶n 1teron O } m&rwi peisqvnta ka≥ taÛt¤ p3nta poi&santa per≥ ’Elvnhß, Sths≤coron „ß o”mai, tuflwq[na≤ fate ËpÏ t[ß < Elvnhß „ß yeus3menon, aˆqiß d† ånablvyai tånant≤a poi&santa. ka≥ taıta lvgonteß oÛd†n ¬tton ålhq[ fasin e”nai t¶n O } m&rou po≤hsin. ka≥ tÏn mvn Sths≤coron ƒn t[i \steron ∑id[i lvgein Òti tÏ par3pan oÛd† ple»seien Ó E } lvnh oÛdamÎse: £lloi d† tineß, „ß Årpasqe≤h mvn E } lvnh ËpÏ toı !lex3ndrou, deıro d† par’ Óm$ß ejß A÷gupton åf≤koito: ka≥ toı pr3gmatoß o\twß åmfisbhtoumvnou ka≥ poll¶n £gnoian πcontoß, oÛd† o\twß Ëpopteısai d»nantai t¶n åp3thn. ‘So ridiculous,’ he said, ‘an eﬀect have these people had upon you that you say of another poet who was taken in by Homer and repeated 114

This controversy is discussed at some length by Davison (1968), 211–13. One might note also that this description is true also of Isocrates’ Helen, though it does not alter one’s interpretation of the Stesichorean passage there. Nor should one neglect the presence of irony and humour in Plato’s Phaedrus— but I shall return to this point later on. 115

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these same stories about Helen—Stesichorus, I think it is—that he was blinded by Helen for telling lies about her, but then recovered his sight by recanting. Yet, although you say these things, you none the less believe that Homer’s account is true. Furthermore, you say that Stesichorus in his later poem [or later in his poem] said that Helen never sailed anywhere at all, but others say that Helen was snatched by Paris and came to us here in Egypt; yet with all this confusion and ignorance surrounding the subject you cannot penetrate the deception.’116

What strikes one is not the speciﬁc details of the story so much as the manner in which it is presented. In particular, an almost cryptic obscurity is created by the multiple layers of indirect speech, which make it diﬃcult to discern just who said what (‘he said . . .’, ‘these people . . .’, ‘you say . . .’, ‘taken in by Homer . . .’, ‘I think . . .’, ‘you say . . .’, ‘you say . . .’, and ‘others say . . .’, in just a few lines of Greek). It seems likely that this obscurity is a deliberately calculated eﬀect.117 But, as we have seen, the tradition of the Palinode was already quite complicated enough. Why should Dio have wished to confuse matters still further? The answer to this question is suggested by Dio’s argument in the Trojan Oration as a whole, and, in particular, his remarks about myth and belief in the opening section (1–11) of that speech. In general, Dio is concerned to expose and to ridicule the naïve manner in which (he claims) gullible readers accept whatever they are told by ancient authors. He argues, playfully and provocatively, that people will believe anything and that the real truth is diﬃcult or impossible to discern. In this context, one’s perspective on the Stesichorus passage is altered. Rather than reading it ‘straight’, as a factual account of the Palinode’s actual contents, one can interpret Dio’s account as an ironical comment on the tangled tradition which had arisen around the Palinode. One detects an ironical or playful intent not only in the obfuscatory indirect speech just noted, but also in the marked way in which Dio’s Egyptian priest archly pretends to have forgotten Stesichorus’ name (he uses the slightly mocking, pseudo-casual phrase Sths≤coron, „ß o”mai, although it is clear that he knows very well the identity of the poet, and goes on to show detailed 116

Dio Chrys. 11.40–1. Cf. Hdt. 1.1–5 for this device, whereby indirect speech and ambiguous focalization are used to highlight the multiplicity of H.’s sources and problematize the notion of objective historical truth. On this passage, see e.g. Goldhill (2001) 14–15 and Pelliccia (1992) 63–84. 117

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acquaintance with the tradition). The Palinode, it seems, is being cited as a good example of a story in which the truth is impossible to uncover; ‘yet with all this confusion and ignorance surrounding the subject’—says Dio with a smirk—‘you cannot penetrate the deception’. Nor is Dio the only ancient author to express such a view. Lucian, another sophistic writer with an interest in the truth-value of myth and history, depicts Helen and Stesichorus as perpetually squabbling even in Elysium—an image which also suggests, with a smile, that this is one of those scholarly problems that is basically insoluble.118 By now, it will have emerged just how tangled and intractable are all these testimonia. Not only must one contend with inaccuracy and contradiction, but also one has to admit the possibility of irony and oblique double meanings. If all this were not enough to give one a headache, matters were confused yet further by an Oxyrhynchus papyrus ﬁnd in the 1960s (P. Oxy. 2506, now published as fr. 193 Davies). This is a fragment of a secondcentury ad commentary on the peripatetic critic Chamaeleon, which mentions, perplexingly, that Stesichorus wrote not one but two palinodes! In general, it is hard to know what value to place on this, the ﬁrst mention of a second palinode, some seven hundred years after the event;119 and, as we shall see, it is equally hard to know from what source (or sources) the information in the papyrus fragment really derives. Indeed, given that it is utterly at odds with every ‘fact’ we have so far seen, one might be forgiven for simply dismissing this evidence as nonsense. But, since (inexplicably) no one seems to have been much troubled by the new fragment, it is worth re-examining it closely and exposing its shortcomings. According to this commentator, Stesichorus wrote two Palinodes, one in which he ‘criticized’ (mvmfetai) Homer, and another in which he ‘criticized’ Hesiod. Two lines are given, which are said to be the openings of each of the two palinodes: 118

Lucian, VH 2.15. Davies (fr. 193) lists other testimonia (Conon, FGrHist 26 F1, Irenaeus, Adv. Haer. 1 fr. 12 = Hippolyt. Adv. Haer. 6.19.3, Interpr. Lat. Irenaei 1.23.2) which might indicate that Stesichorus composed two Palinodes. But this is not necessarily so. Some of these sources either make vague mention of ‘hymns’ (which may have been diﬀerent poems altogether); and those which do mention ‘palinodes’ in the plural could have taken this ‘fact’ from Chamaeleon or his commentator. 119

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deır’ aˆte qe¤ filÎmolpe (‘Come hither again, dance-loving goddess . . .’) and crusÎptere parqvne (‘Maiden of golden wing . . .’). These invocations to the Muse do, unlike Plato’s lines, look like lyric beginnings. Nevertheless, they also correspond metrically, not only to each other, but also to oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß—which might mean that all these lines were from alternating strophes and antistrophes in one single poem.120 But the diﬀerent addressees might tell against that: the two lines from the papyrus seem to be addressed to the Muse,121 while oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß is addressed to Helen. As for the content of the Palinode(s), the papyrus tells us, after quoting the two lyric openings, that in Stesichorus a phantomHelen went to Troy while the real Helen stayed with Proteus in Egypt (aÛtÏ[ß d]v fhs[in Ø] Sths≤coro[ß] tÏ men e[÷dwlo]n ƒlqe∏[n ƒß] Tro≤an t¶n d’ }Elvnhn p[ar¤] t0i Prwte∏ katame∏n[ai). But the authenticity of this information is open to doubt. It may have been lifted straight from Chamaeleon, in which case one might remark that a third-hand, indirect summary is not the best type of information (though it is not necessarily to be discredited on that account).122 It is not even certain that Chamaeleon himself had ﬁrst-hand knowledge of the Palinode(s): it is possible, given what we know about Chamaeleon’s scholarship in general, that this detail originates not from Stesichorus but from one of the other sources already mentioned.123 However, the wording of this fragment strongly implies that Chamaeleon’s writings did not mention Egypt or the phantom. Although Chamaeleon is 120

oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß deır’ aˆte qe¤ filÎmolpe crusÎptere parqvne 〈 -× 〉 = --11-11-× Responsion and its consequences are discussed by Davison (1968) 219–25; Kannicht (1969) 1. 31; Woodbury (1967) 158–65. 121 However, Helen is not out of the question altogether: see Davison (1968) 223. 122 On the diﬀering value of direct and indirect quotations, paraphrases, reports and inferences made of lyric poetry, see Davison (1955) 72–3, 80–1. 123 Chamaeleon’s dates (mid-4th to mid-3rd cent. bc) are rather closer in time to Stesichorus than those of the papyrus author, and (to go by the evidence of Athenaeus, who often quotes him), Chamaeleon was familiar with a wide range of poetic texts. However, Chamaeleon is known for inventing details and for falsely deducing details about writers’ lives from the texts. See Athenaeus 10. 428f–429a; discussed by Arrighetti (1987) 368–72.

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explicitly credited as the source of the two lyric verses („ß ånvgrafe Camailvwn), in the next sentence the commentator introduces his plot-summary with the words ‘Stesichorus himself says that . . . (aÛtÏ[ß d]v fhs[in Ø] Sths≤coro[ß])’. Furthermore, we are not told which of the two Palinodes quoted by Chamaeleon was concerned with Egypt or the phantom. All of this suggests that the commentator had another, separate source of knowledge apart from Chamaeleon. No doubt he would like his readers to think that this source was none other than the Palinode itself (or the Palinodes themselves). But this is almost unthinkable, for the simple reason that, if the commentator really had possessed a copy of the Palinode(s), he would have quoted directly from it, rather than having to resort to Chamaeleon for the two lyric lines which he does quote! And so, if this author had no knowledge of Stesichorus himself, it may well be that he borrowed the supposed details of the Palinode from Euripides, Plato, Isocrates, Dio—or someone else. There is still no good reason, then, to think that the Palinode(s) described a phantom-Helen or Helen’s sojourn in Egypt. If we discount the plot-summary of fragment 193, certain facts remain there which have seemed to shed some light on the content of the Palinode(s). However, these ‘facts’ too are highly suspect. Little can be gleaned from the two lines deır’ aˆte qe¤ filÎmolpe and crusÎptere parqvne. For all the information they contain, the lines might as well have been taken from any poem at all. But there is a more serious diﬃculty, concerning the nature and purpose of the Palinode(s). Either (as elsewhere) Stesichorus recanted his own writings, or (as we are told here) he criticized the writings of other poets. Neither of these possibilities is unnatural, but they are both very diﬀerent types of activity.124 A ‘palinode’, as it was understood by everyone else before and after Chamaeleon, denotes recantation only. I suggest, therefore, that the poems cited by Chamaeleon were not 124 It is not intrinsically unlikely either that the Palinode criticized another poet or that it corrected another ﬁrst-person account by the same poet. From the sixth century onwards, lyric and epic poets were beginning to establish themselves as individual poetic personae, in competition with other earlier poets, and also questioning the concepts of truth and memory. For this aspect of early Greek poetics, see (e.g.) Hes. Theog. 26–8, 526–34, 613–6; Hom. Hymn Dionys.; Pind. Ol. 1. 46–55, 10. 1–6. Discussed by Bowie (1993), Griﬃths (1990) 196–9, and Pratt (1993) 1–53.

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Palinodes at all but some other type of composition. Whether Chamaeleon himself referred to these poems as palinwid≤ai, or whether his commentator is responsible, cannot be known— though we have already seen that the author of the papyrus is rather undependable. But one or other of them seems to have assumed, erroneously, that any poem which contained some element of mythical innovation or criticism was a ‘palinode’.125 If one prefers to maintain that the papyrus evidence is true, and there really were two Palinodes, one must deal with another problem. Two Palinodes would, surely, have represented rather a waste of eﬀort on Stesichorus’ part. That is, if Palinode number one had achieved the desired result, viz. a cure for blindness, what would have been the point of a second? But perhaps this is not such a serious problem after all. The reason Plato gives for Stesichorus’ writing the Palinode ought to be queried. All the ancient critics accepted Stesichorus’ blindness and magical restoration of sight as real historical events—which of course inﬂuenced their view of the Palinode’s likely content. But Plato’s story is almost certainly ﬁctional. It seems to belong to a common type of anecdote, in which supposedly biographical details about the poets were simply lifted from their writings.126 In other words, it is likely that since Stesichorus was known to have written strikingly diﬀerent types of poem, or a poem with a novel myth, a picturesque story arose to explain why.127 The motif of the ‘blind bard’ is particularly appropriate for this purpose because of its Homeric associations. Nevertheless, a little caution is in order. Where the works of a poet survive—in 125 Woodbury (1967) 162 suggests that the author of the papyrus fragment not only misunderstood the Palinwid≤a but also treated the unfamiliar proper name as if it were a common noun. ‘It is,’ he says, ‘as if someone noticed another of Handel’s choruses which contained Hallelujahs and chose to announce this discovery to the world by stating that Handel composed two Hallelujah Choruses’. 126 See Lefkowitz (1981). A typical example of the banality of ancient ‘biographical’ criticism is provided by a testimonium on Aeschylus which asserts that, since Aeschylus was the ﬁrst to put drunken characters on stage, he must have been an inebriate (TGF 3 [Radt] T 118). This method is, signiﬁcantly, characteristic of Chamaeleon also (see n. 123 above)—which again may aﬀect the value of his comments on Stesichorus’ ‘palinode’. 127 It has been suggested by Hutchinson (2001, 116–17) that two Palinodes may have been turned into one in order to make the story work better. However, this explanation does not quite ﬁt. If more than one Palinode existed, it is hard to see why the story should have arisen in the ﬁrst place.

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the case of Euripides or Aristophanes, for example—it is often demonstrable that the biographical ‘facts’ are derivative or invented; but in the case of Stesichorus, where neither the poem nor any independently veriﬁable facts exist, one is in a far less secure position to make such deductions. It is far more probable, of course, that the ‘biography’ arose in order to explain the existence of the Palinode, but is worth bearing in mind that the ‘fact’ being explained by the anecdote might actually have been a freakish episode of blindness in the life of the poet.128 Whatever the truth may be, it is unlikely that Stesichorus really wrote the Palinode(s) in order to persuade Helen to restore his sight. In that case, one might add, it is not necessary to assume that the poem(s) exonerated or justiﬁed Helen’s behaviour.129 The Palinode was a popular subject of discussion in antiquity; but the scholarship surrounding the poem and the circumstances of its composition became hopelessly confused. It seems that the whole tradition sprang up from the knowledge that Stesichorus had once written a provocative, innovative, critical or selfrefuting poem (or poems), combined with scholars’ puzzlement that no trace of such an interesting poem could be found. Our sources disagree in major and minor details, in such a way as to suggest that none of them had ever read the Palinode.130 Their knowledge, such as it is, seems to come from second-hand sources—which may well have included Euripides himself. On the basis of the available evidence, it is impossible to give certain 128 Devereux (1973) proposes, somewhat over-conﬁdently, that Stesichorus suﬀered from the condition now known as ‘hysterical blindness’. Sider (1989, esp. 424–5) gives a balanced summary of viewpoints: he argues, interestingly, that the Palinode was a semi-dramatic performance in which the poet’s ‘blindness’ was acted out—an explanation which might explain some of the odd-seeming features of Plato and Isocrates’ accounts—but we simply do not know enough of the performance conditions of lyric poetry to say whether or not this might be true. (On the performance—or non-performance—of Stesichorus’ lyrics, see West [1971] 302–14.) 129 Dale (1967, xx) writes: ‘the one thing certain about Stesichorus’ story is that it was intended as a rehabilitation of Helen’s character.’ But this is far from certain: the theme of Helen’s guilt or innocence is made much of in Euripides’ play, but why assume that it was an inherited motif from Stesichorus? 130 See Austin (1994) 96: ‘The Palinode was more talked of than read, if indeed it was read at all after the time of Plato.’ In fact, there are signs that Stesichorus’ star was on the wane even earlier than Plato’s time. Eupolis fr. 139 K–A reﬂects a feeling that Stesichorus was thought to be out-of-date; cf. Ar. Clouds 1353 ﬀ . on changing attitudes to lyric poetry in the ﬁfth century.

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answers about the form, content or purpose of the Palinode, or even to say how many Palinodes there were. It has been suggested that all of the garbled information contained in the testimonia derives directly from the Phaedrus passage, and that none of the other scholars and writers had independent knowledge of the poem.131 This conclusion might seem quite attractive, were it not for the existence of Isocrates’ Helen. In the ﬁrst place, the relative dates of Isocrates’ Helen and Plato’s Phaedrus are not known: it is possible that Isocrates is the earlier of the two.132 In addition, as I explained earlier, it is impossible to reconcile the evidence of Plato and Isocrates: therefore it is clear that Isocrates’ description of the Palinode does not depend on Plato.133 The implications of this fact are extremely important, and demand further exploration. Isocrates implies that Stesichorus’ Helen retained responsibility for events at Troy; Plato says explicitly that she did not. One of them must be wrong. It may be that Isocrates was completely ignorant of both the Palinode and the Phaedrus; but still there must be some explanation for the fact that he and Plato seem to be talking about completely diﬀerent poems. In the remainder of this section I shall suggest an explanation. When discussing the problem earlier, I provisionally concluded that Isocrates had somehow made a mistake. This conclusion was based on the assumption that Plato’s is the ﬁrst surviving reference to the Palinode and that his three-line quotation is genuine. But these assumptions may be unreliable. If we assume instead that Isocrates’ version is the ﬁrst, and that it is based on the Palinode itself (or some other, separate source which contained information about the Palinode), we are led to a diﬀerent, and rather disturbing, conclusion. That is, Plato’s quotation must be fake. 131

Kannicht (1969) 1.26–41. It has even been suggested that Plato’s Phaedrus contains polemical references to Isocrates’ Helen: see Howland (1937) and Eucken (1983) 116. The dates of the two works are discussed by Davison (1968) 204 and Mathieu and Brémond (1956) 160. 133 Davison (1968) 204 also writes that Isocrates and Plato are independent witnesses, but gives no justiﬁcation for this view. He claims that certain verbal similarities between the two accounts suggest a common source; but they might equally suggest that one writer copied the other. In any case, as I have already shown, the idea that both Plato and Isocrates are talking about the same Palinode is untenable. 132

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I believe that Plato did indeed invent the lines oÛk πst’ πtumoß ktl.134 This idea may provoke reactions of disbelief, but it is by no means a ludicrous suggestion. If one asks why Plato should have wanted to invent the quotation, the answer is not too diﬃcult to ﬁnd. When we look at Plato’s work in general, we ﬁnd that Plato does sometimes take surprising liberties with his poetic and mythical source-material. As Halliwell has argued, persuasively, in a recent article, Platonic citations of the poets are based on a principle of ‘the subjection of muthos to logos’: in other words, Plato seems to believe that while poetic texts are not in themselves an authoritative source of truth, they can legitimately be used, and manipulated, as the philosopher might wish, in order to make a point.135 For the purposes of argumentation, he often misquotes, invents, paraphrases or adapts lines of poetry, and makes use of pastiche and parody, without any explicit indication that he is doing so.136 When one begins to look in more detail at the Phaedrus in particular, the case that Plato invented the Palinode quotation is strengthened yet further. It turns out that the dialogue in which the Palinode-story appears is extraordinarily full of suspect quotations. In fact, nearly all the citations there have been questioned. These include a gnomic hexameter ‘quotation’ which ﬁts one of Plato’s arguments suspiciously well;137 a parody of epic-style invocations to the Muse;138 a Pindaric ‘quotation’ which has been altered;139 two ‘Homeric’ lines which do not 134 Athenaeus 11.505b (3.116 Kaibel) might be read as regarding Plato, not Stesichorus, as the author of the quotation: Ø kalÏß Pl3twn mononouc≥ ejp*n: oÛk πst’ πtumoß lÎgoß o˜toß, ƒgk*mia aÛtoı diexvrcetai ktl. However, this attribution might simply be an abbreviated form of reference: see Davies (1982b) 9. 135 Halliwell (2000). 136 Plato’s literary inventions and suspicious quotations include, for example, the speeches of Aristophanes and Agathon in Symp.; the misinterpretation of Simonides (fr. 542 PMG) in Prot. 339a–346d; the misquotation of Pindar in Gorgias 484b10; wilful misrepresentation of Solon’s poetry in Prot. 343a; the dubious poet ‘Tynnichus’ in Ion 534d; lies about Theognis’ birthplace in Laws 630a; misquotation of the Iliad in Apol. 28c7–8. Discussion of this aspect of Plato’s relationship to poetic texts may be found in Bernadete (1963) and Demos (1997), among others. 137 Pl. Phaedrus 241d1: this may be an adaptation of Il. 22.263, but I follow Hackforth’s (1952, ad loc.) scepticism. 138 Pl. Phaedrus 237a7–b1: Rowe (1986) ad loc. detects an ironic or ludic tone here. 139 Pl. Phaedrus 227b9–11 (from Pind. Isth. 1.2).

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appear in any text of Homer;140 a paraphrase of another Homeric line, presented as a direct quotation;141 a reference to nonexistent rhetorical treatises by ﬁctional characters;142 a genuine inscription of disputed authorship;143 and, most strikingly, an entire speech which is attributed to Lysias but thought by most critics to be an invention or pastiche by Plato himself.144 There is ample evidence here to suggest that Plato was capable of inventing and distorting poetic material for his own purposes, and that his literary or rhetorical agenda at the point of introducing the Stesichorus story may be rather complex. Here, again, it may repay the eﬀort to examine the overall argument of the Phaedrus. The subject under discussion (among others) in this dialogue is the impossibility of putting philosophical truths 140 Pl. Phaedrus 252b5–9. Plato describes these lines as being ‘from obscure poems’ (ƒk t0n åpoqvtwn ƒp0n), and even ventures the opinion that one of them is ‘totally outrageous’ (—n tÏ 1teron ËbristikÏn p3nu)—which, if he had written the lines himself, must surely be a joke. Hackforth (1952, 97) writes that ‘it is uncertain whether the two lines are simply invented by Plato or modiﬁed from existing lines fathered on Homer, perhaps by some Orphic writer’ (but why should one think that?); Rowe (1986, ad loc.) that ‘hardly anyone doubts that the lines are at least in part Plato’s own’. 141 Pl. Phaedrus 266b6–7: a possible model is Hom. Od. 5.193. 142 Pl. Phaedrus 261b6–8: references to treatises on the art of speaking composed by Nestor and Odysseus in their moments of leisure at Troy!—obviously ﬁctional, though Socrates may be casting Gorgias in the role of Nestor and Thrasymachus (or Theodorus) in the role of Odysseus. 143 Pl. Phaedrus 264d3–6: epigram said to have been inscribed on the tomb of Midas the Phrygian (cf. Diog. Laert. 1.90: he gives two extra lines, however, and says that it is possibly the work of Cleobulus of Lindus). 144 Pl. Phaedrus 230e6–234c5 (= [Lys.] Or. 35, ‘Erotikos’). The general consensus is that the speech is spurious, although ancient critics accepted it as genuine (Diog. Laert. 3.25). Dover (1968b) 69–71 concludes that there can be no certainty as to the authorship: stylistic considerations give no answer, because no other paignion of Lysias survives for comparison, and any non-Platonic features here would be entirely natural in a pastiche. But others ﬁrmly believe that Plato and not Lysias was the author, referring to the content and context of the speech. See e.g. Hamilton (1973) 26: ‘the peculiar appropriateness of the speech in respect to Plato’s purpose is perhaps the strongest argument against its being an actual work of Lysias’. Rowe (1986, ad loc). points out that elsewhere Plato never quotes other authors verbatim at such length. Cf. de Vries (1969) ad loc.: ‘constructing a speech according to all conventional rules, and then destroying it, seems to me to be rather more Platonic play with styles than quoting at length a piece of mediocre contemporary oratory’. This is the view also of Hackforth (1952, 17), who suggests that Plato attributed the invented speech to Lysias because his criticism of rhetorical culture would be more eﬀective with a named target, and Lysias’ name was an ‘obvious’ one to use.

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into writing: Plato says that the written word is nothing more than a pale phantom (e÷dwlon) of the real truth.145 And he has illustrated this argument with misleading, spurious, written texts, of which the Palinode is one among many. When Plato makes Socrates say, apropos of the speech of Lysias, that ‘a speaker who knows the truth can make fun of his hearers and lead them astray („ß #n Ø ejd°ß tÏ ålhq†ß prospa≤zwn ƒn lÎgoiß par3goi toŸß åko»ontaß)’,146 might we detect an ironic double-meaning? Many readers have detected an ironic or ludic tone in this dialogue, and in the Stesichorus story in particular. The argument proposed by Socrates is of great philosophical importance, but he is also warning his readers not to take him— or anything which he says or quotes—entirely seriously. The following passage, taken from the closing section of the dialogue, well represents the overall message and mood of the Phaedrus, with its playful tone and self-refuting use of irony: Ø dv ge ƒn m†n t0i gegrammvnwi lÎgwi per≥ ‰k3stou paidi3n te Ógo»menoß poll¶n ånagka∏on e”nai, ka≥ oÛd†na p*pote lÎgon ƒn mvtrwi oÛd’ £neu mvtrou meg3lhß £xion spoud[ß graf[nai, oÛdv lecq[nai „ß oÈ Âaywido»menoi £neu ånakr≤sewß ka≥ didac[ß peiqoıß 1neka ƒlvcqhsan, [. . .] o˜toß d† Ø toioıtoß ån¶r kindune»ei, _ Fa∏dre, e”nai oÍon ƒg* te ka≥ sŸ eÛxa≤meq’ #n sv te ka≥ ƒm† genvsqai. The person who believes that in the written word there must always be much frivolity, and that no prose or poetry deserves to be taken terribly seriously (not even the recitations of the rhapsodes, which are designed with persuasion in mind, without opportunity for questioning or education) [. . .] I dare say, Phaedrus, that such a person is the sort of man you and I might pray that we ourselves may become.147

The remarks here about poetry and rhapsodes are of particular interest, since at several points in the course of the dialogue Socrates has presented himself in terms of an inspired rhapsode 145

Pl. Phaedrus 276a. Ibid. 262d2–3. Perhaps Plato’s later reference (Rep. 9. 586c) to the supposed e÷dwlon of Helen, usually taken to constitute an additional reference to the Palinode’s contents, is really a ludic reference to his own argument—and the Stesichorean forgery—in the Phaedrus. Incidentally, it is interesting to note that Plato seems to have invented another phantom, this time the f3sma of Eurydice, in Symp. 179d. This has been seen as another example of Platonic invention in ‘a dialogue full of fancies’: Guthrie (1935) 31. 147 Pl. Phaedrus 278a–b. 146

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or poet!148 We are being warned, then, to take everything in the Phaedrus—including the Palinode—with a pinch of salt. In other words, even if the Stesichorus story and the quotation did not contradict the version of Isocrates, it would be impossible to view the Phaedrus passage as a straightforward piece of literary biography. If, as it appears, we cannot trust Plato, the fons et origo of nearly all the information about Stesichorus, the consequences for our ‘knowledge’ of the Palinode are severe. Even the very limited ‘facts’ contained in those three short lines—that Helen never travelled by ship, and never arrived at Troy—must now be rejected. Thus there no longer remains any reason to think that Stesichorus’ poem, like Euripides’ Helen, overturned the Iliadic myth of Helen: indeed, Isocrates suggests very strongly that it did not. A further, ﬁnal piece of evidence which supports the view that the Palinode had nothing to do with negating the story of the Trojan War, or with exonerating Helen, is Gorgias’ Encomium of Helen, a short work of sophistic philosophy and rhetoric, more or less contemporary with Euripides’ Helen.149 In the opening paragraphs of this provocative piece, Gorgias claims to be telling the truth about Helen, revealing at last the falsehoods of other writers. This introductory section would be an obvious and appropriate point at which to mention Stesichorus, but Gorgias, strikingly, fails to do so. Instead, he says emphatically that all previous poets have been unanimous regarding Helen’s guilt.150 Gorgias cannot have been unaware of the existence of such a 148 Pl. Phaedrus 234d–235d (Socrates ﬁlled with inspiration, as a jug with water), 237a (S. invokes the Muses), 238c–d (S. claims to be uttering dithyrambs), 241d–e (S. breaks into hexameter and says that if one is carried away by a subject one becomes poetic), 243a (S. as mousikÎß—the Palinode passage), 259 (the cicadas surrounding S. and Phaedrus are servants of the Muses). 149 I return to this fascinating work, and its implications for the escapetragedies, in Ch. 4 below. 150 Gorgias, Helen (DK 82 B11) §2: toı d’ aÛtoı åndrÏß lvxai te tÏ dvon ørq0ß ka≥ ƒlvgxai toŸß memfomvnouß E } lvnhn, guna∏ka per≥ ¬ß ØmÎfwnoß ka≥ ØmÎyucoß gvgonen ~ te t0n poiht0n åkous3ntwn p≤stiß ~ te toı ØnÎmatoß f&mh,  t0n sumfor0n mn&mh gvgonen (‘The man who says rightly what ought to be said should also refute those who put the blame on Helen, a woman about whom the belief of those who have listened to poets and the report of her name—which has become a reminder of disaster—have been totally unanimous’).

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poem as the Palinode, the work of his famous fellow-Sicilian. (One might claim that Gorgias is deliberately ignoring the Palinode, in order to exaggerate his own originality for rhetorical eﬀect; but in fact the inclusion of an alternative myth which claimed to exonerate Helen, far from detracting from Gorgias’ impact, would actually have lent support to his argument, which is concerned with the power of words to delude and deceive.) The only fact which emerges (more or less) unscathed at the end of our investigation is that Stesichorus once wrote something called a Palinode. The title of this composition suggests that it was markedly diﬀerent from other compositions by the same poet. If it did not contain a denial of the plot of the Iliad, a phantom-Helen, or an Egyptian narrative, one can only guess at its contents. A plausible—but, as usual, unprovable—explanation may, I suggest, be found in Helen’s nature. Helen appears in the Iliad and tragedy as a human character, but she was also worshipped as a goddess in Peloponnesian ritual.151 We know from the fragments of his Helen that Stesichorus portrayed the heroine in her more usual human guise. We also suspect, on the basis of certain local details in other fragments, that Stesichorus visited the Peloponnese, or was inﬂuenced by Spartan patrons, at some point in his life;152 therefore it is likely that Stesichorus composed poetry about Helen qua goddess as well. Poems concerning the divine Helen of Spartan cult would naturally be diﬀerent in kind from poems about the human, Iliadic Helen; so, if Stesichorus composed both types of poem, this could well be what gave rise to the belief that he had ‘recanted’. Of course, this explanation is not perfect: it depends on attaching a rather diﬀerent sort of meaning to the word Palinode (which may or may not have been Stesichorus’ own title). However, it does allow us to look more charitably upon Chamaeleon’s reference to Palinodes in the plural, and his two lines deır’ aˆte qe¤ filÎmolpe and crusÎptere parqvne—which may, perhaps, go some way towards placating those Stesichoreans who shudder at the prospect of being left with no lines at all. There is no indication, then, that either Hesiod or Stesichorus supplied Euripides with the myth of Helen in the precise form which he uses. The most commonly given explanation is that 151 152

See especially Clader (1976). Bowra (1934) and (1961); cf. Davison (1968) 209.

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Hesiod introduced the phantom of Iphigenia and Stesichorus introduced the phantom of Helen, and that the tradition subsequently became confused.153 But, since (as I have shown) one cannot be absolutely certain of any detail, it may plausibly be argued that Euripides used neither Hesiod nor Stesichorus. Most importantly, our limited evidence suggests that the Palinode, whatever it actually was, had nothing to do with a ‘counterfactual’ Helen-myth. What is ‘known’ about these earlier writers’ treatment of phantoms, Egypt, and suchlike is in fact highly problematic and may even derive from Euripides himself. So far, we are no closer to discovering whether Euripides’ alternative Helen-myth was in circulation prior to 412 bc. However, there are two further pieces of evidence which have been thought to be signiﬁcant. The ﬁrst is extremely tenuous and can be dealt with brieﬂy. The passage in question comes from the ﬁrst stasimon of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon (458 bc), where the subject is Menelaus’ desertion by Helen: pÎqwi d’ Ëperpont≤aß f3sma dÎxei dÎmwn ån3ssein.154 And because of his desire for her who is far away across the seas, it seems that an apparition is in charge of the house.

It does seem that the apparition in question is that of Helen: even though she has gone away, leaving only destruction and despair in her wake, Menelaus seems to see her all over the palace: that is why he cannot even bear the sight of statues, as the ode goes on to tell. ‘This, the simplest and most obvious explanation, has always been followed by men with a sensitive feeling for poetry’, wrote Fraenkel.155 It is possible, on the other hand, that the word refers to Menelaus—a ‘shadow’ of his former self—but this is not the most natural reading.156 The main question is: if Helen’s 153 See Austin (1994) 105–11. Note, in addition, that it now seems likely that Stesichorus and the author of the Catalogue were roughly contemporary, which means that either of them could have inﬂuenced the other: see West (1985) 154 130–5. Aesch. Ag. 414–15. 155 Fraenkel (1950) ad loc. He goes on: ‘if anyone cannot appreciate this either from personal experience or the power of imagination, then even the intense pathos of lines like E. Alc. 944 ﬀ . will be lost on him.’ This seems rather disingenuous, or (worse) naïve. 156 Fraenkel (1950) gives two possible tragic parallels for this type of

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apparition is meant here, does this constitute an oblique allusion to the version of the myth in which Helen’s phantom went to Troy?157 This is just possible—despite the fact that f3sma rather than e÷dwlon is used, and that there is no explicit reference to the phantom and substitution. But Fraenkel says, correctly, that the question can hardly be answered, pointing out the total diﬀerence of the situations and declaring that the Agamemnon ode contains simply ‘a piece of general and purely human experience’. These considerations do not preclude the possibility of allusion; but Fraenkel is right to say that certainty is unattainable. The second reference is more diﬃcult to explain. The following lines occur in the speech of Castor ex machina at the end of Euripides’ Electra (1280–3): E } lvnh te q3yei: Prwtvwß g¤r ƒk dÎmwn ~kei lipoıs’ A÷gupton oÛd’ Álqen Fr»gaß: ZeŸß d’, „ß πriß gvnoito ka≥ fÎnoß brot0n, e÷dwlon E } lvnhß ƒxvpemy’ ƒß “Ilion. and Helen will bury [Clytemnestra]; for she has come from the house of Proteus, leaving Egypt, and she did not go to Troy. Zeus, in order to cause strife and bloodshed among mortals, sent a phantom of Helen oﬀ to Ilium.

This is the very version of the myth that appears in Helen. Even Zeus’ motivation (to make the earth less heavy by relieving it of surplus population) appears to be the same.158 Therefore, assuming that the lines are genuine,159 there are certain implications for Euripides’ originality. It is almost certain that Electra preceded Helen, but its precise date is unknown. Metrical analysis suggests a date between 424 expression (Soph. Phil. 946–7, Oed. at Col. 109–10), but notes that in each case the word used is diﬀerent (e÷dwlon, ski3) and the description more explicit. 157 So thinks Welcker (1854) 194–5. 158 This rather capricious divine plan appeared in the Cypria (fr. 1 Davies), and was used by Euripides not only in Helen (38–40) but also in the later Orestes (1639–42). 159 An interpolation? There is no reason to suppose that the lines are not genuine: The manuscript L and its copy P contain them, without any discrepancies, and they cannot be removed without serious disruption of the text. The syntax of 1279–81 will not permit any excision without the loss of sense. Lines 1282–3 are detachable—this would leave the Egyptian reference without the e÷dwlon, but 1281 still clearly says that Helen did not go to Troy.

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and 410,160 but a reference to the ‘Sicilian sea’ (pÎntoß SikelÎß, El. 1347–8) has been thought to date the production to 413: so Denniston wrote, overconﬁdently, that ‘the date 413 bc for the Electra is ﬁxed beyond all reasonable doubt’.161 However, Cropp, following Zuntz, believes that ‘allusions so inorganic to the dramatic context are alien to Greek Tragedy’ and that ‘the passages in question make sense purely in terms of their dramatic context’;162 therefore he rejects the ‘contextual’ dating of Denniston in favour of the somewhat earlier ‘metrical’ date. Nevertheless, the date of production makes a considerable diﬀerence to one’s interpretation of this passage. Leaving aside for the moment the question of who ﬁrst combined the motifs of Helen in Egypt and her phantom-double, I think that one should examine more closely the context of these four lines. No matter what their source, the most important thing is that they are extremely incongruous here: Helen has nothing to do with the plot of Electra and no dramatic relevance in the current situation, where Castor is explaining to everyone what they must do. He reassures Orestes that the burial of his mother will be attended to by Menelaus—and Helen, he adds. Helen is only an adjunct of Menelaus, with no personal function to perform; so her mention here seems like an afterthought. There is no point whatsoever in the additional information that Helen never went to Troy, and neither Castor nor any other character goes on to comment or elaborate upon this strange myth, but the subject is at once changed. In other words—to meet Cropp’s objection—the allusion to Helen is inorganic to the dramatic context, nor does it make sense (purely, or at all) in terms of this dramatic context. Unless we are to assume that Euripides’ art deserted him at this point, we must ﬁnd some other way to interpret the lines. It has been thought that the reference is justiﬁed here because it ‘discredits’ Electra and Orestes’ vengeance on Clytemnestra by 160 Cropp and Fick (1985, 23) estimate somewhere between 422 and 417, with 420–419 more likely; Devine (1981, 47–55) gives the larger range of 424–10; Collard (1981) 2 suggests ‘pre-415’, also on metrical grounds. Matthiessen (1964) 66–9 gives a ﬁrm date of 413 based on a variety of considerations. It should be noted that all of these critics use Murray’s text; Diggle’s OCT, however, deletes far more lines, which means that the calculations for ‘metrical’ dates may be aﬀected. 161 Denniston (1939) xxxiv. 162 Cropp (1988) li, referring to Zuntz (1955) 63–71.

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removing the reason for it.163 But this explanation still leaves the contextual incongruity of the lines unexplained. The only interpretation which seems to me to make sense is that oﬀered by Denniston: the reference to Helen is a deliberately shocking incongruity designed to be an ‘advertisement’ for Euripides’ next production, the Helen.164 This would have been a most striking device (whether or not Euripides was the ﬁrst to use that particular myth), albeit unusual in a tragedy.165 Therefore 413 bc (pace Cropp and Fick) seems the most attractive date. In any case, there is no reason to believe that Electra 1280–3 alludes to any speciﬁc treatment of the ‘counterfactual’ Helen-myth, and we are no closer to concluding whether or not Euripides was its originator in the form which he uses. Now for Iphigenia, which is rather less complicated than Helen (but not without its diﬃculties). Here, as in Helen, I suggest it is likely that Euripides’ myth consisted of a new combination of pre-existing mythical elements. According to one source, the counterfactual Iphigenia-myth of the substitution at Aulis and the transportation to the Black Sea existed as early as the seventh or sixth century bc, in the Cypria.166 But the authenticity of Proclus’ summary, the source of this data, has been questioned: might it not be that Proclus relied on sources other than the Cypria itself, including Euripides’ inﬂuential play?167 This explanation is possible, but it cannot be denied that the Athenians of the ﬁfth century had knowledge both of the Taurians and of the fact that Iphigenia—in her divine aspect— was associated with the Taurian people.168 Herodotus discusses Iphigenia, as a deity, in his section on the Taurians’ custom of human sacriﬁce: ‘the Taurians themselves say that this goddess to whom they make sacriﬁce is Agamemnon’s daughter 163

Eisner (1979) 167–8. Euripides ‘whetting the curiosity’ of the audience: Denniston (1939) xxxiv. Cf. Wilamowitz (1875) 152–3. It has also been suggested that Electra was part of the same trilogy as Helen in 412: Denniston (1939, xxxiv) mentions this only to reject it. 165 There is a comic parallel for this self-conscious advertising of next year’s show, in Aristophanes’ Acharnians (425 bc): lines 301–5 anticipate Cleon’s treatment in Knights (424). 166 Cypria (Proclus), p. 32 Davies. 167 Burnett (1971) 73; Hall (1989a) 111. 168 See §3.2 below. 164

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Iphigenia.’169 Thus, even if Proclus’ evidence for the Cypria cannot be trusted, it is clear that Euripides did not invent the fact of Iphigenia’s presence (in whatever form) in the Tauric land. Another possible source for Euripides is Sophocles’ Chryses. The play itself does not survive, apart from a handful of fragments which contain practically no information about setting, characters or plot.170 But it may be that the plot is preserved by Hyginus: he records a sequel to the events of Euripides’ play, in which Orestes and Iphigenia were pursued by Thoas to Sminthe, the home of Chryses, priest of Apollo; Chryses helped Orestes to kill Thoas so that he could escape to Mycenae with the statue of Artemis.171 It is very likely that Chryses was produced before Iphigenia, which means that Sophocles cannot have been inﬂuenced by Euripides’ version.172 Therefore, if Hyginus’ summary really does represent the plot of Sophocles’ play, Euripides cannot have been the ﬁrst to use the Tauric setting or the alternative Iphigenia myth in tragedy. But that is far from certain.173 I believe that Euripides’ innovation lay in the fusion of precise details. Previously, Iphigenia had either died at Aulis or was immortalized (cf. Hesiod, Stesichorus, Herodotus); in this play, she survives as a human, and eventually returns to Greece.174 Another seemingly new detail in Euripides is that of Iphigenia and Orestes ‘coincidentally’ reuniting in the Tauric land. In this respect, Orestes can be seen to be a particularly useful, ﬂexible character, because part of his unchanging character and function in myth, following the murder of Clytemnestra and pursuit by the Furies, is as an exiled ‘wanderer’. This allows a considerable 169 Hdt. 4. 103: t¶n d† da≤mona ta»thn t[i q»ousi lvgousi aÛto≥ Taıroi I∞ figvneian t¶n !gamvmnonoß e”nai. 170 TGF 4 (Radt) frr. 494–5. 171 Hyg. Fab. 120–1. Cf. Burnett (1971) 73–5; Conacher (1967) 303–5. 172 Ar. Birds (414 bc) parodies Soph. Chryses: S Ar. Birds 1240. This gives a terminus ante quem of 415 for Chryses. If we accept a date of 414–412 for Iphigenia (see §1.1 above), then the order of the two plays is ﬁxed. Cf. Grégoire (1968) 106; Cropp (2000) 45 n.50. Burnett (1971, 75 n. 26) concludes, however, that ‘the chronological situation here is too obscure for dogmatism’. 173 Hyginus’ version is cast somewhat in the form of a Euripidean escapeplot!—which does not seem particularly Sophoclean in character. Nevertheless, one should add that our notion of what is ‘Sophoclean’ is based on a very limited collection of plays. (See Kiso [1984] on ‘the lost Sophocles’.) 174 Cf. Cropp (2000) 44–6.

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freedom of geographical range: Orestes might without incongruity turn up anywhere in the Greek world in the course of his wanderings. Therefore Orestes’ arrival at the Tauric shores does not, unlike that of his sister, require a counterfactual alteration of the existing myth—merely a willingness to accept a slight stretching of the normal limits of tragic probability and necessity.175 However, it is worth remarking that Orestes’ travels elsewhere are not nearly so wide-ranging, nor are they undertaken by ship, as here. (Again, the evidence of Sophocles’ Chryses and Hyginus may testify to a tradition of Orestes in the Black Sea; but here there is more uncertainty than in the case of Iphigenia, and as before Euripides may have been the source for Hyginus.) Ultimately, as I said at the outset, we cannot know the extent of Euripides’ originality, invention or allusion. It is not impossible, on the basis of the evidence above, that Euripides’ counterfactual Helen- and Iphigenia-myths were completely invented in every particular. But it is more likely, and more in line with tragic myth and plot elsewhere (as we have seen in §2.2.2 above), that Euripides inherited, rather than invented, these odd myths or their individual component elements. (For why assume that Euripides is more heterodox and (even) un-tragic than necessary?) Throughout this section I have been inclining towards the view that Euripides’ innovation took the form of mixing together existing strands of myth and forming something slightly diﬀerent, yet familiar. I shall return to this view, and its implications, in the ﬁnal section (§2.4) below. 2.3.3 The new Helen and the new Iphigenia Even if the myths were not Euripidean in origin, they were still unusual fare for tragic drama. Helen—if I am correct, the ﬁrst play in the trilogy176—is, in some ways, the most surprising: this 175 One should never, of course, expect any tragedy exactly to follow the rules of real-life logic; there are always far more ‘coincidences’ than in life. The classic example of tragedy’s ‘oﬀences against probability’—this time with regard to plot rather than myth—is Sophocles’ Oedipus the King: see Dawe (1982) 1–22. 176 See §1.2 above. Position in the trilogy might have a certain relevance in terms of the creation of surprise.

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is reﬂected in Aristophanes’ phrase Ó kain¶ }Elvnh (‘the new Helen’).177 That a play about Helen was written at all is remarkable. Helen of Troy seems to have been one of those characters whose signiﬁcance is increased through being often talked about but seldom seen in person. Her inﬂuence is very often felt, either explicitly or implicitly; she is frequently mentioned, in an evocative or passionate manner, by characters or choruses; she may be said to be one of the most important characters in tragedy—yet she generally remains oﬀ-stage (so that, in fact, her signiﬁcance and mystique are made to seem even greater).178 Helen of Troy was a ﬁgure of great symbolic signiﬁcance. In the ﬁrst place, she stood for beauty. She was the most beautiful woman in the world, the epitome of femininity and desirability, embodying all that men ﬁnd to love in women.179 But Helen, like 177 Ar. Thesm. 850: t¶n kain¶n E } lvnhn. How to translate the phrase? ‘New’? ‘Strange’? ‘Outré’?—the scholion attached to this line interprets kain& in its obvious chronological sense (‘last year’s), but as Kannicht (1969, 1. 21–4) correctly remarks, the adjective also bears the sense of kainÎthß (‘novelty’); as such it may apply equally to the play or to the character of Helen. Kannicht also believes that ‘Ó kain¶ E } lvnh’ had already become a slogan by 411, owing to the notoriety of Euripides’ play. 178 There is no certain record of any other previous tragedy called Helen. Sophocles wrote a tragedy called The Retrieval of Helen (}Elvnhß åpait&siß, TGF 4 [Radt] frr. 176–180a—or, possibly, the title was simply E } lvnh, according to S Ar. Knights 84b), but the surviving lines tell us virtually nothing about the play or characters. The only extant tragedies which feature Helen as a (minor) character are Eur. Tro. and Or. (which post-dates the Helen). nb also that Helen features comparatively rarely in art, and that (signiﬁcantly) none of the surviving artefacts obviously represents a theatrical production. Perhaps it was perceived to be impossible adequately to portray a ﬁgure who was so great an icon and, moreover, of such fabled beauty (see LIMC s.v. ‘Helen’). There is evidence of two 4th-cent. tragedies called Helen. Two lines survive of Theodectas’ Helen, quoted by Arist. Pol. 1255a37 (TGF 1 [Snell] 72 fr. 3), but we have only the title of Diogenes’ tragedy (TGF 1 [Snell] 88 fr. 1b, T 1.2; cf. Suda s.v. Diogenes; Diog. Laert. 6.80). 179 Her presentation in the Iliad makes much of her beauty: for example, a stock line to describe the beauty of other women uses Helen as a point of comparison (Il. 9.140, 9.282 etc.). Note, too, the reaction of the old Trojan men to the sight of Helen in the teichoscopia: oÛ nvmesiß Tr0aß ka≥ eÛkn&midaß !caioŸß | toi[id’ åmf≥ gunaik≥ polŸn crÎnon £lgea p3scein (‘No one could blame the Trojans and the well-greaved Achaeans for toiling for such a long time for the sake of such a woman’, Il. 3.156–7). Sappho (fr. 16.9 L–P) and Alcaeus (fr. 283 L–P) both attempt to exonerate Helen from blame on account of her surpassing beauty. According to various other legends, the very sight of Helen’s beauty caused the Greeks to drop the stones with which they were preparing to pelt her (Stesichorus fr. 201 Davies), and caused Menelaus to throw away his sword

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beauty, was paradoxical. Beauty may be pure and good, or it may turn out to be baneful, with the power to eﬀect unmentionable harm. Aeschylus, for example, links Clytemnestra with Helen in order to ponder whether there is not something intrinsically evil and destructive about the whole of womankind. In this sense, Helen may be seen to have an unusual semiotic function in myth: she is representative of her gender, but she also symbolizes a violent transgression of the normal societal relations between the genders.180 Virtually all the references to Helen in extant tragedy are markedly hostile.181 In Euripides’ play the character herself (among others) makes reference to this fact, saying that there is no one at all among humans who does not loathe Helen.182 Helen is cursed as the causer of tears and woe; she is a wanton, a traitor, the cause or even the personiﬁcation of ruin, a wife that is not a wife, a mad, lust-crazed, evil bitch.183 Helen was supposed to be guilty of causing the Trojan War, the greatest event in Greek myth-history, in which many years were taken up in ﬁghting, a multitude of men were slaughtered, and the world was in turmoil—all of it for Helen’s sake.184 The Trojan War was an årc¶ kak0n—not only a milestone event in history, but also the ﬁrst major event, according to Herodotus: essentially, Greek history and Greek life were perceived to begin with this conﬂict. (Ibycus fr. 296 Davies; S Ar. Lys. 155; Ilias Parva fr. 19 Davies). Helen’s shrines at Sparta and elsewhere were supposedly a source of beauty, to which ugly people ﬂocked (Hdt. 6.61; Paus. 3.7.7). Pherecydes (FGH 3 F 29), claiming that Penelope had more womanly virtue than Helen, is clearly reacting against the common assessment of Helen’s feminine virtues. On Helen’s portrayal in Greek literature in general, see Adams (1988). 180 Aesch. Ag. 1455. Goldhill (1986) is interesting on the subject of Helen as a semiotic device: her adultery ‘strikes at the heart of a relation of exchange through which society is formed and ordered’ (24). 181 Cropp (2000, 199) brieﬂy discusses blame of Helen (yÎgoß E } lvnhß) as a motif in Greek tragedy. 182 Helen 926; cf. Teucer’s words at 81 (see also discussion below: §2.4). 183 e.g. Aesch. Ag. 63, 680, 408, 1051, 1213, 1455; Eur. Andromache 103, 248, 680; El. 214, 1027, 1083; Hec. 441, 629, 943; Iph. at A. 176, 485, 583, 682, 782, 1253; Or. 1588, etc. (An exhaustive list would ﬁll pages.) 184 Helen’s responsibility is a recurrent theme in tragedy and epic, and the phrases E } lvnhß 1neka, ¬ß 1neka, 1qen 1neka, gunaikÏß o\neka, and similar, are widely to be seen. (Hom. Il. 2.156–7, 3.129, 3.154–5, 6.536, 19.235; Od. 11.438, 14.68–9, 17.118; Aesch. Ag. 800, 865; Eur. Andromache 105; Hec. 265–6; Iphigenia 8, 14; Iph. at Aul. 1253; Tro. 865, 891, etc.)

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And Helen was to blame—the archetypal causer of war, of love, of history.185 But in Euripides’ new version it is all diﬀerent, as Helen herself relates in the prologue-speech and later on. Not only the central events, but the characterization also (so it seems) has been altered. Helen presents herself as no longer a lust-crazed deserter of husbands, but a chaste, meek, middle-aged woman: as Dale puts it, ‘she has . . . perfect wifely charm and tact’!186 Much is made in the play of chastity and virginity, qualities which were scarcely to be associated with the old Helen. The description of the ‘lovely-virgin’ (kallip3rqenoi) streams of Nile in the prologue is highly suggestive;187 Helen was sent to Proteus, who was judged to be ‘the most honourable’ (swfronvstatoß) of all mankind, to guard her chastity inviolate for her husband;188 she ﬁnds the thought of a new husband repugnant,189 and is, indeed, so desperate to keep her marriage inviolate that she has ﬂed as a suppliant to Proteus’ tomb (63–5). Helen’s wifely concern for Menelaus is frequently expressed in the earlier parts of the play. She goes on living, she claims, only because she clings to the hope that he is still alive, and is apparently distraught at the news of his death—to the extent that she vows to commit suicide.190 Helen is still beautiful, as before, but she now realizes that her beauty was among the causes of her misfortunes, and wishes that she could be plain.191 Later in the play, she does alter her appearance, by cutting oﬀ her hair, so that this new Helen would have been (literally) unrecognizable.192 185 The topos of feminine abduction is always a problematic feature in Greek theories of causation. One might object that the guilt lies elsewhere (in this case, with the gods or with Paris), but the ﬁfth-century attitude to rape was more complex: Herodotus’ Persians, for example (1.4.2), thought that women were never raped unless they wanted to be (d[la g¤r d¶ Òti, ej m¶ aÛta≥ ƒbo»lonto, oÛk #n Órp3zonto). 186 Dale (1967) viii. 187 Helen 1. Dale (1967, ad loc.), missing the point, evidently thinks this an unusual epithet, concluding that ‘perhaps Eur. did not think too closely about it’. 188 Helen 46–8: for s*frwn in the sense of sexual continence cf. Barrett (1963) 72–3 (on Hipp. 79–81). 189 Helen 294–7; cf. 314. 190 Helen 56–9, 203–4, 277–8, 292–3, 351–6. 191 Helen 27, 261–3. Is this a metatheatrical comment, or something else?— see §4.4.6 and §4.4.7 below. 192 Helen 1186–9. Dale (1967, viii) attributes this to a touching lack of vanity;

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Like Helen, Iphigenia seldom appeared among the characters of tragedy, and was seldom a subject for a tragedy. Aeschylus and Sophocles had each written an Iphigenia, but there is no record of any other ﬁfth-century tragedy on the same subject.193 The most obvious part of the myth for a tragedy on Iphigenia would be the events leading up to her sacriﬁce at Aulis, which, as seems likely, appeared in the versions of Aeschylus and Sophocles, and which Euripides indeed used in his later Iphigenia at Aulis. But, as far as we can tell, the Taurian episode from Iphigenia’s life (whether it was Euripides’ own invention or not) had never before been dramatized. It might seem that Iphigenia has undergone a less radical change of personality in Euripides’ play.194 After all, her character traits, as recorded in the mythical tradition, were not so strongly marked in comparison with the treacherous, over-sexed but the main point is that Helen’s shorn locks are part of the plan to dupe Theoclymenus. But contrast Orestes 128–9, where Helen’s vanity prevents her from cutting oﬀ more than the smallest amount of her hair as a grave-oﬀering: ÷dete g¤r £kraß „ß åpvqrisen tr≤caß, | s*izousa k3lloß: πsti d∞ Ó p3lai gun& (‘look: she has cut only the ends of her hair, preserving her beauty: she is the same old Helen!). As Willink (1986) ad loc. points out, this ‘reasserts that this is the traditional Helen’. In addition, I would add that the phrase Ó p3lai gun& (in a play of 408 bc) might plausibly be a self-conscious allusion to Aristophanes’ Ó kain¶ E } lvnh (Thesm. 850). 193 Aeschylus’ Iphigenia: TGF 3 (Radt) T 78, 6d. No fragments exist, but the title is listed in the Catalogue of A’s plays; it is said, tantalizingly (T 93b 2–3), that it was in this play that Aeschylus ‘profaned the mysteries’. Sophocles’ Iphigenia: TGF 4 (Radt) fr. 305–12 (largely unrevealing fragments). TGF 2 (Kannicht/Snell) frag. adesp. 663 is assigned to a play about Iphigenia because certain features seem to correspond to accounts of the events at Aulis (cf. Apollodorus epit. 3.22); but this is not deﬁnite, and the authorship and date of the fragment are unknown. The 4th-cent. sophist Polyidus may have written an Iphigenia: Aristotle (Poet. 1455a6–8) refers to Ó Pol»idou toı sofistoı per≥ t[ß I∞ figene≤aß, which Lucas (1968, ad loc.) believes to be a commentary of some sort on the Iphigenia of Euripides. Nevertheless, Aristotle goes on: ejkÏß g¤r πfh tÏn O ∞ rvsthn sullog≤sasqai Òti Ó t’ ådelf¶ ƒt»qh ka≥ aÛt0i sumba≤nei q»esqai (‘he said that it was probable for Orestes to reason that he was going to be sacriﬁced because his sister had been sacriﬁced’). The word πfh (‘he said’) is omitted by some manuscripts and papyrus sources, which adds the possibility that Polyidus was the author of a play on the subject of Iphigenia (cf. ibid. 1455b10). Might this play have been a tragedy, or a dithyramb? A certain Polyeidus of Selymbria won a prize for dithyramb c.399–380 bc: see TGF 1 (Snell) 248 fr. 78, T 1–7; Diod. Sic. 14.46. 194 But see §3.3 below for a more detailed discussion of Iphigenia’s characterdevelopment.

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and guilty Helen, which means that the novelty of the ‘new’ Iphigenia would inevitably be less shocking. Nevertheless, in Euripides’ play Iphigenia’s character has been altered. In other versions of the myth, Iphigenia, like Helen, was beautiful (which may have been a reason for her death at Aulis),195 but she was rather less complex: whereas Helen was an active, even malignant, causer of events, Iphigenia was more passive and vulnerable, (simply) a character to whom things happened. But Euripides’ Iphigenia is drawn in such a way as to make her appear even more like Helen. Both women, despite being in a passive position of vulnerability, are really the most active characters in their respective plays: they are able easily to gain ascendancy over their captors; they give orders; they take charge over their male rescuers in the formulation of the escapeplans.196 (Indeed, these women are very far from being the ‘damsels in distress’ that their role in the plot requires them to appear: one might well wonder why they have not escaped before now.) A Helen responsible for the course of events is already familiar; but a dynamic Iphigenia is an innovation. In addition, it would have seemed most surprising and incongruous that the girl who was so cruelly sacriﬁced by her own father is now herself in the position of sacriﬁcing Greeks.197

195 Cf. Iphigenia 20–1: Òti g¤r ƒniautÏß tvkoi | k3lliston, hÇxw fwsfÎrwi q»sein qe$i (‘[Agamemnon] vowed to sacriﬁce to the light-bearing goddess the most beautiful produce of the year’). 196 ‘Active’ women: at Helen 1049, Helen tells Menelaus, ironically, to ‘listen—if a mere woman can oﬀer a sensible suggestion’ (£kouson, ‡n ti ka≥ gun¶ lvxhi sofÎn); at 1621 Theoclymenus claims that he has been ‘wretchedly duped by feminine wiles’ (_ gunaike≤aiß tvcnaisin aÈreqe≥ß ƒg° t3laß); at Iphigenia 1032 Orestes says that ‘women are fearfully good at hatching plots’ (deina≥ g¤r aÈ guna∏keß eËr≤skein tvcnaß). It is worth noting, though, that Helen, Iphigenia and Andromeda are all of a quite diﬀerent type from the ‘bad’ women—the Phaedras and Stheneboeas—whom Aristophanes’ ‘Aeschylus’ (Frogs 1043) thought typical Euripidean heroines. Perhaps this fact explains why in Thesmophoriazusae, when he is charged with misrepresenting women, ‘Euripides’ uses the escapetragedies, with their good heroines, as a suitable ruse. 197 The sacriﬁce at Aulis, with its terror and agony, is described a dozen times throughout the play: Iphigenia 6–9, 19–24, 26–9, 178, 210–17, 358–71, 565–6, 770–1, 783–7, 854–5, 1082–3, 1418.

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2.3.4 A new Andromeda? Euripides’ Helen and Iphigenia are characterized by their novelty; but how does the other escape-tragedy ﬁt into the picture? Of course, one should not fall prey to a banal schematization by automatically assuming that, since they are alike in certain ways, all three plays shared identical features of construction and content. But it may nevertheless be interesting to speculate on whether the plot and the heroine of Andromeda were also based on a counterfactual version of the myth. Nothing in the fragments deﬁnitely suggests an unfamiliar version of the story, but so little can be said for certain of the plot (especially in the latter half of the play) that the absence of clues is not particularly signiﬁcant. It is hard to add anything of substance to Webster’s reconstruction of the plot of Andromeda, which skilfully incorporates all the available evidence from the fragments and other treatments of the myth, including vase-paintings.198 However, it has to be admitted that this reconstruction, like his other versions of lost plays, is not characteristically ‘Euripidean’—that is, he does not fully consider the ways in which Andromeda might have been distinctive or diﬀerent, in line with Euripides’ habits elsewhere (Webster’s Andromeda might just as plausibly have been written by any tragedian). Perhaps such speculation is a waste of time, unprovable and overly reliant upon subjective judgements (just what sort of thing is ‘characteristically Euripidean’?); but I think that it is important at least to take the consideration of Euripides’ originality into account in one’s reconstruction. The fragments, as Webster observes, give a reasonably clear impression of what happened towards the beginning of the play—Andromeda is already bound to the rock; she describes her suﬀerings; she talks to the chorus members and performs a lyric lamentation; Perseus arrives by air; a conversation between Perseus and Andromeda ensues, in the course of which she implores him to take pity on her and rescue her from the monster, in return for her hand.199 The outlines of the story so far 198 Webster (1967) 192–99; Bubel (1991), indeed, adds little. For the paintings, see Trendall and Webster (1971) 78–82, ﬁgs. III.3.10–13 (cf. LIMC I.2 s.v. ‘Andromeda’). 199 This (simpliﬁed) summary deals with frr. 114–32. I have summarized the

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are familiar from the ‘normal’ myth: so, if there were any counterfactual elements, it seems that they were not introduced at the beginning (as in Helen and Iphigenia) but later. Unfortunately, it is not possible to say what happened next. There was obviously a debate of some sort (maybe an ag∫n), the subjects of which included bastardy (fr. 141), wealth (fr. 137, 142–3), and love (fr. 136, 138); and a contretemps of some kind involving a barbarian character (fr. 139); but apart from that, who can say what happened? Our ignorance of the identity of the other characters in the play (apart from Echo—who may perhaps have been a genuine Euripidean invention) is another serious problem. If one imagines a counterfactual overturning of the familiar story as outrageous as that seen in Helen and Iphigenia, then there are several possibilities. One scenario is that Andromeda was not saved by Perseus—the monster proved to be invincible, or perhaps it even killed the gallant rescuer (there is no sign that Perseus survived to the end of the play). It is unlikely that Andromeda was devoured by the monster: this act would have been narrated in a messenger-speech rather than acted out, but Andromeda is (because of her chains) a permanent on-stage presence. Another possible scenario is that Perseus did not marry Andromeda, for whatever reason. Particularly intriguing is the presence of the magical Gorgon’s head, which Perseus has in his sack (fr. 123). Webster makes little of this, suggesting merely that ‘Perseus . . . may have threatened to use the Gorgon’s head to petrify the opposition’.200 But why suppose that the matter extended only so far as a threat? In other versions of the myth, Perseus does actually petrify his rival Phineus and his followers.201 In a counterfactual version, it might have happened that the ‘wrong’ person was turned to stone—even Andromeda herself, perhaps?202 That would have been a most poignant and pathetic end to the tragedy, as well as forming an ironically deﬁnite ‘events’ in Andromeda above (§2.2.2); for more detail see Webster (1967); cf. Klimek-Winter (1993). 200 Webster (1967) 198–9. 201 Apollodorus 2.4.3; Hyg. Fab. 64; Ov. Met. 5.1–235. 202 A possible precedent for petriﬁcation in tragedy is Aeschylus’ Niobe (TGF 4 [Radt] frr.154a–167b), but the fragments provide no clear sign of this. (Cf. Hom. Il. 24.614–7, Ar. Frogs 911–12).

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satisfying ‘frame’ along with Perseus’ ﬁrst sight of Andromeda, where he actually mistook her for a beautiful statue.203 As I said, it is impossible to know whether or not the events in Euripides’ play happened as imagined above or in one of a hundred other diﬀerent ways: such speculation, however diverting, is not a very useful activity. But a strong argument against a ‘counterfactual’ Andromeda is that no extant version of the Andromeda myth contains any such violent variation on the usual themes.204 It could be argued that this is because the counterfactual myths elsewhere (in Helen and Iphigenia) were not part of the mythical tradition but Euripidean inventions; therefore the same might well have been true for Andromeda. But, given the popularity of Andromeda in antiquity, one might have expected the Euripidean version, even if unique and unparalleled, to have been reﬂected in the later mythical tradition. In any case (as I have argued) Euripides probably did not invent material to any great extent. Even if the plot of Andromeda was based on a radical overturning of the usual myth, it would not be exactly comparable with the other escape-tragedies. Counterfactual versions of the myths of Helen and Iphigenia are particularly shocking because both characters may be said to be ‘major’ characters in myth— that is, they are related to a great many other characters and events, and the repercussions of their lives and actions extend through a number of generations. The Trojan War, perhaps the biggest single event in Greek myth and history, would not have happened but for Helen’s elopement and Iphigenia’s sacriﬁce. Also, from the counterfactual angle, the plots of Helen and Iphigenia are to be placed at the end of their respective mythical sequences, and therefore prompt a radical re-evaluation of everything that preceded. In comparison, Andromeda is a ‘minor’ (indeed, non-Greek) character who does not greatly impinge on other characters or myths.205 Therefore the surprise 203 Andromeda fr. 125: parqvnou t’ ejk* tina | ƒx aÛtomÎrfwn la≤nwn tukism3twn | sof[ß £galma ceirÎß (‘It is the statue of a young girl, fashioned out of a piece of solid stone, the work of a skilled hand’). See §4.4.6 below for more comment on this important fragment. 204 See the summaries above (§2.2.2). 205 She was, nevertheless, the mother of Perses: Apollodorus 2.4.3–5; Eratosth. Catast. 15–7; Hdt. 7.61—so her actions and eventual fate were not unimportant.

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created by (say) an Andromeda who was eaten by the monster would not be of precisely the same kind as that created by a chaste Helen or a Tauric Iphigenia. The plot and the treatment of myth in Andromeda may or may not have corresponded to that in the other escape-tragedies, but there are still numerous ways in which connections and similarities can be observed. One of the most signiﬁcant of these is the escape-theme. 2.3.5 Escapology As I observed in the ﬁrst chapter (§1.2), the theme of escape and rescue shared by Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia was almost unparalleled in extant tragedy. It may be that other lost, unknown plays centred on escapes, but the only certain examples of previous ‘escape-tragedies’ are Sophocles’ Andromeda and Aeschylus’ lost Prometheus Unbound.206 Sophocles wrote a tragedy entitled The Retrieval of Helen (}Elvnhß åpait&siß), which survives only in a tiny number of fragments:207 the title might indicate an escape-tragedy, but the fragments give no clue as to the plot, characters or substance of the play. Sophocles’ Philoctetes also took escape as its theme, but that play dates from 409 bc (when it won ﬁrst prize) and was probably inﬂuenced by Euripides.208 Euripides’ Alcestis (438 bc) contains the motif of an ‘escape’ from death, but the central concern in that play is really the dilemma of Admetus. While it can be seen that the subjectmatter of tragedy in general is diverse,209 escape from desperate situations is nevertheless an odd and unexpected theme. Escapes were, it seems, a recurrent feature of satyr-drama (compare, for example, the escape of the Greek sailors from the Cyclops in Euripides’ play).210 This fact is adduced by certain 206 Soph. Andromeda: TGF 4 (Radt) fr. 126–36; cf. TGF 1 (Snell) 100 fr. 1c; 212 fr. 1.; cf. p. 31 above. 207 TGF 4 (Radt) fr. 176–180a: see also n. 151 above. 208 There are other important diﬀerences between Philoctetes and Euripides’ escape-tragedies: the setting (Lemnos, rather than exotic barbarian lands), the small number of characters, the nature of the ‘captivity’ and ‘rescue’, the lack of physical danger, etc. 209 See the discussion in §1.1 above. 210 Further examples are given by Sutton (1980): index s.v. ‘bondage and liberation’, and Seaford (1984) 33 on ‘the captivity, servitude and liberation of the satyrs’. It has been suggested that Sophocles’ Andromeda was a satyr-play:

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critics who claim that Helen and Iphigenia are un-tragic;211 but in fact there is no reason to assume that the escape-theme was perceived in the ﬁfth century as being a characteristic exclusive to the satyric genre. It is more accurate to view escape and rescue as ‘cross-generic’ features which sometimes featured in satyr-play and sometimes (but more rarely) featured in tragedy. (Interestingly, no one ever claims that Philoctetes is satyric or ‘pro-satyric’.) One obvious explanation for the rarity of escape-related plots is that escape features in comparatively few myths—especially few tragic myths, where the focus is usually on suﬀering and death.212 The myth of Andromeda is one of the few exceptions. And the reason why escape-plots are particularly unexpected here is that the myths of Helen and Iphigenia (however interpreted) did not contain escapes from distant countries. Euripides has added the escape element to the traditional myths in order to create his plots. The reason why this was possible, and indeed why Euripides’ plots seem to be more inventive than any others, is that the counterfactual alternatives of the Helen and Iphigenia myths are, in an important sense, not really myths at all. Rather, they are negations of myths, ‘anti-myths’ as one might say. ‘Helen did not cause the war’, ‘Iphigenia did not die’—these are not events; they tell only what Helen and Iphigenia did not do, and not what they actually did.213 Furthermore, these ‘anti-myths’ lack sequels: what really happened to Helen and Iphigenia next is left unclear (despite the attempts of the plays’ concluding aetiologies to pin down their eventual, divine fate, long in the future). In consequence, then, Euripides had a great deal more freedom of imagination than usual to develop his plots, for it was only at their beginnings—the initial situations with which the plays start—that he was bound to the myth. Having inherited the characters and situations (having, in fact, deliberately chosen the presence of Pans (mentioned in fr. 136), as well as the escape-motif, has been seen as another argument in favour of that interpretation (but Lloyd-Jones [1996, 50–1] considers this insuﬃcient evidence). 211 Sutton (1980); E. M. Hall (1997). 212 See §1.2 above. 213 Cf. Austin (1994) 10–11: ‘All that could be said of this revised Helen was that she was not that troublesome ghost who had caused the grief at Troy . . . the only reason for this Helen’s being was to be not-Helen of Troy.’

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them), Euripides would have had carte blanche to develop them as he wished. In this respect one can appreciate the particular importance of Andromeda in relation to the other two myths. As I argued above, Andromeda is not a ‘major’ character like Helen or Iphigenia; neither genealogy nor circumstance connect her to these heroines; and in all probability her mythical tradition, and the plot of Euripides’ tragedy, contained none of the contradictory or counterfactual elements that characterize the other two. Indeed, the three women seem to have little in common: on the face of it, Andromeda is not at all an obvious character to complete the triad. But I believe that the importance of the Andromeda myth is that it suggested to Euripides a plot for Helen and Iphigenia. As Burnett puts it (with reference to Iphigenia), Euripides ‘saw the relevance of the Andromeda pattern’.214 Euripides’ creativity or innovation, in other words, consisted in part of adapting each subject to conform to a single type—an unexpected and imaginative feat. In terms of situation and character, Helen and Iphigenia have been transformed into versions of Andromeda: they have all become (at least, for the purposes of the myth) ‘damsels in distress’ waiting to be rescued. Andromeda’s importance for the trilogy, then, is that she embodies the themes of captivity, oppression, danger from the sea, rescue, and escape which are so central to these plays. One argument against a ‘trilogy of escape’ is that the eﬀect of three tragedies with almost-identical plots would be enervating, confusing or otherwise undesirable.215 But this would not necessarily have been the case. True, a sequence consisting of Helen— Andromeda—Iphigenia would have had an odd, quasi-hypnotic quality which may well have left some audience members bored or baﬄed. Equally true is that it is hard to ﬁnd deﬁnite parallels for a thematic trilogy, especially one concerned with so unusual (even factitious) a theme as escape (though the possibility should 214 Burnett (1971) 74: my italics. On story-patterns, cf. Lattimore (1964) 8–9, 52–3; O’Brien (1988) 99–101; Burian (1997). The ‘Andromeda pattern’ is a folktale motif with parallels in Oriental mythology also. Burkert (1987, 33–4 and ﬁgs. 2.7–8) gives various examples from literature and iconography, including Astarte, who was oﬀered to the Canaanite sea-god Jam; in art, cf. LIMC ‘Andromeda’ I. 215 Schmid and Stählin (1940) I.3, 519–20; Grégoire (1968) 106: see §1.2 above for more discussion of the points raised here.

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not be rejected for that reason alone). But I believe that these three plays were produced as a set, and that there was a deliberate and calculated purpose behind the trilogy. In the ﬁrst place, three escape-plays in succession would have stimulated their audience to think deeply about the subject of escape and its consequences. In general, the close repetition of certain actions and patterns may lead to the emergence of new levels of meaning. Second, this end-to-end arrangement would have forced the audience to consider not only the similarities but also the diﬀerences between three ostensibly identical plots and situations. This is extremely signiﬁcant in the light of another motif which connects the escape-tragedies: the contrast between reality and illusion.216 In other words, the escape-tragedies seem to resemble each other, but in reality there are numerous (large and small) diﬀerences. 2.3.6 Weird geography From the moment when the character Helen stepped on to the stage and started to deliver the prologue-speech, the audience must have realized that this was no ordinary tragic plot. Ne≤lou mvn aJde kallip3rqenoi Âoa≤—‘Nile’s lovely-virgin streams are these’—is the line with which the play opens. The placing of Ne≤lou as the ﬁrst word is extremely emphatic, and seems designed for maximum shock-eﬀect—surely the obvious setting for a tragedy about Helen would have been Troy, or Sparta?217 Most tragedies were set somewhere in Greece or the area around the Aegean.218 Although foreign characters are often to be found, a foreign setting in a barbarian land was unusual, and the choice of Egypt in particular was almost unique. Other tragedies had made mention of Egypt and its inhabitants,219 but 216

See §4.3 and 4.4 below. On shock-tactics in prologues (in particular) see Arnott (1990) 1–2. 218 Of Euripides’ surviving nineteen plays, three (Rhes., Tro., Hec.) are set in or near Troy, four (Med., Hipp., El., Or.) in the Peloponnese, three (Ion, Alc., Andromache) in northern Greece, four (Phoen., Her., Bacch., Iph. at Aulis) in Boeotia, two (Children of H., Suppl.) in Attica and one (Cycl.) in Sicily. (Compare Bernand [1985] 166 on ‘l’atlas d’Euripide’.) Interestingly, no tragedies are thought to have been set in Sparta. 219 Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound and Suppliants. 217

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it seems likely that only once before (if ever) had a tragedy used Egypt as its setting.220 In fact, not just Helen but all three escape-tragedies are remarkable for their far-ﬂung settings. It is probable, though not certain, that Ethiopia was the location for Andromeda.221 The setting would probably have emerged, as in the other two plays, from the prologue-speech (although this is not clear from the fragments).222 As it is, there is no ﬁrm internal evidence to indicate the place: we know that the heroine was imprisoned on a rock situated in the waves of the sea, near a cave;223 but the country and precise locale remain unknown, beyond the fact that it is clearly a barbarian country.224 One has to look for external evidence to suggest a location: but there is some contradiction. Some versions of the myth give the setting as Ethiopia, of which Andromeda’s father Cepheus was king,225 but a number of sources speciﬁcally name Joppa in Phoenicia as the scene of the exposure and rescue;226 and Herodotus says that Perseus married 220 The title of Euripides’ satyr-play Busiris indicates an Egyptian setting. Although the fragments (TGF frr. 313–15 Kannicht) provide no assistance, there exist possible indications of the plot (Apollodorus 2.5.11, Dio Chrys. 8.32, S Apoll.Rh. 4.1396). Aeschylus also wrote a satyr-play called Proteus (TGF 3 [Radt] frr. 210–15). However that might be, there is still no ground for claiming, as some critics do, that an Egyptian setting marks out Helen as satyric or prosatyric: E. M. Hall (1997) xxiii; Sutton (1972 and 1980). Hall (1989a, 112) claims that no tragedy prior to 412 was based in Egypt, but it seems at least possible that Aeschylus’ Egyptians (TGF 3 [Radt] T 78) was set there: cf. Garvie (1969) 188; Taplin (1977) 197–8. Kranz (1933, 75) discusses Phrynichus’ plays with foreign choruses: the Suppliants, which (like Aeschylus’ play of the same name) had an Egyptian chorus, and the Antaeus with its chorus of Libyans (see also Suda s.v. Fr»nicoß). 221 Webster (1967, 199) takes it for granted (without stating the evidence) that Ethiopia is correct. 222 The play notably did not open, as Helen, Iphigenia and many other Euripidean dramas had done, with a scene-setting iambic speech, but instead with a sung anapaestic monody which began _ nŸx Èer3: Andromeda, fr. 114 (cf. S Ar. Thesm. 1065). 223 Andromeda fr. 125 (see further discussion in §3.4 below). 224 Perseus, in Andromeda fr. 124, asks: t≤n’ ejß g[n barb3rwn åf≤gmeqa; (‘to what barbarian country have I come?). 225 Apollod. 2.4.3–5; Eratosth. Cat. 15–17; Philost. Imag. 1.29.3 (Ó kÎrh d† Óde∏a m†n Òti leuk¶ ƒn Ajqiop≤ai, ‘the young girl is delightful on account of her white skin in Ethiopia’). This last detail is reﬂected on vase-paintings, where the white-skinned Andromeda contrasts with the black (Ethiopian?) male ﬁgures: see Trendall and Webster (1971) 78–82 (ﬁgs. III. 3.10–13). 226 Paus. 4.35.9; Joseph. BJ 3.420; Strabo 16.2.28; Conon (FGH 26 F 1.40).

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Andromeda in Persia (naming Belus as her grandfather).227 Nevertheless, Aristophanes’ parody, which is considered good evidence for the content of Andromeda, is set in Ethiopia: this may be decisive.228 Like Egypt, Ethiopia was an extraordinary, if not unique, setting for tragedy.229 The same is true of the Tauric land, the outlandish location of Iphigenia. Here Iphigenia, unusually, postpones announcement of the setting for thirty lines, which again adds emphasis (in a diﬀerent way from Helen’s Ne≤lou), since most Euripidean prologues reveal their setting far sooner.230 It is unlikely that any other tragedy (before or after Iphigenia) was set by the shores of the Black Sea: indeed, apart from this counterfactual Iphigenia story, no other Greek myth seems to have been connected with the Tauric land. (While, as we have seen, it is possible that Sophocles’ Chryses was a precursor to Iphigenia, the plot of that play as preserved by Hyginus unfolds not in the Tauric land but on the isle of Sminthe, near Lesbos.) Whether or not Euripides was the ﬁrst to use these locations, it is one of the most striking features of the escape-tragedies that their geography is as prominent as their myths and characters. That is, the audience is invited to consider not just what the characters did—or didn’t do—but where they did it. By emphasizing the locale so strongly (not just in the prologues but throughout the plays), Euripides is both drawing attention to the radical, counterfactual versions of the myths, and also highlighting the idea of bizarre geography for its own sake. In connection with this, it may be relevant to note that the chief source of amusement in Aristophanes’ parodies of the 227

Hdt. 7.61. Cf. also Eur. Archelaus fr. 228a Kannicht. Ar. Thesm. 1098. 229 It seems likely that Euripides’ Phaethon was set in Ethiopia (fr. 777 Nauck; cf. Strabo 1.2.27 and discussion in Diggle [1970] 78 and Collard, Cropp and Lee [1995] 200, 224). An Aeschylean fragment of uncertain origin (TGF 3 [Radt] fr. 300) is concerned with Ethiopian weather-conditions, including the supposed fact that Ethiopia is a source for Egypt’s water (from melted snow): this clearly relates to Helen 1–3 (see §4.3 below). But who can say if the fragment came from a tragedy set in Ethiopia? 230 Line-numbers indicate ﬁrst revelation of setting: Alcestis 8; Andromache 16; Bacch. 1; Electra 6; Hec. 8; Heracles 4; Hcld. 7; Hipp. 12; Ion 5; [Iph. at Aul. 14, but suspected interpolation at beginning]; Med. 10; Orestes 46; [Phoen. 4, but text corrupt/damaged at beginning]; Rhesus 20–24; Suppl. 1; Tro. 4. 228

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escape-tragedies is not, as one might have expected, the unusual myths and innovative characterization, but the exotic settings and representation of the ethnic diﬀerence between Greeks and barbarians. While it is perhaps dangerous to base too much on this observation—it is always notoriously diﬃcult to interpret ancient jokes,231 and it may be simply that jokes about foreigners are funnier, with far more comic mileage than jokes about myth—Aristophanes’ parody is still strong evidence that the contemporary audience found Euripides’ foreign settings a most remarkable aspect (or the most remarkable aspect?) of the escape-tragedies. I observed above that the counterfactual myths of Helen and Iphigenia were really ‘non-myths’, in that they consisted only of what their characters did not do. In the same way, for the purposes of these (non-) myths, Egypt, Ethiopia and the Black Sea have a purely negative function as ‘non-places’, representing regions so far distant as to be inaccessible or even imaginary.232 Each setting is just somewhere conveniently ‘oﬀ-stage’, where the heroines could be kept safely, doing nothing, completely invisible to the Greek world. Ken Dowden (in his Uses of Greek Mythology) illuminatingly describes ‘barbarian’ lands such as Egypt and Ethiopia as ‘beyond’, contrasting with ‘here’, in the structural scheme of Greek mythology: ‘Locations in Greek myth have a message relative to the location of the speaker . . . the distance of a location from the speaker may be set to ‘maximum’ and therefore divorced from the standard order of things’.233 Places ‘beyond’ (to adopt his term) can be seen to have a relevant connection to the motif of divine rescue: not only in the escape231 See esp. Murray (1933) 86: ‘if the scholars of ad 2500 were to discover some present-day farce in which a man from Aberdeen was represented as wildly scattering his money, or Dr. Einstein as refusing to pay his year’s rent on the ground that Time does not exist . . . might we not easily have a scholiast explaining that Aberdonians were notorious spendthrifts [and] that Dr. Einstein was accused of not paying his debts . . .?’ 232 This is rather diﬀerent from the everyday signiﬁcance of these places to many 5th-cent. Athenians, who would have had knowledge of such countries as real places (often from visiting them in person): see §3.2 below. The imaginary landscape, as opposed to the real signiﬁcance of foreign countries, is very important in the escape-tragedies: I return to this theme in §3.4 below. 233 Dowden (1992) 129–33; the quotation is from 133. Cf. Davison (1991) 58: ‘the outer limits of geographic description serve as a directional device by which the Greeks recognize their centrality in the Mediterranean world.’

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plays but elsewhere do the gods remove their favourites from the scene of action or danger and transplant them to far-ﬂung places ‘oﬀ-stage’. In addition to Helen and Iphigenia, compare, for example, the fragment of Euripides’ Erechtheus where [Poseidon] in the prologue recalls his rescue of Eumolpus: Ajqiop≤an nin ƒxvsws’ ƒp≥ cqÎna (‘I brought him safely to the land of Ethiopia’).234 Poseidon at the beginning of the Odyssey, and Zeus and other Olympians in the ﬁrst book of the Iliad, are said to be ‘away’ visiting the Ethiopians—this, again, is a narrative device to place a character as it were ‘oﬀ-stage’.235 However, in Euripides’ unique transformation of these myths into plots, this ‘device’ has become important in its own right. The geography, the setting, and the means and routes of travel have been made much more central—they are positive rather than negative or purely symbolic features. Indeed, geography and landscape are to form a major preoccupation of the trilogy.236 It can be seen that Euripides’ interest in exotic geography is shared, to some extent, by such poetic writers as Aeschylus and Phrynichus; but this interest more obviously represents the inﬂuence of prose writers such as Hecataeus, Hellanicus and Herodotus, who fall somewhere in between ‘history’ and ‘geography’. The inﬂuence of Herodotus, in particular, can be seen in a number of ways. Most obviously, he mentions all three Euripidean heroines—Andromeda, Helen (in Egypt) and Iphigenia (in the Tauric land), though his version of their myths is substantially diﬀerent from that of Euripides in each case. Some scholars have claimed that Euripides was dependent on Herodotus’ Histories for detailed knowledge of Egypt and the Black Sea.237 In the following chapter, I shall argue that this claim is untrue. The details in Euripides, for whatever reason, do not in fact correspond with Herodotus’ account. Nevertheless, Herodotus is of great importance: not, perhaps, as a factual source, but instead—along with the other geographical234 Eur. Erechtheus fr. 349 Nauck: see Collard et al. (1995) 176 for the identiﬁcation of the speaker. 235 Hom. Od. 1.22; Il. 1.423; cf. 23.205–7. Cf. also S. West (1988) 74: she observes Homer’s vagueness concerning the location of Ethiopia, which supports the view that the country is used primarily as a narrative device. 236 This matter is explored in depth in Ch. 3 below. 237 Notably Hall (1989b): see §3.2 below.

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historical writers just mentioned—as a more subtle, conceptual inﬂuence. Hecataeus, Hellanicus and Herodotus (among others) made several signiﬁcant contributions to Greek thought.238 Their synoptic view of the world, their research into the past, their polarization of human activity into ‘Greek’ and ‘barbarian’, and their increasingly objective attitude to myth and ‘history’—all of these developments are clearly reﬂected in Euripides’ own world-view. The concepts of travel and of mapping the world were developed by Hecataeus, who notably composed a Periegesis (or Periodos) of the world.239 This work, which was organized on the basis of a polar division of the earth into ‘Europe’ and ‘Asia’, seems to have described all the places visited during the course of a voyage around the coast of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The idea of the periplous—a circuit of the world and its seas—may give us another valuable perspective on Euripides’ ‘weird geography’ in the escape-tragedies. It may be attractive to read the escape-tragedies as a kind of periplous, taking in Egypt, Ethiopia and the Black Sea. All of these locations and their inhabitants were described by Hecataeus; and one notes with interest that these three regions in particular were perceived by Herodotus as being at the extreme edges of the inhabited world.240 So the escape-tragedies are, in some sense, a world-tour, a nod to the developing disciplines of ethnography, history and geography. And, like these other writers, Euripides has something serious and important to say about identity, ethnicity, culture and myth. The unusual, ‘geographized’ quality of the escape-tragedies suggests another way of looking at the question with which we began this chapter. That is: can we say who really inﬂuenced Euripides? When we investigate the question, it is worth considering just what we mean by ‘inﬂuence’. I have been dealing with the issue so far in the sense of Quellenforschung—that is, by treating (mostly poetic) texts and authors as sources and attempting to trace speciﬁc (small or large) details of Euripides’ myths or 238 This summary does not even attempt to do justice to the complexity of these writers. Fowler (1996) and Thomas (2000) are among the best surveys of the early historians and ethnographers and their intellectual context. 239 Hecataeus (FGH 1 F 217–68); his inﬂuence on the tragedians is discussed by Hall (1989b) 75–6 and Kranz (1933). 240 Hdt. 3.17, 3.26, 4.46, 4.179.

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plots in these earlier works. As I said at the beginning of this section, we cannot hope to identify Euripides’ sources exactly, owing to the lack of evidence. Even so, I hope that the preceding discussions have reinforced the case for perceiving Euripides’ myths as unusual combinations of elements, rather than as original inventions or as direct borrowings from a single source. In the following section (§2.4), I shall attempt to explain why Euripides should have wanted to combine elements in this way. But ‘inﬂuence’ may be understood in another sense. Instead of focusing our attention on the borrowing of speciﬁc details, we can examine the literary tradition in general, tracing Euripides’ broader conceptual debts to authors, genres or ideas—indeed, this is, in a sense, what I shall be trying to do in the remainder of this book. Once again, we must bear in mind that our information is limited; but the scarcity of surviving texts becomes less of a handicap when we concern ourselves with general inﬂuences rather than detailed allusions. Whether or not Stesichorus’ Palinode has anything to do with Euripides, and whether or not Sophocles got in ﬁrst with the ‘counterfactual’ Iphigenia-myth (and so on), I think that the escape-tragedies reveal the traces of other—and rather more interesting—inﬂuences. In the chapters which follow, we shall see some of the ways in which Euripides reﬂects contemporary intellectual movements. Meaningful connections can be made between his plays and a wide variety of writings—poetic and non-poetic, historical, geographical, philosophical and theological. 2.4 metamythology At the beginning of this chapter, I made the claim that Euripides’ attitude to myth in the escape-tragedies is extraordinary. So far, I have been trying to demonstrate that Euripides’ achievement was to adapt inherited material in a new way. The precise degree to which inheritance and originality are combined must, inevitably, remain obscure; but, in any case, we miss the point somewhat if we spend all our time inquiring into Euripides’ sources. If one can say little for certain about Euripides’ relationship to speciﬁc literary predecessors, it still remains to discuss Euripides’ position with regard to myth and ﬁction in general: it is this position which makes the plays

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extraordinary. I claimed in the introduction (§2.1) to this chapter that the escape-tragedies are in some sense ‘about’ myth and ﬁction, and this ﬁnal section will attempt to expand and illustrate that claim. These plays do not just ‘make use’ of myth in the broadly tragic sense of adopting and adapting traditional stories according to the purposes of plot-construction.241 It seems to me that Helen and Iphigenia242 have a distinctive intellectual quality, in that they encourage their audience to consider the business of myth and ﬁction as a subject in its own right. They are preoccupied with the mythical tradition—with the uses to which myth is put, and the statements which people make about myths. It is this preoccupation, I believe, which lies behind the choice of the myths of Helen and Iphigenia: these myths (as we have seen) were unusually abundant in contradictions and inconcinnities, not just in minor details but in their self-negating counterfactual versions. Such entangled myths are, clearly, ideal subjects for tragedies which explore and problematize the nature and meaning of myth.243 In fact, a failure to realize this has aﬀected the approach of many studies of Euripides’ ‘sources’ (as discussed in the last section). Whether Euripides was drawing on Hesiod or Stesichorus in particular is far less interesting, and far more diﬃcult to demonstrate, than the fact that these escape-tragedies draw on disputed myths in general. In other words, Euripides’ original way of looking at myths is far more important than the myths themselves. Euripides’ attitude to myth and the presentation of the 241 The tired phrase ‘use of myth’—Eisner (1979), Hartigan (1981), etc.— very often marks a lack of thought, a refusal to deﬁne just what this ‘use’ was (apart from mere allusion) and a failure to consider why Euripides should have bothered with these changes in substance and presentation. It is these shortcomings that I have been attempting to address throughout this chapter. 242 Andromeda must largely be excluded from the discussion, for the nature of the fragments prevents any ﬁrm conclusions being drawn about that play’s presentation of myth and ﬁction. Nonetheless, fr. 151 may tentatively be seen to ﬁt into the picture (see n. 279 below). 243 Cf. Hartigan (1981) 27–8: she says that Euripides’ myth in the Helen is ‘eminently suited to illustrate the ideas E. wished to portray. . . . the tension between its very improbability . . . and its dubious veracity . . . oﬀers the dramatist the opportunity to call into question the bases for men’s beliefs and apparent certainties’.

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traditional stories in the escape-tragedies could, I suggest, be described as metamythological. This term has not, to my knowledge, previously been used—but, while acknowledging that jargon in literary criticism may often obscure rather than illuminate, I believe that there is a need for such a term to denote the speciﬁc type of literary activity which is at work here. ‘Metamythology’ may be deﬁned as a type of discourse which arises when mythical characters (here, but not necessarily, in dramatic ﬁction) are made to talk about themselves and their own myths, or when myths are otherwise presented, in a deliberate and self-conscious manner; it is a type of discourse which seems to be designed to emphasize the ﬁctionality of myth, as well as to signal that the myth is being discussed qua myth (rather than qua real life, as the ﬁctional context would normally lead us to assume). This type of literary activity is quite closely related to ‘metatheatricality’ and ‘metaﬁction’, but there is an important diﬀerence. Unlike these other two types of meta-activity, the genre and the context are not important. Hence, it is not the theatricality that is being emphasized: metamythology could be observed in a theatre, or in a song, or as it might be in the pages of a book. Nor is it, speciﬁcally, the ﬁctiveness that is being emphasized (though that aspect, as we shall see, plays a large part in the discussion). It is myth—speciﬁcally in the sense of myth and the mythical tradition—that is under the magnifying-glass. Self-conscious reference to myth has been perceived as occurring in, for example, the recognition-scene of Euripides’ Electra; but in that play the reference is to a speciﬁc earlier tragedy on the same subject by Aeschylus, and not necessarily to the myth or the mythical tradition in a wider sense.244 So the Electra may be classiﬁed as ‘metatragic’, ‘polemical’ or ‘parodic’, but not metamythological as such.245 Indeed, it does not appear that 244 Eur. El. 518–46: discussed by, among others, Bond (1974) and Davies (1998). Davies argues, in particular, that this type of parody is extremely rare: he dismisses nearly all ‘further alleged criticisms of speciﬁc tragedies in extant tragedy’, concluding that in fact there is nothing comparable to the Electra passage and some ‘smaller pieces of dramatic criticism’ in Phoen. 748–53 and Or. 1225–42 (pp. 396–9, 402–3). 245 Segal (1982, 216) gives a good deﬁnition of metatragedy as ‘self-conscious reﬂection by the dramatist on the theatricality and illusion-inducing power of his own work, on the limits and range of the truth that the dramatic ﬁction can convey.’ This is, clearly, something quite diﬀerent from my subject here.

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metamythology is much to be found outside the escapetragedies;246 at least, not with the same frequency and concentration as in these plays—another way, then, in which the escape-tragedies seem to stand together as a distinct group. To begin with, I shall illustrate precisely what I mean by the ‘deliberate and self-conscious’ manner in which myths are presented in Helen and Iphigenia. There are a number of ways in which this can be observed. First, and most prominent, are those instances where characters refer to their own lives and ‘contemporary’ events in such a way as to suggest that these were already well known, as ‘myth’ or ‘history’. Characters and events are described as being ‘famous’; mythological statements are prefaced by such phrases as ‘everyone in the world knows that—’, and ‘people say that—’. References of this type are striking and unnatural whichever way they are viewed. They sit uneasily within the ﬁctional situation in which they are uttered because—although the Trojan War may well have been a popular topic of conversation among Helen and Iphigenia’s contemporaries247—the events to which they refer would not have acquired this sort of mythic or quasimythic status at the supposed date at which the play is set. If, on the other hand, one considers such words as being eﬀectively an address to the audience, not to the characters, the incongruity arises through the ironic rupturing of the dramatic illusion.248 (Clearly, remarks about ‘famous’ events in myth do appeal primarily to the ﬁfth-century audience’s knowledge of myth through Homer and the other poets.) The use of words and phrases meaning ‘famous’ or ‘wellknown’ are common throughout the plays. For example, in the 246 However, see e.g. Euripides’ Melanippe the Wise (fr. 484 Nauck): koÛk ƒmÏß Ø mıqoß, åll’ ƒm[ß mhtrÏß p3ra. Is this metamythological? The lack of context makes it hard to say. A diﬀerent sort of ‘self-consciousness’, based on the loaded use of the word kainÎß, is detected in some of Euripides’ plays (e.g. Heracles 26–34, Suppl. 592–7, Hcld. 929–30, Hec. 674–89) by MacDermott (1991). This is not seen in the escape-tragedies, but may be compared for a broadly similar technique of emphasis and problematizing of myth. 247 Of course, this remark assumes that the audience is to imagine the heroic age and its characters in terms of real people with characteristics explicable in terms of real-life experience—for the pitfalls associated with this line of thinking (the ‘documentary fallacy’ and related concepts), see especially Goldhill (1990); Easterling (1990). 248 Cf. Bain (1977) and (1987)—though with a rather diﬀerent perspective.

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prologue to Iphigenia (9), the heroine describes the bay of Aulis, where her ‘sacriﬁce’ took place, as kleina∏ß. Why, exactly, is Aulis ‘famous’? One could answer that the sacriﬁce of Iphigenia would have been spoken of by the Argives and the Greek army at Troy soon after its occurrence, but there are clearly additional overtones to the description, since it refers to what by the ﬁfth century would have been a famous event. Similarly, Helen refers to the kleinÏn . . . pvdon (‘famous plain’) of Sparta and the klein¶n pÎlin (‘famous city’) of Troy;249 she says, pointedly, in the prologue that her birthplace is oÛk ån*numoß (‘not nameless’);250 one of the reasons given for Zeus’ decision to cause the war was to make Achilles gnwtÎn (‘well-known’);251 and Menelaus talks of kleinÏn tÏ Tro≤aß pır (‘the famous ﬁre that burnt down Troy’) and tÏ TrwikÏn . . . klvoß (‘the glory of Troy’).252 All these descriptions seem unescapably two-edged. One might proﬁtably compare the remark of Winnington-Ingram (on the Phoenician Women): ‘I have often wondered whether the epithet kleinÎß, which occurs with some frequency in these later plays, does not really indicate something like “belonging to the epic”.’253 Lee records that, among the seventy-four deﬁnite instances of kleinÎß in Euripides, more than twenty refer to the Trojan War: ‘this is by far the largest of the categories into which the occurrences of kleinÎß in Euripides can be divided.’254 Sometimes there might be additional irony. Menelaus, who describes himself as being ‘famous the whole world over’ (oÛk £gnwstoß ƒn p3shi cqon≤, 504), nevertheless suﬀers embarrassment and humiliation during the following exchange with the old Portress at Theoclymenus’ palace (453–4): 249

Helen 57–8, 105. Helen 16: an additional reason for believing the description to be pointed is the prominence of Ônoma and related words in that play—see Solmsen (1934a), Segal (1971) and §4.4 below. 251 Helen 41. 252 Helen 503–4, 843–4. Cf. ibid. 1602, where Helen—in rather a diﬀerent sense—asks poı tÏ TrwikÎn klvoß; (‘Where is the glory of Troy?). 253 Winnington-Ingram (1960) 34–5. 254 Lee (1986) 311–12. He is arguing for the manuscript reading kleinÎß at Helen 1399 (in preference to Beck’s conjecture kainÎß, adopted by Diggle and others): not only does the word possess epic connotations, but it is also a regular title of honour bestowed on princes and tyrants (cf. Eur. El. 327, Heracles 38). 250

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ME. aja∏: t¤ klein¤ poı st≤ moi strate»mata; GR. oÛkoın ƒke∏ pou semnÏß Ásq’, oÛk ƒnq3de. Menelaus: Alas!—where is my famous army now? Portress: No doubt you were a big man somewhere or other—but not here.

It must be borne in mind that the Portress is a cantankerous old Egyptian woman, and that Greeks did not expect that barbarians would be familiar with their myths;255 but, even so, this dialogue presents in a depressingly negative light the Trojan War and the heroic way of life as expressed in the person of Menelaus.256 The Portress’s contemptuous ƒke∏ pou (‘somewhere or other’) and the treatment of Menelaus elsewhere in the play, makes the hero of Troy and his exploits seem largely insigniﬁcant. What, after all, does Menelaus’ ‘fame’ mean?—and what is the good of being famous for ﬁghting at Troy, if the war is now seen to have been completely futile?257 In general, the characters show an artiﬁcially enhanced awareness that people up and down the Greek world are talking about them and their myths. For instance, Teucer, asked by Helen about Menelaus, replies: „ß ke∏noß åfan¶ß sŸn d3marti kl&izetai (‘it is said that he perished, together with his wife’), repeating this impression of a universal rumour a little later with qan°n d† kl&izetai kaq’ }Ell3da (‘it is said all over Greece that he is dead’).258 Iphigenia says to Orestes: Tro≤an ÷swß o”sq’, ¬ß Åpantacoı lÎgoß (‘I wonder if you have heard of Troy, whose fame has reached everywhere’).259 The irony here lies not just in the obvious fact, known to the audience but not to Iphigenia, that Orestes certainly ‘knows about’ Troy (the casual ÷swß underlines the irony), but also in her statement that the lÎgoß of Troy—story? 255 In fact, ignorance of Greek customs, including myths, was one of the criteria on which the inferiority of barbarian people was judged: see §3.3 below. 256 Admittedly, Menelaus’ treatment in tragedy does not generally show him up very well. His appearance at Soph. Ajax 1046 is described by Jebb (1896, ad loc.) as ‘the type of Spartan arrogance’, but Griﬃth (1953, 37) considers that ‘rather, he has a good deal of the “Miles Gloriosus” about him’; cf. Eur. Or. and Andromache (for, again, a largely negative portrayal). Even in the Iliad there are precedents (e.g. 15.160) for making Menelaus ‘a combination of the valorous and the ludicrous’ (Whitman [1974] 47); cf. Athenaeus 5.178b. 257 See §4.4.2 below. 258 Helen 126, 132: compare ibid. 926–8 (quoted below). 259 Iphigenia 517.

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history? myth?—is universally widespread. In any case, there is an inherent improbability here (if one is paying attention to logic): how can Iphigenia have been expected to know the extent of Troy’s fame? She had supposedly been ﬂown to the Tauric land at the moment of her sacriﬁce, before the expedition had set sail. (However, there is, I think, an additional point here, concerning tragedy’s own presentation of its spread and inﬂuence throughout the Mediterranean world. The implicit assumption that their tragedies are universally known is, in some sense, an expression of the Athenians’ imperialist attitude.260) The stichomythic section of Iphigenia in which Iphigenia questions her brother about events connected to the Trojan War (517–69) is shot through with similar references to ‘famous’ Greeks. She asks him whether the return of the forces from Troy happened „ß khr»ssetai (‘as it is reported’, 527), and shortly afterwards enquires t≤ d’ Ø strathgÏß n lvgous’ eÛdaimone∏n; (‘what about the general, the one whom they call “fortunate”?’)—a reference to her father Agamemnon, in which lvgous’ has a wider signiﬁcance.261 Like her other questions, it alludes to a mythic tradition of which Iphigenia, trapped for years in the wilds of the Tauric land, could not have been aware. Orestes in the same exchange (532–4) uses similar phrases (—ß Án . . . lÎgoß, „ß lÎgoß) to refer to the wide fame of the heroes of Troy. When asked about Odysseus, he replies (534–6): OR. oÇpw nenÎsthk’ o”kon: πsti d’, „ß lÎgoß. IF. Ôloito, nÎstou m&pot’ ƒß p3tran tuc*n. OR. mhd†n kate»cou: p3nta tåke≤nou nose∏. Orestes: He has not yet returned home, but he is still alive, so the story goes. Iphigenia: May he perish, and never return to his fatherland! Orestes: Do not curse him: his situation is entirely wretched.

Odysseus’ fate in some way mirrors their own; but just how does Orestes know what perils have befallen him on the sea since leaving Troy? It seems that „ß lÎgoß here is a self-conscious appeal to the audience’s knowledge of myth and epic: Orestes is 260 This is, I suppose, metatragic rather than metamythological (but not in any usual sense). 261 Iphigenia 543. Cropp (2000, ad loc.) lists some parallels, all tragic, for the use of eÛda≤mwn to describe the Greek leaders at Troy: Hec. 753, Helen 453, 457, Or. 351–5.

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made to speak as if the Odyssey had already been composed as he stood on the Tauric shores. When Iphigenia asks Orestes about the fate of Calchas, he replies: Ôlwlen, „ß Án ƒn Mukhna≤oiß lÎgoß (‘he has perished, according to the Mycenaean version of events’): this time it is not just myth, but a speciﬁc local tradition, to which attention is drawn. (Did the Mycenaean version of the myth of Calchas contrast with other current versions?262) Again, a detail of minor importance in itself is used to highlight the status of myth qua myth. The suﬀerings of the royal family of Argos following the end of the war are also thoroughly familiar, according to Pylades: ‘everyone who has at all considered the matter’ knows about them.263 This can be seen as an implicit reference not just to the mythical tradition but also to the numerous tragedies which had dramatized the myths of the house of Agamemnon. And just a few lines after this passage, when Pylades is deliberating what to do, it emerges that he is concerned about what people will say about him in the future. Dreading the acquisition of a reputation for cowardice, he says (677–9): ka≥ deil≤an g¤r ka≥ k3khn kekt&somai ⁄rgei te Fwkvwn t’ ƒn polupt»cwi cqon≤: dÎxw d† to∏ß pollo∏si (pollo≥ g¤r kako≤) prodoŸß ses0sqai s’ aÛtÏß ejß o÷kouß mÎnoß. Argos and Phocia with its many valleys will hold me to be a coward and a traitor; and to the population at large (low as they are) I will seem to have betrayed you in order to get home safely myself.

Fear of being scorned by one’s enemies was a regular topos in epic and drama, but perhaps there is another meaning being expressed here. For Pylades, in contrasting the opinion of Argos 262

There were certainly diﬀering versions of the Calchas myth. In one wellknown version, he died of frustration after losing a contest in prophecy to Mopsus, the son of Apollo: Strabo 14.5.16 (= Sophocles, Retrieval of Helen: TGF 4 [Radt] fr. 180, 180a). See Cropp (2000) 212; Platnauer (1938) 106. 263 Iphigenia 670–1: t¤ g¤r toi basilvwn paq&mata | ÷sasi p3nteß —n ƒpistrof& tiß Ái. Cropp (2000, ad loc.) translates as ‘(all) of/from whom there was any attention; not ‘(kings) to whom any regard was due (L.S.J. ƒpistrof& II.3)’. This translation sits better in context: the alternative would remove speciﬁc reference to Agamemnon’s family, which seems to be Pylades’ main point. Cf. Platnauer (1938) ad loc., who translates as ‘ “all who have given and received visitations know . . .”, i.e. all who have not lived out of the world.’ He sees Kirchhoﬀ’s —n 〈t’〉 as attractive in that case, but this change is not necessary.

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and Phocia with that of the population at large, is clearly imagining that his name will be on the lips of many more people than his family, friends and fellow countrymen. So the words dÎxw d† to∏ß pollo∏si may refer to a potentially much wider audience—the audience of tragedy, students of myth, or even the whole of posterity.264 Pylades is not the only character to be concerned with his reputation. Orestes, too, expresses the hope that his name will live on, even if his body perishes at the hands of Iphigenia.265 Iphigenia herself reveals that she is interested in what the Greeks have been saying about her, asking her brother, before they have recognized each other, whether there is any news of Agamemnon’s sacriﬁced daughter (sfage≤shß qugatrÏß πsti tiß lÎgoß, 563). He replies—perhaps disappointingly for her—that there is none (oÛde≤ß ge).266 But fame is important most of all to Helen, whose suﬀerings (she says) arise largely from her false reputation as an adulteress and bringer of ruin.267 Although again Helen is, ostensibly, referring to her stock among contemporary Greeks, seventeen years after the fall of Troy, her frequently-expressed concern for fame has implications far beyond the immediate time-scale of the play. Helen is anxious about the false ‘talk’ (b3xiß) which travels through the cities of Greece,268 and rues the fact that her own name has a ‘false report’ 264 Why call them kako≤ (678), in that case?—a potential diﬃculty, which may be resolved if we take it as a reference to a mass tragic audience, as opposed to Pylades’ aristocratic background. The description then becomes anachronistic, reﬂecting late ﬁfth-century democratic terminology (but this is not incongruous in the context; nor is it unparalleled in tragedy elsewhere: see Easterling [1985a]). 265 Iphigenia 697: Ônom3 t’ ƒmoı gvnoit’ #n. Here, unusually in the escapetragedies, one’s Ônoma is made to seem potentially more, not less, permanent than one’s s0ma. Nevertheless, the unreliability of names and words elsewhere in the plays makes one question the truth of Orestes’ words: see §4.4 below. 266 As we have seen, Iphigenia believes that everyone is talking about Troy and its stories. Many people in real-life and ﬁction are fascinated by the thought of what their friends will say about them, once they are dead. One thinks particularly of Trimalchio, who staged a mock-funeral for his dinnerguests: ‘ﬁngite me’ inquit ‘mortuum esse: dicite aliquid belli’ (Petronius, Satyr. 78.2). 267 Helen 53–55: Ó d† p3nta tl$s’ ƒg° | kat3ratÎß ejmi ka≥ dok0 prodoıs’ ƒmÏn | pÎsin sun3yai pÎlemon E ﬁ llhsin mvgan (‘but I, the long-suﬀering one, am reviled and thought to have betrayed my husband and brought about a massive war for the Greeks’). Cf. 270–90, 926–8, etc. 268 Helen 223–8. This image is rather like that of Vergil’s Fama which sweeps

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(may≤dion πcei f3tin, 250). She bewails the ‘Helen’ of the standard version of the myth, whom this new, ‘real’ Helen wishes to expunge from the public memory (926–8): E } lvnhn g¤r oÛde≥ß Òstiß oÛ stuge∏ brot0n: © kl&izomai kaq’ }Ell3d’ „ß prodoıs’ ƒmÏn pÎsin Frug0n •ikhsa polucr»souß dÎmouß. There is no one alive who does not loathe Helen: I am talked about throughout Greece as having betrayed my husband and having gone to live in Troy’s extravagant palaces.

This is not simply paranoia or egomania: just in case we had forgotten Helen’s negative portrayal in the rest of tragedy, Teucer conﬁrms Helen’s summary of the situation, saying that the whole of Greece hates Helen (mise∏ g¤r }Ell¤ß p$sa t¶n DiÏß kÎrhn, 81). The image created is of a whole world talking about Helen and the Trojan myths. But this far-ﬂung fame is, according to the plays, based on falsehood and delusion: Helen’s desertion of her husband is a misapprehension; Iphigenia’s death was a red herring; therefore the Trojan War, and Orestes’ exile and displacement, were for nothing. If people all over Greece hate Helen, it is a result of myth—and the myth, so we are now led to believe, was wrong. Another sort of ‘self-conscious’ presentation of myth is to be observed (chieﬂy) in Helen. Helen is made to refer to certain incidents from her own life or family history as stories subject to the conditions of truth and falsehood usually associated with ﬁction. In the passages in question, she does not, as one would have expected, vouch for the authenticity of her own stories, but rather invites the audience to choose between either believing or disbelieving them. Helen’s detachment, when talking about events which purport to form her own experience, creates a bizarre and rather unsettling eﬀect: does she not know what happened in her own life? The ﬁrst example of this strangely impersonal ‘autobiography’ occurs in the prologue-speech. Helen relates her genealogy, saying that her father is Tyndareus—but on the other hand there is a certain story (17–21) . . . through cities causing damage (Aen. 4.173 ﬀ .: ‘Extemplo Libyae magnas it Fama per urbes, | Fama, malum qua non aliud velocius ullum’).

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pat¶r d† Tund3rewß: πstin d† d¶ lÎgoß „ß ZeŸß mhtvr’ πptat’ ejß ƒm¶n L&dan k»knou morf*mat’ Ôrniqoß lab*n, ß dÎlion eÛn¶n ƒxvprax’ Ëp’ ajetoı di*gma fe»gwn, ej saf¶ß o˜toß lÎgoß. my father is Tyndareus. But there is a certain story that Zeus, taking the form of a swan, ﬂew to my mother Leda and lay with her by deception, pretending to be ﬂeeing the pursuit of an eagle—if that story is true.

Although the myth of Zeus visiting Leda as a swan was, it seems, an old story,269 the fact of Helen’s having, in a sense, two fathers is odd, and in part it is this oddity to which attention is being drawn. (How can anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of biology seriously believe this myth?) But more important is the way Helen tells the story: she introduces it in the manner of an anecdote which she cannot authenticate and which, more disturbingly, she seems not to believe! The phrase ej saf¶ß o˜toß lÎgoß is diﬃcult to translate accurately, for the precise nuance may consist of any combination of archness, scepticism, indiﬀerence or disbelief. ‘If that story is true’ / ‘That story might be true’—in eﬀect, she seems to be saying: ‘Believe that if you will.’270 This passage should probably be seen as programmatic. Apart from the genealogy of the Egyptian royal family, it is the ﬁrst myth in the play (perhaps the ﬁrst in the trilogy, if I am correct about the order), and thus it sets the stage early on for the problematizing of myth.271 Immediately after these lines we will hear Helen expounding the counterfactual version of her own story (22–55): that myth is presented in a quite straightforward, un-self-conscious manner, but the emergence, right at the beginning, of this new attitude of detached scepticism must alert us to the possibility that not just weird counterfactuals but all myths are potentially suspicious. Elsewhere in the play Helen creates the same impression that she is recounting somebody else’s (ﬁctional) story and not her 269

See §2.2.2 above for sources. Cf. Stinton (1976a) 75: ‘from Helen’s own lips the eﬀect of ambivalence is curious and a little startling.’ He points out that the swan-story is treated with scepticism also at Eur. Iph. at Aulis 793–800; however, there the context and speaker are quite diﬀerent (the passage occurs in a choral ode). 271 Contrast, for example, Eur. Heracles, where the problematic myth—made much of by Stinton (1976a) and Brown (1978)—comes almost right at the end of the play (1341–6). 270

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own (true) one. Take, for instance, the following conversation between Helen and Teucer (98–9): TE. tÏn Phlvwß tin’ o”sq’ !cillva gÎnon; EL. na≤: mnhst&r poq’ E } lvnhß Álqen, „ß åko»omen. Teucer: Have you heard of Achilles, the son of Peleus? Helen: Yes: he once came as a suitor of Helen, so we hear.

‘So we hear . . .’ Of course, Helen has not yet owned up to being Helen, but this remains an odd reply on two counts. Not only does her „ß åko»omen amplify the impersonal attitude already observed (Helen certainly had a great many suitors, but would she not remember Achilles?), but there are also some versions of the myth in which Achilles’ name does not appear among the suitors of Helen.272 Although, as I said, this type of statement is largely restricted to Helen, one might compare Helen’s words here with the conversation which Iphigenia and Orestes have about an episode from their own ancestral history. When Orestes enquires whether Iphigenia knows about the quarrel between her grandfather Atreus and great-uncle Thyestes, she replies that she has ‘heard about it’ (‡kousa, 813). For both characters this is, again, a strangely disinterested way in which to refer to one’s family aﬀairs. Iphigenia is also to be found casting doubt on the story of her ancestor Pelops, in the course of an emotionally-charged speech about the gods’ morality.273 ƒg° m†n oˆn t¤ Tant3lou qeo∏sin ‰sti3mata £pista kr≤nw, paidÏß Ósq[nai bor$i, toŸß d’ ƒnq3d’ aÛtoŸß Ôntaß ånqrwpoktÎnouß ƒß t¶n qeÏn tÏ faılon ånafvrein dok0. 272 Dale (1967) ad loc. says that this detail is ‘inconsistent with prevailing versions of the legend’, but several early (and, presumably, inﬂuential) versions link Achilles erotically with Helen (Hesiod, Catalogue, fr. 204. 87–93 M–W; Cypria [Proclus, Chrestom.] 77–8, p. 32 Davies). Pausanias (3.19.11) and Philostratus (10.32–40) record a tradition in which Helen spent the whole Trojan War with Achilles on the island of Leuke. See also Kannicht (1969) 2. 45–6. 273 Iphigenia 386–90. Iphigenia’s attitude here is comparable to other Euripidean passages (Heracles 1340–6, Tro. 969–82) in which characters profess disbelief in the gods’ actions or existence. All such passages are discussed by Stinton (1976a), to whom I shall return in the following pages.

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Well, I do not believe in the story of Tantalus’ banquet for the gods, that they ate his son with relish; but the people here, since they themselves are murderous, ascribe their disgusting habit to the goddess.

Not only does Iphigenia suppose that myths are invented (as opposed to historical), but she also speculates that cultural motives are to be held responsible for their invention. The story of the swan, and of the egg from which Helen— perhaps—hatched, recurs after the parodos, when Helen is describing her suﬀerings to the women of the chorus. She ﬁrst opines that her mother bore her to be a freak (tvraß) to all mankind, which reaﬃrms her metamythological status as a ﬁgure about whom everyone is talking; then she goes on to comment about the improbability of the story of her birth (257–9): gun¶ g¤r oÇq’ }Ellhn≥ß oÇte b3rbaroß teıcoß neoss0n leukÏn ƒkloce»etai, ƒn —i me L&dan fas≥n ƒk DiÏß teke∏n. It is completely unheard-of for a woman, either Greek or barbarian, to give birth to a child in a white egg-shell, in which they say Leda bore me to Zeus.

Again, Helen refuses to commit herself to a deﬁnite version of events, referring to her supposed birth from an egg as a freakish story put about by unspeciﬁed people. Again, the force of her words is equivalent to: ‘Believe that if you will.’ It may well be completely unheard-of (in everyday life) for a woman to lay an egg, but it is also unheard-of for a mythical character to cast doubt on a myth in this way. In other words, the startling or destabilizing eﬀect here comes about not from the egg-story itself—after all, far odder things than this often happen in myths—so much as from the open-minded, detached manner in which Helen discusses her own mythical life.274 It is possible that these three lines (257–9) are an interpolation. Diggle, following Kannicht, Murray and Wieland, brackets the 274 Evidently some Greeks believed literally in the egg-story: the supposed egg in question later became a tourist attraction (Paus. 3.10.7). Religious belief has been responsible for the acceptance of many freakish or ‘miraculous’ events by otherwise rational people. Before dismissing the myth of Leda’s egg as obvious hokum, one has to ask whether it is so diﬀerent in kind from (say) contemporary Christian belief in parthenogenesis. In other words, the story which Helen here questions is not supposed to be intrinsically ridiculous.

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lines. It has been thought that the sentiments and the wording are inappropriate—Dale, for instance, asked: ‘Are these words from Helen . . . tastelessly grotesque?’275 Kannicht believed that the phrase leukÏn neoss0n teıcoß was taken by the interpolator from another tragedy,276 but Stinton disagrees, claiming that the phrase is ‘clearly paratragic’.277 I can see no particular problem with this phrase, nor with the tone of the lines, which are, clearly, in line with Helen’s ‘metamythological’ behaviour throughout the play. The more serious diﬃculty is in the language of 257–9; in particular, their connection with what goes immediately before and afterwards. Lines 256–61, in full, run: ¢r’ Ó tekoıs3 m’ πteken ånqr*poiß tvraß: gun¶ g¤r oÇq’ }Ellhn≥ß oÇte b3rbaroß teıcoß neoss0n leukÏn ƒkloce»etai, ƒn —i me L&dan fas≥n ƒk DiÏß teke∏n: tvraß g¤r Ø b≤oß ka≥ t¤ pr3gmat’ ƒst≤ moi, t¤ mvn di’ H ﬁ ran, t¤ d† tÏ k3lloß a÷tion. It seems, then, that my mother bore me to be a freak in the eyes of mankind: for it is completely unheard-of for a woman, either Greek or barbarian, to give birth to a child in a white egg-shell, in which they say Leda bore me to Zeus. Yes, my life is freakish, and my situation too, in part because of Hera, and in part because of my beauty.

It may be that the repetition of g3r (257 and 260) is undesirable, creating a slight awkwardness in the line of argument. Dale defends the text, arguing that the repeated g3r is used in a ‘notonly-but-also’ construction: ‘[And indeed it seems as if it must be so], for [not only was I born a tvraß but] my life in general and my fortunes are thus extraordinary.’ This seems quite possible. Kannicht’s additional objection, that tvraß must be understood in two diﬀerent meanings (on 256 it refers to her ‘freakish’ birth, but on 260 it refers to her ‘remarkable’ life), is not actually very important: tvraß may naturally bear either meaning and there is nothing incongruous about the usage here. It would be far more unappealing, in fact, to delete 257–9 and thus leave tvraß at the start of 260 immediately following tvraß at the end of 256. Dale and Denniston278 both argue that, if 257–9 are deleted, 256 should also go: in that case, however, the explanation tvraß g¤r 275 277

Dale (1967) ad loc. Stinton (1976a) 77.

276 278

Kannicht (1969) vol. 2 ad loc. Denniston (1954) 581.

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ktl. would appear unprompted as if from nowhere. In the end, Stinton’s suggested emendation of the second g3r to d’ £r’ is the best answer (if one either keeps or rejects 257–9). I should prefer, with him and Dale, to keep all the lines (as in the manuscript L), incorporating this slight change. However, Stinton’s interpretation of these lines is less satisfactory. Not only does he explain the peculiar tone of this passage as ‘manifestly unserious’, by reference to the supposed ‘comic aﬃnities’ of Helen,279 but he interprets the meaning of the lines according to a type of rhetorical ploy which he detects in Euripides in general. Stinton’s argument, in brief, is that certain common expressions of scepticism or disbelief ‘are frequently not what they purport to be, and express not disbelief but some quite diﬀerent attitude’.280 He ﬁnds that in most cases apparent ‘disbelief’ is in fact a device calculated to add emphasis. (Aﬁcionados of situation-comedy will naturally call to mind the character Victor Meldrew from David Renwick’s excellent One Foot in the Grave,281 whose catchphrase ‘I don’t believe it!’ denotes not disbelief but rather horror or surprise at a situation whose reality Meldrew believes only too well.) This interpretation is largely convincing, but Stinton’s case is weakened by a desire to adduce too many examples which, when subjected to pressure, turn out to mean something slightly diﬀerent.282 Granted, lines 257–9 of Helen may well possess a ‘pathetic emphasis’ as Stinton argues; but the tone of arch detachment and scepticism is much more prominent and should not be explained away—especially when the passage is viewed in the context of the play as a whole. We have seen Helen’s reluctance to vouch for the truth of any particular story; Teucer is similarly evasive when asked by Helen whether her brothers, the Dioscuri, are still alive. He answers, unexpectedly, that ‘they are dead and not dead: there are two versions of the story’ (teqn$si koÛ teqn$si: d»o d’ ƒstÏn lÎgw, 138).283 As far as the audience is concerned, one function of 279

Stinton (1976a) 77. Ibid. 60. 281 Written and directed by David Renwick: BBC Television, 1990–2000. 282 Brown (1978) 22–30, for example, has attempted to reﬁne some of Stinton’s interpretations (in the case of Eur. Heracles). 283 For the ‘doubleness’ of the disputed myth, compare Helen’s ‘two fathers’ 280

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Teucer’s reply is the creation of suspense regarding the ultimate fate of the twins; but the natural eﬀect of these words on Helen would be maddeningly imprecise. Nevertheless, Helen does not give any sign that she ﬁnds Teucer’s answer incongruous—she simply asks which version is the better (Ø kre≤sswn) one. The reason why all this jars so horribly is that we expect these characters to talk about each other as if they were real, not as ﬁctions subject to alteration and debate. If they cannot believe their own myths, why should anyone else do so? The next (and ﬁnal) way in which ‘metamythological’ activity can be seen is through what might be called ‘provocative’ presentation of myth—that is, references to mythical characters and events which are loaded with scepticism or which include outré or invented matter. This occurs even with peripheral, minor details, which seem to have no other purpose than to be slightly outrageous. I have already mentioned Helen’s incidental statement (99) that Achilles was among her suitors, a detail which is at odds with certain other accounts. There is no obvious contextual reason for Helen to mention this supposed fact: one might suspect, therefore, that it is deliberately intended to strike a slight discord. The same can be said of Helen’s telling of the story of Callisto (375–80):284 in other versions of the story, Artemis transformed Callisto into a bear after her rape by Zeus, but according to Helen Callisto became not a bear but a ‘wild-eyed lioness’ (Ômmati l3brwi sc[ma lea≤nhß): a change that is pointless in itself, but whose signiﬁcance seems to lie in its discrepancy with the usual story. False stories are mixed up with true, but both types are presented in a way that makes them equally (un-)believable. Compare the rather more shocking revelation (136) that Leda committed suicide because of her daughter’s infamy: Dale and Kannicht consider this to be an invention by Euripides. Certainly it is unparalleled in other sources. This story, also, is prefaced by the loaded word fas≤n (‘they say’), which (as elsewhere) causes one to question its sources and veracity.285 Shortly (ibid. 17–21, discussed above)—and see §4.4 below for further discussion of these lines. 284 Diggle (1993, 179–80) thinks these lines corrupt. 285 Compare Andromeda fr. 151: t&n toi D≤khn lvgousi pa∏d’ e”nai DiÏß | ƒgg»ß te na≤ein t[ß brot0n Åmart≤aß (‘they say that Justice is the daughter of Zeus and

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afterwards (143), Teucer cuts oﬀ the ﬂow of Helen’s questions, saying ‹liß d† m»qwn—‘enough of stories’ (‘myths’?—‘ﬁctions’?— ‘lies’?). One consequence of inventing plots which involved escapes was that the escapees (excepting Andromeda, whose monster was already written into the tradition) required threatening ﬁgures from whom to escape. In Helen, the threat is posed by the tyrant Theoclymenus and his omniscient sister Theonoe; in Iphigenia, by the tyrant Thoas. It seems possible that these characters are Euripides’ inventions,286 since they occur in no other extant version of the myths (and, in fact, in no other place in the whole of Greek mythology). However, there is something strangely familiar about these ‘new’ characters, for certain preexisting accounts contained characters whose names and characteristics were extremely similar to those of Theoclymenus, Theonoe and Thoas. For example, Aeschylus’ satyr-play Proteus contained a character called Eido (the ‘alternative’ name of Theonoe, given in Helen 11).287 This is probably an abbreviated form of the name Eidothea,288 the name of Proteus’ daughter in the Odyssey.289 The name Theoclymenus is found also in the Odyssey, where it belongs to a seer (perhaps odd, then, to ﬁnd it here of a character whose sister, not himself, has prophetic skills). Thoas’ name, like that of the other tyrant, is familiar from Homer, where it belonged to the king of Lemnos and father of Hypsipyle.290 But are we meant to be reminded, also, of ‘Thonos’, the king of Canobus killed by Menelaus in return for his attack on Helen in one version of the myth?291—or ‘Thon’, the husband of the Egyptian Polydamna in the Odyssey?292—or ‘Thonis’, which is (confusingly) Strabo’s name for the same king, as well as Herodotus’ name for the guard of the Nile mouth who tells Proteus of Paris’ treachery?293 This play on that she dwells near human error’). Bubel (1991, 152) comments: ‘wie auch sonst häuﬁg teilt Euripides Realien der Mythologie, die hier auf Hesiod zurückgehen, unter Berufung auf eine communis opinio.’ 286 The view of Dale (1967) 70; Cropp (2000) 174–5, and others. 287 Aesch. Proteus, fr. 212 (TGF 3 [Radt]). 288 Compare U } y* for U } yip»lh (Aesch. fr. 247, TGF 3 [Radt]). On the abbreviation, see entries in the Suda and Etymol. Symeonis s.v. kerd*; cf. S EHQ 289 Od. 4.351–455. Hom. Od. 4.366. See Sutton (1980) 184–7. 290 291 Il. 14.230, 23.745. Hellanicus (FGH 4 F 153). 292 293 Od. 4.220–32. Strabo 17.1.16–17.

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the names of minor characters is rather provocative: it highlights, again, the discrepancies within the tradition, as well as providing yet another suggestive link between Helen and Iphigenia. In addition, the importance of characters who are paradoxically both familiar and unfamiliar will emerge a little later. Iphigenia’s prologue-speech contains what seems to be both a sceptical reference to the mythical tradition and a deliberate reference to Helen (another argument, incidentally, for believing that Iphigenia followed Helen, as I believe, later in the same trilogy). Talking about her sacriﬁce at Aulis, she says that Agamemnon sacriﬁced her—so it seems—for the sake of Helen (πsfaxen E } lvnhß o\nec’, „ß doke∏, patvr, 8). In their immediate setting, the words „ß doke∏ are unnecessary, and therefore striking. If Iphigenia really does belong to the same trilogy as Helen, then Iphigenia’s pejorative description of the ‘old’ Helen of myth (521–5) must also be seen as remarkable. Her words _ m∏soß ejß E ﬁ llhnaß, oÛk ƒmo≥ mÎnhi (‘O hateful creature—to the Greeks, not just to me!’) could also be seen, in the light of the discussion above, as referring to the mythical tradition at large. On another occasion where Iphigenia talks about the events at Aulis (359), she says that she went to the slaughter ‘like a calf’ (¿ste mÎscon). This description can be explained in terms of the standard sacriﬁcial image of young animals seen elsewhere in tragedy (the calf, unlike the hind, was a sacriﬁcial animal);294 but I wonder whether an additional allusion cannot be seen, to another ‘counterfactual’ version of the myth in which Iphigenia’s last-minute substitution was for a calf rather than a hind?295 A striking feature of the earlier part of Iphigenia is that it obviously plays with the diﬀerent possibilities oﬀered by the ‘standard’ versus the ‘counterfactual’ versions of the myth: namely, is Iphigenia dead or not? Even though she tells of the 294 Cf. Mossman (1995) 147–51. Cropp (2000) ad loc. lists parallels from tragedy in which sacriﬁcial victims, including Iphigenia, are described as goats or calves (Aesch. Ag. 232; Eur. Iph. at A. 1083, 1113, etc.). 295 Reﬂected only in one late source (Antoninus Liberalis 27): the ultimate source and date cannot be known. It is an interesting variant, however, because of the very diﬀerent status of these animals in ancient thought. The substitution of a calf (domestic, sacriﬁcial animal) for Iphigenia implies that the sacriﬁce was appropriate, whereas a hind (untamed, non-sacriﬁcial) implies that the sacriﬁce is not appropriate.

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miraculous substitution, Iphigenia still describes herself as having been killed, which creates a certain amount of confusion.296 Ghosts were not unusual in tragedy—Aeschylus’ Persians and Euripides’ Hecabe contained such characters, and in the latter play the shade of Polydorus even speaks the prologue. Thus the audience is left perpetually unsure just what is going on. The ﬁrst entry of Menelaus in Helen (at line 386) has been seen as unusual in terms of the play’s structure, since it appears to be a ‘second prologue’, following the emptying of the stage after the parodos.297 It is remarkable also in the fact that it plays with the theme of counterfactual myth, in a rather diﬀerent way from the passage just discussed. Menelaus starts by apostrophizing his mythical ancestor Pelops (386–90): _ t¤ß teqr≤ppouß Ojnom3wi P∏san k3ta Pvloy Åm≤llaß ƒxamillhqe≤ß pote, e÷q’ •feleß †tÎq’ [Ón≤k’ πranon ejß qeoŸß peisqe≥ß ƒpo≤eiß] ƒn qeo∏ß† lipe∏n b≤on, pr≥n tÏn ƒmÏn !trva patvra genn[sai pote O Pelops, you who once competed in the chariot-race with Oenomaus at Pisa, if only you had died †at the time [when you were served up as a meal for the gods]† , before you begot my father Atreus . . .

In expressing the wish that things had turned out diﬀerently, Menelaus is suggesting the possibility of additional counterfactual myths—a version of the story in which Pelops was not fed to the gods,298 and in which the house of Atreus never even existed. How is the audience expected to interpret, at this stage in the play, a second counterfactual prologue? The provocative idea provides a little incidental food for thought, but it is not developed further. However, might not certain perceptive members of the audience have remembered Menelaus’ lines when (as it might have been a few hours later) they came to the 296 Iphigenia 8 (πsfaxen), 20 (sfage∏san), 27 (ƒkainÎmhn), 177 (sfacqe∏s’), 359–60 (m’… πsfazon), 541 (pa∏ß πt’ oˆs’ åpwlÎmhn), 563 (qanoısan), 770 (sfage∏san), 920 (pat¶r πkteinv me). Remarked upon by Hulton (1962) 365. Note, however, that these imperfects may diﬀer in meaning from aorists, in that they may refer to an attempted killing (cf. Ion 1408). 297 See §4.4.7 below. 298 Pindar (Ol. 1.36–63) had in fact already experimented with a counterfactual Pelops-myth, saying that he could not believe that the gods were greedy enough to eat the boy. See Cropp (2000) 202 (and refs. there).

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beginning of Iphigenia, where the ﬁrst word of yet another ‘counterfactual’ prologue is ‘Pelops’ . . .? Perhaps Euripides’ idea was to tantalize them with the possibility that Iphigenia would deal with an alternative, ‘Pindaric’ version of the Pelopsmyth?299 From counterfactuals to embroidery. I mentioned above one remarkable feature of Iphigenia and Orestes’ discussion of Atreus’ and Thyestes’ quarrel. Even more worthy of comment is the fact that Iphigenia wove a tapestry depicting this event (\fhna ka≥ tÎd’ e”doß eÛm≤toiß ploka∏ß, 817). Weaving was a perfectly natural feminine pastime in the Greek world, but it has also been seen, in certain literary contexts, to have a symbolic function. Helen in the Iliad (3.121–7) famously wove a tapestry depicting the events of the Trojan War, and this has been interpreted as a self-referential activity. Homer’s Helen is able to distance herself from the events in which she herself is so deeply implicated and to act instead as a ‘commentator’ outside the action; her weaving in some way represents the act of poetry or myth-making.300 Iphigenia’s tapestry here can be seen in a similar metaphorical light: not only is it another instance of ‘metamythology’, but it also illustrates another way in which Iphigenia has become more like Helen—is Euripides trying to conﬂate or confuse the roles of the two women? Iphigenia’s ka≥ seems to indicate that this is not the only tapestry which she has woven; thus her metaphorical function may be seen as habitual. In other words, it is not just in this one place that Iphigenia’s actions form a commentary on myth. More self-conscious mythic commentary occurs in a speech of Orestes: a most bizarre allusion to the Dionysiac ceremony of the Choes. The ritual itself and its connection with the drama will be 299 Of course, ‘metamythography’ is not the only purpose of the strategic placing of Pelops in Iphigenia’s prologue. In addition, the genealogy, signiﬁcantly, ‘highlights successive generations of betrayal and deceit’ (Hartigan [1986] 106) which come to a climax, in one sense or another, in the course of the play. Cf. O’Brien (1988). 300 This interpretation was seen very early on by S Iliad 3.126–7 (‘the poet has formed a worthy archetype of his own poi&siß’). Cf. Kennedy (1986, 5–14), who interprets Helen’s weaving as metaﬁctional; and Taplin (1992, 97), who says that ‘her weaving gives her a special aﬃnity with the poet and his audience.’ He compares Il. 6.357–8, where Helen says to Hector that the suﬀering has come about in order that they may be a subject of song to the generations to come: „ß ka≥ øp≤ssw | ånqr*poisi pel*meq’ åo≤dimoi ƒssomvnoisi.

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discussed in a later chapter; but for the present purpose what is most interesting about this speech is its forward-looking reference to a ﬁfth-century Athenian festival. Orestes says (958– 60): kl»w d’ !qhna≤oisi tåm¤ dustuc[ telet¶n genvsqai, k£ti tÏn nÎmon mvnein co[reß £ggoß Pall3doß tim$n le*n. I have heard that the Athenians have based a ritual upon my suﬀerings, and that the people of Pallas even today have the custom of honouring the pitcher.

It is highly improbable that Orestes can be talking about a ritual which existed in his own time: this is, almost certainly, an anachronism. Cropp, following Wolﬀ, interprets the lines as ‘advertising to Euripides’ audience the importance of such ritual institutions and their dependence on careful negotiation between humans and the divine’.301 This is perhaps true, but the main point is, surely, the complete incongruity of the reference, especially Orestes’ ‘even to-day’ (k£ti). Nowhere else does an aetiology of this sort occur mid-play, in the mouth of a human character. Platnauer’s opinion was that the lines ‘certainly seem unnecessary to an Athenian audience’,302 but his conclusion was that they are spurious. On the contrary, there is no reason to doubt the lines, and they have an obvious part to play in the metamythic strategy which pervades the whole play. A further example of bizarre aetiology is to be found at the end of the Helen. Here the Dioscuri ex machina make another alteration to the ‘new’ myth of Helen, adding an element which has previously not been mentioned at all. They say that Hermes, after lifting Helen up from Sparta, set her down on an island called Acte en route to Egypt. This detail is geographically unconvincing, since ‘Acte’ is Makronissi, oﬀ Sunium, and (as Dale rightly observes) it brings Hermes wildly oﬀ-course for Egypt.303 Indeed, in other versions Acte was a stopping-point en route to Troy. It seems possible that Euripides is making the same sort of change to Acte’s place within the myth as he has made to the way in which Egypt ﬁts into the myth: for versions 301 302 303

Cropp (2000) 231: cf. Wolﬀ (1992) 325–9. Platnauer (1938) ad loc. Helen 1670–5; cf. Dale (1967) ad loc.

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existed in which Helen went to Egypt either en route to Troy from Sparta, or on the way home from Troy to Sparta, either with Menelaus or with Paris, or even (as here) instead of going to Troy at all.304 The precise stage at which the signiﬁcant location (Acte or Egypt) ﬁts into the myth is subject to alteration—which means that one is led, again, to question why, or even if, it is signiﬁcant.305 It is time for some tentative conclusions. All of the instances of metamythography which I have described should be seen not as providing incidental food for thought but as being intricately tied up with the use of all the old-and-new elements in Euripides’ myths and plots, and with the overall messages and meanings of the escape-tragedies. However one might interpret these plays, it seems undeniable that they are calculated to draw particular attention to their myths. The unusual nature of the myths themselves, combined with the arch self-consciousness displayed by the characters, makes the myths stand out with unusual clarity and emphasis. This is done in such a way as to create a tone of complete artiﬁciality throughout the plays. The result of this mannered presentation and extreme incongruity is that it is not just the more bizarre-seeming elements, or the smaller ‘incidental’ details, which stand out. Rather (by implication), all myths are exposed to the same scrutiny—as is the manner in which these traditional stories are talked about and transmitted. Euripides is provoking his audience to examine their ‘knowledge’ of myth and to question what had previously seemed unobjectionable. Myth is never simply ‘there’ to be accepted as a condition of the plot and stage-action. It is problematized; it is made to seem remarkable, illogical, irrational, unreal. In the earlier sections I suggested that Euripides did not 304 Hdt. 2.112–20; Hecataeus (FGH 1 F 307–9); Hellanicus (FGH 4 F 153); Hom. Od. 4. 305 Perhaps this oddity can be accounted for by suggesting that a local cult may have been associated with the place during the ﬁfth century. The existence of cults may often explain the tendency of poets to retain odd-seeming (small or large) details of previous myths: see e.g. Sourvinou-Inwood (1997). However, this explanation still fails to explain why the geographical location—or, indeed, the cult—was signiﬁcant. Cult aetiologies in tragedy may often perplex us precisely because they do not satisfactorily justify beliefs or ritual practices: see §5.2 below for more discussion of this problem.

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invent the strange-seeming elements in the ‘new’ myths of Helen and Iphigenia, but in each case combined previously disparate elements into a single myth. If this is true, then there is a particular purpose to be detected, which can be explained in the light of metamythology. I have argued elsewhere that the interpretation of the meaning of tragedies comes about from the interplay between the audience’s pre-existing knowledge of the mythical subjects and the particular manner in which these subjects were presented on stage.306 This is equally true of the escapetragedies. Most people (I maintain) would have been familiar with the ‘standard’ myths of Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia, and some (though fewer—perhaps an educated minority) would have had knowledge of some or all of the mythical variants to be found in a variety of authors—the trip to Egypt, the phantom(s), the substitution at Aulis, and so on. Euripides has included no major detail that would not have been familiar to at least some members of his audience. What he has done is far more interesting. The whole point of Euripides’ myths is, I believe, that they are deliberately designed to be confused, mangled, mixed-up composite versions.307 But because they contain nothing new, they would be virtually unassailable to anyone whose instincts prompted them to cry: ‘That tale is not true!’ (vel sim.). Apart from those few who possessed intimate knowledge of the tradition and its many oddities, the audience would have found themselves hopelessly confused by this mythical mish-mash which was both familiar and baﬄingly unfamiliar. (‘Is that what happened to Iphigenia? I seem to remember it, but . . .’) The overall eﬀect would have been to shock the audience out of complacency and radically to undermine their sense of secure, certain knowledge of myths—even of these myths which ‘everyone knew’. This eﬀect corresponds precisely with that of Euripides’ metamythological presentation of individual elements, as illustrated above. And I think that this scenario, if true, would be far more eﬀective and meaningful than an alternative scenario in which the extent of Euripides’ invention was greater.308 306

See §1.1 above. Cf. Austin’s (1994, 186) verdict that the Helen is ‘a hodgepodge of the old Helen stories’. 308 And yet, as I warned before (§2.3.1), it remains possible to argue that Euripides invented a huge amount of material. It may be that any scenario which 307

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But what is the point of this so-called metamythology? Now it may be that Euripides’ intention extended no further than a desultory throwing-round of witty ideas, aiming for a certain ‘piquant intellectual novelty’: this is the assessment often made of Euripides’ philosophical or intellectual content.309 But I have assumed, rather, that Euripides was using metamythology to say something particular about myth. The connection which he has made between the past and the present (i.e. 412 bc) is such that his audience is made to question what they know now about the mythical past. Put brieﬂy, Euripides’ message is that the details of myths are confused, that the manner of their transmission precludes authenticity or absolute veracity, and that, ultimately, literal belief in myth is impossible. Ostensibly, the counterfactual myths of Helen and Iphigenia are presented as the reexamined, true versions of these stories, in contrast to those false myths which were previously the basis of our ‘knowledge’. But the manner of presentation makes it progressively more plain that there is no more justiﬁcation for believing the new than the old version, and that there is, ultimately, no way at all of deciding which myths are true and which false. That is, all myths are nothing more than substitutable ﬁctions. Other critics have hinted at a similar interpretation, discussing Euripides’ ‘sceptical’ attitude to individual myths and linking his tragedies to a perceived late ﬁfth-century Zeitgeist of doubt, crisis and intellectual questioning.310 This explanation is perfectly plausible, but it will become clear that the escapetragedies view the matter from a slightly diﬀerent angle. Here, it is not individual myths which are being treated with scepticism, but the whole paraphernalia of the mythical tradition—and, in a wider context, the basis for belief or disbelief in anything at all— which Euripides is (explicitly or implicitly) criticizing. This theme is intimately connected with his exploration of reality and ﬁts the limited facts is as good as any other, but I maintain that the interpretation oﬀered here is conceptually more satisfying. 309 e.g. Winnington-Ingram (1969); Griﬃth (1953) 36–7 (from whom the phrase ‘piquant intellectual novelty’ comes); Kitto (1961) 319; Austin (1994) 187, etc. 310 Euripides was ‘forced to use myths which he didn’t want to’—the oversimpliﬁcation of Lucas (1968) 176; cf. Snell (1960) 132; Whitman (1974) 116– 28; Eisner (1979) 155, etc.

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illusion—a subject to which I shall return in Chapter 4 below. In this metamythological world, myths are presented as a form of illusion (or delusion), possessing only a tenuous and unveriﬁable connection with reality.311 It is possible to see why many critics have detected a comic tone in some of the passages which I have been discussing. First of all, the mood of artiﬁciality and detachment which can be detected in the plays is very diﬃcult to interpret. In addition, metamythology is essentially an ironical, ludic activity:312 it strikes the reader (or the person in the audience) as an intellectual game, which may be entertaining, witty or thought-provoking. But talk of sophisticated ‘play’ on myth and ideas belies the basic seriousness of Euripides’ intention. We should not be misled into equating ‘ludic’ with ‘comic’, for there is nothing funny about metamythology. On the contrary, the implications of Euripides’ presentation of myth, for religious belief and epistemology in general, are grave. The mythical tradition was the only means available to ﬁfth-century Athenians of knowing about their history and their gods; but if the veracity of myth is subjected to severe pressure, the consequences are disturbing. After sitting through the escape-tragedies, not only must we question whether or not there are any reasons left for belief in anything, but we are bound to be left, also, with a terrible feeling that nothing at all is as it seems. The words which bring to an end the messenger-speech in the Helen seem to provide a suitable, if sobering, conclusion: on the basis of what has been seen and experienced, there is no more useful advice for humans than to be sensible, and disbelieve.313 311 It may seem that this is a rather ambitious claim to make, and certainly it will be easier to appreciate Euripides’ overall meaning after a fuller consideration of the ontological and epistemological themes of the plays (§4.4 below). 312 Cf. Eisner’s (1979, 157) view that Euripides aim was aesthetic rather than didactic: the poet ‘playing games’ for a small reading public. Goward (1999, 144), thinks that all drama is essentially ‘ludic’ in nature. 313 Helen 1617–18: s*fronoß d’ åpist≤aß | oÛk πstin oÛd†n crhsim*teron broto∏ß. Dale (1967) and Kannicht (1969, vol. 2 ad loc.), both believe that this line recalls, by means of paraphrase, a maxim of Epicharmus (DK 23 B13: n$fe ka≥ mvmnas’ åpiste∏n: £rqra taıta t0n fren0n, ‘be sober and sceptical: that is the route to articulate thought’). If so, it is a rather loose parallel. Kannicht adds that it is similar to other general reﬂections in tragedy (Med. 1224–30, Hcld. 863–6, Suppl. 726–30, Bacch. 1150–5).

3 A Tragic Landscape

KHDESTHS oÍÎn te, pr≥n tÏn spl[na komid[i m’ ƒkbale∏n, par¤ soı puqvsqai po∏ m’ £geiß, wˆripidh;1

3.1 a sense of place In literature, the creation of a vivid ‘sense of place’—that is, evocative description of an imaginary location, or careful, accurate depiction of a real one—is most usually associated with genres such as narrative poetry or the novel. For a playwright, whose concern is primarily with action and not description, and whose means of exposition and description is through the spoken words of his characters, the matter of creating a setting in which to locate a play’s action may be diﬃcult. Consequently, dramatic genres are not particularly connected with detailed visual description. But a strong ‘sense of place’ turns out to be a striking, indeed characteristic, feature of the escape-tragedies.2 How, exactly, is a dramatic poet to go about creating a sense of place? Description of the environment emerges in several ways. First, there are the prologue-speeches which Euripides almost invariably employs,3 in which principal characters succinctly 1 Ar. Thesm. 3–4. ‘Relative: Euripides! Can you tell me, before I pass out completely, where you’re taking me?’ 2 This fact has seemed to some scholars to provide another argument for viewing the escape-tragedies as romantic or proto-novelistic (as distinct from tragic): see E. M. Hall (1997) xxiii–xxiv; Segal (1971) 553–8 (connecting Euripides with the romantic as formulated by Frye 1965); Eisner (1979) 168–9. Ostensibly the setting of the escape-tragedies resembles the faraway, ‘nevernever land’ familiar to romance; but (quite apart from the anachronism of this viewpoint—Euripides cannot have been taking over a feature of a genre that did not yet exist!) I hope to demonstrate that Euripides’ purpose substantially diﬀers from romanticism. In any case, the settings of the escape-tragedies are real, not fantastic, places: see §3.2 below. 3 All his extant plays have such prologues, except for the Rhesus (which is possibly spurious) and the Iphigenia at Aulis (which is suspected to have undergone substantial alteration, but contains a ‘scene-setting’ speech from line 49 of

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provide important information. These prologues are (literally) ‘scene-setting’, as they tell the audience where exactly the action is to be played out, often adding a few local details for the sake of verisimilitude, embellishment, or as it might be deeper signiﬁcance for interpreting the play’s action and thought.4 The plays’ lyric portions, in particular the stasima, are narrative to a greater extent than the spoken portions, and so more suitable for (among other things) descriptions of place. But choral lyrics cannot be treated simply as an extension of the scene-setting of the rest of the play: though closely linked, they are nevertheless separate from it, and so their landscape may often be quite distinct from the ‘real’ landscape of the play’s action. (See §3.3 below for further discussion.) Then there are references and descriptions in the course of the action (or the messenger-speeches, which are predominantly narrative in mode).5 These may include descriptions of the geographical setting or, more usually, the mise-en-scène: the house, palace, tent or cave represented by the stage-building and the physical objects (altars, shrines, rocks, etc.) in view on the stage. This manner of description may be incidental, ornamental or more meaningful; or it may include those which seem to have the function of ‘stage-directions’, all of which are internal to the text.6 It is important to remember that the surviving texts alone do not give the whole picture. Certain details of ancient theatre production are impossible to excavate from the texts themselves; the transmitted text). But Andromeda began in unorthodox form, with a sung monody (fr. 114). Aristophanes (Frogs 946–7, 1197–247), using elaborate parody and pastiche, shows just how characteristic Euripides’ prologues were thought to be, and contrasts this technique with that of Aeschylus. See Sommerstein (1994) 264–6 on the Frogs passages, and, on Euripides’ prologues in general, Erbse (1984). 4 For example, Poseidon’s prologue to Trojan Women describes in horribly vivid detail the sacked city of Troy, comparing its former glory, its ring of walls, its towers and its masonry (5–7, 45–6) with the smoking ruins (8), the deserted groves (15), the bloodied temples (15–16), the corpse-strewn altar steps (16–17) and the Greek ships, full of booty, by the shore (18–20). Aphrodite’s prologue to Hippolytus identiﬁes the scene as Troezen (12) before ﬁlling in signiﬁcant details of its topography: the woods where Hippolytus hunts and worships Artemis (16), and the rock of Pallas, with its temple to Artemis, imagined as visible over the sea from Troezen (30–1). Hermes in Ion describes at length the layout of the Delphic precinct (5–81) as well as giving some details about Attica and its 5 mountains (8–19). See de Jong (1991). 6 See Taplin (1977) 28–39 and (1978) 9–21.

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yet such resources as scenery and costume (in which the playwrights took a personal concern) would have been of great importance in the creation of a setting. One technique of stagecraft was skhnograf≤a, which is said by Aristotle to have been invented by Sophocles.7 This has aroused great interest and speculation, for no one knows just what skhnograf≤a was. The word is usually translated ‘scene-painting’, which is appropriately vague. Does it refer literally to paint and paintbrushes— something along the lines of painted scenery or backdrops? This is the traditional explanation;8 but it cannot be either conﬁrmed or rejected, owing to our lack of evidence. My own view is that any painting was minimal and that scene-‘painting’ was achieved mainly by the words of the text. Two factors support this view. First, the layout of the theatre of Dionysus was substantially diﬀerent from most modern theatres, whose scenery involves a backdrop or a blank wall at the rear of the stage. But the ‘backdrop’ of the outdoor, tragic theatre was the panoramic view of the Attic countryside, taking in the Peiraeus and the sea. An important characteristic of the ancient theatre has been seen to be its use of the real, outdoor environment. The French critic André Bernand, for example, describes Greek theatre as ‘le théâtre ouvert’, writing provocatively that the great diﬀerence between ancient and modern drama is that one ‘opens up’ the scene, while the other is a ‘closed room’: ‘Le théâtre est donc une sorte d’observatoire dominant un panorama 7 Arist. Poet. 1449a18–19: tre∏ß ka≥ skhnograf≤an Sofokl[ß (‘Sophocles [introduced] three [actors instead of two] and scene-painting.’) This elliptical sentence is diﬃcult to interpret: see Brown (1984). 8 Lucas (1968, ad loc.) translates skhnograf≤a as ‘scene-painting, which made use of the newly-discovered knowledge of perspective. According to Vitruvius 7.11, this was due to the painter Agatharchus, and the initiative came from Aeschylus.’ (But he does not discuss the contradiction between Vitruvius and Aristotle: was Aeschylus or Sophocles responsible?) Brown (1984, 8 n. 31) gives a large number of references attesting the translation ‘painting in perspective’, to be distinguished from skiagraf≤a (‘trompe l’oeil’). Halliwell (1986, 338) also accepts the usual translation. Kuntz (1993, 153–61) is (rightly, I think) more sceptical, pointing out that there is no evidence whatsoever in support of any interpretation. Brown (1984) argues that Arist. Poet. 1449a18–19 is an interpolation, and that Sophocles is unlikely to have used ‘scene-painting’ in our sense of the term. His arguments are similar to mine (which follow): he adds (9–12) that vase-paintings of tragedy never set ﬁgures in front of a background, and that even in later antiquity only three basic kinds of dramatic ‘set’—comic, tragic and satyric—were known (Vitruvius 5.6.9).

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. . . symboliquement et physiquement le paysage est présent.’9 Every scene in tragedy is to be imagined as taking place outdoors: when events occur inside the house, they are always reported rather than played out on stage.10 So there were never any sets, in the sense of rooms. The real landscape would have acted as the ‘set’, except in so far as the stage-building may have been painted to resemble the exterior of some building or other (man-made or natural) structure. We cannot know if any other temporary (wooden or other) structures were used; but, in general, if we imagine what the spectators would have actually been able to see in front of them, it seems unlikely that painted scenery, wooden boards or backdrop (vel sim.), if used, would have been very eﬀective at creating an illusion of place.11 Second, the stage-building was required to represent four diﬀerent places in the course of a tetralogy.12 Sometimes these might be very similar—four royal palaces, for example—but sometimes, as in the escape-tragedies, the settings were substantially diﬀerent—a palace, a temple, a cave. It is safe to assume that, since the plays occupied a single day, they were played in quick succession, separated by only short intervals. Such intervals would not have been long enough to re-paint the stage-building for its new purpose, though the possibility of painted boards on the sk∂n∂, which could be quickly changed, cannot be ruled out. In a few cases there was even a scene-change during a single play,13 which makes it seem even less likely that backdrops were used.14 9

Bernand (1985) 17–19. Great play is very often made on the contrast between what happens in and outside the house, especially in Aesch. Oresteia: on this see Taplin (1978) 31–40. 11 The theatre building and related paraphernalia are discussed at length by Arnott (1962) and Pickard-Cambridge (1946); cf. Csapo and Slater (1994) 79–88. 12 However, it is not always clear, especially in earlier tragedies, whether the skene was used to represent anything at all: not all the texts make reference to the presence of a building or other feature in the background. Aesch. Prometheus is the most problematic, since the setting is supposed to be in the uninhabited wilds (see Taplin [1977] 452–9). 13 At Aesch. Eum. 231 the scene changes from the Delphic shrine to the Athenian Areopagus (see Taplin [1977] ad loc.); the action of Soph. Ajax 719 ﬀ . must be seen as shifting from the tent to an unspeciﬁed area of open countryside. Webster (1967, 196) believed that the scene of Andromeda changed from the seagirt rock to the palace of Cepheus, but there is no evidence for this. 14 Trendall and Webster (1971, 9) note that ‘the rare changes of scene within 10

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This leaves little scope for ‘set-design’ (another possible meaning ofskhnograf≤a). Some rudimentary paintwork, perhaps; some large objects, like altars, shrines, thrones or rocks; a limited number of hand-held props, such as bows and arrows, scrolls and poison-bottles: all of these are implied by the texts. But are we to believe that these elementary stage-properties were absent from pre-Sophoclean drama? It is possible, but seems unlikely, even if one bears in mind the non-realistic conventions of tragedy, and that early drama may have had its origins in mime. Discussion of original staging details must, inevitably, remain speculative; but the subject cannot be ignored. Alternatively, skhnograf≤a may be taken more metaphorically to mean that Sophocles was the ﬁrst playwright to take care to create a ‘sense of place’ in the text: that is, verbal scene-painting.15 Although (as I stated above) this seems an attractive explanation of how scenes were ‘painted’ in drama generally, it is unlikely that Aristotle meant the word in this sense. Sophocles can hardly be said to have pioneered the art of describing places in words; and, in any case, the extant plays of Sophocles suggest that he was largely indiﬀerent to geography and physical setting: indeed, he seems to have been less concerned to describe his plays’ locations than either Aeschylus or Euripides.16 So the question of skhnograf≤a must remain unanswered, but not ignored. This chapter is concerned with the various ways in which these plays explore and exploit their physical setting—their geography and topography, the question of ethnicity, and the real and imaginary landscape in which the action unfolds. Far from merely furnishing picturesque, aesthetically pleasing poetic description, far from being an interesting but incidental feature, the landscape of the escape-tragedies is central in their action, language, rhetoric and meaning—is, in a sense, what these plays are about. More than any other extant tragedies, the escapetragedy were chieﬂy indicated by the chorus leaving the orchestra and returning to say that they had arrived somewhere else.’ 15 This view is implied by Arnott (1962, 26), who suggests that Greek tragedy in ‘its most inventive and productive period’ rejected realistic, physical scenepainting in favour of verbal scene-painting. 16 Cf. Bernand (1985) 101.

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plays are ‘geographical’. Geography is central to their myths; their plots are driven by travel to and from diﬀerent locations; and they pose important questions of culture and identity. Recent scholarship has given some attention to the unusual geography of the escape-tragedies and drawn certain conclusions about its nature and meaning. In particular, it will be obvious that I have made much use of the highly inﬂuential work of Edith Hall, which is of great relevance in this area, and now even represents the standard orthodoxy on such matters.17 But I have questioned her conclusions and those of others; while not, perhaps, radically diﬀering, I have attempted to adapt, reﬁne and clarify. Again, as before, my approach has been to read the plays closely without preconceptions about what they should be like. Tragic geography and ethnicity in general may be seen to exhibit certain patterns, but there is no reason why one should automatically interpret these tragedies in particular as conforming to the general rules. It seems that Euripides’ treatment of physical setting in the escape-tragedies is both thoughtprovoking and completely unexpected. 3.2 exotica As we saw in the previous chapter, the escape-tragedies are remarkable for their exotic, far-ﬂung settings and their ‘geographized’ myths. In this section, I want to examine the plays’ presentation of their exceptional settings.18 How accurately does Euripides depict these locations and their geography? What, in other words, is distinctively Egyptian, Tauric or Ethiopian about the plays’ sense of place? The answer to these questions may be surprising. In order to give an answer, it is necessary to investigate how much Euripides and his audience knew about Oriental geography and culture, and from what sources they derived this knowledge. The approach of Edith Hall (and various others) is to sift through the ethnographic portions of Herodotus’ Histories and the tragedies of Aeschylus for evidence, looking for parallels with Euripides’ treatment. Herodotus’ writings, which were 17

Hall (1987), (1989a), (1989b), (1997). Not enough of Andromeda survives to make precise discussion of its geographical content feasible—but see §2.3.6 above for its setting. 18

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almost certainly in circulation by the 420s bc, contain lengthy sections describing the geography, inhabitants and customs of both Egypt and the Black Sea region.19 Aeschylus’ Suppliants and Prometheus demonstrate precise knowledge of, even fascination with, genuine ethnographic material from Egypt:20 one scholar writes that Aeschylus was ‘seduced’ by the appeal of barbarian settings and characters.21 Aristotle particularly associates Aeschylus with the type of drama which is eﬀective because of tÏ terat0deß, the marvellous, picturesque or weird-andwonderful element which was one of the eﬀects provided by foreign (i.e. non-Greek) content in tragedy.22 There is no doubt that Herodotus is a valuable source, for Athenian perceptions of non-Greeks as much as the ethnographic data which he provides; and I have suggested elsewhere certain ways in which Herodotus’ overall conceptual outlook may have shaped Euripides’ own.23 However, the precise details of Herodotus’ non-Greeks do not match up with the details in the escape-tragedies. If, like Edith Hall, we attempt to make the two writers’ accounts correspond, we run up against two serious problems. In the ﬁrst place, Herodotus is far from being a straightforward, objectively ‘factual’ text. Not only is much of his ethnographic material likely to be deliberately polemical, reacting provocatively aginst the views of Hecataeus and other predecessors,24 but also his accuracy and use of source-material is questionable—in particular, he may never have visited any of the places which he describes.25 Second, and more importantly, 19

Herodotus, bks 2. and 4, respectively. See Kranz (1933) 98–102; Bernand (1985) 68–74. 21 Bernand (1985) 74. 22 Arist. Poet. 1456a. As Kranz (1933, 74) writes: ‘Weit ausgebreitet und lockend lag die außerhellenische Welt vor den Augen des Dramatikers der Frühzeit.’ 23 See §2.3.6 above. 24 This point is made by David Braund in relation to Herodotus’ treatment of the Taurians. I am grateful to Prof. Braund for allowing me to see drafts of his forthcoming book on this subject, which has inﬂuenced my own views in much of what follows. 25 The extent of Herodotus’ factual knowledge and experience has been questioned: improbable or inaccurate details, impossible sights, etc. have caused some critics to wonder just how much of his History was a fabrication. Armayor (1978, 62), for instance, writes apropos of Herodotus’ section on Scythia and the Taurians: ‘If Herodotus went to the Black Sea at all, his narrative bears little or no relation to whatever his travels may have been on the basis 20

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there is no reason to suppose that Herodotus represented the only source, or even a particularly authoritative source, of knowledge. Some of Hall’s conclusions, to which I shall refer in what follows, are based on the view that Egypt and the land of the Taurians were completely unfamiliar, alien places, known to Euripides and his audience chieﬂy through the pages of Herodotus. However, this seems to be an unrealistic assumption. It can be seen that Athenians of 412 and earlier had knowledge of Egypt and the Black Sea area from a wide range of sources, including direct personal contact. Travel and trade between Greece and these foreign countries had been going on for perhaps hundreds of years: Naucratis, in particular, had long been a famous centre of Greek trade.26 Herodotus, though elsewhere he is at pains to show the lack of cultural continuity between Greeks and barbarians, states explicitly that Greeks had enjoyed regular intercourse with Egyptians since the time of Psammetichus, and he describes Greek settlements at Memphis and elsewhere.27 There is evidence of Athenian imperial interest in Egypt and the Black Sea during the mid- to late ﬁfth century, including a major (but unsuccessful) expedition to Egypt and Cyprus in the 450s and an expedition by Pericles to the Black Sea in the 430s.28 Miltiades’ conquests and settlement in the Chersonese during the mid-sixth century are described by Herodotus.29 Therefore, many Athenians in the audience would have visited these locations, or they would have known people of evidence now in hand.’ Fehling’s (1989) extensive survey oﬀers a strongly negative view of the value of Herodotus’ information, concluding (240–1): ‘there is possibly not a single passage, certainly none concerned with anywhere outside Greece, that we can treat as evidence that Herodotus went to a particular place.’ 26 See Bernand (1971) for extensive discussion of Greek-Egyptian links in the archaic and classical periods. Trade between Greece, Egypt and Libya is 27 Hdt. 2.154.4. attested in e.g. Thuc. 4.53, 8.35. 28 The Athenians fought a campaign in Egypt for six years from 459–8 bc; and a few years later, at the time of the ﬁve-year truce between Athens and the Peloponnese, Cimon’s expedition to Cyprus included sixty ships destined for Egypt (Thuc. 1.109–12). Both expeditions were unsuccessful, but they show intense interest in expanding Athenian interests in this area over a long period. Pericles’ expedition is mentioned in Plut. Pericles 20, but little information is known about this episode. 29 Hdt. 6.41–2, 137–40.

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who had travelled there, or they would have had contact of some sort with Egyptians or Scythians. This means that their natural reaction to Euripides’ plays, unlike that of Hall and other modern readers, would not have been to detect detailed allusions to Herodotus. It is almost certain, then, that Euripides and his audience were familiar with the geography and culture of Egypt and the Black Sea. Therefore—had Euripides wished—Helen and Iphigenia could easily have been colourful, recognizable portrayals of Egyptian and Tauric antiquities, drawing on genuine ethnographic material to provide local colour. But this is not the case. Helen’s scene-setting opening lines (1–3) are deceptively fecund with information: Ne≤lou m†n aJde kallip3rqenoi Âoa≤, ß ånt≥ d≤aß yak3doß Ajg»ptou pvdon leuk[ß take≤shß ciÎnoß Ëgra≤nei g»aß. These are the lovely-virgin streams of the Nile, which waters the soil of Egypt’s ﬁelds not with rainfall from Zeus but with white, melting snow.

Following the surprise revelation that Egypt is the location, we are treated to a strikingly accurate description of precipitation in the Nile region: melting snows are indeed the cause of the Nile’s ﬂooding, and this meteorological fact is mentioned by Anaxagoras as well as other tragedians.30 But, as it soon transpires, this is virtually the only accurate local detail. It is almost as if it has been inserted right at the start in order to give the audience a misleading idea of what sort of play this is. The initial impression is that Helen will be an ethnographic, description-rich play about Egypt, perhaps accumulating a mass of picturesque detail in the manner of Aeschylus. But that impression is very soon dispelled. No attempt is made to describe the topography or exact physical geography of Egypt.31 Helen says that the site of Theoclymenus’ palace is somewhere on the banks of the Nile, 30 I discuss the sources (with references) in §4.3 below (see particularly n. 132–4 there). Herodotus (2.18–24) oﬀers the same explanation, along with two variants. Plato (Laws 657a–b) describes the pleasantness of the Nile region (possibly conveyed by kallip3rqenoi, although the adjective is more complex than that). 31 Cf. Goossens (1935) 245: ‘Il est clair qu’ Euripide, en écrivant l’ Hélène, ne s’est pas beaucoup préoccupé de pittoresque et d’ exotisme.’

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but we never learn just where; clearly it is within walkingdistance of the sea, at some quite short distance from the harbour and Theoclymenus’ dockyards.32 There is a stream, a large palace, an altar; some jagged rocks lurk along the coast, to sink Menelaus’ ship; but apart from these scant details—none of which can be said to impart an authentically Egyptian ﬂavour— there is nothing. No detail is given of Menelaus’ fraught journey to Egypt, or of the route by which he and Helen will escape to Greece. The ﬁnal stasimon of the play notably describes their homeward journey without a single geographical reference: all that emerges is that the Greeks are sailing away in a ship, and that, presumably, they will get back to Greece on this journey, because the gods will it. Menelaus does tell his helmsman to steer for Greece (1611), but it might be argued that, when one has a god guiding one’s journey with favourable winds, one does not need to possess a knowledge of maritime geography. However, the Greek characters’ ignorance of Egyptian geography is amply stressed. The old Servant who enters from the shore complains of the diﬃculty of trying to ﬁnd Menelaus, saying (possibly an exaggeration) that he has ‘wandered over the whole of this savage land’ in search for him (p$san planhqe≥ß t&nde b3rbaron cqÎna, 598). Teucer has stopped oﬀ in Egypt en route to Cyprus—an odd route to take from Salamis, one would have thought—and has to ask Theonoe the right way to go (147–50). Menelaus arrives on the scene completely lost, not recognizing anything, not knowing where on earth he has landed (414–15, 459). When Helen and Menelaus are formulating their escapeplan later on, they are forced to concede that escape over land is impossible since, in their ignorance of this barbarian country, they have no idea what route to take (1041–2). It may be that their ignorance reﬂects the genuine ignorance, or indiﬀerence, of Euripides and his audience. Even if a knowledge (to whatever extent) of Egypt is assumed, and if some trade took place between Greece and Egypt, it is not clear how familiar Greek travellers would have been with Egyptian geography; nor is it clear how much an ‘average’ Athenian of the ﬁfth century would have known of such matters.33 If the lack of description reﬂects 32 The play involves two-way movement of characters between the palace and the shore: Helen 428–9, 740, 1390, 1513, 1530. 33 Some familiarity with cartography is assumed by Aristophanes, Clouds

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indiﬀerence rather than ignorance, then one must ask why this should be. Perhaps Euripides decided not to bore his audience with abstruse details, or perhaps there is a particular reason for his deliberately leaving these places ill-deﬁned and nebulous. So much for geography; what else does Euripides tell his audience about Egypt? There is no clear evidence of a debt to Herodotus, or any literary text, at all. Of Herodotus’ crocodiles, hippopotami, ﬂying snakes, mummies, and numerous other Egyptian curiosities there is no trace. One scholar has seen in the proximity of the palace and Proteus’ tomb a possible reference to a Herodotean description of Egyptian antiquities, but this is an extremely tenuous claim, scarcely justiﬁed by the slight similarity of the situations.34 Another has laboriously tried to ﬁnd parallels between Theonoe’s ritual paraphernalia and other accounts of Egyptian religious customs:35 one small detail, the use of a torch to purify the air, is also found in a passage of Plutarch,36 but other supposed correspondences are less certain.37 It might be that there are details in the play which made sense in the light of knowledge of Egypt from some other, nonHerodotean source; but there is nothing which obviously ﬁts this description. In fact, apart from the scant details just noted, the play is devoid of anything which even resembles local detail. Euripides’ Egypt is scarcely more Egyptian than Athens. One might compare with Helen Euripides’ description of the Black Sea setting of Iphigenia, to see whether similar tendencies emerge. At ﬁrst glance, at least, there is a little more local detail here: but critical opinion diﬀers. Hall writes that Euripides’ Taurians, and their geography, are accurately depicted; but 206–17, where Strepsiades is made to seem a buﬀoon on account of his ignorance of maps and (at least Attic) geography. But is this strictly comparable? 34 Bernand (1985) 286; he compares Hdt. 2.112. 35 Goossens (1935) 249–50. 36 Theonoe’s assistants at Helen 865–7 burn incense; cf. Plut. Moralia (de Iside et Osiride) 383b, where Egyptian priests burn resin and myrrh. 37 Helen 1013–16 records a belief in punishment for sins after death (but Bacon [1961, 149] points out that this is a Pindaric motif); Theoclymenus at Helen 1421 discounts the after-life, but this actually contradicts Hdt. 2.123. The tolerance of Greek customs expressed at Helen 1241–4 also contradicts Hdt. 2.79. Hall (1989a, 148) suggests also that the plot of Andromeda reﬂects an eastern, possibly Phoenician ritual of propitiatory sacriﬁce: but this too is vague, and there is no real evidence from the surviving text to support this claim.

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another critic judges that the geography is a muddle, and that none of the ethnographic references in the play localizes a speciﬁc, actual place: ‘it is probably not ignorance that makes Euripides vague and inaccurate. The fact is that for his particular poetic purpose it does not matter whether he is geographically accurate or not.’38 Which is true? One can see that in Iphigenia there is an attempt made to locate the action a little more exactly than in Helen—at least, in the sense that speciﬁc topographical reference is made to the Black Sea and its environs. The place is named twice as ‘the land of the Tauri’,39 placing it somewhere in the region of the Black Sea and Scythia.40 Like Egypt, it is said to be a very long way away from civilized Greece (1325–6). At lines 106 ﬀ . the coastal milieu is stressed, but Greece, too, has plenty of coastline and caves: what makes the Tauric coastline diﬀerent from any Greek one is its inhospitability. It is repeatedly described as ‘inhospitable’, £xe(i)noß.41 In one of its frequent uses this adjective is simply a geographical term, a name by which the Greeks called the Black Sea;42 nevertheless, the adjective is not invariably a toponym, and the double meaning (or word-play: see §3.4 38

Bacon (1961) 156–8. Iphigenia 29, 85. The play’s Hypothesis gives the additional detail ƒn Ta»roiß t[ß Skuq≤aß (‘among the Taurians of Scythia’), which may be slightly misleading: the question of how far a distinction ought to be made between Taurians and Scythians depends on the extent of Euripides’ familiarity with Herodotus (who makes a case for stricter classiﬁcation of the peoples of the Black Sea, saying [4.99] that Taurians and Scythians are diﬀerent). However, it seems likely that Herodotus is unusual (polemical?) in distinguishing the two groups: few followed him. The character in Ar. Thesm. who represents Thoas in the parody of Iphigenia is not Taurian but Scythian, which suggests that the distinction was not a standard one, or (at least) not seen to be very important. (However, the aims of the parody may be more complicated: see Hall [1989b, 48–54], who observes that Scythian archers were essentially comic stereotypes of barbaric characters, to be found also in Acharnians and Lysistrata. Truly enough, the Scythian archer in Thesm. 1016–18 fulﬁls the dramatic function not only of the Taurian king but also of the [Ethiopian?] villain of Andromeda.) 40 Hdt. 4.99–101. 41 Iphigenia 94, 218, 253, 341, 438, 1388. 42 Allen (1947, 86–8) argues convincingly that the toponym £xe(i)noß for the Black Sea was adopted not just because of its appropriateness to describe such perilous waters, but because of its similarity to the old Iranian word acsˇaéna (‘dark, black’); the euphemism eÇxeinoß was later adopted by Ionians who settled in the region. Cf. Pind. Pyth. 4 and Eur. Andromache 794 for £xe(i)noß in its toponymic sense. 39

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below) is particularly appropriate here.43 As in Helen, the coast, and its caves hollowed out by the sea, must be suﬃciently near the temple to allow easy and quick two-way movement of characters.44 As for the description of the speciﬁc place where the temple of Artemis stands, there are a few indications, all of which are contained within the choral lyrics. ‘The debate over where Euripides visualized the action of the drama,’ writes Hall, ‘centres on three passages: in all other places the information he supplies is not only internally consistent, but accords with Herodotus’ account of the Tauric Chersonese.’45 But this assessment makes the problem sound far less serious than it really is, because the three debated passages in question are in fact the only passages which describe the geography in any detail! First, at the start of the parodos, Iphigenia addresses the chorus (123–5): eÛfame∏t’, _ pÎntou diss¤ß sugcwro»saß pvtraß åxe≤nou na≤onteß. Keep holy silence, you who dwell by the twin converging rocks of the inhospitable sea.

Later on in the parodos, the chorus members sing (132–6): }Ell3doß eÛ≤ppou p»rgouß ka≥ te≤ch cÎrtwn t’ eÛdvndrwn ƒxall3xas’ EÛr*pan, patr*iwn o÷kwn 1draß. [I have come,] leaving behind the towers and walls of Greece, rich in horses, and Europe with its thick forests, site of my ancestral home.

The third and most substantial description comes in the ﬁrst stasimon, where the chorus discuss the voyage made by Orestes and Pylades to the Tauric land (393–7). They address the 43 But compare e.g. Helen 404–5, where Menelaus says of his windblown, oﬀcourse wanderings in Libya: Lib»hß d’ ƒr&mouß åxvnouß t’ ƒpidrom¤ß | pvpleuka p3saß (‘I have sailed to all the desolate and inhospitable places of Libya’). Perhaps the adjective is no less common as a metaphor than as a toponym (cf. Soph. Phil. 217). Bacon (1961, 157) notes that often ways of naming or referring to the Black Sea are simply formulaic. So frequent references are indeed emphatic but not necessarily precise. 44 Iphigenia 67–70, 106–9, 236–7. 45 Hall (1987) 427.

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ku3neai ku3neai s»nodoi qal3ssaß, Jn’ o”stroß †Ø petÎmenoß !rgÎqen† £xenon ƒp’ o”dma diepvrasen 〈 〉 !si&tida ga∏an EÛr*paß diame≤yaß, Dark-blue, dark-blue channels of the sea, where the gadﬂy that ﬂew from Argos traversed the swell of the inhospitable sea 〈 〉, leaving Europe and travelling to the land of Asia,

and continue to speculate (422–38): p0ß t¤ß sundrom3daß pvtraß, p0ß Fineºdaß †å»pnouß† åkt¤ß ƒpvrasan par’ ‹lion ajgialÏn ƒp’ !mfitr≤taß Âoq≤wi dramÎnteß . . . . . . ∂ pne»masi Zef»rou, t¤n poluÎrniqon ƒp’ a”an, leuk¤n åkt3n, !cil[oß drÎmouß kallistad≤ouß, £xeinon kat¤ pÎnton; How did they pass through the clashing rocks? How did they pass through the †unsleeping† shores of Phineus, running along the sea’s coast on Amphitrite’s surf [. . .] or under the breath of Zephyr, to the land of many birds, the white shore, the lovely running-ground of Achilles, across the inhospitable sea?

Just how much information is actually being given here? The ‘dark-blue passage’ (ku3neai s»nodoi), presumably, represents the channel leading into the Black Sea from the Propontis, and the ‘clashing rocks’ (sundrom3daß pvtraß) the Symplegades which marked the entrance to the Black Sea itself. These jagged, impassable rocks are mentioned many times throughout the play, which suggests that they are a very important element of the imagined setting,46 but we still do not ﬁnd out where exactly the temple of Artemis is supposed to be. It is most probably the Chersonese peninsula, but who is to say for certain? Somewhere in the region of the Tauri is indicated, but where? When Iphigenia says that the women of the chorus dwell by the Symplegades and the Black Sea (a vague, far-reaching description), are we supposed to imagine that these coastal features are 46 References to the ‘clashing rocks’ are found also at Iphigenia 124–5, 241, 260, 355, 392–5, 746, 889–90, 1389.

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right next to the temple? This would surely place the play’s action somewhere other than the Chersonese: that is, in an area not elsewhere associated with the Taurians. As Hall points out, the diﬃculty may be resolved by interpretation. The verb used for ‘dwelling’ (na≤w transitive without ƒn) is vague; and mention of the Symplegades or the sea could well be a generalized, metonymic means of referring to a very wide geographical area, just as ‘Nile’ may sometimes stand for Egypt. But even if this interpretation is accepted, the description, far from being straightforward as Hall suggests, is at best ambiguous. The description of Orestes’ and Pylades’ voyage does not resolve the diﬃculty. They are said to have sailed from the Propontis, through the Bosporus (lines 393–5) and the Symplegades (422) into the Black Sea itself, and then to have passed, surely northwards, along the coast (423–6). So they are deﬁnitely (as we already knew) somewhere in the Black Sea; but from this point precise details are lacking. The ﬁnal piece of information given is that the voyagers sailed in the direction of ‘the white coast’ (435–6), a reference to Leuke (modern Phidonisi), an island lying opposite the mouth of the Danube, which housed a temple to Achilles. This information gives us their direction of travel, but not their ﬁnal destination.47 Hall argues that we should still locate the play in the Chersonese—not because Euripides actually tells us this, but because other details of the play are ‘compatible’ with what was known, from Herodotus, of the Taurians who inhabited the Chersonese. (I remain unconvinced that these details are similar, as I shall go on to say in a moment.) Hall’s view of Euripides in general, in fact, is that he was profoundly inﬂuenced by the historian, and that Iphigenia ‘constituted a dramatic bringingto-life of chapters in Herodotus.’48 It is not satisfactory to deﬁne geographical ‘accuracy’ as correspondence with Herodotus. As it turns out, Hall cannot show that Euripides was inﬂuenced by 47 Bacon (1961, 158) assumes that Leuke was Orestes’ ﬁnal destination; but the play gives no sign that this was its location. Hall (1987, 428–9) rightly points out that this ode is not a periplous of the Black Sea, but continues: ‘for poetic reasons he chooses not to deal with the remaining itinerary, which involved skirting the coast of the Black Sea which curved north-eastward to the Chersonese.’ But we cannot know for sure that the Chersonese was the ﬁnal location. 48 Hall (1989a) 112.

G

F E

Black Sea

D A B C D E F G

Hellespont Propontis Bosporus Symplegades River Danube Leuke (Phidonisi) Chersonese

B

C

A 0

50

100

150 miles

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Herodotus, because the details are diﬀerent in each; but, even if Euripides was inﬂuenced by Herodotus, this would not necessarily consitute ‘accuracy’ of a type to which the audience could relate. Hall’s ﬁnal point concerns the statement of the chorus that they ‘left Europe’ (135) in coming to the Tauric land. She argues that ‘no Athenian who was inﬂuenced by Herodotus—as Euripides plainly was—could conceive that the Taurians lived anywhere but Europe’, and accordingly she adopts Barnes’s emendation EÛr*tan for the manuscripts’ EÛr*pan, making them say instead that they have ‘left the Eurotas’.49 Nevertheless, as we have seen, the chorus (apropos of Io’s wanderings) do describe the Bosporus as the ‘gateway from Europe to the land of Asia’ (393–5), which is deﬁnitely a contradiction and cannot be so conveniently emended. So, whether or not Euripides knew Herodotus, it does seem that he conceived of the Taurians inhabiting Asia and not Europe. Was this due to ignorance, indiﬀerence or disagreement? The characters’ ignorance of local geography is also marked (as it was in Helen). Orestes and Pylades did not arrive at the Tauric land as a result of aimless, clueless wanderings, but deﬁnitely steered their ship there from Argos (70), which does, admittedly, imply geographical knowledge of the region (but, on the other hand, it might well be that, with Apollo guiding them, they could never have sailed oﬀ-course, however ignorant of the route to take). Orestes does later say that it is to an unknown country that they have come (£gnwston ƒß g[n, 94); and, as in Helen, it is made clear that escape by any route except by sea would be impossible, owing to ignorance of the terrain as well as its dangerous nature (including bad roads).50 The geography may be ambiguous, but let us examine the few other details in Iphigenia which, Hall claims, reﬂect Herodotus’ description of the Taurians who inhabited the Chersonese.51 Herodotus, like Euripides, describes the Taurians’ custom of 49

Hall (1987) 430; Barnes (1694) ad loc. Iphigenia 884–9: pÎteron kat¤ cvrson, oÛc≥ naΩ | åll¤ pod0n Âip$i; | qan3twi pel3seiß £ra b3rbara fıla | ka≥ di’ ØdoŸß ånÎdouß ste≤cwn. (‘[Shall we go] on dry land, not on shipboard but with ﬂurry of feet? But in that case you would meet your end as you pass through barbarian tribes and roads that are no roads.’) 51 Hall (1987); (1989a) 110–12. 50

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sacriﬁcing shipwrecked sailors;52 and the Taurians’ nasty habits of impaling people on stakes or throwing them over cliﬀs are reﬂected in the threats which Thoas makes to the chorus and the escapees.53 But Hall pushes her case too far. It cannot really be said that the simple, imprecise mention of b3rbara fıla (‘barbarian tribes’) is to be taken as a reference to Herodotus’ more detailed catalogues of barbarian peoples,54 and these few scattered references are just not suﬃciently substantial or numerous to justify her claim that Iphigenia ‘was profoundly inﬂuenced, if not actually prompted, by Herodotus’ account of the Taurians’.55 In any case, Hall does not acknowledge the diﬀerence in detail between Herodotus and Euripides. For example, the character of Iphigenia is diﬀerent in each: in Euripides she is a priestess who returned to Greece in human form, but in Herodotus she is a goddess. Hall also claims, falsely, that decapitation features in both accounts; but in fact there is no sign of this practice in Euripides’ play.56 Once again, then, we have to conclude that Euripides’ Taurians are neither Herodotean nor well-deﬁned in any other sense. Another odd feature of these ‘foreign’ plays is that they contain hardly any foreigners: the Greek characters outnumber the natives. In Iphigenia there is only one major Taurian character (Thoas) and two minor ones (Herdsman, Messenger), while in Helen there are two Egyptians with substantial roles (Theoclymenus, Theonoe) and three lesser ones (Portress, two Messengers). More unexpectedly still, the choruses of both Helen and Iphigenia (and possibly of Andromeda also)57 are composed of Greek women, rather than indigenous inhabitants of the land in question.58 A foreign chorus was a signiﬁcant way of marking the setting, not just because of their very presence on 52

Hdt. 4.99–109: cf. Iphigenia 38–41, 72, 276–8, etc. Hdt. 4.103: cf. Iphigenia 1429. 54 Iphigenia 886–7; cf. Hdt. 4.16–29, 99–109: Hall (1989a) 112. 55 Hall (1989a) 134. 56 She arrives at this supposed parallel by mistranslating Euripides’ Greek (Iphigenia 74): see p. 185 below. 57 Andromeda fr. 117: f≤lai parqvnoi, f≤lai moi (‘Dear maidens! my dear friends!’), spoken by Andromeda to the chorus (S Ar. Thesm. 1015). Greek, Ethiopian, or other? 58 Contrast the use of foreign choruses elsewhere: Phrynichus’ Suppliants and Libyans, Aeschylus’ Egyptians and Suppliants, Euripides’ Phoenician Women, and so on. (See §2.3.6 above.) 53

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the scene, or whatever costumes and mannerisms they had, but because of their music (since there were distinct ethnic styles of music, singing and dancing in tragedy).59 Signiﬁcantly, it has been noted that all the genuinely foreign words and references to foreign speech in Euripides, but not in Sophocles or Aeschylus, are contained in the choral lyrics.60 The Greek choruses of the escape-tragedies are therefore unconventional: they seem to be another way in which Euripides has reduced the exoticism of his chosen settings, has made them even less foreign, by putting his foreigners in the minority. Furthermore, the presence of large numbers of Greek women in such remote, inaccessible regions is intrinsically unlikely and highly outré. Why on earth are they there? How did they arrive at these far-ﬂung regions at all, and why have they ended up, coincidentally, as attendants to the respective heroines?61 To sum up: Euripides’ presentation of Egypt and the Taurian land is very diﬀerent from what one might have expected. He (along with his audience) was almost certainly knowledgeable about Egypt and the Black Sea area; but, as far as the geographical data goes, these locations are drawn neither precisely nor coherently, and there is an almost total absence of distinctive local detail. Euripides has gone to great lengths to set these tragedies in the most outrageously exotic far-ﬂung settings imaginable, choosing and even specially adapting variant myths for the purpose: but, having established these settings, he then deliberately underplays and undermines them. One possible explanation for this strange treatment is that Euripides was not concerned to depict these regions for their own sake, but rather for what they represented in ﬁfth-century Athenian rhetoric. Many of Euripides’ contemporaries were accustomed to thinking about distant lands in terms of their 59

See n. 72 below. Bacon (1961) 115–20. Krausse (1905, 205) was the ﬁrst to suggest that Euripides relied on music for his ‘foreign eﬀects’. 61 Iphigenia 1109–10 suggests that the Greek women were taken in a piratical raid and sold to Thoas as slaves; why Thoas should have given them to Iphigenia (63–4) is unclear. Helen gives similarly little clue as to the origins of its chorus, though one presumes that they suﬀered a similar fate (191). The Greek women are attendants of Helen, but Hermes is not said to have borne them to Egypt along with Helen; no doubt that would have quite spoiled the eﬀect. Note that sometimes the chorus’ presence is explained (Aesch. Cho., Eur. Phoen., Ion, Iph. at Aulis). 60

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diﬀerence from Greek lands and peoples. As much recent work in this area has shown, stereotypical portrayals of foreign places and people were prevalent in ﬁfth-century discourse. In the next section I shall examine how, and why, the escape-tragedies react to this rhetoric. 3.3 ethnicity It is well known that Greeks of the ﬁfth century constructed their ethnic identity in two ways.62 First, there was the ‘aggregative method’ of self-deﬁnition, characterized by a panhellenic, unifying spirit, as expressed famously by Herodotus’ Athenians: aˆtiß d† tÏ }EllhnikÎn, ƒÏn ÒmaimÎn te ka≥ ØmÎglwsson, ka≥ qe0n Èdr»mat3 te koin¤ ka≥ qus≤ai ‡qe3 te ØmÎtropa (‘But then think of what it is to be Greek: it is common blood and common language, and the temples of the gods which we share, and rituals, and also similar customs’).63 Aggregative self-deﬁnition, encouraged by panhellenic festival activity, existed from the archaic period onwards. The second type of ethnic self-deﬁnition was ‘oppositional’, a method emphasizing ethnic diﬀerences rather than similarities. Historians’ and ethnographers’ descriptions of far-oﬀ lands, even when giving speciﬁc details of individual ethnic groups, used language designed implicitly and explicitly to mark a simple contrast: ‘we’—the Greeks—with ‘them’—foreigners. The central concept of Greek ethnic ideology of this type is contained in the word b3rbaroß, sometimes translated ‘barbarian’ but used to stand for any people, of any ethnic group, who were non-Greek.64 It has been argued convincingly that oppositional deﬁnition was a direct response to the Persian Wars in the early decades of the ﬁfth century, and that the dichotomy 62 On subjective and objective deﬁnitions of ethnicity, see Smith (1986) and (on Greek antiquity) J. Hall (1997). 63 Hdt. 8.144.2. 64 Peculiarly, this notion of a ‘universal foreigner’ is unique to Greek ethnicity. Even the strong national identity of the English in the early twentiethcentury did not give rise to quite the same sort of terminology, despite the widespread presence of such xenophobic views as those caricatured by Nancy Mitford: ‘Uncle Matthew’s four years in France between 1914 and 1918 had given him no great opinion of foreigners. “Frogs,” he would say, “are slightly better than Huns or Wops, but abroad is unutterably bloody and foreigners are ﬁends.” ’ (The Pursuit of Love, ch. 15.)

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was absorbed into all areas of rhetoric, politics and literature— but it came about (for whatever reason) that tragic drama in particular both embodied and created fundamental attitudes of oppositional identity.65 As Hall puts it, the standard rhetoric of tragedy contrasted a ‘single category’ of Greeks with a ‘single category’ of barbarians embodying the opposite values.66 Speciﬁc aspects of their foreignness were expressed using the same criteria as Herodotus’ aggregative deﬁnition of Greekness—descent, language, religion and culture. In the terms of this polarized rhetoric, ‘barbarians’ were completely unrelated to Greeks by blood ties; they communicated in chattering, incomprehensible languages; they worshipped strange gods in unfamiliar rituals; they were cruel, tyrannical, inferior in intellect and body; they wore ridiculous clothes; they were presented as everything that the Greeks were not (a logical impossibility).67 To Euripides and his audience, then, the Egyptians, Taurians and (perhaps) Ethiopians of the escape-tragedies, whatever their individual ethnic characteristics, were all to be viewed as b3rbaroi. Thus an obvious explanation of what seemed above to be strangely imprecise depiction of foreigners has been that Euripides’ purpose was to provide, not ethnographic entertainment, but rather embodiment of what, by 412, was a widespread ethnic viewpoint. It has been written that Euripides’ ‘underlying premise’ in writing plays such as Helen and Iphigenia was ‘the ascendancy of Hellas over the barbarian cultures at the edges of the earth’.68 There is indeed an extraordinarily large number of occurrences of the word b3rbaroß (often pejorative) in the plays: so there can be no doubt that Euripides was awake to the familiar question of ethnicity and concerned to make his audience acutely aware of the fact.69 65 In particular, the works of Hartog (1988) and Hall (1989a). Both methods of deﬁnition, the oppositional and the aggregative, are highly problematic rhetorical devices (on which see e.g. Hobsbawm [1992] 1–20): my interest here is not in the relative objectivity or truth of either method, but in the speciﬁc treatment of the ‘Greek versus barbarian’ dichotomy in the escape-tragedies. 66 Hall (1989a) 161. 67 Herodotus (2.35.2) wrote that the Egyptians were so peculiar that they were contrasted with the rest of mankind, not just the Greeks! 68 Hall (1989a) 113. 69 Examples of b3rbaroß (or cognates) abound, more or less evenly-spaced throughout the plays: in Helen, twenty-seven (131, 192, 224, 234, 257, 274, 276,

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But the obvious explanation may not always be the correct one; and, in fact, the way in which Euripides actually explores the question is surprisingly unfamiliar. Just as he evokes a foreign atmosphere of extreme exoticism only to ignore it, so he brings the ethnic question to the audience’s attention only to do something rather unexpected with it. In the escape-tragedies the standard dichotomy breaks down, and what one sees is not good, noble, splendid, familiar Greeks contrasted with rotten, cruel, savage, strange barbarians, as one might have expected, but something rather more peculiar and unsettling. One must acknowledge a certain degree of self-consciousness, even archness, in such remarks as that of Thoas, when he hears of Orestes’ matricide: ‘By Apollo! not even among barbarians would anyone have borne to commit such a deed!’ (⁄pollon: oÛd’ ƒn barb3roiß πtlh tiß £n, 1174). Both Theoclymenus and Thoas and the Taurians, bizarrely, refer to themselves as ‘barbarians’ rather than ‘Egyptians’ or ‘Taurians’,70 which is highly provocative. A tendency towards deconstruction of such polarities as ‘Greek’/‘barbarian’, ‘slave’/‘free’ (etc.), in line with the commonly perceived Zeitgeist of intellectual questioning and crisis at Athens, has already been observed in several late Euripidean tragedies;71 but I maintain that, in these particular plays, the questioning tendency shows itself, not just in such occasional raised voices of provocative query, but in a way that is seriously, radically subversive. Euripides’ attitude here is diﬀerent from that of many other ﬁfth-century writers and his 295, 501, 598, 600, 666, 743, 789, 800, 863, 864, 1042, 1100, 1117, 1132, 1200, 1258, 1380, 1507, 1594, 1608); in Iphigenia, ﬁfteen (31, 180, 417, 739, 629, 775, 886, 906, 1086, 1112, 1170, 1174, 1337, 1400, 1422). These numbers are extraordinarily high, and unmatched by any other Euripidean play. Bacon notes (1961, 10 n.7) that Euripides uses b3rbaroß or related words ten times as often as Sophocles and six times as often as Aeschylus: a highly suggestive statistic, which becomes even more suggestive when one realizes (as Bacon does not point out) that over 40 per cent of all these occurrences are in Helen and Iphigenia. Bacon also thinks (1961, 12) that occasionally in Euripides b3rbaroß loses all reference to nationality and comes to mean only ‘savage’, ‘evil’, or ‘cruel’: she cites as evidence Helen 501 and Iphigenia 31, 417, 739, 886. (But while these instances may certainly be pejorative, they are by no means simple: their cruelty, etc., is closely bound up with other aspects of their ethnicity and cannot be separated.) 70 Iphigenia 1174, 1422; Helen 1210, 1258. 71 Saïd (1984); Hall (1989a) 201–22.

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own work elsewhere. Whatever his purpose may have been, it was not to demonstrate the ascendancy of Hellas over the barbarians. Take the chorus, for instance. I mentioned (§3.1 above) the unexpected fact that the choruses are composed of Greek women, and the strangeness of their being present at all; but, even stranger still, the chorus of Iphigenia sing in a very unGreek way (179–81): åntiy3lmouß ∑id¤ß \mnwn t’ !siht$n soi b3rbaron åc¤n despo≤nai g’ ƒxaud3sw. To you, mistress, I shall respond with songs and the barbarian clamour of Asian hymns.

This oddity may perhaps be explained in terms of the musical ‘modes’ which were associated with the evocation of speciﬁc emotions,72 but this does not entirely explain away the oddity of Greeks who sing barbarian songs. Do the Greek chorus members adopt a characteristically foreign style of singing or dancing in the other odes, also? How are they dressed? It is fascinating to speculate. One might point out, also, that Helen (in the parodos of her play) calls for the chorus to come and sing with a Libyan ﬂute, which might mean that there is something distinctively un-Greek about their odes, as well.73 Later on, in the second stasimon of that play (the so-called ‘Magna Mater’ ode, representing a syncretism of Cybele, the Phrygian nature-goddess, with Greek worship of Demeter), with its mention of exotic musical instruments, rattling cymbals and Dionysiac revels, there are clear Oriental inﬂuences in subject72 See West (1992) 178–82. The Mixolydian and the ‘tense’ Lydian mode were thought suitable for women and for lamentation (Plato, Rep. 398e); the Ionian and the ‘slack’ Lydian mode were used for symposia. Morwood (1999, 166) explains that ‘[the chorus in Iphigenia] plan to demonstrate the intensity of their sorrow by singing in the Mysian or some other Asiatic mode’ (musical style); cf. Plutarch, De Audiendo 46b, which records that a chorus member was rebuked for laughing during the singing of a lament in the plaintive Mixolydian mode. Compare Cyclops 443 and Erechtheus fr. 370 Nauck for the association of Asiatic music with lamentation. 73 Helen 170–1: mÎloit’ πcousai L≤bun | lwtÏn (‘come with Libyan ﬂute’). Nevertheless, there are other ‘Libyan’ ﬂutes in Euripides which do not necessarily connote exoticism or barbarism: Iph. at Aulis 1036, Alc. 346, Heracles 684.

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matter and style, which might well have been expressed in performance.74 Language was indeed an important criterion in deﬁnitions of ethnic identity. All Greeks were supposed to speak the same language (Herodotus’ description above ignores the numerous dialects, some of which were mutually unintelligible to a substantial degree),75 while barbarians were supposed to converse in unintelligible tongues.76 Language diﬃculties are a stock-intrade of ancient (as well as modern) comedy: one thinks of the Triballian god in Aristophanes’ Birds, or the character called Pseudartabas in Acharnians, both of whom speak a sort of nonsense-language, half-Persian and half-Greek.77 But the fact that Greeks evidently found language diﬀerences humorous might explain why there is in tragedy little attempt to represent foreign speech. Aeschylus’ Persians contains various foreign names and items of vocabulary,78 and it is possible that other lost plays with exotic-sounding titles also did the same; but in general it is true to say that tragedy did not represent foreign language to the same extent or in the same way. All characters, whether Greek or barbarian, speak in Attic in the dialogue sections and break into other Greek dialects from time to time in the lyrics.79 It is hard to know what the actors sounded like, whether singing or speaking, but it is possible that a suggestion of foreignness could have been made in production, in a way which would naturally not show up in the text. This area of discussion is necessarily inconclusive, but there are a few indications from other plays which might give useful pointers. Two passages in particular have sometimes been taken to suggest that ‘normal’ Attic Greek was sometimes spoken with a discernible foreign accent. In Aeschylus’ Libation-Bearers, Orestes and Pylades 74

Helen 1301–68. See Hall (1989a) 152–3; Hartog (1988) 80–2. See e.g. Thucydides 3.94.5 (unintelligible Aetolians); Aesch. Cho. 563–4 (Phocian dialect); J. Hall (1997) discusses the role of language in constructing ethnicities. 76 The word b3rbaroß originally expressed purely linguistic diﬀerence (Homer used barbarÎfwnoß, Iliad 2.867), and only later came to express racial diﬀerence: this suggests that language is a most important means of deﬁnition. 77 Ar. Birds 1628–9, 1678–9; Ach. 100–104. 78 Aesch. Pers. 825–64, 900–2. 79 Notable instances in Greek tragedy where reference is made to foreign dialects or accents: Phoen. 1302–3 (the chorus), Rhesus 294–7 (a Trojan shepherd), Orestes 1395–7 (a Phrygian slave), Bacch. 158–9 (chorus). 75

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disguise themselves to gain entry into the royal palace; and Orestes adds: ‘We will both speak the language of Parnassus, mimicking the sound of the Phocian dialect.’80 But when it comes to the deception-scene (lines 653 ﬀ .), Orestes’ speech is, as before, written out in Attic, not Phocian. One could compare a passage in Euripides’ Phoenician Women where Jocasta refers to an utterance of the chorus as a ‘Phoenician cry’.81 This is just what one might expect, perhaps, from a chorus of Phoenicians, but the important point is that Jocasta claims to have heard a sound, in a passage of spoken Greek, which struck her as being distinctively Phoenician.82 Colvin’s survey of foreign speech in Greek drama concludes that in tragedy there was only a limited degree of ‘linguistic realism’, by which he means that reference to dialect was permissible, but oral representation of dialect was not. This is implied by the frequency with which the characters make self-conscious reference to foreign speech: there would, Colvin claims, have been no need to do so, if foreign pronunciation was actually being used.83 There is virtually no sign in the text of Helen or Iphigenia that the barbarian characters were characterized by means of linguistic diﬀerentiation. Thoas, Theoclymenus, Theonoe and the minor characters are no less articulate than the Greek characters, nor do they use any authentically foreign, or otherwise unusual, words or expressions. The only possible oddities (and these are triﬂing) occur in the speech of Theoclymenus: he utters more exclamations than the other characters (but, after all, Helen is a play of much surprise and suspense),84 and he uses one colloquial expression.85 But neither of these unusual features (if 80 Aesch. Libation-Bearers 563–4: £mfw d† fwn¶n ~somen Parnhss≤da | gl*sshß å”t¶n Fwk≤doß mimoumvnw. It may be that Aeschylus, by using fwn¶n and å”t¶n, is distinguishing between ‘accent’ and ‘dialect’: see Garvie (1986) ad loc. 81 Eur. Phoen. 301: Fo≤nissan bo¤n kl»ousa. 82 To illustrate what is meant, the scholiast quotes a passage from a lost Sophoclean play where a character’s speech is said to ‘smell’ Spartan: Retrieval of Helen, fr. 176 Radt (ka≥ g¤r carakt¶r aÛtÏß ƒn gl*sshi t≤ me | parhgore∏ L3kwnoß øsm$sqai lÎgou). 83 Colvin (1999) 74–89 (esp. 86). 84 Helen 1165 (_ ca∏re), 1176 extra metrum (πa), 1180 (∑&), 1204 (⁄pollon). 85 The colloquial particle da≤ following interrogative p0ß (Helen 1246): Dale (1967 ad loc.) says that this idiom ‘should not be banished from Eur.’, but there is a slight diﬃculty. The word is found elsewhere in Euripides (Cycl. 450; El. 244, 978, 1116, 1303; Ion 275; Iph. at Aulis 1443; Med. 339, 1012), but in all

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they are to be seen as unusual at all) can properly be said to mark out the speaker as barbarian. If it was (pace Colvin) possible for actors to speak Attic Greek in a Phocian, Phoenician or Spartan accent, it must also have been possible to speak in an Egyptian or Taurian accent. But, in any case, whether or not oral representation of accent was attempted, there is no reference to foreign speech in either play. So it seems that there was no audible diﬀerence between the Greeks and the other characters: Euripides’ ‘barbarians’ speak in beautiful, unmarked Greek iambics. An odd literary survival is a papyrus dating from the second century ad, which is an anonymous mime, Charition, clearly based on the Tauric Iphigenia.86 This is signiﬁcant in a number of ways. First, it strongly suggests that, in later antiquity at least, Euripides’ play was perceived to be about the ethnic contrast between Greeks and barbarians; second, it expresses the ethnic diﬀerence primarily through language and mutual incomprehension; third, it makes this diﬀerence extremely overt; fourth, it is comical. Euripides could not have made the language of his Taurians and Egyptians like that of Charition’s gibberishtalking foreigners, owing to tragic conventions—but would it not have been possible, if desired, to make more of linguistic traits? As for the lineage and descent of Euripides’ barbarians, a similar blurring of the expected boundary occurs. For we learn that, far from being of separate (inferior) stock, the royal family of Egypt has a place in Greek mythical genealogy. Grandfather Nereus and father Proteus were Greek sea-deities, mother Psamathe a Nereid who had earlier been unhappily married to Aiacus. The new king and his sister have Greek names— Theoclymenus and Theonoe—with Greek etymologies (‘famous because of a god’ and ‘knowledgeable about the divine’, respectively). No information is given about the ancestry of the invented Thoas, but he too has a Greek name, unattested in any cases except Cyclops and Helen the manuscripts record variants or are otherwise corrupt. It seems that da≤ was thought by editors, scribes (or others) to be improper tragic usage. Stevens (1976, 45) has more to say on da≤, which he identiﬁes as a colloquialism in this passage. Helen 1246 may be incongruous, then; but did Euripides mean it to be so, or should one emend to d’ aı, d¶, d’ oˆn vel sim.? The question is unanswerable. However, it cannot be said, on the basis of this single word, that Theoclymenus’ speech is markedly odd. 86 Page (1954) 336–49.

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local material, which (as we are painstakingly told) means ‘swift’.87 Not only their language and blood, but also their gods—Zeus, Artemis, Hera, Aphrodite, Hermes, Athena et al.—are Greek. This was probably not because Euripides was ignorant of foreign religious customs. I have argued above that Egypt and the Black Sea were at least moderately well known to Greeks of 412; the non-Greek gods worshipped in Egyptian and Taurian ritual, including Isis, Osiris, Amun and others, are discussed in some detail by Herodotus;88 and Euripides himself had written a satyrplay called Busiris—which proves at least some degree of acquaintance with Egyptian athanatology.89 But despite this knowledge, Euripides chose not to represent foreign gods, either in these plays or elsewhere in his tragedies.90 This may have been because, while satyr-drama was permitted to introduce foreign gods onto the stage (presumably in the form of grotesquely comical, anthropoid characters such as the Triballian god in Birds), tragedy was (largely) about the Olympian gods:91 anything else would be not only beneath the dignity of tragedy, but also impossible to ﬁt into its acknowledged theological system. (How could the supernatural workings of tragedy possibly have contained both foreign and Greek gods operating side-by-side? A theomachy would doubtless have resulted—but clearly tragic poets were not interested in exploring this possibility.) Another, more important reason for the presence of Greek gods in barbarian ritual was that Euripides was purposely Hellenizing his barbarians and barbarizing his Hellenes—as in various other ways. Edith Hall believes that at least one aspect of Taurian religious practice, as depicted in Iphigenia, is both authentic (according to 87 Helen 9–10, Iphigenia 31–3: on names and their (in-)appropriateness, see §4.4.5 below. 88 Herodotus (2.42–55; 4.58–60, 103–4) describes Egyptian, Scythian and Taurian gods and religious practices, including their possible similarities with, and inﬂuences on, Greek religion. H. suggests that there existed a certain tendency to identify Greek and Egyptian gods. 89 Eur. frr. 313–15 Nauck. 90 That is, except those foreign gods who had been integrated into Greek religion, such as Dionysus or—most notably—Artemis. 91 Thanatos in Alcestis is an exception; but this play may also be an exception to generic rules (see §1.1, p. 21 above). Prometheus in Aeschylus and Lyssa in Heracles are other non-Olympians in tragedy.

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Herodotus’ description, that is) and stereotypically barbarian (in the sense of cruel and savage). Orestes’ and Pylades’ ﬁrst sight of Artemis’ temple frightens them on account of its grisly decoration (69–75): OR. Pul3dh, doke∏ soi mvlaqra taıt’ e”nai qe$ß, πnq’ !rgÎqen naın pont≤an ƒste≤lamen; PU. πmoig’, O ∞ rvsta: so≥ d† sundoke∏n cre*n. OR. ka≥ bwmÎß, E ﬁ llhn o˜ katast3zei fÎnoß; PU. ƒx aÈm3twn goın x3nq’ πcei qrigk*mata. OR. qrigko∏ß d’ \p’ aÛto∏ß skıl’ Ør$iß ]rthmvna; PU. t0n katqanÎntwn g’ åkroq≤nia xvnwn. Orestes: Pylades, does this seem to you to be the temple of the goddess, for which we sailed here over the sea from Argos? Pylades: It does indeed, Orestes, and you must agree that it is so. Orestes: And is this the altar where Greek blood drips down? Pylades: Yes—at least, its copings are stained with blood. Orestes: And do you see spoils fastened underneath the copings themselves? Pylades: Yes—the ﬁrst-fruits of dead visitors.

It is the word skıla, ‘spoils’ (74), which is important. Hall interprets this word as a reference to Herodotus’ description of decapitation among the Taurians, translating it as ‘heads’. However, I cannot agree with this. She seems to be deliberately bending the meaning, in order to bolster her already tenuous case that Euripides is ‘enormously indebted’ to Herodotus.92 In fact, the details in each writer are quite diﬀerent—and not just where heads (or the lack of them) are concerned. Whereas Herodotus and Hall talk of severed heads fastened to the tops of buildings, Orestes and Pylades are clearly looking at spoils fastened to an altar.93 92 Hall (1989a) 111–12. The relevant passage from Herodotus is 4.103.1–3. Hall is followed by Morwood (1999) 3 (see also his notes on pp. 164–5): ‘And do you see the heads hung up under the coping?’ The display of decapitated heads was no doubt alien to the civilized ideals of 5th-cent. Athens, but it may not have been seen as an exclusively barbarian habit: a Sophoclean fragment (Oenomaus fr. 432 Radt) shows that Oenomaus treated the heads of Hippodamia’s suitors in such a manner. In Stesichorus’ Cycnus (fr. 207 Davies), the Thessalian son of Ares beheaded strangers and made their skulls into a temple to Phobos. 93 Hall is not alone in this mistake. One of the vase-paintings of Iphigenia (Trendall and Webster [1971] 3.3.32 = Leningrad inv. 2080/W.1033), a 4thcent. amphora by the Ixion painter, shows a severed head hanging from the architrave of the Taurian temple. So it seems that Herodotus (or other

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The temple itself, which is described in some detail, is extremely Greek in its architecture and ﬁttings. This is oddly incongruous: a temple of savage cult, miles from Greece, is neither decked out in barbarian decadence and splendour nor crudely built, but in every respect resembles a Greek building.94 So, in the wilds of the Black Sea region, there is a Greek temple, where a Greek goddess is worshipped in rites carried out by a Greek priestess: a curiously paradoxical situation. I shall return to this paradox, and attempt to explain it, later on in this section. The business of human sacriﬁce in Iphigenia has attracted some attention, for the text does not admit of easy interpretation.95 The majority of references seem to present a coherent picture of the doings at Artemis’ Taurian temple: Iphigenia presides at the sacriﬁce of Greeks, but other (male) attendants carry out the actual killing;96 and other visiting Greeks have indeed been sacriﬁced before Orestes’ and Pylades’ arrival.97 However, there are several incongruities. The ﬁrst description, in the prologue-speech (34–41), of knowledge of Taurian customs), as well as Euripides’ play, had an inﬂuence on the iconographic tradition. 94 Iphigenia 72–5, 96–99, 113–29, 1044–5, 1157–8, 1286. Bacon (1961, 132–6) describes the temple at length: it has Doric triglyphs, double doors, a stone base, columns, coping-stones, a cult statue in an inner room, and an altar in front. ‘All these, unless qualiﬁed by some suggestion of strangeness, could only remind a Greek audience of their own architecture (136).’ Bacon compares also the tombsanctuary at Theoclymenus’ palace in Helen (800–1), which is (she says) Greek in style. All this means that, when Pylades says to Orestes: ‘does this seem to you (doke∏) to be the right temple?’ (69), one might well suspect another incidence of the reality-illusion theme which is a preoccupation of the escape-tragedies (see §4.4 below). This building does not seem like a Taurian temple, but it is. (Or is it? . . .) 95 There are eighteen references to the Tauric ritual: Iphigenia 34–41, 53–4, 72, 225–8, 258–9, 342–3, 336–9, 384–91, 439–46, 456–8, 464–71, 584–7, 617–24, 725–6, 774–6, 1153–4. Grube (1961) 331–2, Diggle (1993), Sansone (1975) and (1978), Strachan (1976), and Cropp (2000) ad loc. discuss various disputed aspects of the text and suggested emendations. 96 Iphigenia 621–4; cf. 471–2 and 725–6 for similar details. 97 Iphigenia 53–4 (kåg° tvcnhn t&nd’ ©n πcw xenoktÎnon | tim0sa, ‘And I, in observance of this stranger-killing art which I practise . . . ’) implies an ongoing, frequent process (cf. 774–6). At 72–4 Orestes and Pylades see bloodstains; at 342–3 Iphigenia describes her former kindness to her Greek victims; at 584–7 she recounts the last moments of a recent Greek victim, who penned a letter for her.

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Iphigenia’s bloody duty is perhaps the most problematic of all, owing largely to textual diﬃculties: nao∏si d’ ƒn to∏sd’ Èervan t≤qhs≤ me: Òqen, nÎmoisin oÍsin ~detai qe¤ ⁄rtemiß, ‰ort[ß (toÇnom’ ¬ß kalÏn mÎnon: t¤ d’ £lla sig0, t¶n qeÏn foboumvnh) [q»w g¤r Ôntoß toı nÎmou ka≥ pr≥n pÎlei ß #n katvlqhi t&nde g[n E ﬁ llhn ån&r] kat3rcomai mvn, sf3gia d’ £lloisin mvlei [£rrht’ πswqen t0nd’ ånaktÎrwn qe$ß]. (S)he made me priestess in this temple: hence, by the customs which please the goddess Artemis, I preside over a festival (which is ﬁne in name only—for the rest of it, I keep silence out of respect for the goddess); [for, by the custom which this city has long since followed, I sacriﬁce every Greek man who reaches this land]. I preside, but the slaughter [a matter not spoken of within these precincts of the goddess] is a task carried out by others.

The ﬁrst question is: who is the subject of t≤qhsi (line 34)? The context leaves it ambiguous—was it Thoas or Artemis who put Iphigenia in her current diﬃcult position? Platnauer (ad loc.) believes that the subject is to be understood as Artemis; but perhaps Thoas is preferable, especially in the light of Iphigenia’s later declaration that the Taurians, being murderers themselves, impute their own wicked deeds to the goddess (toŸß d’ ƒnq3d’, aÛtoŸß Ôntaß ånqrwpoktÎnouß, ƒß t¶n qeÏn tÏ faılon ånafvrein dok0, 389–90). Nevertheless, it was certainly Artemis herself who brought Iphigenia here, and Artemis still allows the ritual to take place. Lines 37 and 38 here are deleted by Diggle, because the interval between ‰ort[ß (36) and its verb kat3rcomai (40) is overlong, creating grammatical awkwardness. It also might seem that q»w contradicts kat3rcomai: Iphigenia ‘presides over’ the ritual, but can she be said to ‘sacriﬁce’ the victims herself, since, as she says, the actual slaughtering is carried out by others? In fact, as it turns out, q»w must be capable of bearing either meaning. It more naturally refers to the physical act of slaughter, and is found in the play in just this sense,98 but it seems that the word can also quite normally refer to the act of presiding at the 98 Iphigenia 621–2: OR. aÛt¶ x≤fei q»ousa q[luß £rsenaß; | IF. oÇk: (Orestes: ‘Do you yourself, a woman, sacriﬁce the men with a sword? | Iphigenia: No . . .’).

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sacriﬁce, without actually wielding the knife: when Orestes asks Iphigenia who will sacriﬁce (q»sei) him, she replies that she will, for she holds this oﬃce of the goddess.’99 Thus there cannot be said to be a contradiction here, only a (perhaps calculated) ambiguity. A more serious diﬃculty is the use of the verb katvrcomai (39), seemingly in the sense of ‘arrive at’, which Diggle says is not to be found elsewhere.100 Sansone ﬁnds a parallel, but from Homeric Greek, which is not necessarily ‘acceptable tragic usage’ as he states.101 Sansone is eager to retain the bracketed lines for two reasons: ﬁrst, the fact that Greeks (in particular) are sacriﬁced has to be given here if the audience is to understand Iphigenia’s dream later in the prologue-speech; and second, the words ka≥ pr≥n (38) give the detail that the ritual is a longstanding custom. Markland transposes lines 38–9 to follow line 41, which (apart from breaking up the long, interrupted sentence structure from 36–40) is pointless. The excision of line 41 is a comparatively minor change: line 66 is virtually identical, and it adds nothing here, so has been thought to be an interpolation.102 Nevertheless, Sansone would preserve all the lines 34–41 intact.103 Whether excision is carried out or not, these lines do not directly contradict any information elsewhere in the play; but other problematic passages, confusingly, do. Two passages in particular have been taken to deny what is elsewhere amply stated—that Iphigenia has certainly sacriﬁced 99 Iphigenia 617–18: OR. q»sei d¶ t≤ß me ka≥ t¤ dein¤ tl&setai; | IF. ƒg*: qe$ß g¤r t&nde prostrop¶n πcw (‘Orestes: But who will brave the awful deed of sacriﬁcing me? | Iphigenia: I will: for this duty of the goddess is held by me’). 100 Diggle (1993) 56–9. 101 Sansone (1978) 38 quotes Od. 24.115. 102 Platnauer (1938, ad loc.) thought scribal; Page (1934, 76), less plausibly, histrionic. Cf. Cropp (2000, 175), who sees 40–1 as ‘an “informative” editorial interpolation’. 103 In order to do so, however, he makes a major emendation which has no basis in the manuscript (L): Sansone views lines 35–6 as peculiar in sense: for how could Iphigenia regard as ‘fair in name alone’ anything which is at the same time lawful? So S., believing that a negative has somehow been omitted, gives for 34–5 oÛd∞ ƒnnÎmoiß tima∏sin ~detai qe3. This is unnecessary, since there is a recurrent ambiguity, not only in this play but in the whole myth-ritual tradition (see Lloyd-Jones [1983a]), as to Artemis’ attitude to the sacriﬁce of the defenceless young. Compare Iphigenia 384–91 and 484–6 for contrasting attitudes within the play.

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other Greeks in the past. In the ﬁrst, Iphigenia is made to say, of Orestes and Pylades (258–9): crÎnioi g¤r ~kous’: oÛdvpw bwmÏß qe$ß E } llhnika∏sin ƒxefoin≤cqh Âoa∏ß. Their arrival is timely: the altar of the goddess has not yet been stained with streams of Greek blood.

Later, the Herdsman says to Iphigenia (336–9): hÇcou d† toi3d’, _ ne$ni, so≥ xvnwn sf3gia pare∏nai. k#n ånal≤skhiß xvnouß toio»sde, tÏn sÏn E ﬁ llaß åpote≤sei fÎnon d≤kaß t≤nousa t[ß ƒn AÛl≤di sfag[ß. It is for strangers like these, young mistress, that you have been praying to have as your victims. If you execute these strangers, Greece will be making amends for your murder and paying the price for your sacriﬁce at Aulis.

The ﬁrst of these is clearly a contradiction, and should be deleted (as Diggle, rightly, does).104 The second is not: it does not preclude the fact that Greek strangers have been to the temple before, and the stress must therefore be on toi3d’ (336): it is for strangers like these that she has been waiting—noble, heroic young men of the sort that went to ﬁght at Troy, necessitating her own sacriﬁce.105 Iphigenia, after all, desires revenge on the Greeks for her ‘death’ (357–8); the chorus, too, acknowledge this feeling, when they wish for Helen to come to the Tauric land so that their mistress may kill her (439–46). Sansone, bizarrely, elects to retain both of these problematic passages, on the grounds that Euripides ‘recognized that there were dramatic possibilities inherent in both situations, Iphigenia’s experience of having sacriﬁced previously and her not having sacriﬁced at all, and he tried to take advantage of both’.106 That Euripides made use of calculated ambiguity, in order to leave the audience in doubt as to Iphigenia’s frame of mind at any given point in the drama and to make them fear for 104

Emendations—Dobree’s o÷d’ åf’ o˜, Heath’s ƒx Òtou—fail to convince. Diggle adopts Mekler’s hÇcou (for ms. eÇcou). Cropp (2000, 197) retains the imperative (cf. El. 563–5, Ion 423), because the imperfect makes this the only passage suggesting that Iphigenia previously relished her job. Either way, this problem is less important than the other inconsistencies. 106 Sansone (1978) 43. 105

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Orestes’ life, is an attractive theory and would be entirely characteristic; but one must be careful to distinguish between ambiguity and contradiction. What the text actually provides, as it stands, is the latter, the eﬀect of which is not dramatically enhancing, but confused and obfuscatory. It seems likely, rather, that some bowdlerizing interpolation has taken place at some stage in the transmission of the text, by someone who found the idea of a Greek-hating, Greek-murdering, ‘barbarian’ Iphigenia unattractive. Iphigenia’s prayer to Artemis, dvxai qus≤aß | 4ß Ø par’ Óm∏n nÎmoß oÛc Øs≤aß | †ﬁ Ellhsi didoŸß† ånafa≤nei (‘receive these sacriﬁces which †our Greek custom clearly declares† unholy’, 464–6) seems, despite its textual crux, to provide a reminder that Greece considers human sacriﬁce abhorrent. But this cannot be read as a straightforward comment reﬂecting Greek-versus-barbarian ethnicity. Iphigenia may complain about the necessity of sacriﬁce, here and elsewhere,107 but she also seems to welcome the opportunity, as we have seen:108 and, unwilling or not (as one might choose), she still performs her rites and never mentions having considered refusing her ‘duty’. Far more importantly, we are reminded frequently throughout the play of another human sacriﬁce carried out by a Greek— Iphigenia’s own sacriﬁce, at Aulis in Greece, by her father Agamemnon! There are a dozen references to the scene at Aulis, in which Iphigenia keeps recalling the terror and the agony of the experience,109 and the parallelism between Iphigenia’s sacriﬁce and Orestes’ narrowly-averted fate is clearly emphasized.110 Greek custom and conventional Greek rhetoric might well consider such deeds unholy and barbarous, but Euripides’ Greeks nevertheless perform these deeds.111 More paradox abounds in Thoas’ kingdom, not only in the area of religion but also in its politics. The place where the 107

Cf. Iphigenia 36 (for which see above) and 389–91. Iphigenia 336, 357–8, 439–46. 109 Iphigenia 6–9, 19–24, 26–29, 178, 210–17, 358–71, 565–6, 770–1, 783–7, 854–5, 1082–3, 1418. 110 This theme has been discussed at length by Sansone (1975) 283–5; Hartigan (1986) 119–21; Strachan (1976); O’Brien (1988). 111 Cf. Croally (1994) 77–8: ‘The problems involved in the maintenance of one polarity (man/god) infect the security of another (Greek/barbarian).’ 108

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Taurians live is repeatedly described as a polis,112 and, although they have a king, they are nonetheless peculiarly referred to as ‘citizens’.113 But such political structures were supposed to be characteristically Greek. Barbarians looked distinctively bizarre: that is, their manner of depiction in ancient art, in paintings, vases and sculptures, invariably contrasts them with Greek aesthetic ideals. In these media, barbarians appeared ugly, squat, small-featured, comical, sometimes dark-skinned; they sported strange, stripey clothes and comical millinery. To judge by vase-paintings inﬂuenced by drama, it seems that theatrical costumes were often distinctive and elaborate.114 But since Euripides nowhere describes the appearance of any barbarian character—either their physiognomy or their apparel—we cannot know how they looked on stage. There is no reason why the plays should metatheatrically draw attention to the costumes unless there is a speciﬁc dramatic point in so doing at any given moment. Were Thoas, Theoclymenus, Theonoe and the barbarian servants dressed as stereotypical barbarians? One would have thought it possible, even probable, but it is not at all certain.115 Attention is seldom drawn to the visual appearance of the characters, but sometimes the absence of description may be suggestive. The Portress in Helen knows at once that Menelaus is Greek, even before he has spoken: does he have a distinctively Hellenic appearance, even though he is—at this stage—clothed in tattered rags (437–40)? It seems not; for Helen shortly afterwards complains that he has a ‘savage look’ about him, this man who is chasing her (£grioß dv tiß | morf¶n Òd’ ƒst≥n Òß me qhr$tai labe∏n, 544–5). Similarly, Menelaus cannot tell from her appearance whether Helen is Greek or Egyptian, so has to enquire.116 112

Iphigenia 38, 220, 463–6, 595, 877, 1212, 1214. Iphigenia 1226, 1417 (pol≤taiß), 1422 (åsto≥). 114 On this subject, see Taplin (1993) 21–9; Webster (1967); Trendall and Webster (1971). One of the vase-paintings of Andromeda (Trendall and Webster [1971] 3.3.10 = Berlin inv. 3237) shows Andromeda and Cepheus in non-Greek headgear, but otherwise the paintings of the escape-tragedies show unremarkable, Greek-style costumes. 115 Ley (1991, 33–4), dealing with this aspect of the production of Helen, is extremely speculative. 116 Helen 561 (omitted by L; the line is restored from Ar. Thesm. 910): E } llhn≥ß e” tiß ∂ p ∞ icwr≤a gun&; (‘Are you a Greek woman or native to this place?) 113

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The same situation occurs in Iphigenia, where the siblings Orestes and Iphigenia are unable to tell each other’s nationality by looking at—or, surprisingly, from talking to—each other. In the end, the main indication for Orestes is that Iphigenia displays a suspiciously large amount of knowledge about her native Greece.117 Nevertheless, Iphigenia had earlier asked the Herdsman where he thought the strangers had come from, in a way which implies that their appearance would have given them away.118 Bodily appearance was meant to be a sure sign of one’s ethnicity; but in plays where a constant theme is the discrepancy between seeming and being, where not everything is as it seems, perhaps one ought not to be too surprised at this ambiguity.119 More deceptive appearances abound. Teucer’s description of Theoclymenus’ palace, for instance, has been seen to represent typical barbarian luxury and decadence:120 t≤ß t0nd’ ƒrumn0n dwm3twn πcei kr3toß; Plo»tou g¤r o”koß £xioß proseik3sai, bas≤lei3 t’ åmfibl&mat’ eÇqrigko≤ q’ 1drai.121 Who is master of this imposing palace? Why, one might well compare it to the house of the god Wealth, looking at its royal battlements and its walls with their solid coping!

But can this really be said to be typically Egyptian or typically barbarian? After all, tragic tyrants, whether Greek or barbarian, all live in rich houses: wealth, and display of wealth, is an attribute of royalty and a status-symbol. To say that ‘tyrannical’ behaviour is characteristic of barbarians was a topos of Athenian political philosophy (although there were plenty of Greek tyrants),122 but the situation in tragedy is more complicated. 117 Iphigenia 495–541: Cropp (2000) 201 has some remarks on the place of question-answering scenes in what he calls ‘recognition-and-intrigue’ plays. 118 Iphigenia 246: podapo≤; t≤noß g[ß sc[m∞ πcousin oÈ xvnoi; (‘Where are they from? What country’s appearance do these strangers present?’). Note that sc[m’ is Monk’s conjecture, replacing L’s Ônom’. 119 Again, see §4.4 below on this aspect. 120 Hall (1989a) 127; Hartog (1988) 322–30. 121 Helen 68–70. The description is later echoed by Menelaus (430–3), where, again, wealth is stressed. 122 Saïd (1984, 29) lists barbarian richesse as one deﬁning characteristic of the breed, mentioning Theoclymenus’ palace in particular. Hall (1989a, 154–5) says that terms such as t»rannoß, £nax and basile»ß in tragedy frequently bear pejorative overtones: but, while this may be true to a certain extent, monarchy and its language cannot be seen as speciﬁcally barbarian. Cf. Podlecki (1984) 83–99.

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Democracy may often provide an implicit inﬂuence on tragic rhetoric, but in tragedy there are few democrats:123 all the major characters, whether barbarian or (as usually) Greek, are from royal houses and may be described as t»rannoi, ‘tyrants’—with or without the pejorative connotation of the word. Thus, when Teucer and Menelaus draw attention to the elaborate appearance of Theoclymenus’ palace, it seems unlikely that they are making a comment on barbarian, despotic decadence, or that the audience is meant to interpret the description (which, after all, is less than three lines in length) as implicit ethnic or ideological commentary. It may be that Teucer’s surprise is due to no more than his unexpectedly ﬁnding an important-looking building, after a wearisome period of wandering about a completely unfamiliar country. Nor, one might add, is the description of the palace distinctively Egyptian or ‘foreign’: the building is rich and elaborate, with an encircling wall and coping to the roof, but such buildings existed in Greece. One is, naturally, reminded of the Greek-looking temple in Iphigenia. Egypt and the Tauric land, it is emerging, would have seemed disturbingly Hellenic to the Athenian audience of 412. When one examines the behaviour of the barbarian characters, there emerges a similar pattern. It is diﬃcult to describe any of the Egyptians or Taurians as brutal, alien or inferior to the Greek characters: the stereotypes do not correspond to this particular Euripidean reality.124 Barbarians were supposed to be hostile to Greeks; but Helen explains that all the Egyptians are friendly towards her (p3nteß f≤loi moi, 314). When Menelaus presumes that she must have been ill-treated by the barbarians, she replies emphatically in the negative, and her husband’s reaction is one of great surprise.125 123 Exceptions include Theseus in Eur. Suppl., Demophon in Hcld., and the king in Aesch. Suppl. 124 Nevertheless, most critics would disagree with me: as well as the inﬂuential view of Hall (1989a), which I go on to discuss, Burnett (1960, 157) describes Theoclymenus as ‘a cruel despot, willing to break any law, human or divine’; Podlecki (1970, 415) believes that attempts to absolve Theoclymenus of guilt represent ‘misguided critical ingenuity’; Segal (1971, 584) thinks that Theoclymenus ‘completely fulﬁls the possibilities of a bizarre, outré idiosyncrasy that one might expect of an Egyptian monarch.’ 125 Helen 600–1: qaım’ πst’ (‘It is marvellous!’). Is is too far-fetched to see in this an arch allusion to the ‘great and marvellous deeds’ (πrga meg3la ka≥

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We have already learnt in the prologue to Helen that Proteus, the late king of Egypt, was a good, noble and wise man—the most virtuous man in the world, in Zeus’ opinion (p3ntwn . . . swfronvstaton brot0n, 47)!—although, surely, such qualities are scarcely associated with non-Greeks.126 Then there is the Portress at Theoclymenus’ palace: an unfortunate quarrel takes place when she ﬁrst encounters Menelaus at the palace doors, but it transpires that she was just trying to ward him oﬀ for his own good, lest her feared master Theoclymenus should catch him: her grim exterior is adopted to disguise the fact that she actually likes Greeks (eÇnouß g3r ejm’ E ﬁ llhsin, 481)! Like so many characters in Helen, she is not what she seems. Theonoe, too, is a ‘good’ barbarian who, like her father, embodies characteristically Greek virtues: her heart contains a huge shrine of Justice (1002); it is her nature and her wish to show piety to the gods (998); she is wise, omniscient, and helpful to Helen and Menelaus to the extent that she even endangers her own life. Even Theoclymenus is not as barbaric as he might have been. The play’s plot and structure demands that he should pose a threat to the safety of Helen and Menelaus, but he is not as formidable an enemy as he seems.127 Both Helen and the Portress remark that Theoclymenus kills any Greek whom he catches near his house, but we never see any evidence of this. Menelaus is treated with respect and fairness, even though he is deceiving his host. Helen says to Teucer, rather obliquely, that he ‘must not seek to discover the reason’ for Theoclymenus’ supposed qwmast3) of Herodotus (1.1 pr.) which were supposed to be amazing characteristics of barbarians? 126 Quite the opposite: Greeks were wise, just, prudent, virtuous; barbarians were foolish, arbitrary, unjust, wicked by nature, according to Greek ethical thinking. Cf. Plato, Rep. 427e10–11, 444b7–8. The Scythian Anacharsis in Herodotus (4.46.1) is the exception that proves the rule: oÇte g¤r πqnoß t0n ƒntÏß toı PÎntou oÛd†n πcomen probalvsqai sof≤hß pvri oÇte £ndra lÎgion o÷damen genÎmenon, p3rex toı Skuqikoı πqneoß ka≥ !nac3rsioß (‘it cannot be said that a single one of the tribes in the Black Sea region possesses any wisdom, nor do we know of any distinguished person from that region, except for the Scythian Anacharsis’). 127 Burnett (1971, 97) interprets the ‘diminishment of the villain’ as a structural device: ‘it entirely destroys the kind of suspense ordinarily generated by scenes of intrigue, leaving a kind of emotional vacuum which the poet has ﬁlled in this case only with verbal wit.’ This may or may not be true; but far more prominent is the manipulation of ethnic attitudes which is eﬀected by this presentation of the tyrants.

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bloodthirstiness, and that she will not tell him.128 Teucer does not seem to think this odd: perhaps one just came to expect that sort of inexplicable, odd behaviour from barbarians. Theoclymenus, like his sister, is reverent towards the gods—we learn in the prologue that his name was given to him for that very reason,129 and we see that he behaves piously throughout. Although he is eager to marry Helen, he never assaults her, nor violates her supplication at Proteus’ altar. Helen professes to fear such an event, talking of Theoclymenus’ outrageous behaviour (\briß, 784–5), but there is no evidence that she has any real cause for fear. Perhaps her former experience of treatment at the hands of men, or her feeling that even suicide is preferable to being married to a barbarian, is to blame: who can say?130 Theoclymenus’ love, or one might perhaps call it physical longing, for Helen is in no doubt; it is referred to throughout the play, sometimes in the form of metaphors or imagery from hunting.131 But how to interpret his attentions? Hall’s view is that they represent ‘the barbarian male’s generic lust for Greek females’;132 but this ignores certain factors. First, Helen is most decidedly a special case: she is not just any Greek female, after all, but the most beautiful woman in the world: would not anyone, Greek or barbarian, pursue her with a view to marriage? (The answer, given in the play and in just about every extant work of Greek literature, is of course: Yes.133) Nor has Theoclymenus actually 128 Helen 156–7: Òtou d’ 1kati m&te sŸ z&tei maqe∏n | ƒg* te sig0. Dale (1967, ad loc.) says, literal-mindedly, that the reason is Theoclymenus’ fear that someone will carry Helen oﬀ (cf. 1175–6); but this does not entirely explain the odd means of expression here. 129 Helen 9–10: Diggle’s text, following Nauck, brackets these lines (they will not scan properly and may be inauthentic on other grounds). Dale (1967, ad loc.) comments that ‘the etymology does not work very well, nor is the description suitable to the age or the conduct of the new king’; but she is mistaken. In the ﬁrst place, many of Euripides’ etymologies are atrocious, to the extent that one often suspects ironic or even punning intent (in the escape-tragedies, there is also Thoas’ weak etymology at Iphigenia 32–33; cf. also Ion 661–3, Bacch. 367, Rhesus 158–9). In the second place, contrary to what Dale believes, the play shows that Theoclymenus’ conduct towards the gods is indeed reverent, quite living up to his name. 130 See Helen 296–302 for her feelings on the matter. (But one should not, of course, succumb to the ‘documentary fallacy’.) 131 Helen 62–3; 541–3; 1170–1. 132 Hall (1989a) 113 (my italics). Cf. Austin (1994, 162) on Theoclymenus’ ‘un-Hellenic lust’. 133 Cf. Hom. Il. 3.156–7: oÛ nvmesiß Tr0aß ka≥ eÛkn&midaß !caioŸß | toi[id’ åmf≥

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forced his attentions on Helen. She fears that he might— possibly thinking, like Edith Hall, of the generic characteristics of barbarians—but all that he has done is to make his interests known. Perhaps this behaviour is to be called hybristic because Menelaus is still alive, or because Theoclymenus as a barbarian ought to have known his place. But if Theoclymenus had been a stereotypically barbaric barbarian, without regard for decency or piety, he would have raped Helen, suppliant or not;134 and if he had lusted after Greek females in general, he would have raped the members of the chorus (who are only slaves and not, like Helen, an aristocratic house-guest). After all, Theoclymenus is a despot, and there is nothing to prevent him from doing anything he wants—but he refrains from such shocking anomie. In the scene of dialogue between Helen and her Egyptian suitor (1186 ﬀ .) a number of questions arise. First: had Theoclymenus always been hell-bent on killing all the itinerant Greeks who came his way? It is implied strongly that his decision came about only from the time when he decided to marry Helen; for there are only two possible reasons, according to Theoclymenus, why any Greek should come to Egypt. Either he would be a spy, or he would try to steal Helen (1175–6). But when he actually encounters Menelaus, whom Helen introduces as a Greek sailor, he makes no attempt to kill him, because Helen persuades him that this Greek is no threat. Theoclymenus is kind and considerate to Helen, he makes no attempt to leap on her, even though she is no longer in supplication, he rejoices when Helen tells him that at last she has agreed to marry him, and he readily acquiesces in her plan to give Menelaus a bogus burial at sea, and willingly takes instruction: s» moi s&maine, pe≤somai d’ ƒg* (‘show me what I must do, and I will obey’, 1256). It is right, says Theoclymenus, that he should foster piety in his own wife (prÏß Óm0n £locon eÛseb[ trvfein, 1278): a restatement of Theoclymenus’ own religious character and a reversal of the expected pattern of civilized Greek versus uncivilized barbarian. Theoclymenus is, admittedly, angry when he learns of the gunaik≥ polŸn crÎnon £lgea p3scein (‘no one could blame the Trojans and the wellgreaved Achaeans for suﬀering toils for such a long time for the sake of such a woman’). 134 Cf. Hdt. 3.80.5: Otanes says that one of the greatest crimes of the generic tyrant is that he rapes women (bi$tai guna≤kaß).

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escape of Helen and Menelaus: but he has, after all, been duped in a particularly unfair and upsetting manner by a woman whom he had hoped to marry, and a great number of his own countrymen have been slaughtered in the process. He rushes to murder his sister out of vengeance, which is sometimes said to be another act of barbarian cruelty and impulsive violence; but the reason which Theoclymenus gives for his putative fratricide, we ﬁnd, is justice (Ó d≤kh kele»ei m’, 1628). ‘No! unjust,’ we may object—but how many other, Greek characters in tragedy commit terrible acts out of a sense of perceived ‘justice’ which is later brought into question? Is Theoclymenus really so diﬀerent? Then, just how stupid is Theoclymenus? Barbarian backwardness and intellectual inferiority was a commonplace,135 and it has been thought that the king is a stereotypically blockheaded, guileless character, whom the Greek characters, without much diﬃculty, deceive.136 But this assessment is not quite accurate. Certainly Helen’s persuasive charms have the desired result; but there are other reasons apart from stupidity why Theoclymenus might have granted her request. As we shall see in a later chapter,137 it is not just barbarians who succumb to the power of persuasive rhetoric and deceptive appearances. Mutual ignorance of religious customs is another explanation: Theoclymenus is persuaded that the usual paraphernalia of Greek obsequies includes a ship, because he knows no better.138 His ignorance may perhaps strike the audience as stupidity, but it is largely pardonable. Another reason for Theoclymenus’ compliance is that he wants to please Helen, whose charms and guile extend beyond the norm. But, certainly, the tyrant’s reaction on learning that Helen has disappeared again seems naïve: ‘How? Did she ﬂy away, or go by 135 Compare Andromeda fr. 139, in which [Perseus] comments on the limitations of the barbarian mentality: aja∏, t≤ dr3sw; prÏß t≤naß strefq0 lÎgouß; | åll’ oÛk #n ƒndvxaito b3rbaroß f»siß. Also similar is Hecabe 1129–31; cf. Plato, Rep. 4.435e6 on barbarian stupidity. 136 Hall (1989a) 122: ‘IT and Helen both include long deception scenes in which Greek characters demonstrate their intellectual ascendancy over barbarian foes.’ Vellacott’s highly tendentious translation (1973) of Helen (esp. 1171: ƒg° d’ ƒmautÏn pÎll’ ƒloidÎrhsa d&, ‘I’ve just been calling myself a fool’) corresponds to such a view. 137 See §4.4 below. 138 Helen 1210–79, esp. 1246 (lvleimmai t0n ƒn E ﬁ llhsin nÎmwn, ‘I am most unfamiliar with Greek customs’).

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foot?’ he cries.139 Since he gave her the ship in question, such a query might indeed strike one as foolish; even when the messenger explains a few lines later that the Greeks sailed oﬀ in a ship, Theoclymenus is slow to grasp the signiﬁcance of this. So perhaps Theoclymenus is to be viewed as intellectually inferior to the Greek ideal. However, the Greeks do not precisely measure up to these ideals, either. Helen is intellectually nimble, but Menelaus is rather dull. He emerges from the scene of argybargy with the Portress (437–82) without much credit, and he is hopelessly bewildered by Egypt and the situation which he ﬁnds there. What! he thinks. Is there a man called Zeus living by the banks of the Nile? . . . And are there two places called Sparta, two Troys? He is at a loss.140 While intellect and command of rhetoric were not characteristics necessarily associated with every hero of the Homeric type, the absence of these qualities does not exactly show Menelaus up in a good light, especially when comparison between him and the barbarian king can so easily be made. The Greeks, it is true (both here and in Iphigenia), still manage to outwit their foes, but the contrast between clever Greeks and stupid barbarians is not at all clearcut. Thoas, the only principal barbarian in Iphigenia, like Theoclymenus and Theonoe turns out to be surprisingly courteous, piously religious and—dare one suggest it?—Greek in his behaviour. Unlike Theoclymenus, he is not eager to take the heroine as his bride, nor does it seem that he compels Iphigenia to oﬃciate in the temple against her wish.141 He readily acquiesces in Iphigenia’s fraudulent rituals purely from 139 Helen 1516: ptero∏sin årqe∏s’ ∂ pedostibe∏ pod≤; Kannicht (1969, 2.401) places this in a class of ‘ironische åd»nata’, comparing Hec. 1263–5. Theoclymenus’ words may seem naïve or silly, but in fact the form of expression, with its evocation of ﬂight and mobility, is relevant: see §3.4 below. The line also echoes the Servant’s words of 605–6: bvbhken £locoß s¶ prÏß ajqvroß ptuc¤ß | årqe∏s’ £fantoß (‘your wife is gone: she was raised up and disappeared into the folds of the air’). 140 Helen 491–4. Dale (1967, xi–xii) even (wrongly, I think) ﬁnds a ‘halfcomic tone in the depiction of Menelaus’ bewilderment’. I return to this passage, and the interpretation of Menelaus’ character, in more detail in §4.4 below. 141 But it may be signiﬁcant that, as we have seen, the text makes it unclear whether Artemis or Thoas made Iphigenia a priestess (see discussion of Iphigenia 34 above).

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motives of religious devotion, and like Theoclymenus, although he is ignorant of Greek religion, he is ready to be instructed in the right thing to do.142 He allows Iphigenia free rein to do as she thinks ﬁt: t¤ t[ß qeoı pr$ss’ ƒp≥ scol[ß kal0ß (‘Perform the goddess’s rituals properly, at your leisure’, 1220). Thoas trusts Iphigenia because she is a priestess, although, as she ironically tells him, one can never trust a Greek.143 Thoas understands her to mean that Orestes and Pylades cannot be trusted—so it seems that he does not quite think of Iphigenia as a Greek—but he will soon learn the truth. Thoas’ reversion to type comes, like that of Theoclymenus, at the end of the play, when he learns that he has been duped: he threatens to throw the escapees over a cliﬀ or to impale them, as soon as he catches them (1428–30), and promises to ‘punish’ the chorus members whenever he has leisure (poinasÎmesqa, 1433). But when Athene ex machina orders Thoas to quell his anger, he complies without demur, saying that he is not angry—why should he be (1474–8)? Hall’s view is that Thoas and Theoclymenus ‘seem to have been created precisely in order to provide an opportunity for exploring vices stereotypically imputed to the barbarian character.’144 But as we have seen, these vices are not exploited but signiﬁcantly played down. So it cannot really be said that they were created precisely in order to do something which they do not, in fact, do. Iphigenia, on the other hand, is surprisingly barbaric, as we have already seen with regard to her participation in the Tauric ritual. When Iphigenia tells Thoas that she hates the whole of Greece (p$s3n ge misoıs’ }Ell3d’ ~ m’ åp*lesen, 1187), the immediate context leads one to interpret this remark ironically: she is, after all, in the process of deceiving Thoas into giving her a ship in which to escape, and she will naturally employ every persuasive rhetorical device to hand, however mendacious. But left open is the distinct possibility that Iphigenia really does hate 142

Iphigenia 1188–219. Note esp. 1217: t≤ cr& me dr$n; (‘what must I do?’). Iphigenia 1205: pistÏn E } ll¤ß o”den oÛdvn. Saïd (1984, 43) sees in this remark a provocative reference to Hdt. 8.142, „ß barb3rois≤ ƒsti oÇte pistÏn oÇte ålhq†ß oÛd†n (‘among barbarians there is no such thing as truth or honesty’): another way, in other words, in which Euripidean Greeks are seen to have barbarian characteristics. (It is interesting to note that Herodotus’ Persians [1.138] consider lying to be one of the gravest sins.) 144 Hall (1989a) 103. 143

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Greece and the Greeks, on account of her treatment at their hands. She may express regret and nostalgia (although less frequently than do the chorus members), but her feelings for her native country are by no means unambiguously warm. She is sometimes said to be compassionate;145 but her kindly attitude towards Greeks vanishes as soon as she thinks that the last of her surviving relatives is dead—so it is primarily her family, not Greeks in general, for whose company she yearns. Iphigenia has become savage, as she explicitly confesses (]gri*meqa, 348). Eventually, on her last appearance at the end of the play—when she has left the Tauric land and is sailing for Greece again!—she is seen as a witch, uttering loud barbarian shrieks.146 In the last two sections I have illustrated the nebulous and imprecise way in which the exotic regions of the escape-tragedies are evoked, as well as the highly unusual treatment of barbarians. Exoticism and ethnic stereotypes are underplayed and subversively undermined. Rather than exploiting the familiar tragic contrast between Greeks and barbarians, Euripides has chosen to play on the ideas and perceptions of his audience, deconstructing this dichotomy and producing an eﬀect which is paradoxical and unsettling: we have to question our assumptions and perhaps draw disturbing conclusions. But what sort of conclusions? Why has Euripides confronted us with barbarians to whom we have to respond in this odd way? We can fall back, if we like, on the fairly common explanation that Euripides is simply a provocative playwright, who wants to prompt awkward questions or provide ‘clever’, piquant entertainment. However, I think that the matter can be pursued a little further, so as to link the plays’ ethnicity to their other themes. One explanation for the erosion of the Greek-versusbarbarian distinction is to be found in religious ritual. When discussing Iphigenia above (p. 186) I noted that ‘in the wilds of the Black Sea region, there is a Greek temple, where a Greek goddess is worshipped in rites carried out by a Greek priestess: a 145

Strachan (1976) 138; Sansone (1978) 44. Iphigenia 1336–7: ånwlÎluxe ka≥ kat[ide b3rbara | mvlh mage»ous’ (‘she howled aloud and started reciting barbarian chants, behaving as a witch’). Cropp (2000) ad loc. detects an ‘amusing’ reference to magical incantations, in which foreign-sounding names and terms were often used, but I ﬁnd the description rather more chilling. 146

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curiously paradoxical situation’. This summary is only partially true, because this is a deliberate paradox, which reﬂects the character of both Artemis and Iphigenia. Artemis is a Greek goddess, but she is also a Taurian goddess; Iphigenia is a Greek heroine, but she is also deﬁned by her role in the Taurian cult, as well as being, in both Taurian and Attic cult, a goddess comparable with (or, in some sense, identical to) Artemis herself. It is possible to read Iphigenia as an extended aetiology for Artemis-worship, which explains certain ‘darker’ aspects of the ﬁfth-century Attic cults at Halae and Brauron.147 The play’s religious message is concerned with the integration of Greek and barbarian elements: when Orestes brings both Iphigenia and Artemis from the wilds of the Taurian land to civilized Greece, it is symbolic of a fusion of cultures. This explanation might suggest a largely positive, aﬃrmatory interpretation of the plays: Euripides is, it seems, reminding us that Greek culture, despite its oppositional, polar rhetoric of ‘self’ versus ‘other’, does in reality contain a mixture of elements (racial, linguistic, religious, mythical) from diﬀerent ethnic origins. Similarly, it is fairly clear that Andromeda was (literally) about the marriage of Greek and Ethiopian. However, this positive explanation is not the only one available to us. Helen, in contrast with the other escape-tragedies, is not at all concerned (either in its closing aetiology or elsewhere) with the integration of Greek and foreign elements—which suggests that the explanation for Euripides’ ethnic paradoxes may be more complicated than cultural or religious ecumenism. Why else might Euripides have presented his audience with barbarized Greeks and Hellenized barbarians? Another explanation may lie in contemporary intellectual ideas about identity, language and knowledge. Euripides was not alone in debating these issues. Antiphon the sophist, at roughly the same time as the escape-tragedies were produced, had doubted the diﬀerence between Greeks and barbarians, arguing that there is nothing at all in nature to diﬀerentiate the two and that it is all a matter of nomenclature.148 This argument seems to have come from his 147

I return, brieﬂy, to this aspect of the play in §5.2 below. Antiphon (DK 87 B44b, col. 2, 7–27): ƒn to»twi d† prÏß åll&louß bebarbar*meqa, ƒpe≥ f»sei p3nta p3nteß Ømo≤wß pef»kamen ka≥ b3rbaroi ka≥ E ﬁ llhneß e”nai. skope∏n d† parvcei t¤ t0n f»sei Ôntwn ånagka≤wn p$sin ånqr*poiß: por≤sai te 148

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treatise On Truth, which was—like the escape-tragedies—concerned with the relationship between reality and our perceptions of it.149 The deconstruction of the ‘self’-versus-‘other’ antithesis in these plays is, I believe, linked to the plays’ epistemological and ontological themes which I shall discuss in the next chapter. Euripides is using geography and ethnicity, along with other features of myth and plot, to explore the possibility that nothing is as it seems. In the escape-tragedies (not just Helen), the notion that we can know anything at all about our identity, or about anything else that we formerly took for granted, is subjected to serious pressure. ‘Self’ and ‘other’, ‘Greek’ and ‘barbarian’, ‘true’ and ‘false’, ‘real’ and ‘illusory’—none of these polarities stands up to pressure, which may lead to some disturbing conclusions. It seems, then, that positive and negative readings are both possible. The evidence so far, then, has seemed only to disprove my initial claim that the escape-tragedies are notable for their physical sense of place. The sense of place which these tragedies ostensibly lead their audience to expect—that is, the actual setting—is systematically rejected. But in the following section I will argue that, instead, the plays’ sense of place depends on what one might call an imaginary landscape, which combines elements physical, metaphysical and metaphorical. 3.4 the imaginary landscape ka≥ d[t’ ƒp≥ t[ß ne°ß ånagign*skont≤ moi t¶n !ndromvdan prÏß ƒmautÏn ƒxa≤fnhß pÎqoß t¶n kard≤an ƒp3taxe p0ß o÷ei sfÎdra.150 Now as I was reading Andromeda to myself on a ship, a sudden longing struck my heart, you can’t imagine how hard! kat¤ taÛt¤ dunat¤ p$si, ka≥ ƒn p$si to»toiß oÇte b3rbaroß åf*ristai Óm0n oÛde≥ß oÇte E ﬁ llhn (‘in this respect we have been behaving as barbarians to one another, since by nature Greeks and barbarians are alike in every single respect. If one considers the natural qualities which are essential to all people, one ﬁnds that in respect to all these faculties there is nothing to distinguish any of us as barbarian or Greek’). 149 On the argument of Antiphon’s Per≥ !lhqe≤aß see Moulton (1972), Luginbill (1997). 150 Ar. Frogs 52–4.

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The god Dionysus was particularly fond of Euripides’ Andromeda; and, as it would happen, he was travelling on the sea when he read it. Now ‘one would have thought that the deck of a trireme was a far from ideal environment for such a purpose’,151 so it may be that there is some signiﬁcance in these Aristophanic lines. The escape-tragedies were produced at the festival of Dionysus, in Dionysus’ own theatre, and it is perhaps no coincidence that the god had a traditional connection with the sea;152 but why else might Andromeda have been seen to be particularly appropriate shipboard reading? The reason lies in the escape-tragedies’ unusual sense of place. For, if one sets aside the problematic foreign aspects of the setting, one is left with a richly drawn landscape consisting of the sea, with its coasts and caves, and the sky. One might well call to mind Helen, Andromeda or Iphigenia when travelling over the waves, or looking out across the sea from the shore, because they each so strongly evoke their landscape. Critics in antiquity found Euripidean descriptions of the sea sensitive and evocative. Indeed, the ancient Life of Euripides records that the reclusive playwright lived in a cave on Salamis which opened out onto the sea. This was probably a ‘biographical’ invention based on the supposed evidence of the dramas themselves: it seemed logical to suppose that Euripides lived by the sea because so many of his similes describe the sea.153 151

Sommerstein (1996) ad loc. e.g. Homeric Hymn to Dionysus (7); Apollod. 3.5.3; Philostr. Imag. 1.19; Lucian, Dial. mar. 8; Ov. Met. 3.582–691. Dionysus is to be found in the iconographic tradition depicted with Amphitrite and Poseidon, and on-board ship (see LIMC s.v. ‘Dionysus’, 603–5, 788–90). See also Burkert (1985) 166–7. 153 EÛrip≤dou gvnoß ka≥ b≤oß 22 (= Kovacs [1994] 2–11). Cf. Fairweather (1974), Lefkowitz (1981, 90) and Lesky (1947, 246) on the biographical tradition. Lesky asks why the tradition should have concentrated on Euripidean sea-imagery when the other tragedians can be shown to have treated this area with comparable interest and skill (e.g. Aesch. Eum. 550 ﬀ ., Seven 158 ﬀ .; Soph. Ant. 586 ﬀ , etc.). One might, interestingly, compare Matthew Arnold’s ‘Dover Beach’ for a Victorian idea that Sophocles was particularly associated with the imagery of the Aegean. Lefkowitz (1981, 91) suggests that the same comments are not made of the other tragedians because they were not supposed to have shunned human company; but this leaves one in some doubt as to which part of the tradition arose ﬁrst. In 1998 a small skyphos bearing the inscribed name of Euripides and dating from the 2nd or 3rd cent. ad was discovered in a cave in the bay of Peristeria on Salamis. It is supposed to be a dedicatory or commemorative item, and supports 152

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Images of the sea in Euripidean tragedy in general are, certainly, of interest for their poetic and aesthetic qualities; but with regard to the escape-tragedies in particular the sea is not merely an interesting ‘feature of poetic imagery’, to be listed alongside ﬂowers, small animals, ﬁre, Sphinxes and wheelbarrows.154 Rather, one ought to be concerned with the way in which the imaginary landscape of sea, coast and sky ﬁts into a system of ideas and meanings, gaining interpretative signiﬁcance. In each of the three tragedies the heroine and the chorus members are trapped in a certain location, from which they will eventually be rescued.155 But, interestingly, despite the diﬀerence in their precise situations, the locale is practically the same in each case. They are trapped not just anywhere, but, as the audience is emphatically told, beside the sea. Andromeda is chained to a sea-girt rock in the foam of the ocean,156 Helen is stranded by the Nile coast,157 Iphigenia’s prison is the Black Sea coast beyond the Symplegades.158 All three coastlines have a cave to hand, for the habitation of Echo, the safe-keeping of the phantom-Helen or the concealment of Orestes and Pylades. Most of the action takes place at the water’s edge or in the sea itself: however, in two of the plays these actions are reported and not observed, and the scene of the on-stage action (Proteus’ palace; Artemis’ temple) is imagined as being at a little distance from the shore itself. Andromeda alone is actually situated at the sea-shore, with the stage-building presumably representing the cave.159 the view that Salamis became a place of pilgrimage for Euripidean enthusiasts (for which see Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 15.20.5). See the Archaeological Reports for 1997–8, pp. 16–17 and ﬁg. 27. 154 Barlow (1971) exhibits this tendency: the other examples of imagery (qua ‘imagery’ alone) are taken at random from her index (168). 155 The fate of the chorus-members in Iphigenia is perhaps unclear (see Cropp [2000] 264 and Kovacs [2000]). 156 Andromeda fr. 125. 157 Helen 1–3. 158 Iphigenia 123–5. 159 Webster (1967, 196) believes that in the second half of Andromeda the scene changes from the sea-girt rock to the palace of Cepheus; but there is no evidence for this in the fragments. (Scene-changes were very rare: see n. 13 above). In South Italian vase-paintings of Andromeda, a cave often appears behind the heroine and the sea-shore in front: see Trendall and Webster (1971) 3.1.27. The problem of skhnograf≤a is again relevant here: how was the sea represented, if at all? Could the parodoi or orchestra have been somehow

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The similarity in setting is marked: but its interest is to be seen, speciﬁcally, in the way it is used. The sea’s signiﬁcance lies in its capability to bear multiple levels of meaning and symbolism. In the Greeks’ mythical and historical tradition, the sea was a paradoxical entity. It was seen to provide great possibilities for mobility and trade, but at the same time was full of mystery and danger. The Greeks frequently travelled by ship, but were always aware of its perils and the possibility of shipwreck. The danger of the sea is a common topos in literature: Hesiod writes that sea-trade is too risky for sensible men to attempt;160 a Phaeacian in Homer ventures the opinion that there is nothing more terrible than the sea;161 Plato writes that avarice is the only possible reason for embarking on navigation, since it is so dangerous;162 for Xenophon, seafarers epitomize the general class of men who fear danger.163 Yet sea-trade did go on, as a characteristic feature of Greek life.164 Nevertheless, any aspect of human activity connected with the sea acquired, in certain literary genres, negative moral connotations. Sailing, ﬁshing and trading took on a notably pejorative aspect, compared with landbased pursuits.165 There was thought to be something in the sea’s nature which made it essentially diﬀerent from the world on dry decorated to represent the beach or waves? Were there certain areas of the stage that were ‘out-of-bounds’, as it were uncrossable areas of water? How was Andromeda’s isolation physically suggested? Such considerations mean that Andromeda was probably more diﬃcult to stage than either Helen or Iphigenia. 160 Hes. WD 240, 618–90. 161 Hom. Od. 8.138; cf. Od. 14.224. 162 Plato, Gorgias 467d; the chorus at Iphigenia 408–12, surprised that Orestes and Pylades have made it to the perilous Black Sea, suppose that a desire for making money brought them. 163 Xen. Cyr. 3.1.24. Interestingly, the Greeks thought they were the only race who could swim well: Hdt. 6.44.2–3, 8.89.2. Cf. Hall (1993), on swimming and Timotheus’ Persians. 164 The seashore, in that case, would be the place most accessible to Greek travellers, and the area in any non-Greek location in which Greeks will naturally be interested, even if they penetrate no further. This may be an additional reason why the escape-tragedies’ settings have more to do with the coast and less to do with exotica. 165 Scorn directed at ‘dishonest’ trader: Theocritus 5.14; Hesiod, Th. 440–7; Plato, Laws 705a; Aesch. fr. 322 TGF (Radt), Eur. fr. 1114 Nauck; S Aesch. Seven 545; Soph. Ant. 295; Eur. Iphigenia 412; see also Knorringa (1926) 5–8; Buxton (1994) 97–100. A ship’s sailing was what, traditionally, ended the Golden Age . . .

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land. The sea’s water itself was considered by Heraclitus to be, paradoxically, both pure and impure; and even eating the ﬁsh which inhabited it had peculiar moral overtones.166 Sea-ﬁshing was dependent on luck, for one never knew what one would net; in fact, fortune, good or bad, was seen to characterize most activity in the sea.167 The sea was not only a chancy thing, but also deceitful: one could never foresee hidden dangers, accurately judge the sea’s depth, or predict whether a calm sea would turn squally. An aphorism of Pittacus, one of the ‘Seven Sages’, runs: pistÏn g[, £piston q3lassa (‘Put your trust in dry land, but never the sea’).168 The presence of this considerable anti-sea culture, among people whose way of life was to a large degree dependent on maritime activity, whose overseas expansion was achieved through seaborne mobility, and whose various hegemonies were largely thalassocratic,169 is a peculiar but recurrent phenomenon. The sea, and the Greeks’ attitude to it, is full of contradictions and mysteries. In literature, the metaphorical function of the sea is of great interest: again, it bears not just one but a variety of meanings. Sometimes the sea was a symbol of high emotion: for instance, Phaedra’s Nurse in Hippolytus warns her mistress about becoming more wilful than the sea;170 Plato compares angry men to ships which bob up and down on the waves without cargo or ballast;171 a beautiful but deceptive woman is compared by Semonides to the sea;172 the chorus of Antigone liken savage, 166 Heraclitus (DK 22 B61). Was sea-water drinkable? Cf. Strabo 6.1.1; Purcell (1995) 132. 167 Purcell (1995) 147: ‘The person who is the classic type of dependence on luck, the ﬁsherman, has a special role in the economy of luck which is as based on the sea as his activities . . . and an economy of luck is what the ancient world knew.’ For strange catches, cf. Hdt. 3.41–2; Paus. 10.9.3. On luck, one might compare, from Roman antiquity, Anicetus’ ironic—perhaps proverbial— remark to Nero: ‘nihil tam capax fortuitorum quam mare’ (Tac. Ann. 14.3), and the poor ﬁsherman Gripus, in Plautus’ Rudens, who ﬁnds a treasure-chest. Fishermen in tragedy might also net the unexpected: a purple-ﬁsher in Euripides’ Stheneboea (fr. 670 Nauck) comes across Bellerophon’s body in the waves; and it is a ﬁsherman who rescues the messenger in Helen (1615–17) when he has jumped overboard. 168 Pittacus (DK 10 5.10). 169 See Purcell (1990). 170 Eur. Hipp. 304. 171 Plato, Theat. 144a. 172 Semonides fr. 7 PMG.

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uncontrollable love to the sea.173 In tragedy in particular, the sea became a common symbol of turbulence and the uncertainty of human aﬀairs.174 In all three tragedians’ work appears the image of the ‘ship of state’ which was also a familiar image from lyric poetry: the polis in times of political trouble is like a ship battered by many storm-waves.175 But the most distinctive tragic image is perhaps the ‘sea of troubles’, as a metaphor for inexplicable suﬀering.176 The tragic sea of troubles spawned more related metaphors: a person in trouble may be described as the steersman of a ship;177 a deliverer from disaster is a ‘harbour’;178 to ‘be a fellow-passenger’ (sumple∏n) means that one shares another’s suﬀerings;179 to ‘bob up and down on the waves’ (sale»ein) means that one’s fortunes ﬂuctuate.180 The escape-tragedies can be seen to dramatize all the various aspects of the sea: beauty, mystery, ‘otherness’, ambiguity, danger, troubles. What makes these tragedies distinctive is that they do not just contain the image of, but are actually about, the ‘sea of troubles’. When Orestes says to Pylades that they are fellow travellers on the sea of troubles, he is speaking literally as well as metaphorically.181 Euripides has taken a common metaphor and turned it into a central element of setting and plot. The ﬁrst mention of the sea in Iphigenia is made by its heroine in the prologue. Here the sea is violent, described by a succession of adjectives as black, swirling, eddying waters, churned up by the winds—the scene of cruelty and horror, of her bloody 173

Soph. Ant. 783–6. Nevertheless, Eur. Bellerophon (fr. 304 Nauck) provides an odd exception: there, winds and waves are used not as symbols of life’s mutability but as a contrast to it. 175 Alcaeus, fr. 6 and fr. 208 PMG; Aesch. Seven 208, 795; Soph. Ajax 1083; Eur. Suppl. 473. The allegorical image became common also in Hellenistic and Roman lyrics: see e.g. Hor. Carm. 1.14 and Nisbet and Hubbard (1970) 181. 176 Aesch. Pers. 599 (kl»dwn kak0n); Soph. OT 1527 (kl»dwna dein[ß sumfor$ß); Eur. Hipp. 822 (kak0n pvlagoß); Eur. Med. 362 (kl»dwn kak0n). 177 Soph. OT 923; Eur. Tro. 225. 178 Aesch. Ag. 900; Eur. Med. 769; Andromache 749, 891. 179 Eur. Her. 1223. 180 Soph. OT 22–3, El. 335, 1074–5. Campbell’s (1986) brief study concerns nautical imagery in OT as a metaphor for disaster (lines 420–3, 695–6, 795, 922–3, 1208–10, 1411). See also Knorringa (1926) 30–3. 181 Iphigenia 599–600: Ø naustol0n g3r ejm’ ƒg* t¤ß sumfor3ß, | o˜toß d† sumple∏ t0n ƒm0n mÎcqwn c3rin (‘I am a traveller on the sea of troubles, and this man is my fellow-sailor on account of my diﬃculties’). 174

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sacriﬁce at the hands of Agamemnon.182 We will soon learn that the shores of the Tauric land, similarly violent with wind and waves, are the scene of human sacriﬁce. So we are prepared from the beginning for the seashore’s sinister and deathly signiﬁcance. The sea itself may bring death, by drowning or shipwreck: Pylades is a reminder of this, fearing that he might get lost at sea and fail to deliver Iphigenia’s letter to Argos (755–9). In Helen it seems initially that Menelaus is drowned; and later on her plot depends on the pretence that he has met his death in the waves (1050). The sea’s deathly potency is made much of in Helen: it is stressed several times that many men were wrecked, drowned or lost on the voyage home from Troy (126–32, 397–403, 409–10); mention is twice made of Nauplius, who used beacons to lure men to their death in the waves (767, 1126–31); Theoclymenus fears that Helen will commit suicide by throwing herself into the sea (1395–7); and the escape-ruse involves the bloody slaughter of numerous Egyptian sailors on-board ship, where murder ‘ﬂows’ (fÎnwi d† naıß ƒrre∏to, 1602). In Andromeda the danger of death posed by the sea is increased by the presence of a maneating monster (frr. 121, 145). The sea, then, may present many perils; it may also rob those who travel upon its waves, as Menelaus complains: the sea has ‘stolen’ his clothes and equipment, thus forcing him to appear in rags, and has even taken his ship: ‘theft’ is thus another aspect of the shipwreck theme.183 Even when the sea does not carry death, it may represent wandering, uncertainty and toil to be endured for a long period of time. Sea-journeys, even when they are blessed with favourable winds and calm waves (which occurs seldom in tragedy—except under unusual circumstances, by the special pronouncement of a deus ex machina for instance184), take a long time, and nearly every reference to sea-travel in the escape182 Iphigenia 6–8: ©n £mf≥ d≤naß 4ß q3m’ EÇripoß pukna∏ß | aÇraiß ‰l≤sswn kuanvan ‹la strvfei | πsfaxen (‘. . . my father sacriﬁced me by the eddying currents which Euripus with its frequent gusts of wind whirls around as it churns the dark-blue sea’). 183 Helen 423–4: pvplouß d† toŸß pr≥n lampr3 t’ åmfibl&mata | clid3ß te pÎntoß ~rpas∞ (‘the sea has stolen my clothing and shiny, luxurious equipment’); 1048: ~n g¤r e÷comen q3lass’ πcei (‘the sea has got hold of the ship we had’). For the image of the sea as thief, cf. Antiphanes fr. 151 PCG. 184 In addition to the endings of the escape-tragedies, perhaps compare the choral prayer for calm seas in Euripides’ Phaethon (fr. 773 Nauck).

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tragedies stresses the extraordinary length of time and endurance involved.185 The classic paradeigma of seaborne troubles and wanderings is of course Odysseus, who is mentioned when Orestes is questioned by Iphigenia about the fates of those who left Troy by sea. ‘Odysseus has not returned home yet, but he is still alive,’ says Orestes, ‘so the story goes . . . his aﬀairs are grievously aﬄicted.’186 Some force is seen to be at work to prevent the sea-voyagers from putting an end to their protracted wandering: Menelaus has been on the waves for ten years, ever since he sacked Troy; but every time he thought he was nearing his native land, the sea and winds forced him away, so he continues to wander—a thoroughly miserable process, as he describes it to Helen187— and he has come to believe that his misfortunes are caused by the gods’ will.188 Similarly, as Burnett writes of the sea-storm which nearly averts the ‘felicitous’ ending of Iphigenia, ‘the report of the wave seems to testify to the existence of an unidentiﬁed force at large in creation, a force strong enough to destroy with ease the noblest of human achievements, but weak enough to be set aside by god with an even greater ease.’189 In Andromeda, the image of the wind is used to describe the changeability of human fortunes.190 Thus the sea, the winds and the weather are all mysteriously linked; they are held to possess a supernatural aspect, representing the unpredictable and powerful forces at work in the natural world, suspected to be controlled in whole or part by the will of the gods or something more random and inexplicable (i.e. 185 Iphigenia 116–17, 533, 599, 1109; Helen 126, 147, 226, 387, 397, 400, 520, 773–4, 1107. 186 Iphigenia 533–6: IF. t≤ g¤r Ø Lavrtou gÎnoß; | OR. oÇpw nenÎsthk’ o”kon, πsti d’, „ß lÎgoß. | . . . p3nta tåkeinoı nose∏. Odysseus’ fate mirrors their own; but just how does Orestes know what perils have befallen Odysseus on the sea? See §2.4 above for a ‘metamythological’ interpretation of these words. 187 Menelaus describes himself as wretched or long-suﬀering at Helen 401 (tl&mwn Ål0mai), 520 (trucÎmenoß), 777 (_ t3laß), 876 (_ tl[mon) etc. 188 Helen 402–3: kåß p3tran cr&izwn mole∏n | oÛk åxioımai toıde prÏß qe0n tuce∏n (‘even though I long to go home, I am not thought deserving of this by the gods’). 189 Burnett (1971) 65. Winds and divine powers are also linked at Eur. Hec. 1289–90: see Segal (1993) 221. 190 Andromeda fr. 153: ne»ei b≤otoß, ne»ei d† t»ch | kat¤ pneım’ ånvmwn (‘life nods its head, fortune nods its head, along with the movement of the winds’). See §5.3 below for more discussion.

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t»ch).191 Certain gods, demi-gods or other supernatural beings make their home in the sea and take a part in controlling what goes on in their waters, but non-aquatic deities also are involved in altering the eﬀect of the sea. Menelaus, before his aquatic escape-attempt, prays to Poseidon and the Nereids for a safe escape for himself and his wife (Helen 1584–7); the reason why Orestes and Iphigenia’s escape is almost prevented is, according to the messenger, that Poseidon is working against them; but it takes the favour of another god, Athena, to make Poseidon still the waves and turn the sea into a controlled, less chaotic entity (Iphigenia 1435–89). Aphrodite, born from the sea,192 also has a certain authority there: Theonoe warns Helen that Aphrodite is working against them, and that they must pray for her to allow them to cross the waters, as well as imploring Hera to remain well-disposed towards their escape (Helen 1025–7). The Dioscuri ﬁnally intervene to grant Helen and Menelaus a safe passage, ensuring a favourable wind for the journey.193 The sea is conceived of by the characters (and, as seems likely, the audience) as, by nature, precisely the sort of place where supernatural entities are likely to be in operation. When the herdsmen in Iphigenia (264–74) spot Orestes and Pylades by the rocks and caves at the seashore, they conclude automatically that they are deities of the sea, and pray fervently to them—but who are they? Palaemon, son of the sea-nymph Leucothea, protector of ships? The Dioscuri? Members of the family of Nereus, father of ﬁfty ocean-nymphs? The young men are none of these, but to the awestruck herdsmen, bewitched by the strangeness of the sea (and arrivals by sea, especially on this perilous Black Sea coastline), anything seems possible. The supernatural inhabitants and controllers of the sea in Andromeda (whoever they might have been) included an added menace, the terrifying monster, who might arbitrarily dart out of the waves (fr. 145): one is reminded of that other symbol of the sea’s terror, the shadowy and monstrous bull which rose from the deep to kill 191

On t»ch and its meaning in the escape-tragedies, see §5.3 below. Her name was sometimes thought to bear an etymological connection with åfrÎß, ‘foam’ (see Plato, Cratylus 406c). 193 Helen 1642–79. Compare the scene with the end of Orestes, where Apollo promises that Helen will become honoured for eternity along with the Dioscuri, holding sway over the sea and those who sail on it (πntimoß åe≥ | sŸn Tundar≤daiß to∏ß DiÎß, Ëgr$ß | na»taiß medvousa qal3sshß,1688–90). 192

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Hippolytus.194 Menace and terror seem far removed from the Egyptian coast, but the sea-setting of Helen is nevertheless semisupernatural, for the ruling family of Egypt is descended from Proteus, the ‘Old Man of the sea’, who married a sea-nymph called Psamathe (a name which has some etymological connection with sand). Both Proteus and Psamathe, as Homer and Hesiod relate, possessed the ability to change into any desired shape—so each was, like the sea, a being of multiple and shifting identity.195 The chorus later (1457) sing of another (this time beneﬁcent) deity of the sea, Galaneia, the ‘grey daughter of Pontus’. Now, for the dramatic events which actually happen at the sea. All the major actions have an aquatic setting, since the seashore is perceived as the direction of movement: in Iphigenia, the sea is described as crashing right next to the temple where the action takes place (1196–7). Most of the arrivals and departures (Teucer, Menelaus, the Greek sailor, Orestes and Pylades, the herdsmen, the messengers, etc.) take place to and from the seashore; and of course the escape-plots themselves make use of the sea. The characters and the chorus frequently, even obsessively, talk about the sea and the coast. Here one sees an acute sense of landscape, colours and textures, but there is more to the sea’s recurrent presence than a need to create a sense of place which is convincing and aesthetically pleasing. Euripides’ preoccupation with the sea is highly self-conscious—in other words, he seems deliberately to be drawing attention to the sea, even when, in certain contexts, this attention appears unusual or artiﬁcial. At one point in Iphigenia the Herdsman enters the stage and announces the seaborne arrival of Orestes and Pylades. The chorus has already announced, in Iphigenia’s hearing, that the herdsman has come from the sea-shore (ka≥ m¶n Òd’ åkt¤ß ƒklip°n qalass≤ouß | bouforbÏß ~kei, 236–7), but nevertheless Iphigenia proceeds to ask the herdsman where he was when he happened to see the two men. His answer is: £kraiß ƒp≥ Âhgm∏sin åxvnou pÎrou 194

Hippolytus 1197. Helen 3–7; cf. Hom. Od. 4. 365–6; Hes. Theog. 1003–4. Watery places in general, it seems, were the favoured home of shape-changing deities: Proteus (sea) was the archetype; but not the only well-known shape-changer: cf. Achelous (river) in Soph. Trach. 9–13. 195

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(‘right by the breaking waves of the inhospitable sea’, 253). This is a stilted answer, and the herdsman is telling Iphigenia nothing she did not already know: what need for the question to be asked in the ﬁrst place? and what need for him to say that he saw the men ‘right by the breaking waves of the inhospitable sea’, instead of something more succinct? One might counter that tragic dialogue is never natural; but I think that there is something particular to be noted about these words. A phrase which signals a possibility of additional meanings is åxvnou pÎrou, the ‘inhospitable sea’: this suggestive description has already been used twice of the Tauric coastal region, and will recur prominently throughout the play.196 The unusual description is to be noted, then: but the dialogue moves on, and now Iphigenia herself makes it clear that the herdsman’s reply is intrinsically unlikely—why, she asks, should herdsmen have anything to do with the sea (ka≥ t≤ß qal3sshß boukÎloiß koinwn≤a; 254)? What was he doing there in the ﬁrst place, instead of policing the hills and pastures? The herdsman replies that he and his colleagues were washing their cattle in the waves, an improbable scenario.197 Now one could point out that many ‘coincidental’ happenings in tragic plots are similarly unlikely; but incongruities often have a point. Here it seems that the plot is being manipulated for the speciﬁc purpose of making everything centre on the seashore.198 The herdsman goes on to furnish an evocative description of the milieu of the sea and coast: the clashing rocks, the hollow cliﬀs, the caves which are used as a shelter for the purple-ﬁshers who carry on their 196 Instances of åxv(i)noß pÎntoß: Iphigenia 125, 218, 241, 253, 341, 394–5, 434, 1388. Discussed further on pp. 217–18 below. 197 The ritual use of the sea in ceremonies of puriﬁcation is attested, but I can ﬁnd no example of whole herds of cattle being driven into the sea: see Parker (1983) 226–30. Burkert (1985) 55–9 describes the more usual features of animal sacriﬁce. Even if this is a genuine echo of ritual practice at Halae or Brauron (which, again, cannot be proved with the available evidence), the positioning of the reference here is prominent and provocative. 198 There is no deﬁnite evidence from the Andromeda, but clearly the action must have taken place at the sea-shore for at least so long as Andromeda was in chains. Interestingly, Webster (1967, 196) suggests that fr. 146 (p$ß d† poimvnwn πrrei le*ß ktl., ‘all the shepherds are going together . . .’) was spoken by a herdsman-messenger character following ‘some such opening as “I had just brought my sheep down to the sea” (cf. Bacch. 677–80)’. The fragment may well imply (at least) that shepherds were somehow involved in the action (again, why shepherds by the sea-shore?) . . . so a possible parallel is provided.

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trade by sea; again, it all seems deliberately self-conscious and calculated. There is another signiﬁcant point to be made about this exchange: the act of washing cattle in the sea has a ritual feel about it, and in this aspect it obviously preﬁgures the bogus ritual of the escape plot, in which Iphigenia supposedly has to bathe and purify the tainted bodies of Orestes and Pylades and the cult statue (1187–98). In Helen too (1258) the bogus ritual involves the sacriﬁce, at sea, of a bull. ‘Rituals at sea’ form a distinct motif in the escape-tragedies: but these rituals all turn out to be unrealistic or fraudulent. Iphigenia tells Thoas that the sea washes all pollution from human bodies (q3lassa kl»zei p3nta tånqr*pwn kak3, 1193), but the puriﬁcatory aspect of the sea is signiﬁcantly played down, since the rituals are sham. In these plays seaborne religious rituals are stripped of meaning, instead purely playing the part of stratagems. They are artiﬁcial; like so much in these plays, they are not what they seem.199 To cast an oﬀering into the sea is an empty and pointless exercise. Like the many men who were drowned, Menelaus’ ship which was wrecked and his equipment and clothes which were ruined, if things go into the sea they are as good as lost. So far I have been discussing the sea’s various ‘signiﬁcances’; but it remains to explore precisely how the sea, along with the other aspects of the settings, ﬁts into a context of action and plot. It is worth noting (although it might at ﬁrst seem somewhat banal) that the plots of escape-tragedies require, ﬁrst: a place of captivity; second: a place of refuge; third: a means of escape; and that these three requirements are necessarily interlinked. A couple of passages from Helen and Iphigenia should make the connection clear. ME. pe≤seiaß £n tin’ oJtineß tetraz»gwn Ôcwn ån3ssous’ ¿ste n0in doınai d≤frouß; EL. pe≤saim’ 〈£n〉: åll¤ t≤na fug¶n feuxo»meqa ped≤wn £peiroi barb3rou g’ Ônteß cqonÎß; ME. åd»naton e”paß [. . .] åll’ oÛd† m¶n naıß πstin ¬i swqe∏men #n fe»gonteß: ©n g¤r e÷comen q3lass’ πcei.200 199

See §4.4 below.

200

Helen 1039–43, 1047–8.

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Menelaus: Could you persuade someone, if they own four-horse chariots, to give one to us? Helen: I could—but how shall we make our escape, since we are ignorant of the plains of this barbarian country? Menelaus: You are right: it is impossible [. . .]; and there is not even a ship in which we could escape to safety: the sea has got hold of the one which we had. IF. t≤na soi 〈t≤na soi〉 pÎron eËromvna p3lin åpÏ pÎlewß, åpÏ fÎnou pvmyw patr≤d’ ƒß !rge≤an; [. . .] pÎteron kat¤ cvrson, oÛc≥ naΩ åll¤ pod0n Âip$i; qan3twi pel3seiß £ra b3rbara fıla ka≥ di’ ØdoŸß ånÎdouß ste≤cwn: di¤ kuanvaß m¤n stenopÎrou pvtraß makr¤ kvleuqa naºoisin drasmo∏ß.201 Iphigenia: What way, what way shall I ﬁnd for you to bring you back from this city, from violent death, back to Argos your homeland? [. . .] Should it be by land, not on a ship but with ﬂurry of feet? No—you would meet your death at the hand of barbarian tribes as you travel along roads that are no roads. You must go on ship by the long route through the narrow passage of the dark rocks.

How are the escapes to be made? Or rather, what is preventing escape? Neither Helen nor Iphigenia is bodily restrained by chains, like Andromeda (fr. 128), but what traps them is their geographical location. There are only three possible modes of travel from place to place: over land (which is dangerous and impracticable; they would be caught and killed), over sea (but they have no ship) or through the sky (but they cannot ﬂy).202 So another sense of paradox is created: the land, sea and sky represent both the means of escape and the instruments of captivity, by which boundaries are imposed on the Greek escapees. In this way a further symbolic signiﬁcance of the landscape emerges: the seashore comes to represent the boundaries of the characters’ situations. As Richard Buxton observes in his Imaginary Greece: ‘the shore is narrow—a line, a boundary, a margin 201

Iphigenia 876–9, 884–91. Observe the priamel here: for this speciﬁc usage, of plans mentioned only to be rejected (and perhaps a metatheatrical comment on the evolution of plot), cf. Soph. Trach. 498 ﬀ . with Davies (1991b, ad loc.) and (1998). 202

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where opposites meet . . . there is even an entire tragedy, Euripides’ Iphigenia in Tauris, whose action is located on a series of symbolic and literal margins.’203 This description also ﬁts Helen and Andromeda: the Nile’s shores and Ethiopia stood for the outer limits of the known, civilized world, so their locations are ‘marginal’ in an additional sense.204 In all three plays the coastal setting symbolizes the marginal nature and the isolation, mental and physical, of the characters.205 The characters and the audience are acutely aware of these boundaries and of the means of freedom which is so close, yet elusive. Travel cross-country, even if they knew which way to go, is not quick enough; only gods and birds possess the ability to travel through the air. Thus, in terms of practical expectations related to human capabilities, the characters plot their escapes by sea, the only method with at least a chance of success. Inevitably, most of the travelling about in these plays does take place by sea; but there are important exceptions. First, some boundary-crossing is done by air. The most striking example from these plays was probably the arrival of Perseus in Andromeda. Although he might on occasion travel by 203 Buxton (1992) and (1994) 101–3. A recent structuralist book on mythology (Dowden [1992] 129–33) describes places like Egypt, the Black Sea and Ethiopia as the setting for myths which represent margins and the ‘beyond’: they are seen as ‘oﬀ-stage’; as ‘[lands] where myth and reality merge’. Myths are located in such places (Dowden states) because their function is to distance the material from the speaker and the standard order of things. Davison (1991, 49–63) also deals with ‘myth and the periphery’. Myths which traverse exotic places have the function (he says) of demarcating the world into ‘centres’ and ‘boundaries’. 204 Indeed, Herodotus represents all three settings, Egypt, Ethiopia and the Black Sea, as geographical extremes and as barely accessible to travellers (3.17, 3.26, 4.46, 4.179). Compare Andromache 650 for the metaphorical usage of the Nile to represent the world’s limits. 205 For such eﬀective linking of landscape and psychology, compare Soph. Phil. and Achilles’ retreat to the seashore in the Iliad; also Eur. Andromache 854 combines the coastal setting with a feeling of abandonment, desolation and danger. (‘Abandonment on the shore’ later became a topos of Latin poetry, notably in the Ariadne–Theseus story: Ov. AA 1.530 ﬀ , Amores 1.7.15 ﬀ .). Cf. Morwood (2001) on the use of geography as metaphor in Eur. Iph. at Aulis: ‘Euripides draws our attention to the location of the play by the Euripus with its famously shifting currents . . . because he wishes it to be an external symbol . . . for the extreme shifts the play’s characters undergo (p. 608).’ It is worth noting, too, that herdsmen (prominent in Iphigenia), like ﬁshermen, were seen as ‘marginal’ people: Buxton (1992) 100–1.

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ship like anybody else,206 Perseus’ entrance in this case was airborne, ‘on swift sandal, planting my foot on high, cutting a path through the midst of the aether’.207 Perseus’ ability to ﬂy marked him out as extraordinary, transcending the normal human limits.208 Elsewhere, too, ﬂying can be achieved rarely and only by strange or supernatural means.209 Helen travelled through the air (though not literally ﬂying), when Hermes took her up in the folds of the sky, wrapping her in a cloud (Helen 44–5), and similarly Iphigenia was spirited away through the bright air by Artemis (Iphigenia 28–30). Helen’s phantom, which is not quite human or divine, also moves freely through the ether.210 The Dioscuri are something of an exception to normal rules of travel and transport, and it is hard to tell just how Euripides envisaged them as moving about. At the end of Helen the heavenly twins appear in the sky (ex machina) with instructions for Helen and Menelaus’ escape: however, they seem to have been riding horses (another staging problem), and are described as pÎnton parippe»onte, so what is meant? Is it land, sea or air travel—or a magical sort of mixture of all three? The point is really that the Dioscuri, as gods, have absolute freedom to travel, eﬀortlessly, above, through or over any given physical feature. They simply go from place to place without having to specify or even conceptualize (as humans have to do) a medium or mode of transport. This deliberate vagueness of detail, representing absolute freedom from human boundedness, is paralleled by other 206 Perseus, in Andromeda fr. 123, travelled ‘over the sea to Argos, carrying the Gorgon’s head (PerseŸß prÏß ⁄rgoß naustol0n tÏ GorgÎnoß| k3ra kom≤zwn). 207 Andromeda fr. 124: _ qeo≤, t≤n’ ejß g[n barb3rwn åf≤gmeqa | tace∏ ped≤lwi; di¤ mvsou g¤r ajqvroß | tvmnwn kvleuqon pÎda t≤qhm’ ËpÎpteron. 208 See Sommerstein (1994) on Thesm. 1008, and Mastronarde (1990) 280, for the question of staging Perseus in both Aristophanes and Euripides. It is probable that the mechane was used for the exit and entrance of divine characters: one should observe the similarity between Andromeda and Helen and Iphigenia in this respect. 209 Perseus ﬂies only by means of technology (tace∏ ped≤lwi) and not, like divine characters, by special powers of his own: similarly, the other examples of human ‘ﬂight’ in tragedy required magical chariots or horses (cf. Medea 1321 [although as Helios’ grand-daughter her status is ambiguous]; Bellerophon fr. 306–8, Stheneboia fr. 669 and the parody at Ar. Peace 80–126). 210 See esp. Helen 605–6 (the servant to Menelaus): bvbhken £locoß s¶ prÏß ajqvroß ptuc¤ß | årqe∏s’ £fantoß (‘your wife has gone oﬀ into the folds of the ether, raised up on high, invisible’).

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descriptions of gods travelling. Compare, for example, the wanderings of Demeter in the second stasimon of Helen. She is portrayed as travelling with amazing speed and freedom, as if ﬂying, but over land. Demeter ‘ran on speeding feet over the mountains, through the wooded forests and the streams of the rivers and the deep-roaring waves of the sea’—a bewildering and awesome description.211 This depiction of divine freedom as a contrast to human captivity is to be borne in mind when dealing with the choral odes, which present a highly distinctive conception of movement and travel. The opening lines of the parodos of Iphigenia (123–5) introduce a word which—as we have already seen—is suggestive and relevant. eÛfame∏t’, _ pÎntou diss¤ß sugcwro»saß pvtraß åxe≤nou na≤onteß. Keep holy silence, you who dwell by the twin converging rocks of the inhospitable sea.

As Barlow points out, ‘the prominence the chorus give to the sea suggests that it is a controlling force in their lives’,212 and indeed the formulaic opening (whether the lines are spoken by Iphigenia or by the leader of the chorus of Greek women213) reﬂects this prominence. Iphigenia later replies (218–20): 214 nın d’ åxe≤nou pÎntou xe≤na sugcÎrtouß o÷kouß na≤w, £gamoß £teknoß £poliß £filoß. And now I, enjoying the hospitality of the inhospitable sea, live on the borders of the world, unmarried, childless, cityless, friendless.

The introduction and Iphigenia’s reply both contain the epithet 211 Helen 1301–5: øre≤a pot† drom3di k*- | lwi M3thr ƒs»qh qe0n | ån’ Ël$nta n3ph | pot3miÎn te ceım’ Ëd3twn | bar»bromÎn te kım’ ‹lion ktl. 212 Barlow (1971) 26. 213 Diggle’s OCT, following Taplin (1978, 194 n. 3), attributes the lines to Iphigenia; Cropp (2000) to the chorus. 214 Iphigenia 218–20. The MSS reading (219) is in fact duscÎrtouß, ‘barren’, which seemed to Platnauer and Köchly an odd word for o÷kouß. The latter’s suggested emendation to sugcÎrtouß, ‘bordering on’ (c. gen.; cf. Andromache 16–7) is attractive, especially in view of Iphigenia’s ‘marginality’ (though I only tentatively use it, not wishing to bend the text to ﬁt the argument). Nevertheless, Diggle did not think it worthy of inclusion in his apparatus criticus.

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åxe≤noß to decribe the sea: this was noted earlier as an unusual feature of the herdsman’s description of the coast. What is the signiﬁcance of this recurrent word, ‘inhospitable’, ‘unfriendly’, ‘hostile to foreigners’ (etc.)? It is an uncommon adjective, and its meaning here seems to extend beyond its toponymic usage.215 First, the literal meaning would have become very clear to any Greeks who should happen to land on these shores, for it is Iphigenia’s duty to sacriﬁce them.216 Second, as far as Iphigenia, a foreign visitor (xe≤na), is concerned, the Tauric land is simply an unpleasant and barren place:217 Iphigenia’s isolation, and the menacing, inhospitable nature of the place in which she now lives, is clear. (In this respect it is very diﬀerent from the setting of Helen.) But another sense of åxe≤noß is that no outsiders ever come here: these shores are remote from civilized human contact, unknown and all but inaccessible to visitors (including, most importantly, potential rescuers). In this sense, however, there is some degree of irony implicit: for, although we are reminded often that the dangerous Symplegades make it virtually impossible for anyone to gain access, nevertheless Orestes and Pylades, the other Greeks who were sacriﬁced in the temple, and Iphigenia herself (albeit by supernatural means) are outsiders who have managed to penetrate this far. Iphigenia’s own self-observed status is deliberately contradictory: she is åxe≤nou pÎntou xe≤na—‘enjoying the hospitality of the inhospitable sea’—a guest in a place where (supposedly) no guest ever comes. For the greater part of the plays, then, the characters are trapped, by whatever means. The types of captivity may all be diﬀerent. Egypt, where the lovely-maiden streams ﬂow, is beautiful and delightful, as even Menelaus grudgingly admits to the Portress.218 In contrast, the Tauric land is utterly bleak and 215 Earlier used of persons, meaning ‘inhospitable’, opp. pol»xeinoß: Hes. WD 713, Plato, Soph. 217e. For its geographical sense, see n. 42, p. 169 above. 216 See §3.3 above for detailed discussion of this controversial point. 217 Cf. Strabo 7.3.6 on the unpopularity of this sea, with its fogs, sudden storms and the lack of good harbours. 218 Helen 461–3: ME. A÷guptoß; _ d»sthnoß, oÍ pvpleuk’ £ra. | GR. t≤ d¶ tÏ Ne≤lou memptÎn ƒst≤ g3noß; | ME. oÛ toıt’ ƒmvmfqhn: t¤ß ƒm¤ß stvnw t»caß. (Menelaus: I am in Egypt? Oh, misery, to have sailed here! | Old Woman: And what is wrong with the splendour of the Nile? | Menelaus: Nothing—I am lamenting my own fortunes.)

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unprepossessing,219 and Andromeda’s rocky prison is particularly uncomfortable. However, in all cases, whether in the wilds of the Tauric land or in the Nile valley, whether in the service of one’s guardian goddess, in ﬂight from a love-struck despot or exposed as food for a monster, captivity causes its victims great misery and despair. In their misery, their thoughts naturally turn to escape and to the place to which they wish to return. ‘Oh, my life!’ cries Helen (594–6): oŒ ∞ g*: t≤ß Óm0n ƒgvnet’ åqliwtvra; oÈ f≤ltatoi le≤pous≤ m’ oÛd’ åf≤xomai E ﬁ llhnaß oÛd† patr≤da t¶n ƒm&n pote. Who can be more wretched than me? Those whom I love abandon me, and I shall never rejoin my fellow Greeks, nor reach my native land ever again.

Note that ‘escape’ means not simply getting away but, speciﬁcally, returning home to Greece and the civilized society to which they belong—the prayer of Iphigenia to Athena and the repeated wish of the chorus members.220 As long as the heroines are in captivity, they feel a terrible sense of isolation, and all of them complain about being alone.221 Similar sentiments are expressed too by those in exile from Greece (Teucer and Orestes):222 so exile is also a sort of captivity, from which ‘liberation’ can only take the form of repatriation. Another indirect way, then, in which a sense of place is created is through nostalgia, a most potent means of evoking a setting. Trapped at the ends of the earth, the characters reminisce about their homes, using highly moving, emotional language. The second stasimon of the Iphigenia is an extended expression of homesickness: ƒg* soi parab3llomai qr&nouß, £pteroß Ôrniß, 219

See the descriptions at Iphigenia 107, 260, 324, 1373. Iphigenia 1399–400: s0sÎn me t¶n svn Èervan prÏß }Ell3da | ƒk barb3rwn g[ß (‘Bring me your priestess safely back to Greece from this barbarian land’). Cf. the chorus members’ words: Helen 1452, Iphigenia 447, 1123, etc. This feature of ‘escape’ (qua ‘return’) may represent a 5th-cent. development of an epic theme (from the Odyssey and Nostoi). 221 Andromeda fr. 122; Helen 274; Iphigenia 220. 222 Helen 87; Iphigenia 711. 220

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poqoıs’ }Ell3nwn ågÎrouß, poqoıs’ ⁄rtemin loc≤an. I match my lament with yours, I, a wingless bird, longing for the gatherings of the Greeks, longing for Artemis, goddess of childbirth.

Here (1094–7) the chorus members remember their own country, the characteristically Greek activity of the pan-Hellenic festival, Greek wedding-feasts, dancing and the humane religious rituals to which they were formerly accustomed. They long for escape—they long for return. 223 A principal characteristic of the choral lyrics is nostalgic reminiscence about Greece and a wish to return there. But there is more to be remarked, in connection with the plays’ structure and unity. The common use of choral odes at climactic points in drama, either to release tension or simply to change the direction of movement, had already in Euripides developed into a discernible type of ode. Padel, in a sensitive and thought-provoking article, identiﬁes as a distinct group those odes which share the ‘e÷qe geno≤man theme’—odes, in other words, which express desperate or impossible wishes—and her discussion centres on Euripides’ use of escapism to counteract the supposed realism of his tragedies.224 The wish to become a bird and ﬂy away had been expressed before by tragic characters in times of extreme distress;225 but Euripides can be seen to be developing the motif, expanding it into entire odes. As Padel observes, these odes are not exactly to be classiﬁed as ‘escapist’, but rather they move, at crisis-points in the drama, to an imaginary location, in order to explore various preoccupations of the play ‘in a new mode, as a dream regroups the thoughts and events of the waking day’.226 223 Iphigenia 1094–7. It is unusual that the Greek girls yearn for Artemis Lokhia (in her capacity as goddess of childbirth) in particular. Perhaps the signiﬁcance is that, as perpetual virgins, they will never have children and so are in need of escape in another sense, ‘stranded’ at a particular point in life. Cf. Iphigenia’s complaint that she is childless (£teknoß, 220). 224 Padel (1974) 227. 225 The topos is found also at Hippolytus 732–5, Andromache 861–4, Ion 746 and Soph. OC 1081. The chorus in Aesch. Suppl. 777 ﬀ . wish that they could turn into smoke and disappear. The same motif is found in Ar. Birds 1337–9 (which the scholiast attributes to Sophocles’ Oenomaus) but can in fact be traced back to Alcman (PMG fr. 26.2–4). See L. Parker (1997, 340–1) for further parallels and discussion. 226 Padel (1974) 241.

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In the escape-tragedies, certainly one looks for, and ﬁnds, thematic unity between play and ode of the type Padel describes, and one might remark too that odes of escape are particularly appropriate in escape-tragedies. But here I believe that Euripides has gone a step further: he has transformed yet another common tragic metaphor into a central concern of the plays’ structure and plot, in an expert union of form and content.227 It has been pointed out that when the chorus members reminisce about Greece, they ‘mentally cross the sea ﬁrst’.228 This observation is clearly of relevance to my earlier remarks about the plays’ conception of movement and travel and the limitations placed on the human characters. But the odes are fantasy. When the characters and chorus fantasize about escape, they are envisaging themselves in a dreamlike situation as doing the impossible; as transcending their boundedness like a god, a ship, a bird; of ﬂying; of soaring beyond constraints; of being liberated, like gods, from human boundaries and covering a vast geographical range. Now it is possible to see a large-scale structural eﬀect: for the dynamic of the tragedies is a constant alternation and contrast between the boundedness of the episodes and the liberation of the choral odes. Not just one but all the odes in the escape-tragedies (apart from the third stasimon of Iphigenia) are concerned with journeys over a vast expanse of sea or sky.229 In the second stasimon of Iphigenia the Greek women imagine liberation in the form of airborne travel: the ode is addressed to the halcyon, the bird of the sharp sea-cliﬀs (1089), and culminates in a wish to become a bird and ﬂy across the sea (1138). They also recall their own abduction, the ships which rowed them away to this barbarian coast, and predict that a similar pentekonter will arrive to take Iphigenia and Orestes back home by swift sea-voyage 227 In fact, one could view the escape-tragedies’ counterfactual plots in their entirety as a reconceptualization of the ‘e÷qe geno≤man theme’, in its sense of a rhetorical topos of tragedy, in which characters very often wish, in vain, that things had turned out diﬀerently. A famous example of this topos is the prologue to Medea: ‘If only the Argo had never sailed . . .’ (e÷q’ •fel’ !rgoıß m¶ diapt3sqai sk3foß | KÎlcwn ƒß a”an kuanvaß Sumplhg3daß ktl., 1–3). 228 Barlow (1971) 28. (My italics.) 229 The lyric prologue of Andromeda began by describing the chariot of the Night, ﬂying through the starry sky (fr. 114); apart from that, though, the fragments divulge nothing about the odes of that play.

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(1110–24). There is clearly a contrast between the practical expectations of escape by sea and the fantasy of escape by air, made necessary because they realize that they will be left behind and that fantasy is their only option. This is similar to the wish of the chorus in Helen’s third stasimon to ﬂy with cranes (di’ ajqvroß e÷qe potano≥ | geno≤meq’, 1451), though the situation and general mood of that ode is somewhat diﬀerent. There Menelaus and Helen have just departed for what looks like a successful escape and the chorus sing joyfully and impressionistically about sea and air travel—an ode of pure escapism. The parodos of Helen and the second stasimon of Iphigenia tell of the abductions of the Greek women at the time of the Trojan War; Helen’s ﬁrst stasimon relates Menelaus’ laborious seatravels and the Greek expedition; Iphigenia’s ﬁrst stasimon describes the arrival of Orestes and Pylades and (like the second stasimon and the third stasimon of Helen) anticipates longingly their return to Greece; the ‘Magna Mater’ ode of Helen tells of Demeter’s magical, racing journey all over Greece. It is also interesting that nearly all the odes are addressed to birds or ships: the Sirens,230 the nightingale,231 the halcyon,232 the swift Sidonian ship.233 A great mobility and geographical sweep is imagined before the succeeding episodes bring the action, more or less literally, ‘down to earth’. At the end of each play the Greeks successfully escape from their places of captivity, at last achieving the liberation and mobility which has so far been the stuﬀ of nostalgic fantasy. Correspondingly, in the last section of each play there seems to be a change in the signiﬁcance of the landscape. An inﬂuential structuralist reading of Helen has maintained that, instead of symbolizing suﬀering, danger and uncertainty, the sea now acquires newly positive functions: the restoration of identity, recovery of the past, puriﬁcation, rebirth.234 The sea in Iphigenia, 230

Helen 167. Helen 1107–10. 232 Iphigenia 1089–90. 233 Helen 1451. 234 Segal (1971) 595–6. He sees the second stasimon of Helen as an ode of rebirth, ‘crystallizing the movement of the entire plot, which is in turn the cyclical movement from Winter to Summer’; he also connects the third stasimon with its reference to the Hyacinthia. His interpretation stresses the cultaetiological aspect which other structuralist analyses of the play have been keen to pursue (e.g. Foley 1992). 231

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also, ostensibly assumes a newly positive aspect. But I would argue that these seemingly ‘happy’ endings, and the role of the landscape, are open to diﬀering interpretations. One can choose to view the endings of the escape-tragedies as ‘happy’, since the characters are all successfully liberated, there has been an Aristotelian peripeteia from bad to good fortune, and the plot has been wound up in an ostensibly satisfying way. But it is also possible to take a more disturbing, more pessimistic view. It seems that the plays, especially in their closure, prompt their audience to ask certain questions. What is the end result of all these abductions, rescues and escapes? What, for that matter, is escape or imprisonment? No satisfactory or reassuring answers are oﬀered, but it is diﬃcult to view the Greeks’ successful escaping as ‘a dream come true’, as a straightforward reading of the plays and their odes would suggest. If we subject to pressure the plays’ presentation of escape, a more sinister possibility emerges. In the ﬁrst place, one might ﬁnd it hard to agree that lifeenhancing optimism and rebirth can really be represented by seas on which many men are stabbed to death in the course of perverted, fake ritual burials, and which may still without warning (as in Iphigenia) churn up in a perilous storm; or by escapes which are eﬀected on ships where murder ‘ﬂows’ (fÎnwi d† naıß ƒrre∏to, Helen 1602). It seems that this still may be a sea of troubles, never shedding its danger, unpredictability and capacity for bringing suﬀering. Captivity is more complex a state than it might seem. Andromeda’s situation is possibly the most straightforward: she is chained to a rock and her oppressor is a monster, a thoroughly undesirable state of aﬀairs. But Helen’s imprisonment, on the other hand, constitutes no physical ordeal; and, indeed, ‘escape from a beautiful place’ is a slightly paradoxical concept. (Why does Helen wish to escape from Egypt to a Greece where she is hated and, indeed, may never regain her former reputation?235) Iphigenia’s position is diﬀerent again, because (as we have seen) she fulﬁls a double role: she may be a captive in the Tauric land, but she is also a captor, in some sense parallel to Thoas; she 235 At Helen 287–9, Helen says that it would be worse than anything she has yet suﬀered, if she were to return home and yet be unable to clear her name and recover her identity. These lines (and others) may well have prompted the audience to reﬂect that Helen did not succeed in clearing her name. . . .

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exhibits barbarian characteristics; she is the menacing priestess of Artemis with a disturbing penchant for human sacriﬁce, from whom Orestes and Pylades, her rescuers, themselves have to be rescued; she shows few signs, even, of wanting to escape until her discovery that Orestes is still alive. Thus more paradox and unease abounds. One has to question, also, just what and where the escapees are escaping to. Despite the Greeks’ constant nostalgic yearnings for their native land and prayers to the gods to save them from the barbarians, the systematic blurring of the distinctions between Greeks and barbarians means that one can no longer simply view a return to Greece in terms of (as in the Odyssey) a blessed return to civilized, familiar values. One strong implication of the plays is that one can say little for certain of people or places; but there are ample hints that a return to Greece may not be particularly desirable. Greece is the place where Iphigenia was sacriﬁced, the place which, as she says, she hates; it is the place where Helen’s name is utterly reviled. Furthermore, it is impossible for either heroine to resume her previous ‘normal’ existence in Greece. Not only are their families now severely reduced in size, largely as a result of murder or suicide, and their homes destroyed—but also, more importantly, there is no proper sequel to these alternative, radically diﬀerent versions of the myths. That is, we learn, at the end of each play, the eventual divine role of the heroines, far in the future; but neither the ‘real’ Helen nor the ‘murdered’ Iphigenia have any subsequent mythological existence in immediate, human terms. They sail oﬀ into the sunset, to who knows what fate? We have seen how ‘escape’ is constantly envisaged as being equivalent to repatriation. But Helen and Iphigenia have already been saved once, before the plays begin: they have only come to be in these strange, barbarian lands as a result of earlier rescues. They were saved from Greece, and brought to Egypt and the Tauric land: so, in other words, it is possible to view the barbarian lands as places of refuge as well as prisons. Likewise, Orestes and Menelaus are in their current parlous positions because of earlier ‘rescues’ from the sea.236 What gain can there 236 This fact is stressed particularly at Helen 778 (swqe≥ß d’ ƒke∏qen ƒnqad’ Álqeß ƒß sfag3ß, ‘you were saved from there only to come here and be killed’) and 863–4 (Tro≤aß d† swqe≥ß kåpÏ barb3rou cqonÏß | ƒß b3rbar’ ƒlq°n f3sgan’ aˆqiß

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be in escaping from one situation to ﬁnd themselves in another, worse situation? In fact, the rescuers are as restricted by their human limitations as all the other characters: Menelaus, Orestes and Pylades (and Perseus?237) themselves require rescuing, and at the close of each play it is a god alone who can ﬁnally remove the danger, subdue the seas and allow them to transcend their boundaries. It may be that the boundedness of the characters’ physical situations metaphorically represents their human limitations: they can never really ‘escape’, but simply move around, propelled by forces largely outside their control. Near the start of Iphigenia (116–17), Pylades exhorted Orestes to complete the task which they set out to perform, saying that they have not rowed such a long journey to turn round and row back again (oÇtoi makrÏn m†n ‡lqomen k*phi pÎron | ƒk term3twn dv nÎston åroımen p3lin). But the words must strike an ironic note when one realizes that this is precisely what they will do, whether they complete their mission or not. Their sea-journeying, a long and arduous toil, will necessitate more journeying and more toil. Again, the supposed ‘circularity’ which the structuralist critics see in these plots may be negative rather than positive, representing not optimism, rebirth and the great cycle of nature, but pessimism, self-defeat and ﬂux. Is there any ultimate purpose to human endeavour—or is Euripides advancing a nihilistic world-view? It has emerged from this chapter, I hope, that Euripides’ uses of setting are greatly more numerous, complicated and provocative than at ﬁrst seems to be the case. The unique sense of place which the escape-tragedies, in their various ways, create is an area of quite crucial importance, in which close connection of substance and ideas can be observed between all three plays. The landscape of the escape-tragedies—especially when considered in relation to their other intellectual themes—makes them wholly distinctive works of art. ƒmpes[i, ‘having been saved from Troy, a barbarian land indeed, you will yet die by a barbarian sword’). 237 It is diﬃcult to make any ﬁrm statement; in some sense, as we have seen, Perseus is more able to transcend boundaries than the other rescuers (i.e. by literal ﬂight), but it seems likely that a situation arose in Andromeda from which Perseus himself needed divine help (see Webster’s (1967, 197–9) reconstruction of the play, which supposes a threat to Perseus’ life from the monster and from Cepheus). Cf. §2.3.4 above.

4 Tragedy of Ideas

EURIPIDHS Òtan t¤ nın £pista p≤sq’ Óg*meqa, t¤ d’ Ônta p≤st’ £pista. DIONUSOS p0ß; oÛ manq3nw. åmaqvsterÎn pwß ejp† ka≥ safvsteron.1

4.1 introduction The ancient description of Euripides as ‘the philosopher of the stage’2 is often quoted but seldom discussed at length.3 In this chapter I want to explore the meaning and the implications of these words, and to evaluate the ways in which Euripides (or, for that matter, any ﬁfth-century tragedian) can be described as ‘philosophical’. This is an important question, the answer to which is left only implicit, or even ignored altogether, by most writers on tragedy. It is even more important for the current purposes to formulate a point of view on the matter, not only because Euripides is generally regarded (for whatever reason) as the most ‘philosophical’ of the Greek dramatists,4 but also 1 Aristophanes, Frogs 1443–5. ‘Euripides: When we believe the true untrue, and the untrue true, too— Dionysus: What? I don’t understand. Could you possibly explain it more clearly, in words of one syllable?’ 2 First attested in Vitruvius, De Arch. 8 pr. 1: Euripides, auditor Anaxagorae, quem philosophum Athenienses scaenicum appellaverunt; cf. Athenaeus 4.48, 158e (Ø skhnikÏß o˜toß filÎsofoß: it is suggested that Euripides would appeal particularly to a learned, grammatik*tatoß, man) and 13.11, 561a (ka≥ ƒlvcqhsan lÎgoi filÎsofoi p3mpolloi: ƒn oÍß tineß ka≥ ƒmnhmÎneusan toı skhnikoı filosÎfou EÛrip≤dou åism3twn); Sextus Empiricus, Adv. Math. 1.288: Ø skhnikÏß filÎsofoß; Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 5.70.1: Ø ƒp≥ t[ß skhn[ß filÎsofoß EÛrip≤dhß. 3 The epithet is mentioned, in diﬀerent contexts, by Nestle (1901, 4), Décharme (1893, 21), E. Segal (1968a, 9), Winnington-Ingram (1969, 127), Collard (1981, 30), and others: I shall go on to discuss the diﬀerent senses in which these and other scholars understand the concept. 4 It is interesting to note, incidentally, that the surviving portrait busts of Euripides (from various periods) resemble a recognizably philosophical type: see Décharme (1893) 6–7 (listing images of Welcker, Alte Denkmäler 1. 485).

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because (as I shall argue) the escape-tragedies are particularly rich in ideas. I believe that Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia are more intellectually advanced than has previously been appreciated, and that all three plays5 can be read as interrelated treatments of the same ideas. For the time being, I shall concentrate on what one might broadly term ontological and epistemological ideas, postponing until the next chapter discussion of Euripidean theology. Beginning (§4.2) with an examination of the relationship between tragedy and philosophy, I shall proceed (§§4.3, 4.4) to explore the nexus of ideas in the escape-tragedies which might be considered speciﬁcally ‘philosophical’, namely those concerning the relationship between sense-perception, spoken and written words, and reality. In this respect, the connection between Euripides and other contemporary thinkers, such as Gorgias and Anaxagoras, will require careful analysis. Underlying this approach is an impulse to search for meaning in the plays—in other words, an essentially hermeneutic method. Of course, this is not to claim that my interpretation is the only valid one. Nevertheless, I do not want to subscribe to the prevailing trend which emphasizes ambiguity, unanswered questions and lack of resolution in the discussion of tragedy in general, and paradox and elusiveness in the discussion of Euripides in particular.6 The work of the ‘French school’ critics, from which these and similar phrases derive, has provided great insights into the genre as a whole; but it seems to me that many readings of tragic texts, under the inﬂuence of Vernant and others, go too far. Continual recourse to words such as ‘problematic’ or ‘ambiguous’ not only overstates the case, but can also imply an automatic, even lazy, uniform response to tragic texts. On my reading of the escape5 With the usual caveat, of course: the fragmentary state of Andromeda means that one can make only provisional attempts to ﬁt it into the picture. 6 Ambiguity and ‘open questions’ as characteristic of tragedy: see esp. Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1983); Goldhill (1986); Taplin (1986) and (1996). Euripides seen to be (deliberately) resisting interpretation: see especially Dale (1967) vii–xvi; Segal (1968b), who calls Euripides a ‘poet of paradox’; Wolﬀ (1973) 61; Vellacott (1975) 2 (‘Euripides’ plays were apt to end with a questionmark rather than a full stop’); Dimock (1977) 7; Collard (1981) 30–6; Barlow (1986b); Buxton (1988), who believes that ‘baﬄement’ is the eﬀect aimed for by many Euripidean plays; Croally (1994) 16 (‘Euripides, as I present him, more often questions than aﬃrms, more often makes things diﬃcult rather than easy’), etc.

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tragedies, a less open-ended interpretation emerges: Euripides is directing his audience towards a deﬁnite conclusion about the nature of human knowledge; and, furthermore, this conclusion is a distinctly pessimistic and disturbing one. Indeed, this is another way in which one can view Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia as being thoroughly tragic—not at all ‘light’, ‘amusing’, or ‘comic’. However, this is not a widely held opinion. The title which I have given to this chapter represents a deliberate reaction against that of Anne Pippin Burnett’s inﬂuential 1960 article, ‘Euripides’ Helen: a comedy of ideas’.7 Why does she call it ‘comedy’ rather than ‘tragedy’? The question is diﬃcult to answer because of the manner in which Burnett expresses her argument: she oﬀers scarcely any explicit justiﬁcation of her opinion that Helen is ‘comic’, which means that one struggles to engage with her argument in detail. Although she makes some interesting points, Burnett’s whole approach seems to me ﬂawed because (in common with so many studies of Euripides) it is based on implicit and largely subjective judgements of ‘tone’ which ultimately represent nothing more or less than personal taste. While it may seem perfectly reasonable for Burnett to read the play and ﬁnd it amusing (for whatever reason), she ought to have done more to convince other readers why they should agree—or, at least, to have given suﬃcient grounds on which to base agreement or disagreement. On only two occasions does Burnett come close to an explanation. The ﬁrst is when she writes that ‘a new comic irony’ is what characterizes the play and sets it apart from other Greek tragedies. This ‘comic irony’ occurs, she says, in the course of the scene where Helen and Menelaus deceive Theoclymenus:8 ‘the responsibility of tragic irony, with its burden of knowledge shared by audience and dramatist but withheld from the characters, is laid aside, and the spectator may rest and enjoy the irony of double meanings which are conscious expressions of intention and power.’9 This point can be answered by pointing out that the type of irony in question is neither remarkable, nor diﬀerent in 7 8 9

77).

Burnett (1960): as ‘A. N. Pippin’. Helen 1193–300. Burnett (1960) 153: she reuses the term ‘comic irony’ in a later book (1971,

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kind from irony elsewhere in tragedy, nor characteristic of comedy as a genre, nor particularly ‘comical’ or ‘funny’.10 (Nevertheless, I shall return, brieﬂy, to ‘irony’ below.11) The second occasion is when, a couple of pages later, Burnett writes that ‘Euripides has hung some of the baubles of Old Comedy in the branches of the tragic structure’,12 elaborating on this, she explains that the portress’s invective, Menelaus’ costume and his characterization, and the deception theme are all ‘highly Aristophanic’. However, this, too, fails to convince. Deception of one sort or another, like irony, can be seen in many tragedies, as can cowardly or blustering characters (for example, Jason, Polymestor, Admetus).13 Ragged costumes and the dialogue with the portress are ‘Aristophanic’ in the sense that Aristophanes parodied these features in his comedies, but they cannot be seen as intrinsically comic features.14 As I said above, deciding what is comical or funny is to a large degree a subjective matter.15 Nevertheless, it will not do simply 10 Rosenmeyer (1996, 510–15) gives a useful ‘taxonomical’ outline of some species of irony which makes clear the large variety of ironical eﬀects in drama and elsewhere. What we have in Helen is simply deception of one character by another—categorized by Rosenmeyer as a type of ‘forensic irony’. Similar scenes occur in Iphigenia (although Burnett would, I suspect, also call that a ‘comedy of ideas’), Medea, Philoctetes and frequently elsewhere in tragedy. 11 See pp. 230–2. 12 Burnett (1960) 155. 13 It might be objected that Menelaus’ swaggering is of a somewhat diﬀerent sort from that seen elsewhere—both Griﬃth (1953, 37) and Grube (1961, 339), rather like Burnett, thought that Menelaus had something of the miles gloriosus about him, but they miss the point. Menelaus is not funny; the debunking of his heroic values, and of the Trojan War, has a very serious point (related to the questioning of knowledge, myth and traditional values). See also Dale (1967) xi–xii: ‘the comic aspect of Menelaus should not be pressed too far’ (although, rather confusingly, Dale goes on to say that Euripides is trying to create ‘amusement instead of pathos’ at Menelaus’ ﬁrst appearance). Podlecki’s (1970, 402–3) interpretation is far more subtle. (On this question in more detail see §4.4.2 below.) 14 Euripides’ ragged heroes—of whom Menelaus is the only extant example—did appeal to Aristophanes’ sense of humour (Ach. 410–79, Peace 146–8, Frogs 841–2, 1063), but they are not in themselves either comical or exclusively Euripidean: Aeschylus’ Persians and Sophocles’ Philoctetes and Oedipus at Colonus provide notable counter-examples. The portress-scene is parodied in Ar. Thesm. (870–88). It should be noted that a comic poet’s decision to parody something does not imply that the feature in question is itself comic or funny. See further Rau (1967). 15 Cf. Winnington-Ingram’s (1948, 40) perhaps over-pessimistic view: ‘The presence of humour cannot be argued; it can only be felt.’

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to state that something is funny; and, although one may not be able to prove one’s case on stylistic grounds, one must attempt to provide illustration. Throughout the article Burnett relies for her illustration of Helen’s ‘comic’ tone on an unscrupulous technique, which is in fact a recurrent feature of discussions of supposedly ‘comic’ or ‘tragi-comic’ tragedies. Rather than quoting from Euripides’ Greek, Burnett adopts a mixture of paraphrase and over-enthusiastic translation which is characterized by barely-suppressed hilarity and mirth: this gives a quite misleading impression of the tone of the Greek.16 However, if we examine the words of the play itself, this apparent jollity evaporates. I shall give just a few examples here (though there are plenty of others). Burnett’s account of the meeting and subsequent dialogue between Menelaus and Helen is typical. ‘From the moment of ﬁrst seeing her,’ she writes, ‘his head has not worked very well, but at last he shakes it and says, “No, my mind is sound, it’s my eyes that have gone wrong”.’17 In Greek, this is: EL. oÛk πstin £llh s& tiß ånt’ ƒmoı gun&. ME. oÇ pou fron0 m†n eˆ, tÏ d’ Ômma mou nose∏; Helen: You have no other wife except me. Menelaus: What? Have I lost my reason? Is my eye diseased?

One might remark, ﬁrst of all, that there is nothing here about head-shaking—this is, of course, a possible description of the stage action, but how could we know? But, more importantly, the bantering tone of the translation is not found in the Greek. If one looks at the whole of the passage in question, ‘ideas’ are certainly prominent, but comedy is absent. In fact, the tone of the stichomythic dialogue seems urgent, anxious and perplexed. It might be that the particle pou, sometimes ironical, has 16 I should stress that Burnett is not alone in this practice, but it is a most serious shortcoming. Dishonest rendering into English is a factor which contributes signiﬁcantly to the perpetuation of the idea that Euripides’ tragedies are not tragic; and it is a great handicap for any who study the plays in the medium of English translation. See e.g. the Penguin translations of Euripides by Vellacott (1953–74) and the Aris and Phillips edition of Orestes by Martin West (1987), as well as Conacher (1967) and (1998); Dale (1967); E. M. Hall (1997); Kitto (1961); Knox (1979); E. Segal (1968b); Webster (1967); WinningtonIngram (1969). 17 Burnett (1960) 152, quoting Helen 575.

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inﬂuenced Burnett’s judgement; but here it is more naturally taken as expressing Menelaus’ genuine doubt rather than irony.18 Finally, the paraphrase ‘his head is not working very well’ does not directly reﬂect anything in the Greek, and is clearly ﬂippant. A little later, Burnett gives a facetious rendering of Helen’s comment to Menelaus on his ragged costume: ‘Well, you’ve certainly got a nasty way of dressing’.19 In this case, the words which Euripides wrote are: ME. oÛ kl0pvß ƒsmen oÛd’ Ëphrvtai kak0n. EL. ka≥ m¶n stol&n g’ £morfon åmf≥ s0m’ πceiß. Menelaus: I am not a thief or a criminal! Helen: And yet your body’s clothing, indeed, is ugly.

As in the previous passage, it is hard to see that the Greek version is as amusing as the English. At this stage, Helen and Menelaus are each unaware of the other’s identity: Helen is unconvinced by Menelaus’ assurance that he does not pose a threat, and so she replies (picking up his words oÛ kl0pvß ƒsmen) that his appearance suggests otherwise.20 Burnett’s translation of this line is especially inappropriate, since it emphasizes the ‘comedy’ but actually ignores the prominent ‘idea’ (the self-conscious use of the word s0ma to bring out, as often elsewhere, the diﬀerence between outward appearances and reality).21 Helen’s comment on her disguised husband’s costume, in Burnett’s translation, resembles not so much the confusion of a frightened woman as the unasked-for opinion of some acerbic arbiter elegantiae. Similarly, Theoclymenus, when he too remarks on Menelaus’ rags, is made to sound like Bertie Wooster’s Aunt Agatha: ‘What’s that frightful outﬁt he’s wearing?’22 (Euripides wrote: 18 Denniston (1954, 492) places the pou of Hel. 575 (along with identical usage at 135, 600 and 791) in the category of ‘incredulous or reluctant’ questions. 19 Burnett (1960) 152, quoting Helen 554. 20 Again, the use of the particles (the nuances of which are sometimes diﬃcult to grasp) seems unambiguous. Although ge can sometimes be ironical, sarcastic or contemptuous, in this instance it should clearly be taken with ka≥ m¶n, as giving emphasis to stol&n. See Denniston (1954) 119–20: ‘Determinative ge is most commonly found after connecting particles. Whether these express disjunction, opposition, progression, or inference, ge serves to deﬁne more sharply the new idea introduced: “this, and nothing else”.’ (Examples of this use of the combination ka≥ m¶n . . . ge are supplied by Denniston on page 120.) 21 See §4.3 below for extended discussion of this theme. 22 Burnett (1960) 152, quoting Helen 1204.

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⁄pollon, „ß ƒsq[ti dusmÎrfwi prvpei, ‘By Apollo! How conspicuous he is in his tattered garments’.) Elsewhere, this time discussing the scene in which Theoclymenus is deceived, Burnett again supplies a missing stagedirection and a tone of voice, as well as another misleading translation. In response to Theoclymenus’ concern about his forthcoming wedding and Helen’s previous husband,23 Helen replies—‘slyly’ as Burnett would have us believe—‘Nonsense! my wedding celebrations have already begun.’24 Euripides wrote: åll’ oÛkvt’: ‡dh d’ £rce t0n ƒm0n g3mwn—in which the absence of the word ‘Nonsense’ may be noted.25 (The mistranslation of the imperative £rce, while distracting, does not aﬀect the tone.) This is the ‘comic irony’ which Burnett makes central to her discussion. Seriously misleading translations, then, are an inadequate basis for a reading of any play, and should be avoided. A couple of further methodological problems emerge from Burnett’s article. The ﬁrst is an apparent contradiction regarding the supposed generic status of Helen. Although she has been arguing that it is a comedy, at one point Burnett states that Euripides’ plot is something rather diﬀerent: ‘a romantic plot is used as an excuse for the poetic expression of philosophical ideas’.26 This causes confusion: what, then, is the Helen? Surely it cannot be both comic and romantic?27 In fact, neither label is satisfactory, but ‘romantic’ is even less appropriate than ‘comic’, since the genre of romance did not yet exist in 412 bc.28 Burnett follows this up by stating that Helen is ‘ancestor to Measure 23 In this case, the text—that is, the order of lines 1225–31 more than the words themselves—is problematic (see Diggle’s apparatus, incorporating Jackson’s transposition); but this seems unlikely to aﬀect one’s judgement of the tone. 24 Burnett (1960) 153–4, quoting Helen 1231. 25 There does not seem to be any way in which åll’ oÛkvt’ could mean ‘Nonsense!’ A better translation would run: ‘I shall spurn your advances no longer: now begin the preparations for our marriage’. The words clearly answer Theoclymenus’ question t≤ kertome∏ß me; (‘Why are you taunting me?’ 1229). Cf. Dale (1967) ad loc. 26 Burnett (1960) 154: my italics. 27 Admittedly, Burnett does refer (ibid.) to the ‘experimental’ nature of Helen, which might go some way to explaining the seeming inconsistency. On the application of ‘romance’ and other generic labels, see §1.1 above. 28 This problem has already been discussed at greater length (§1.1 above).

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for Measure and The Winter’s Tale’, which underlines the anachronism of her approach. We cannot use Shakespeare (who was, directly or indirectly, inﬂuenced by Euripides) to illuminate Euripides’ intentions; a comparison of the two writers should not be taken to prove anything about the earlier. It may be that this inconsistency is not very important, aside from illustrating the woolliness with which numerous critics talk about issues of genre. But the second problem is fundamental to the whole question of Euripides’ treatment of ‘ideas’: is it the ‘ideas’ themselves which make Helen seem to be comic? Burnett’s title and general tone appear to be implying this, but in places— with the sentence about the ‘romantic plot’ which I have just quoted, as well as her identiﬁcation of supposedly ‘Aristophanic’ features—she implies that, on the contrary, it is certain plotelements, rather than the ‘ideas’ themselves, which are being judged comical. This is to assume both that ‘plot’ is separable from ‘ideas’ and that plot is less important (‘used as an excuse’) than ideas. However, both of these assumptions are questionable. (How might one go about separating the ideas from the plot, since each partly determines the other? Even if one could expunge the ideas, would the plot still remain?) Burnett’s article, then, does not yield a clear explanation why Helen or the other tragedies should be seen as comedies. Nevertheless, the writings of Burnett and other critics who have interpreted the plays on similar lines all imply that the ‘ideas’ are indeed, at least partially, responsible for the perceived lightness of tone.29 This implication needs to be taken very seriously: why, exactly, should intellectual content and humour be seen as concomitant qualities in drama? Is there something intrinsically funny about epistemological, ontological, or cosmological speculation? Perhaps the answer lies precisely in the fact that these philosophical subjects are not funny. At issue here is a fundamental, general question of the literary presentation of serious ideas: there is a feeling that the dull dough of philosophy has to be 29 Burnett (1960) 162; Zuntz (1960) 201–3; Grube (1961) 232; WinningtonIngram (1969)—on which see below (§1.2) for further comment; Segal (1971) 553–6 and 561; Wolﬀ (1973) 82; Dimock (1977) 4–6; Bowie (1993) 218–9; E. M. Hall (1997) xxiii–xxv; on Iphigenia, compare Burnett (1971) 48 (referring to the play’s ‘festive complexity’) and Cropp (2000) 33–4.

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leavened with something more lively, if it is to appear palatable to readers (or, especially, the audiences of drama, which by its nature arouses expectations of entertainment more than other forms of—written and read—literature). Of course, no ‘intellectual’ writer, ancient or modern (not even the writer of an academic monograph), ever entirely eschews entertainment. But the techniques employed to make serious works more entertaining—irony, word-play, puns, and so on—can also make the overall tone diﬃcult to interpret.30 Since tragedy aims at an emotional, not just an intellectual, eﬀect, this diﬃculty is particularly serious. A self-conscious or ludic manner of presentation may often belie the complexity and the seriousness of the treatment of ideas, misleading us into thinking that the writer’s intention is funnier than it really is. Even the critical terminology which we use—‘word-play’—may distort the picture; but we should be quite clear that word-play and irony, although they are (in some form) part of comedy’s stock-in-trade, are not intrinsically or exclusively comic.31 Finally, there is another reason why the escape-tragedies should not be seen as comedies. In general, comedy’s relationship to the world of ideas is signiﬁcantly diﬀerent from tragedy’s. Comic poets, typically, treat philosophical ideas in a superﬁcial way; they represent philosophy or philosophers, often in a caricatured or satirical manner, but they rarely engage with ideas in a dynamic sense or add new ideas.32 A recent survey of philosophy and comedy notes that Old Comedy presented the 30 I have already mentioned this problem in relation to ‘metamythology’ (§2.4 above). One might compare Kevin Lee’s (1997, 31) diﬃculties in interpreting the ‘ideas’ of Euripides’ Ion, another play often, like the escape-tragedies, unfairly labelled ‘tragicomedy’: ‘what is the tone of this exploration of human (mis-) understanding? . . . Euripides’ treatment . . . may not have a tragic edge, but neither is it reassuringly comic.’ 31 Goldhill (1986, 236) recognizes this when he says that tragedy as a whole is characterized by close attention to the (shifting, negotiable) meaning of words: ‘this is not just “word play”, but deadly serious debate of issues contemporary and important to the polis.’ 32 Evidence of Old Comedy’s interest in contemporary philosophy includes Ameipsias’ Connus (which featured Socrates as character as well as a chorus of frontista≤, ‘thinkers’), Eupolis’ Flatterers (which featured Protagoras), Cratinus’ All-Seeing Ones, the Sophists of the comic poet Plato, and, of course, Aristophanes’ Clouds (Socrates and the personiﬁed Dissoi Logoi). See Carey (2000) for details.

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intellectuals ‘in a broadly similar light’ as ‘verbose poseurs.’33 Aristophanes’ attitude may have been rather more complex, and his presentation of ideas more detailed, than that of his rivals, but it seems that the taste of the comic audience was for less philosophy and more jokes.34 In contrast, tragedy tends to explore, rather than simply representing, philosophical ideas. This important diﬀerence is reﬂected in the fact that the philosophical tradition, from Plato onwards, is far more preoccupied with tragedy than with comedy.35 In case it is objected that this contrast is too simplistic, I should add that the relationship between tragedy and philosophy is rather more complicated and variable than I have so far suggested. The next section (§4.2) will attempt to clarify the connection between the two. For the moment, however, the important point is that the type of treatment of ideas which we see in the escape-tragedies is essentially unlike that of comedy. Drama, then, can be intellectually dazzling, provocative, ironical, ludic or entertaining without thereby becoming comic. On the contrary, Helen and the other escape-tragedies are deadly serious, and unambiguously tragic . . . but ‘philosophical’? So far, I have been assuming that tragedy is (or may be) philosophical, but this is a matter which calls out for a little more preliminary discussion. 4.2 philosopher of the stage 4.2.1 Tragedy and ‘philosophy’ If we are to take Euripides and his ideas seriously, there are two questions that have to be pondered, in the light of ancient and modern critical views. First of all, is tragedy really philosophical, and, if so, in what ways? Second, is Euripides philosophical or merely ‘clever’? We might begin by reconsidering the description Ø skhnikÏß 33

Carey (2000) 429–30. This may be seen in e.g. the reception of the ﬁrst, more complex, version of Aristophanes’ Clouds. See the poet’s own remarks in the parabasis of Wasps, and cf. Dover (1968a) xxxii–lvii and lxxx–xcviii and MacDowell (1995) 30–6 for discussion of Aristophanes’ presentation of Socratic ideas and the two versions of Clouds. 35 This point is made by Goldhill (2000) 84–6. 34

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filÎsofoß, ‘philosopher of the stage’: what might this phrase mean, or what might it have meant to a ﬁfth-century audience? Does the emphasis lie on skhnikÏß or filÎsofoß?—in other words, is Euripides a philosopher who happened to write plays, or a playwright whose work happened to have a philosophical ﬂavour? The answer is that he is both of these things, and yet neither formulation is really appropriate. The date at which the phrase was ﬁrst used makes a diﬀerence—whether in the ﬁfth century bc, the ﬁrst century ad,36 or at some point in between. Critical perceptions of Euripides in Hellenistic and Roman culture reﬂect various opinions accumulated over several centuries, from Aristophanes and his contemporaries onwards, which means that it is diﬃcult to identify contemporary, ﬁfth-century views among much later reactions based on diﬀerent sets of assumptions. This problem particularly aﬀects our understanding of Ø skhnikÏß filÎsofoß, because the relationship between philosophy and poetry was perceived in quite diﬀerent ways at diﬀerent times. There is a widespread tendency in the scholarly tradition to make a clear distinction between poets on the one hand and philosophers on the other. This is probably due to Plato’s inﬂuence. His criticism of poetry (especially in the Republic), and his well-known formulation of ‘the ancient quarrel between poetry and philosophy’, have greatly aﬀected the history of ideas.37 However, the ‘quarrel’ was not as ancient as all that. The terms in which Plato expresses the problem reﬂect his own intellectual preoccupations—he is arguing, polemically, for the primacy of his own type of writing over that of earlier writers— but they do not necessarily reﬂect the situation in the ﬁfth century and earlier. True, the relationship between diﬀerent types of literature, and the value of their content (measured in terms of truth, validity, pleasure, or other qualities), were matters for ongoing debate, and had been since (at least) the time of Hesiod;38 but the Vitruvius’ is the ﬁrst known citation: see n. 2 above for references. Plato, Rep. 10. 607b5–6: palai¤ mvn tiß diafor¤ filosof≤ai te ka≥ poihtik[i. (See Halliwell (1988) ad loc. and Kannicht (1988) for discussion.) A comparable Platonic statement of the conﬂict between philosophy and epic and tragic poetry can be seen at Laws 7. 817a–d. See also Croally (1994) 23 (with n. 19) on the subject of the huge bibliography relating to Plato’s view of tragedy. 38 Hes. Theog. 27–8 is often quoted: ÷dmen ye»dea poll¤ lvgein ƒt»moisin Ømo∏a, 36 37

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formulation of this debate as a quarrel between two opposing terms is a distinctly fourth-century phenomenon. Indeed, it is arguable that ‘philosophy’ did not exist as something separate from ‘poetry’ in Euripides’ time.39 (Signiﬁcantly, filÎsofoß in the sense of ‘philosopher’ is not attested until Plato.40) It would be more accurate to describe the situation in terms of a number of diﬀerent writers all staking individual claims to truth and undermining similar claims in other, earlier writers. Therefore, to describe Euripides as a poet writing philosophy or a philosopher writing plays inadequately reﬂects the complexity of the situation in 412 bc. In other words, then, it is unlikely that Euripides’ contemporaries called him Ø skhnikÏß filÎsofoß. The evolving conception of genre and the gradual emergence of ‘philosophy’ mean that it is diﬃcult to give accurate or meaningful labels to writers of this period. As one scholar has recently written, ‘deciding whether a particular individual is a rhapsode, a sophist, an orator, or a philosopher is of questionable utility’.41 Instead of trying to separate these titles and functions, | ÷dmen d’, eˆt’ ƒqvlwmen, ålhqva ghr»sasqai (‘we understand how to speak many lies similar to genuine facts, and we understand how to give voice to truth, when we wish to do so’). Later writers join in the debate with varying degrees of sophistication. Xenophanes (DK 21 B1, 11–12, 14–16) and Heraclitus (DK 22 A22–3, B40, 42, 56–7) acknowledge that Homer and Hesiod are teachers, but criticize them for their errors: this no doubt inﬂuenced Plato’s view of the harmful eﬀect of poetry. Pindar (Ol. 1.52, 9.35–41) reacts against earlier poets, allegedly in the interests of a more truthful version. See esp. Griﬃth (1990) on the competitive nature of early Greek poetry; Bowie (1993) on claims of truth and falsehood in the poets; Morgan (2000) on the relationship between myths, poetry and philosophy. Thomas and Webb (1994, 10) examine the intellectual transformation from orality to rhetoric and philosophy in this period as a process by which ‘men create their own eloquence without the aid of the Muses’. 39 See Nightingale (2000) 138: ‘philosophy’ as a 4th-cent. invention. Plato appropriated the term filosof≤a, ‘which had previously been (broad) intellectual cultivation’. 40 Heraclitus (DK 22 B35) used filÎsofoß as an adjective, in the sense of ‘wisdom-loving’ (cf. LSJ II.1). The verb filosofvw is used by Herodotus (1.30.2) of Solon, who had come to Sardis after travelling about ‘in search of knowledge’ (filosofvwn g[n poll¶n qewr≤hß eJneken). According to Cicero (Tusc. 5.3.9), Pythagoras described himself as filÎsofoß rather than sofÎß (‘wise’). But the ﬁrst widespread use of the word to denote, speciﬁcally, an occupation seems to have been in Plato (see esp. Rep. 5.475e: the search for truth is what characterizes a filÎsofoß; but note also Phaedo 61c, which describes the sophist—and poet—Evenus as a filÎsofoß). Later, Aristotle made further distinctions between disctinct branches of philosophers (fusiko≤, fusiolÎgoi, muqolÎgoi, etc.): 41 see Most (1999) 332–4. Morgan (2000) 91.

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we should, instead, acknowledge how much the diﬀerent writers have in common, not only in their choice and treatment of subject-matter but in other ways as well. For example, we cannot make a straightforward distinction between prose (philosophy) and verse (poetry), because certain writers whom it is customary to call ‘philosophers’ (Empedocles, Xenophanes, Parmenides) wrote in hexameter verse. Even in Aristotle’s time, the debate over generic classiﬁcation was still continuing, as is seen in his discussion of the similarities and diﬀerences between Homer and Empedocles.42 Although the prose treatise was then widespread, it was not the only vehicle for philosophy (and it is interesting that Aristotle found it diﬃcult to assign a genre to Plato’s dialogues).43 It is not just the writers of ‘philosophical’ literature but also their audiences that one must consider.44 Philosophy, in the sense of prose treatises and written books, implies a small, specialist community of practitioners and readers; but, again, this is not a view of ‘philosophical’ activity which is seen in Euripides’ time. The context for serious thought was not primarily solo reading, or the classroom.45 On the contrary, ƒp≤deixiß—the element of public performance—is what characterized ‘philosophy’ of the ﬁfth century and earlier; and its 42 Arist. Poet. 1447b17–20: oÛd†n d† koinÎn ƒstin }Om&rwi ka≥ E ∞ mpedokle∏ pl¶n tÏ mvtron, diÏ tÏn m†n poiht¶n kale∏n, tÏn d† fusiolÎgon m$llon ∂ poiht&n. On his interpretation, Homer and Empedocles have nothing in common except their metre, but it is typically Aristotelian (because of his interest in ‘taxonomical’ categorization) to point out diﬀerences rather than similarities. 43 Arist. Poet. 1447b9–13: oÛd†n g¤r #n πcoimen ønom3sai koinÏn toŸß S*fronoß ka≥ Xen3rcou m≤mouß ka≥ toŸß SwkratikoŸß lÎgouß oÛd† e÷ tiß di¤ trimvtrwn ∂ ƒlege≤wn ∂ t0n £llwn tin0n t0n toio»twn poio∏to t¶n m≤mhsin (‘we have no single term to refer to the mimes of Sophron and Xenarchus and Socratic dialogues, nor to any imitation which one could produce using iambic trimeters, elegiac couplets or any other such verse form’). Compare also Aristotle, Per≥ poiht0n fr. 72 (= Athenaeus 505c), which adds that this new genre of philosophical dialogue, inspired by Socrates’ conversations, was ﬁrst practised by Alexamenus of Teos. 44 A point well made by Most (1999) 336. 45 If it is objected that certain philosophical ideas can be grasped more subtly or thoroughly by the process of reading (rather than spectating), this need not pose a problem: it is clear that written texts of drama existed alongside public performances for (at least) a considerable part of the ﬁfth century (see e.g. Ar. Frogs 52–3). It is quite possible that the playwrights had in mind a smaller, more ‘academic’ reading public in addition to the 15,000 spectators in the theatre of Dionysus.

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audiences would have been large and varied.46 The hexameter poetry of Empedocles and others was written to be recited in public by rhapsodes (Âaywido≤).47 Hippias, Gorgias and the other sophists spoke in public buildings, in theatres, at festivals, dressed in elaborate costumes.48 In their style of presentation and their relationship to their audience(s), what Plato calls ‘philosophy’, ‘poetry’ and ‘drama’ are directly comparable: indeed, Plato’s own ‘philosophy’ takes the form of dramatic dialogue!49 A tragedy diﬀers from a prose treatise in that it does not oﬀer a straightforwardly systematic, sustained treatment of ideas or theories. However, this is not enough to prevent our seeing tragedy as ‘philosophical’: it is rather that the meaning emerges in a diﬀerent way, and the identiﬁcation of the poet’s own opinion is more problematic (an issue to which I shall return). These considerations aside, tragedy and ‘philosophy’ are alike in their intellectual objectives. Serious drama is full of ideas; it makes people think. Nevertheless, there is still disagreement over the function of tragedy as an institution and the aims of its writers. For instance, a notable recent book, Malcolm Heath’s Poetics of Greek Tragedy, adopts an extreme version of Plato’s view of tragedy, arguing that tragedy aims only at aesthetic and not at cognitive or didactic ends.50 Heath quotes several texts which suggest that educational or intellectual aims come second to pleasure;51 and he maintains that none of the ancient theorists ascribes to tragedy a didactic function. (In fact, Aristotle wrote that tragedy 46 Compare Bonanno (1997) and Goldhill and Osborne (1999), who see archaic and classical Athens in general as a ‘performance culture’. 47 See e.g. Athenaeus 14.12, Diog. Laert. 8. 63–6. 48 Gorgias (DK 82 A1a, 9, B7–9); Lysias 33.2; Plato, Hipp. Min. 363c7–d4, Gorg. 447a1–b3; Prodicus, DK 84 B8: see Kerferd (1981) 18–34. Guthrie (1971, 41) adds that ‘audiences of sophistic displays were presumably similar in composition and behaviour’ to audiences at the theatre and the assembly (comparing Thuc. 3.38.7). 49 Charalabopoulos (2002) asks whether the Platonic dialogues were written to be performed as, in some sense, ‘dramatic’ events. The contributors to Gill and McCabe (1996) discuss the various problems of interpreting philosophy in dialogue form. 50 Heath (1987) 1–39. Cf. Croally (1994) 22–8 for more detailed criticism. 51 See particularly Dissoi Logoi (DK 90.3.17) and Plato, Gorgias 501e–502d: note, however, that such texts are polemical and deliberately hostile to tragedy.

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is ‘more philosophical’ and ‘more serious’ than history, because it is concerned with universal or general matters, rather than—as history—speciﬁc or trivial concerns.52 But this is not quite the same thing as saying outright that tragedy is philosophical or didactic.) However, Heath does not take into account the fact that Plato’s criticism is based on the assumption that Athenians expected to learn from tragedy.53 Perhaps it is better to talk in terms of the uses which people made of tragedy, rather than the (ultimately unknowable) purpose of the institution or the aims of its practitioners. But whether or not one agrees that tragedy was an intrinsically didactic genre, it is clear that audiences and readers of tragedy, in all periods, saw tragedy as having an intellectual content which could be turned to didactic ends.54 There is ample evidence, from Xenophanes, Plato, Isocrates and others, that didactic uses were widely made of tragic texts.55 The evidence from Old Comedy is also striking: Aristophanes’ Frogs explicitly represents tragedians as teachers. The character ‘Euripides’ there says that he has taught his audiences to chatter (a claim also referred to by ‘Aeschylus’), and he later claims to have taught them to think, putting a rational, critical spirit into 52 Arist. Poet. 1451b5–7: diÏ ka≥ filosof*teron ka≥ spoudaiÎteron po≤hsiß Èstor≤aß ƒst≤n: Ó m†n g¤r po≤hsiß m$llon t¤ kaqÎlou, Ó d’ Èstor≤a t¤ kaq’ 1kaston lvgei. The meaning of t¤ kaqÎlou, ‘universal matters’, discussed by Lucas (1968) and Halliwell (1986) ad loc., seems to take into account a process by which the events in question become intelligible: cf. An. Post. 88a5, t≤mion tÏ kaqÎlou Òti dhlo∏ t¶n ajt≤an (‘generalization is valuable because it explains things’). Aristotle also saw m≤mhsiß as educative (Poet. 1448b5). 53 A point made by Croally (1994) 26. 54 In this respect, one might also compare Goldhill’s (2000, 62–5) view of the political and ideological uses of tragedy: he stresses in particular the scale of citizen participation (assisted by the theoric fund) and refers to a sense of ‘the city on display’, arguing that tragedy did indeed aim to shape the viewpoints of the polis. 55 Croally (1994) quotes a range of texts to support this view. See particularly Xenophanes (DK21 B10); Plato, Rep. 595c1–2, 606e1–5. Similarly, Nussbaum (1986, 123) quotes Heraclitus (DK22 B40), who includes himself among a list of ‘rivals’ which includes Hesiod, Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hecataeus. ‘In our terms,’ writes Nussbaum, ‘he has named a didactic poet, a seer and oral philosopher, a philosopher who wrote in verse, and a writer of prose ethnographical treatises.’ (Compare also my own earlier remarks [§1.1 above] about the—often banal or simplistic—‘meanings’ which ancient readers, including Aristophanes, saw in tragedies.)

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his drama.56 A didactic purpose to tragedy is also assumed in the exchange between ‘Aeschylus’ and ‘Euripides’, where they consider what qualities ought to be admired in a poet. The answer, according to ‘Euripides’, is the ability to give good advice: that is, poets make people better citizens.57 It is not just Euripides who is seen as a teacher: ‘Aeschylus’ also claims to have taught his audiences patriotism and a martial spirit.58 Indeed, the plot of Frogs as a whole requires that poets be seen as ‘useful’ to the city, in the sense of practical or moral teachers (did3skaloi). The stimulus to think about moral, ethical, political, or ‘philosophical’ issues could come from tragedy as much as from the poems of Homer, Parmenides, Empedocles, or any other writer. Since, as we have seen, ‘philosophy’ was not a clearly delineated branch of literary activity in Euripides’ time, there can be no diﬃculty in seeing the plays as philosophical (if we want to use the word).59 Nor, I believe, would Euripides’ audiences have seen anything unusual about ‘philosophical’ tragedies. Naturally, the range of responses from the large audience of a dramatic performance would vary more widely, in type and in profundity, than the responses from a small group of professional philosophers. Naturally, not every tragedy would invariably be ‘philosophical’ in a profound sense, and not every play would treat ideas at the same level of complexity. Nevertheless, tragedy is an intellectual genre, a platform for—among other things (of course)—the serious exploration of ideas. 56 Ar. Frogs 944: πpeita toutous≥ lale∏n ƒd≤daxa; 1069: e”t’ aˆ lali¤n ƒpithdeısai ka≥ stwmul≤an ƒd≤daxaß. Cf. ibid. 972–9. 57 Ar. Frogs 1008–10. Sommerstein (1996, ad loc.) comments that Aristophanes ‘was outstanding if not unique among comic poets in the emphasis he laid on his own contribution to making people better members of their communities’, comparing Frogs 389–90 and 686–7. So comic, as well as tragic, poetry might be seen as didactic (or philosophical): but see my earlier remarks (§4.1 above) on the diﬀerence between tragic and comic ‘ideas’. Note that the claim to teach people and make them better citizens was made also by the sophist Protagoras (according to Plato, Prot. 319a). 58 Ar. Frogs 1026–7: e”ta did3xaß Pvrsaß met¤ toıt’ ƒpiqume∏n ƒxed≤daxa | nik$n åe≥ toŸß åntip3louß (‘afterwards, when I put on my Persians, I taught them to desire always to beat their rivals’). 59 Foley (1985, 9) is probably correct when she says that the rise of ‘philosophy’ as a distinct genre was linked to the decline of tragedy in the fourth century: ‘philosophy soon challenged the intellectual role of drama in the city’. Cf. Easterling (1993) on developments in the tragic genre during the fourth century.

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It remains to ask why Euripides should have been seen as ‘the philosopher of the stage’, more philosophical than any of his contemporaries. None of the remarks above seems to apply to Euripides alone: Aeschylus and Sophocles, and no doubt the majority of the other ﬁfth-century tragedians (who included, notably, the polymath Ion of Chios), may also be seen as intellectually advanced.60 So why was Euripides singled out for special mention? The phrase Ø skhnikÏß filÎsofoß seems to be a judgement on Euripides’ work in general; but whether it originally arose from the reception of a particular play or trilogy cannot be said. (Did Euripides always strike his audiences as being notably more philosophical than the competition, from The Daughters of Pelias onwards?) It might be that Euripides, more than the other tragedians, came under the inﬂuence of the sophists in the later part of his life, so that in some sense he came to represent the ﬁfth-century ‘enlightenment’ (or, alternatively, ﬁn de siècle decadence and doubt): this was the view of Nietzsche, derived from Aristophanes, to which we shall turn shortly. On balance, it seems probable that Euripides’ plays struck his contemporaries, or later readers, as being unusually intellectual, or as reﬂecting current philosophical trends. But did this impression arise from the plays themselves, or from Aristophanes’ exaggerated representation, or from some other source? Ultimately, one cannot say for certain, because of the lack of evidence—not only the small total number of surviving tragedies, but also the fact that all the extant plays of Euripides come from the latter half of his career and of the century. Euripides may or may not be more philosophical, in general, than Aeschylus or Sophocles: it is hard to say. The important point, though, for the current purposes, is that he can be seen as a serious intellectual ﬁgure, and (what is more demonstrable) that the escapetragedies in particular are philosophical. Nevertheless, the Platonic notion that tragedy and philosophy ought to be kept in separate compartments leads people to take Euripides’ ideas less seriously than they deserve. One 60 Little work has been done in this area. Nevertheless, traces of ‘intellectualism’ in Aeschylus (for example) are the subject of a recent article by Letizia Poli Palladini (2001), and Rösler (1970) discusses links between the Presocratics and Aeschylus. Kitto gave a series of lectures, published in 1958, on Sophocles as ‘dramatist and philosopher’.

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frequently ﬁnds, in modern discussions of Euripides’ intellectual content, the qualiﬁcation that tragedy is not philosophy, or that Euripides is a dramatist rather than a thinker.61 This persistent attitude may be explained as a reaction against Nietzsche’s idiosyncratic but powerful view of tragedy in Die Geburt der Tragödie. This is not the place to engage at length with Nietzsche’s complex argument, but three features of his conception of tragedy are relevant here: ﬁrst, his division between philosophy and poetry; second, his characterization of Euripides as a Socratic rationalist; and third, his condemnation of Euripides as the destroyer of tragedy. In the ﬁrst place, Nietzsche believes that it is possible to fragment Euripides the writer of tragedies into (at least) two separate aspects or personae—the most commonly quoted pairing is ‘Euripides the poet’ versus ‘Euripides the thinker’, but it is also formulated as ‘Euripides the passionate actor’ versus ‘Euripides the Socratic thinker’.62 According to Nietzsche, what is wrong with Euripides is that he is not an artist pure and 61 e.g. Décharme (1893) 19, 42; Dodds (1929) 79; Norwood (1954) 14–15; Arnott (1973) 138; Wolﬀ (1973) 77–8; Lloyd-Jones (1983b) 146–7; Williams (1993) 14; Goldhill (2000) 88. Matthiessen (1964, 103–4) denies that one can see a sustained exposition of serious philosophical or religious ideas in Helen; Segal (1971, 556) follows Matthiessen, adding that ‘there is . . . some danger in going too far and forgetting that the Helen…is also a play for the stage’; in Conacher’s (1998, 10) view, ‘Euripides was not a philosopher, or even a systematic thinker; he was a dramatist, very much a man of the theatre’. 62 Nietzsche (1872) §11, p. 76 [NB all page-numbers are given from the edition of Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari, Nietzsches Werke III.1, Berlin 1972]. In Nietzsche’s vision, Euripides is imagined sitting in the theatre and acknowledging that he does not understand his great predecessors: he feels superior to the masses, but not to two of his spectators—one of these spectators is Socrates, and the other is ‘Euripides selbst, Euripides als Denker, nicht als Dichter.’ The second pairing is from §12, p. 80: ‘als Sokratischer Denker entwirft er den Plan, als leidenschaftlicher Schauspieler führt er ihn aus.’ Michelini (1987, 8) records that such an ‘inner division’ already existed in the European scholarly tradition, and explains that it had been formulated to explain the seeming contradiction or incongruity posed by beautiful poetry with philosophical or political speculation: ‘if an artist’s work was expressive of his inner nature, such a mixture of irreconcilables must express a very uneven and divided nature.’ Michelini cites a further two scholars who seem to have found Euripides practically schizophrenic: Schlegel (1846, 139), ‘Man kann in ihm eine doppelte Person unterscheiden’, and Weil (1879, xiii), ‘A la fois penseur et poète, il proteste contre les fables qu’il fait revivre; et ce qu’il créé d’une main, il le détruit de l’autre’.

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simple, either in the design or in the execution of his plays.63 In other words, we are required to accept both that there could be such a person, in the sphere of tragedy (at least), as ‘an artist pure and simple’,64 and also that tragedy and philosophy do not mix. For Nietzsche, art is something which ought to be separate from philosophy: Euripides has failed precisely because he has blurred the boundary between these two categories and thus contaminated the purity of his work. Nevertheless, it is signiﬁcant that in Euripides’ case tragedy and philosophy can and do mix, because this shows that they are not completely separable. The reasons why (according to Nietzsche) they ought to be kept apart are aesthetic or moral, rather than arising from a natural incompatibility. The other two major features of the Nietzschean Euripides are closely linked, although the manner in which they are presented is a little confusing. Nietzsche’s account of tragedy’s Todeskampf at the hands of Euripides mentions the playwright’s technical and formal innovations, but, no matter what outward changes have been made, it is still Euripides’ view of the world that Nietzsche seems to mean when he says that Euripides has destroyed tragedy.65 Nietzsche’s account identiﬁes Euripides with a late ﬁfthcentury ‘rational’ intellectual movement, and (in particular) equates the Euripidean with the Socratic.66 As Nietzsche memorably expresses it, Euripides was, in a sense, only a mask which barely concealed the fact that a new ‘deity’—Socrates— was speaking through him!67 Euripides’ tragic project as a whole is seen to be radically at odds with the pathos and grandeur of Aeschylean and Sophoclean tragedy: by contrast, he wants, like Socrates, to make everything rational and intelligible. Nietzsche also compares Euripides to another great thinker, Anaxagoras, in 63 Nietzsche (1872) §12, p. 80: ‘Reiner Künstler ist er weder im Entwerfen noch im Ausführen.’ 64 Aeschylus—in Nietzsche’s opinion—ﬁts this description. 65 Cf. Silk and Stern (1981) 296. 66 The view of certain others, too: Euripides as a product of his age. See especially Reinhardt’s (1957) well-known article; also Décharme (1893) 31–6; Collard (1981) 30; Webster (1967) 21, etc. 67 Nietzsche (1872) §12, p. 79: ‘Auch Euripides war in gewissem Sinne nur Maske: die Gottheit, die aus ihm redete, war nicht Dionysus, auch nicht Apollo, sondern ein ganz neuegeborner Dämon, gennant Sokrates.’

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the sense of a pioneer: just as Anaxagoras (he says) was the ﬁrst ‘sober’ person among ‘drunken’ philosophers, so Euripides may be seen as the ﬁrst ‘sober’ poet.68 Nietzsche takes as historical reality the biographical tradition in which Euripides and Socrates are closely linked: he sees as a genuine and crucially important fact the story that Socrates attended the theatre only when Euripides’ plays were being performed.69 Is Nietzsche right? Leaving aside his naïve acceptance of the ancient anecdotes, it does no justice to the ideas of either Euripides or Socrates to treat them both as more or less interchangeable. It is doubtful whether Euripides’ ideas are even similar to those of Socrates, except in a broad sense. Silk and Stern, in their study of Nietzsche, query whether Euripides is really more of a rational, critical artist than the other tragedians. They agree that he ‘is certainly a cerebral writer, the prototype of the Western intellectual. He thinks and makes his audience think—about the gods, about women, about war. He even draws attention to earlier tragedians’ technical inadequacies’.70 Nevertheless, Silk and Stern point out that ‘none of this makes [Euripides] more of a “critical” artist than Aeschylus . . . or Sophocles . . . or Wagner’.71 Another problem in Nietzsche’s argument is his claim that Euripides’ ‘destruction’ of tragedy led directly to the New Comedy of Menander et al.72 But, although New Comedy is certainly characterized by the quotidian reality and some of the formal features which Euripides (according to Nietzsche) introduced, it is certainly not more philosophical, nor even comparably so.73 This means that Nietzsche’s linear model of change and development does not entirely work. 68 Nietzsche (1872) §12, p. 83: ‘Und wenn Anaxagoras mit seinem nous unter den Philosophen wie der erste Nüchterne unter lauter Trunkenen erschien, so mag auch Euripides sein Verhältniss zu den anderen Dichtern der Tragödie unter einem ähnlichen Bilde begriﬀen haben.’ 69 Nietzsche (1872) §13, pp. 84–5. (See n. 86 below.) 70 Silk and Stern (1981) 259–60. 71 Ibid. Silk and Stern, correctly, see that one reason for Nietzsche’s excessive antagonism towards Euripides—and another reason to treat Nietzsche with caution—is that Euripides ‘reminds Nietzsche uncomfortably of Wagner’ (262), as a critic, innovator or destroyer. 72 Nietzsche (1872) §11, p. 72. 73 Menander’s interests have often been seen as particularly ethical, but this is a rather diﬀerent matter. See Gomme and Sandbach (1973) 24–6 on Menander’s interest in human character and relations; discussions are to be found also at Bain (1983) xviii–xix and Zagagi (1994) 33–45.

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Whatever the merits or faults of Die Geburt der Tragödie, Nietzsche exerted an inﬂuence on many critics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries—particularly in his formulation of Dichter und Denker. ‘Attempts to treat Euripides as a philosopher who wrote poetry were persistent and widespread,’ writes Michelini, summarizing Euripidean scholarship in this period.74 For example, the title of Nestle’s 1901 book, Der Dichter der griechischen Aufklärung, reﬂects his preoccupations unambiguously. For Nestle, Euripides was a rationalist, a questioner of received views, to whom ‘knowledge’ amounted to doubt and scepticism.75 Nestle shares with Nietzsche the tendency to compartmentalize: in this case, not poet versus thinker, but poet versus teacher—for Nestle, Euripides, although basically Socratic in method and outlook, diﬀered from his philosophical contemporaries in the fact that he wrote for a general public, not for a close circle of chosen pupils.76 But this explanation misrepresents the type of activity of the ‘philosophers’ of the period, who were public performers (see pages 238–9 above). It also exaggerates the relative levels of accessibility: Socratic philosophy was intended to be comprehensible rather than abstruse, and tragedy, though intended for a large audience, is not simple (at least, its ideas are such as to appeal to sophisticated thinkers as well as those on a comparatively low level). Nietzsche, Nestle, Reinhardt and others tended to deprecate Euripides’ poetic qualities in favour of his philosophical qualities. Even comparatively recently, Lattimore expressed the view that Euripides would have been happier writing in prose.77 However, E. R. Dodds’ article ‘Euripides the irrationalist’ was an attempt to dissociate Euripides from Socrates—thus countering not only Nietzsche but also A. W. Verrall’s famous (and now much-maligned) book of 1895, Euripides the Rationalist.78 74

Michelini (1987) 8. Nestle (1901, 42) sums up Euripides’ outlook thus: ‘Der Zweifel ist der Vater aller Wissenschaft und jeder wahren Überzeugung.’ 76 Nestle (1901) 50: ‘er predigt dabei seine Weisheit, wo nicht auf der Gasse wie Sokrates, doch in jedermann zugänglichen Theater so daß ihn hören kann, 77 wer will.’ Lattimore (1964) 104–11. 78 Dodds (1929). He says that Euripides did not believe in rationalism in any of the usually accepted (Socratic) senses: cf. Silk and Stern (1981, 260), who discuss this point in more detail. 75

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Dodds seems to have believed in the dichotomy of Dichter und Denker,79 but he was prepared to minimize its importance: ‘the answer to this is simply that while Sophocles is a dramatist, Euripides happens to be, like Bernard Shaw and Pirandello, a philosophical dramatist.’ Dodds’s main argument is that Euripides did not believe, like Plato, that lÎgoß was the guiding principle in the universe: this is what he means by ‘irrationalism’.80 The same point is also made by Bruno Snell: ‘it is quite wrong to brand [Euripides] as a rationalist or to call him simply the poet of the enlightenment, for the rational optimism of the sophists, who thought that through their learning they could control life, is completely alien to him.’81 Dodds raises another question, which is of particular importance if one wants to see Euripides as philosophical—that of interpretation. It is inevitable that a dramatic text by its nature will admit more ﬂexibility and variety of interpretations than a work of prose philosophy.82 But if one wishes to interpret a tragedy as expounding, in some form, a philosophical argument, how might one go about identifying this argument, and how does it relate to the poet’s own point of view? The way in which Dodds (and others) approached the problem is based on a naïve assumption, made by Aristophanic comedy and the biographical tradition, that the views expressed by characters in a play are those of the author. Dodds, rightly, does not make this simplistic assumption, but he still uses the opinions and arguments of individual characters within the plays as a basis for interpretation. He believes, ﬁrst, that it is possible to distinguish between characters who are ‘only characters’ and those who are ‘thinkers’; and, second, that from the views of these ‘thinkers’ we can extract Euripides’ own opinions (in those places where the views seem incongruous to the situation or the personality of the speaker).83 Some members of the audience may well have 79 Dodds (1929) 79: ‘The business of a dramatic poet is, in Aristotle’s words, to represent “men in action”, not theories in discussion . . . the fact remains that Euripides wrote plays, not treatises.’ 80 As Dodds makes clear, other critics—in particular, Verrall—understood ‘rationalism’ in a slightly diﬀerent sense: I shall return to this subject in §5.2 81 Snell (1982) 401. below. 82 But again, compare the diﬃculties of interpreting Platonic dialogues (see n. 49 above): Plato’s meanings, like those of tragedy, are often notoriously elusive. 83 Dodds (1929) 80 (giving as an example Hec. 592 ﬀ .): ‘Where . . . [a

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interpreted the plays’ meanings along these lines; but Dodds’s method leaves too much to individual, subjective judgement. On what basis is one to decide which characters fall into the category of ‘thinkers’? Even if one is conﬁdent that one has made a correct identiﬁcation, it still remains to determine which of their views are ‘incongruous’—but by what criteria? The result of such a method will be an uncomfortable amount of disagreement and ‘grey areas’. However, unless one supposes that Euripides wanted his ideas to be implicit or concealed, it seems more natural to try to interpret his meaning without resorting to a complex strategy of selection. Just as one would not use a scattered selection of separate paragraphs from a prose treatise as the basis for interpretation, so it is better to look at the plays as a whole, rather than individual passages (of whatever length, and from whatever speaker) taken out of context. That is how philosophical meanings and arguments will emerge: we can interpret individual passages only in the light of the wider context of the play’s action, when we see how the events unfold. In other words, the plot and shape of the play, rather than extended verbal discussions, are what provide the framework of the ‘argument’. The eventual ‘meaning’ may be referred to as either ‘the author’s own view’, or ‘the view of the postulated author-ﬁgure’, or ‘the play’s view’ (provided that we are quite clear what we mean by this, and about the way at which we have arrived at our interpretation). Nevertheless, the audiences of tragedy are expected to do a lot of the thinking for themselves: the plays’ ‘meanings’ are conveyed implicitly, and therefore are more subject to (as it might be perverse or erroneous) interpretation than the explicit arguments of prose philosophy. The modern scholarly opinion that Euripides is not really to be taken seriously as a thinker may be a reﬂection of Plato’s idea of poetry, or a reaction against Nietzsche, Nestle and others; but it can also be seen as a reaction against the ancient tradition regardingEuripidesandthe philosophers.84 In this ‘biographical’ character’s] opinions are conspicuously inappropriate to his personality or his dramatic situation—where the di3noia breaks loose from the mıqoß—there we have especial reason to suspect the intervention of the author.’ 84 The majority of these ‘biographical’ texts are quoted from the edition of Kovacs (1994).

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material, much of it dating from several centuries after Euripides’ death, Euripides is consistently portrayed as an important intellectual ﬁgure. (The ancient Lives and anecdotes concerning Sophocles and Aeschylus, by contrast, contain no such information.) The most interesting feature is the large number of assertions that Euripides was connected personally with, and even taught by, other intellectuals. In particular, Anaxagoras and Socrates are most commonly linked with Euripides, but the names of Protagoras, Prodicus and others also crop up.85 However, the value of the ancient biographies has been seriously doubted. Apart from Old Comedy, the material is all late, which has been seen to aﬀect its reliability as evidence. Furthermore, as Wardy points out, the identiﬁcation of intellectual ‘genealogies’ was a standard organizational principle of the later doxographers.86 This means that relationships between writers may be artiﬁcially distorted to make them ﬁt a pattern, so that the factual content of the ‘information’ regarding Euripides’ life may be quite low. Most seriously, it has been convincingly argued that nearly all the biographical material is derived either from the Euripidean plays themselves or from Old Comedy.87 Aristophanes may be the original source of the idea, so important to Nietzsche, that Euripides and Socrates are closely comparable. In his Clouds, both Socrates and Euripides represent 85 Satyrus, Life of Euripides (P. Oxy. 1176 = Kovacs [1994] 14–27), §37: Euripides admired Anaxagoras, and echoed his theories in his plays (quoting Eur. fr. 912); §38–9: Euripides echoes Socratic thought (quoting Eur. fr. 1007c). Suda, s.v. EÛrip≤dhß E3695: Euripides heard lectures by Anaxagoras and Clazomenius and turned to philosophy because of Anaxagoras’ trial for impiety. Gvnoß EÛrip≤dou ka≥ b≤oß (= Kovacs [1994] 1–5), §4–5, 33: Euripides studied under Anaxagoras, Protagoras, Prodicus, Socrates, and Archelaus, and his plays were actually co-written with Socrates and Mnesilochus! Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights 15.20: Euripides studied under Socrates, Anaxagoras and Prodicus. Diogenes Laertius 2.45: Euripides and Socrates were both pupils of Anaxagoras; 2.18, Socrates collaborates with Euripides on his plays; 2.22, Euripides gave Heraclitus’ works to Socrates; 3.6, Euripides went with Plato to see the Egyptian prophets; 9.54, Protagoras read out his work at Euripides’ (or possibly Megacleides’) house. Aelian, Var. Hist. 2.13: Socrates went to the theatre only if Euripides was competing (cf. Cicero, Tusc. 4.63) 86 Wardy (1996) 7. 87 Fairweather (1974) and (1983); Lefkowitz (1981); Kovacs (1990) 1–35. For example, Diogenes Laertius (2.18) gives four comic fragments as ‘evidence’ that Socrates wrote Euripides’ plays: Teleclides fr 41 K–A (misattributed by Diogenes), fr. 42 K–A; Callias fr. 15 K–A; Aristophanes fr. 392 K–A (the ‘ﬁrst’ Clouds).

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new and progressive ideas; in his Frogs, when Euripides loses the contest with Aeschylus, the chorus reﬂects that ‘it isn’t, after all, desirable to sit beside Socrates chattering away, ignoring poetry and neglecting the most important aspects of the tragedian’s art. Wasting one’s time on pretentious claptrap and cant is the mark of a madman.’88 Kovacs, rightly, stresses that the evidence from Old Comedy is diﬃcult to assess.89 It is easy to miss the point of ancient jokes; we cannot tell how accurate the comic portraits are, nor how positive or negative is the intended eﬀect. Nevertheless, it is easy to be too cautious and to assume that there is no value at all in this type of evidence. While it is clear that the factual content of Old Comic jokes may be low, it is not necessarily null; and, although the later biographers made erroneous or naïve use of this material, it does not follow that the material itself is worthless. It is not intrinsically impossible, or even unlikely, that Euripides did indeed have a close connection with Socrates, Anaxagoras and others. Kovacs is sceptical: ‘that Euripides is said to have studied with almost every one of the leading intellectuals of the ﬁfth century is remarkable,’ he writes; ‘we have no reliable evidence of personal contact or that he was in any special sense a student or associate of philosophers.’90 If we conceive of the relationship between Euripides and Socrates (or Anaxagoras, etc.) as that of teacher and pupil, this scepticism is perhaps prudent;91 but to conceive of it as familiarity with each other’s work, or inﬂuence (of either man on the other), or even friendship or acquaintance, is plausible even if not provable.92 In any case, Kovacs fails to see that personal contact or friendship is far less interesting, and of less consequence, than intellectual inﬂuence. Whether or not Euripides was inﬂuenced (in some 88 Ar. Frogs 1491–9: car≤en oˆn m¶ Swkr3tei | parakaq&menon lale∏n, | åpobalÎnta mousik¶n| t3 te mvgista paralipÎnta| t[ß tragwidik[ß tvcnhß.| tÎ t’ ƒp≥ semno∏sin lÎgoisi| ka≥ skarifhsmo∏si l&rwn| diatrib¶n årgÏn poie∏sqai,| parafronoıntoß åndrÎß. 89 Kovacs (1990) 22: ‘the amount of truth in a comic portrait can be extremely low’. 90 Kovacs (1990) 10, 12. 91 One should not, of course, assume that Euripides’ ‘education’ stopped in the 450s. 92 As Plato’s Socrates points out (Apology 26d), Anaxagoras’ works were widely and cheaply available in Athens at the end of the 5th cent.; the same was no doubt true of many other philosophers’ writings.

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sense) by Socrates or Anaxagoras matters greatly; whether or not he drank wine with them does not. The relationship between Euripides and speciﬁc philosophers is only one aspect of the comic portrayal. The other, perhaps equally important, feature is that in general Aristophanes describes Euripides—using words such as sofÎß or dexiÎß—as an intellectually ‘sophisticated’, ‘learned’ or ‘clever’ playwright.93 Again, it is Frogs that provides the most vivid portrait: in that play, Euripides is consistently presented as intellectual, in his use of rhetoric and his ideas. The inhabitants of Hades, where Euripides now lives, are said to have gone mad over his twisty speeches, which made them consider him sof*tatoß (‘extremely clever’);94 and ‘Aeschylus’ and others repeatedly present this rhetorical character in a pejorative light, saying that he has brought about idle chattering.95 Euripides is seen in the intellectual context of Athens in the last decades of the ﬁfth century, where (supposedly) everyone is literate and understands clever ideas: they are all sofo≤!96 This is a comically exaggerated 93 Ar. Lys. 368: oÛk πst’ ån¶r EÛrip≤dou sof*teroß poiht&ß (‘there is no poet cleverer than Euripides’). See also Clouds 1369–70, where Euripides’ progressive plays are seen as the favourite literature of the degenerate younger generation—in the words of Strepsiades, he is a ‘neoteric’: sŸ d’ åll¤ to»twn | lvxon ti t0n newtvrwn, ‹tt’ ƒst≥ t¤ sof¤ taıta (‘go on, then: you recite something by a neoteric poet—some of their clever stuﬀ’). Pheidippides later adds that Euripides is sof*tatoß (‘very clever’, 1378). In Thesm., the character Euripides’ Relative addresses him in similar terms: dexi0ß mvntoi lvgeiß (‘you do put it cleverly’, 9) and oÍÎn gv po» ’stin Ó sof0n xunous≤a (‘what a wonderful thing it is, the conversation of intellectuals’, 21). Euripides’ reputation for cleverness is seen also in Acharnians (17–18), where a slave asks how to express himself komyeuripik0ß (‘in a wordy, Euripidean way’). A further fragment of Aristophanes (682 K–A, quoted by S Frogs 775) describes the art of Euripides as strey≤malloß (‘twisty, complex’); similar to this is a well-known fragment of Cratinus (342 K–A) which links Aristophanes and Euripides together in verbal dexterity and cleverness: t≤ß d’ e” su; 〈t3c’ #n〉 komyÎß tiß πroito qeat&ß. | ËpoleptolÎgoß, gnwmidi*kthß, eÛripidaristofan≤zwn (‘“Who are you?” some clever play-goer may ask. “Weaver of subtle words, chaser of epigrammatic saws, euripidaristophanist’). Brief discussion can be found in Kovacs (1990) 22–32: the translation here is taken from Kovacs (1994) 112. 94 Ar. Frogs 774–6. 95 Ar. Frogs 841, 917, 944, 1069, 1310, 1491–2, 1496–7. Perhaps Plutarch was thinking of Frogs when he wrote that one could ﬁnd fault with Euripides’ lali3 (‘verbosity’: de recta ratione audiendi 13 = Moralia 45a). Note again the assumption here that tragedy’s function is didactic (see above). 96 Ar. Frogs 1108–18. This passage—in so far as one can detach ‘real’ meaning from the jokes—has important consequences for our knowledge of Athenian

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presentation of events, which makes the coming verbal contest (åg*n)—which is far from high-brow—more funny and unexpected. Nevertheless, for the play to caricature such a situation, and for Euripides in particular to be associated with novel ideas, is important. 4.2.2 Euripides’ cleverness Aristophanes’ discussion of Euripidean sof≤a brings us at length to the second of the two major questions with which I began this section: is Euripides really a serious intellectual? Aristophanes’ tone has led some critics to argue that Euripides, far from being philosophical, was merely a ‘clever’ playwright aiming to create sophisticated, but ultimately superﬁcial, amusement.97 This may be seen as another type of anti-Nietzschean viewpoint; or it may be another variation on the essentially negative view of Euripides which pervades so much of the critical tradition. (In other words, to deny that Euripides is a serious thinker is another form of value-judgement, along the same lines as saying that his plays are boring, badly structured, untragic, vel sim.) It will be seen that such an argument, with its implications for tone and genre, also relates back to Burnett’s assessment of Helen as a ‘comedy of ideas’ (see §4.1 above). R. P. Winnington-Ingram’s 1969 article ‘Euripides: poietes sophos’ is the classic exposition of this viewpoint. In the opinion of Winnington-Ingram, the ‘inﬂuence’ of the sophistic movement on Euripides and the ‘echoes’ of contemporary philosophy in his work have been overemphasized by critics: ‘it is arguable that, despite this top-dressing of philosophy, Euripides was the least philosophic of the three tragedians . . . one can be clever without being a philosopher.’98 Winnington-Ingram exhibits the literacy, as Sommerstein (1996, 255–6) notes (with some useful bibliographical references). 97 It is interesting to observe that the two inﬂuential views—‘Euripides as serious thinker’ and ‘Euripides as completely lacking in seriousness’—both derive from readings of Aristophanes. 98 Winnington-Ingram (1969) 127. This judgement is reﬂected in Arnott’s (1973) article also: he refers to Euripides’ ‘cleverness’ and ‘frivolity’, and claims to show how ‘a serious dramatist can use his skill to lighter ends’ (p. 63). On Euripides’ ‘superﬁciality’, compare also E. Segal (1968b, 249–53), Eisner (1979, 157), and Dale’s (1967, xvi) summary of the intellectual content of Helen: ‘there

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tendency, which I have observed, to see the clever ideas as responsible for a less than tragic tone: he talks in terms of ‘sophisticated jokes’ which aim ‘to amuse his fellow-intellectuals’.99 This ‘sophistication’ is seen in a superﬁcial sense: ‘the less seriously his thought and feelings were engaged, the more scope, the more excuse there was for sophistication’.100 Winnington-Ingram, suggestively, goes on to compare Euripides’ art to that of Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde.101 However, one need not, as I have said, interpret self-conscious cleverness or irony as light or funny. ‘Cleverness’ may be a suitable translation of dexiÎthß and sof≤a in Aristophanes, because it is able to capture both positive and negative overtones. However, it is hard to agree that Aristophanes’ tone is disparaging. Even if one does believe that Aristophanes found Euripidean tragedy lacking in depth, it is still better to query this conclusion for oneself by reading the tragedies, rather than simply to accept a comic portrait at its face value. In this respect it is suggestive that Aristophanes describes Socrates in the same terms as Euripides. In Clouds, Socrates and his teachings are described as sofÎß and dexiÎß;102 and this was not conﬁned to Aristophanes: Phrynichus’ Muses also portrayed Socrates as dexiÎß.103 The importance of the parallel is important, as Kovacs remarks: we should not infer that Euripides’ cleverness was merely superﬁcial, ‘just as we should not infer from Clouds that Socrates in the 420s was or was thought to be a quack is much play with such antitheses as s0ma/Ônoma, and ﬂashes of irony from this source point the dialogue, but there is no metaphysical or psychological depth here, nor would anything of the kind be conceivable or appropriate’. 99 Winnington-Ingram (1969) 132. 100 Ibid. 128. 101 Ibid. 136, 138. 102 As Dover points out (1968a, 106 and 113), Aristophanes describes his own work in terms of sof≤a and dexiÎthß (e.g. Clouds 547–8); but I cannot agree with him that these terms are nowhere intended by the speaker to have any derogatory tones: the irony of the passages in question (Clouds 148, 331, 418, 428, 520–1, 527, etc.) makes it quite possible to interpret them in a pejorative sense, as sneering at ‘cleverness’ on the part of naïve or disingenuous characters. (For this tone, perhaps one could compare Encolpius’ ‘admiration’ of Trimalchio’s lautitia and elegentia in Petronius’ Satyricon [26.9, 27.4, 29.1, 32.1]: see Smith [1975] 52.) Further discussion of the nuance of sofÎß and sof≤a in Aristophanes (‘clever’? ‘intellectual’? ‘ironic’?) can be found in Woodbury (1986) 244. See also n. 93 above. 103 Phrynichus, Muses fr. 32 K–A: see Carey (2000).

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scientist and a teacher of dishonest rhetoric’.104 Furthermore, Aristophanes described his own poetry in similar terms;105 which, again, does not suggest that he perceived Euripides as an ersatz intellectual. Winnington-Ingram describes Euripides’ Athens as ‘a world of clever ideas (with which in the main I am not concerned)’.106 The italicized phrase highlights the danger of this kind of approach— that is, concentrating on the tone but ignoring the really interesting aspect of the drama because one believes that the ‘ideas’ themselves are not worth detailed study. On the contrary, one should concern oneself with these ideas. Winnington-Ingram fails to raise the ﬁrst of the major questions which I have been discussing, that of tragedy’s intrinsically (un-) philosophical nature: that is, even if Euripides’ tone were serious rather than ‘light’, would the presence of ideas count as an undesirable intrusion? I have been arguing that tragedy is (or can be) seriously ‘philosophical’, but it is unclear from Winnington-Ingram’s article whether he would agree. In other words, Aeschylus and Sophocles may not share Euripides’ questionable cleverness; but are they interested in current ideas? (Largely not, I suspect Winnington-Ingram would answer.) If one begins from the premise that drama is something diﬀerent from philosophy, then one is bound to take the plays less seriously, whether or not one can detect in them a playful tone. I have already discussed (apropos of Burnett’s article) the diﬃculty of proving that the tone of a passage is light or comic. It is similarly diﬃcult to prove that the presentation of an idea is only superﬁcial. Winnington-Ingram relies on the same technique employed by Burnett—that of tongue-in-cheek mistranslation.107 As an example of superﬁcial ‘sophistication’, he oﬀers the presentation of Ion’s attitude to Apollo. Setting the scene by 104 Kovacs (1990) 24. It is clear that Socrates was not a charlatan, but it is worth remarking that popular conceptions of Socrates were aﬀected, for the worse, by Aristophanes, as Plato’s Socrates himself remarked (Apology 17d– 19d). 105 Ar. Clouds 547–8 (comparing himself with other, ‘lesser’, comedians): åll’ aje≥ kain¤ß jdvaß ejsfvrwn sof≤zomai | oÛd†n åll&laisin Ømo≤aß ka≥ p3saß dexi3 (‘I am always introducing new ideas which are the height of cleverness and have nothing in common with anything previously seen’). Plutarch [Mor. 854c], however, did not agree with this claim. Cf. Cratinus fr. 342 K–A (quoted in 106 Winnington-Ingram (1969) 127: my italics. n. 93 above). 107 See §4.1 above.

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referring to the ‘little sermon’ of the temple servant, he renders Ion’s words nouqethtvoß dv moi | Fo∏boß, t≤ p3scei into English as: ‘What has come over Apollo? I must give him a piece of my mind.’108 A little later, turning his attention to the Electra, he compares Castor’s criticism of Apollo—sofÏß d’ ¯n oÛk πcrhsv soi sof3—which he translates as: ‘He is clever, but there was nothing clever about his oracle to you.’109 This is less straightforward, since it hinges on the interpretation of the word sofÎß. Winnington-Ingram has his own reasons for wishing to translate it as ‘clever’, but it might equally mean ‘wise’. Indeed, the context here—a divine character in tragedy speaking of another god—might seem to demand the weightiness implied by ‘wisdom’, rather than the lighter alternative. Surely Castor’s tone is somewhat diﬀerent from that of (say) Aristophanes’ Pheidippides describing Euripides? It is hard to be conﬁdent that this really is witty; but, as Winnington-Ingram acknowledges, ‘there is bound to be a subjective factor’ in such cases. It is not only sophistication but also novelty with which Winnington-Ingram is concerned. These two qualities are said to be ‘closely related but not identical’ (although throughout his article they are in fact treated as identical, and equally associated with this perceived lightness of tone). He also draws attention to Euripides’ parody of Aeschylus in Electra, which (he says) is ‘not malice so much as an exhibition of cleverness. It was clever to score points at the expense of the archaic technique of the older poet’.110 This may be correct; but there is more to the Electra’s recognition-scene than point-scoring; it is a serious demonstration of Euripides’ awareness of his literary predecessors and the self-conscious highlighting of his own originality—metatragedy rather than paratragedy. Another ‘hit’ at Aeschylus, and an illustration of the ‘light’ tone, is detected in Euripides’ Helen, at the point when Theoclymenus, on his ﬁrst entry, salutes his father’s tomb: _ ca∏re, patrÏß mn[m’: ƒp’ ƒxÎdoisi g¤r | πqaya, Prwteı, s’ 1nek’ ƒm[ß prosr&sewß.111 Winnington-Ingram enquires: ‘When . . . the 108 Winnington-Ingram (1969) 128, quoting Euripides, Ion 436–7 (‘I must reproach Apollo for his actions’ would be a more literal translation). 109 Ibid., quoting Euripides, Electra 1246. 110 Ibid. 129. 111 Helen 1165–6. A literal—not terribly amusing—translation runs:

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Egyptian king explains that he has buried his father outside the front door so that he can salute him as he goes in and out of the palace, is this a tribute to realism? Or is it a hit at the conventional treatment of locality in the Choephori, where the scene shifts unobtrusively from tomb to palace-front?’112 The lines may be described as metatheatrical, but not for that reason, necessarily, as ‘light’ or as a ‘hit’. It should also be noted that this sort of ‘cleverness’ (if that is how one wishes to refer to it) is of a diﬀerent order from allusion to sophistic ideas or rhetorical dexterity. Winnington-Ingram’s attempt to demonstrate Euripides’ superﬁciality fails to convince, then, not only because of his questionable interpretations but also because he focuses on individual passages and utterances rather than the plays in their entirety—a method which is itself superﬁcial. But when one takes a little longer to explore the plays’ treatment of ideas, it becomes harder to believe that they are merely ‘clever’. A diﬀerent (and slightly more justiﬁable) reason for not investigating Euripides’ philosophy in depth is given by Desmond Conacher, in his short book Euripides and the Sophists: that is, we do not possess enough knowledge of current ideas in the ﬁfth century to make such an investigation feasible or meaningful.113 We cannot say (as I have already discussed) whether Gorgias, Anaxagoras and others inﬂuenced Euripides, and their works survive only in fragments and (often distorted) citations. From this Conacher concludes that an attempt to situate Euripides in his intellectual context is doomed from the start. To me this seems excessively pessimistic, as I shall go on to discuss (§4.3); however, even if we had no knowledge at all of these other thinkers, there would be no reason not to interpret Euripides on his own terms, viewing him as an independent thinker.114 ‘Greetings, monument of my father. I buried you, Proteus, by the palace doors so that I could easily speak to you’. 112 Winnington-Ingram (1969) 131: I cannot see why one ought to understand here a speciﬁc allusion to Choephori. Dale (1967, ad loc.) perceives only a ‘slightly naïve eﬀect’, but the metatragic element is seen also by Kannicht (1969, 2.308), quoting Arnott (1962) 61: ‘Had the tomb been a portable property, it could have been displaced to one side, and no apology would have been needed. We can only conclude that it was represented by a permanent ﬁxture which Euripides could not move and therefore felt compelled to account for.’ 113 Conacher (1998) 10. 114 This is the view also of Allan (2000b, 147): he thinks that it is ‘misguided’

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But Conacher does not proceed along these lines, because he also, like Winnington-Ingram, denies that Euripides was a systematic or philosophical thinker.115 In fact, he presents a distinctly Nietzschean outlook, holding that most critics ‘have failed to distinguish suﬃciently sharply between Euripides the dramatist and Euripides the thinker’,116 and that ‘Euripides was not a philosopher, or even a systematic thinker; he was a dramatist, very much a man of the theatre’.117 Accordingly, Conacher deﬁnes the (rather limited) scope of his book as that of examining only the ‘dramatic treatments’ of certain ‘philosophical ideas’.118 But there is a lack of deﬁnition here. What is a dramatic treatment of ideas, as distinct from a philosophical (or other) treatment? If Euripides uses ideas only to make a dramatic point, how does a ‘dramatic point’ diﬀer from a philosophical point? Conacher leaves these important questions unanswered; but the Euripides who emerges from his interpretations of the plays is not very diﬀerent from the Euripides of Winnington-Ingram. On this reading, Euripides’ ‘dramatic point’ turns out to be nothing more than unambitious, superﬁcial allusion to ideas with which the members of his audience might have had varying degrees of familiarity. Conacher turns his attention in particular to Helen, describing it variously as ‘a jeu d’esprit on the appearance and reality theme’119 and ‘the only play we have considered in which Euripides . . . has provided a clearly satirical treatment of sophistic themes’,120 and concluding that ‘the poet is here interested mainly in a sort of dramatic tour de force on what might have been a favourite theme of sophistic debate, rather than making any moral point with to look for the views of individual Presocratics or sophists in Euripides’ plays; however, he believes that what is important is not Euripidean ‘borrowing’ but the poet’s individual, creative, intellectual response to central problems of society. 115 Conacher (1998, 11) later describes Euripides as ‘a poetic magpie of ideas’. 116 Ibid. 13. 117 Ibid. 10. 118 Ibid. The same view is expressed by Collard (1981, 32): ‘Euripides frequently expatiates or “philosophizes” as context suggests a way of making its dramatic point immediate to the audience through familiar techniques of expression and argument’. 119 Conacher (1998) 82. 120 Ibid. 110: it is unclear why Helen is the only such play among Euripides’ oeuvre.

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regard to it’.121 I believe that Conacher is mistaken. Phrases such as jeu d’esprit and tour de force are basically inadequate to describe the nature of Euripides’ art. Perhaps it is no coincidence that such descriptions are so often used of Euripides, since they are also found in discussions of the sophists. As we shall see, Euripides—whether or not we care to call him ‘sophistic’122—clearly ﬁts into the same intellectual movement as Gorgias, Hippias, Democritus and others. He shares certain major preoccupations with the sophists—for example, as we shall see, an interest in epistemology, language and rhetoric—as well as the twisty, paradoxical ﬂavour which makes their work hard to assess.123 So it is perhaps unsurprising that Euripides should be talked about in the same terms and held in the same sort of suspicion. In particular, Gorgias’ two most important surviving works (Encomium of Helen and On What is Not) have often suﬀered, like Euripides’ Helen and Iphigenia, from a feeling that their slippery ‘cleverness’ is not to be taken too seriously; they have even been interpreted as elaborate jokes.124 This is particularly signiﬁcant, because (as I shall argue 121

Conacher 47. Is Euripides sophistic? Just as it is diﬃcult to attach the label of ‘philosopher’, it is rather diﬃcult to deﬁne a ‘sophist’ in the ﬁfth century, or even to talk about a coherent sophistic ‘movement’. (Various attempts at deﬁnition are made by Guthrie [1971, 14–50], Kerferd [1981, 24–34], Goldhill [1986, 222–6], Wardy [1996, 6–9], Winton [2000, 93–4], Morgan [2000, 89–92], etc.) The term sofist&ß in Plato (Protagoras, Sophist, Gorgias and elsewhere) acquired negative connotations, as well as the speciﬁc sense of one who took money for lessons in rhetoric; but it originally had a wide range of meanings, including wise man, skilled practitioner of an art, philosopher, seer, even poet. A comprehensive list of sources, along with discussion, is given by Kerferd (1950) 8–10. Euripides certainly never taught rhetoric for money; but he shared the sophists’ sceptical, provocative attitude to ideas—as is reﬂected by frequent references to him in Guthrie’s (1971) study of the sophists (28, 49, 127, 136, 157–9). 123 Euripides sometimes gives explicit indications of his sophistic leanings: for example, Hecabe 816–9, 1193–5; Hippolytus 921; Antiope fr. 189 Kannicht. 124 Gorgias’ own description of his Encomium as a joke (pa≤gnion, Helen [DK 82 B11] §21) is partly responsible for this tendency (cf. MacDowell [1982] ad loc.). Interestingly, Zuntz (1960, 209) describes Euripides’ Helen as a ‘superior pa≤gnion’, though he makes no explicit connection between the two writers. Guthrie (1971, 197 n. 2) called On What is Not ‘engaging nonsense’. Waterﬁeld (2000, 223–5) mentions that Gorgias’ work ‘used to be dismissed as a jeu d’esprit’ (note the use of this phrase again), but argues that we should treat it as serious and coherent philosophy. Kerferd (1981, 93–100) gives a very full outline of several critical judgements (On What is Not seen as a joke or parody, a rhetorical exercise, an attack on speciﬁc philosophical doctrines, or a subtle 122

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in the following sections) these two Gorgianic works are crucial for understanding the escape-tragedies. Nevertheless, recent scholarship has been more willing than before to take Gorgias and the other sophists seriously; I maintain that this enlightened attitude should be adopted in the case of Euripides also. To sum up so far, I have been setting the scene, at some length, for a discussion of the escape-tragedies as serious, profound, intellectual tragedies of ideas. The length of this preliminary section is, I think, justiﬁed, because it is absolutely essential to identify the nature of the issues at stake and the basis on which much of the critical literature rests. It seems that two major issues have arisen. First, there is the question of what one means by ‘philosophy’ and its relation to literature. Second, it continues to be clear just how much the question of genre (central to my whole book) aﬀects the way in which one focuses on other central questions. It transpires that much of the scholarship in these areas can be seen as, in some (positive or negative) sense, a response to the extreme views of Plato and Nietzsche or to the questionable evidence of Old Comedy. We should recognize these preoccupations without necessarily distorting our own picture by reacting too strongly against earlier views. Whatever we have been conditioned to think by Aristophanes, Plato, Nietzsche and others (or by clichéd reiterations of their positions), in fact ‘philosophical’ ideas are perfectly compatible with the tragic genre; poetry is not an entity separate from ‘philosophy’; Euripides is both a poet and a ‘philosopher’ (if we still want to use such terminology); and we have still not encountered a single convincing argument that the escape-tragedies are comic. reinterpretation of Parmenides). Wardy (1996, 22) asks: ‘is it philosophy? Or is it merely a cerebral joke?’ As in the case of Euripides, it is not only the tone of Gorgias’ writing but also its status as philosophy that is being debated. Gomperz (1908, 35) denied that On What is Not had any philosophical content at all: ‘der “philosophische Nihilismus” des Gorgias ist aus der Geschichte der Philosophie zu streichen. Seine Scherzrede über die Natur hat ihren Platz in der Geschichte der Rhetorik’; the question is discussed also by Dodds (1959, 8) and Segal (1962, 99–102). Woodruﬀ (1999, 306) thinks that On What is Not is a serious attempt to refute Zeno, Parmenides and others, but that it is entirely negative (in that it denies altogether the possibility of ontological discussion). That I accept both Gorgias and Euripides as serious ‘philosophers’ will become even more clear from the next section (§4.3).

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However, it is still not enough to reveal the shaky foundations of some critics’ arguments, nor will it do simply to state that we can read the plays (or any tragedies) seriously. The remainder of this chapter aims to demonstrate conclusively that such a reading of the escape-tragedies is feasible, by examining in detail the plays’ exploration of ideas. 4.3 tracing philosophical threads When people talk of ‘inﬂuences’ on tragedy they are usually referring to poetic source-material or the ‘mythical tradition’ (in a broad sense). However, it can be seen that the escape-tragedies (among other tragedies) draw on a far wider range of sourcematerial, including cosmological, epistemological, ontological and theological texts in both prose and verse: this tells us a lot about the type of drama with which we are dealing. When I discussed (in Chapter 2) the question of Euripides’ poetic sources, and the extent of his borrowing or innovation, I noted that the main obstacle was the lack of evidence. This is no less true when discussing Euripides’ philosophical ‘sources’. The writings of the Presocratics and the sophists exist only in the form of fragments, quotations and summaries by later writers, leaving the historian of ideas to stumble around in comparative darkness. It is possible to identify the main subjects of interest to sixth- and ﬁfth-century intellectuals—for example, the nature of existence, the physical composition of the world, the relationship between reality, words and sense-perception, and the nature of the gods—but a good deal harder to discern just what anybody thought about these subjects. The exact details of their arguments, the complexities of their ideas, and the extent of agreement or disagreement between individual thinkers all remain unclear; nor can we talk with very much conﬁdence about philosophical ‘movements’.125 Some over-pessimistic scholars, as I mentioned earlier, have viewed this shortage of information as fatally prohibitive to further study.126 However, there are two good reasons for rejecting this view. In the ﬁrst place, it is true that we cannot say, whenever we identify a philosophical idea in a tragedy, precisely 125

Cf. Kerferd (1981) 18–34.

126

See pp. 256–7 above.

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how much it owes to Anaxagoras, Antiphon or others. However, if we treat Euripides as a serious, creative thinker (rather than, simply, a ‘poetic magpie of ideas’),127 we can still try to interpret that idea—for, although the Presocratics’ and sophists’ works are fragmentary, the plays themselves are complete. We should not only be scraping around for allusions and parallels, but rather asking: does this make sense on its own terms as a coherent treatment of ideas? As things stand, the question of Euripides’ originality cannot exactly be answered; but there are other, more interesting issues at stake. Euripides should not be seen as merely interpreting or ‘packaging’ ideas in a form palatable to the public, but rather as responding creatively to these ideas. As Simon Goldhill sees, the situation is more complicated than a one-way ‘inﬂuence’ of the sophists et al. on Euripides.128 Rather, it is a two-way process. Both tragedian and sophist address current ideas: ‘they share the intellectual life of the city’, and they are ‘parallel investigators of the position of man in language and society’.129 A second cause for optimism is that, although our evidence is scant, it is not completely non-existent. In the case of the escapetragedies, at least, the fragments do enable us to get some idea of the philosophical context into which the plays ﬁt, and to make some meaningful connections between Euripides and other intellectuals (including, notably, Gorgias). To begin with, however, it is necessary to distinguish between two classes of ideas in the plays. First, and most important, are ideas which are central to an understanding of the plays; those themes which recur prominently both in the course of individual scenes and throughout the overall plot-structure. Second, there are some ideas which seem to be no more than incidental allusions to the theories of other writers. Their connection to other ideas or themes is not obvious, and it is diﬃcult to interpret them 127

Conacher’s (1998, 11) term. Goldhill (1986) 238: ‘nor is it suﬃcient to note “a sophistic inﬂuence” as if that answered the question.’ 129 Goldhill (1986) 229 (cf. ibid. 243: ‘Tragedy and sophistic writing both attest to a radical series of tensions in the language and ideology of the city’); Allan (2000b) 147 has a similar outlook. Vernant’s overall view of tragedy interprets it as being close to the concerns of the sophists: according to Vernant and Vidal-Naquet (1988, 235), the tragic genre aims to teach us that ‘there are in the words exchanged between humans zones of opacity and incommunicability’. 128

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either in their immediate context or in relation to the play as a whole: such ideas have struck some readers as irrelevant or gratuitous.130 Bearing in mind the source-problems just mentioned, this division is of course artiﬁcial. It is the second class that is more problematic, for it may well be that, if an idea strikes us as being of peripheral importance, this is only because we do not have enough information to comprehend it fully. If a manuscript containing the entire body of Presocratic and sophistic writing were unexpectedly to surface, I suspect that we would be able to see the relevance of at least some of these ideas. Nevertheless, as things stand, there are certain ideas which do seem to obtrude into the plays without obviously adding very much to the interpretation of the plays on the whole. (It may well be this type of idea which certain critics have in mind when they accuse Euripides of superﬁcial cleverness.131) The opening lines of Helen (1–3) might be taken to illustrate this second, ‘peripheral’ type of ideas: Ne≤lou m†n aJde kallip3rqenoi Âoa≤, ß ånt≥ d≤aß yak3doß Ajg»ptou pvdon leuk[ß take≤shß ciÎnoß Ëgra≤nei g»aß. These are the lovely-virgin streams of the Nile, which waters the soil of Egypt’s ﬁelds not with rainfall from Zeus but with white, melting snow.

These three lines, outlining the theory that the Nile’s waters come not from its tributaries but from the melted snows of Ethiopia, are explicitly engaging with contemporary cosmological speculation. The source of the theory is—typically—no 130 Bers (1994, 179), for example, talks of ‘accumulations of argument that seem to run beyond, or even contrary to, dramatic need’; Norwood (1954, 14–5) complains of ‘wildly irrelevant lumps of philosophy and science’ (such as Tro. 884). Euripides’ echoes of contemporary thought sometimes do seem out of context, and this was occasionally remarked on in antiquity (see S Hipp. 953, S Hec. 254, S Alc. 780, S Phoen. 388, as well as the implied criticism of Aristophanes [§4.2.2 above]). Grube (1961, 92–8) devotes a long discussion to ‘the problem of relevance’ in relation to Euripides’ ‘philosophizing’, but he is really talking about gnomic or proverbial utterances, rather than speciﬁc engagement with or allusion to the theories of other writers. Scattered, incidental irrelevancies (if that is what they are) may strike one as aberrations; but it is quite a diﬀerent matter to say, with Norwood, Nietzsche and others, that on the whole philosophy and tragedy do not mix. 131 e.g. Burnett’s (1960) ‘comedy’ article deals with the (seemingly peripheral) ideas in Helen 1013–16 (discussed below).

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less obscure than the source of the Nile. It was thought to be Anaxagorean,132 but may derive from some other writer: Kannicht points out that Aeschylus’ Suppliants, written earlier than Anaxagoras’ arrival in Athens, makes reference to the same idea.133 Several other writers, including Sophocles and Herodotus, had already contributed to the discussion before 412.134 What is clear, then, is that Egyptian meteorology was a matter for current debate, and that, by placing these lines right at the start of the play, Euripides is being provocative. It is a clear sign of intellectual engagement (an important enough point in itself); but it cannot be seen to have a wider relevance within the play. (That is, the Nile is an important physical and metaphorical presence throughout Helen,135 but the source of its waters, never again mentioned, does not seem to make any diﬀerence.) Hard-to-pin-down allusions are seen in another passage from Helen (1013–16), where the purportedly omniscient Theonoe explains why it is important to behave justly: ka≥ g¤r t≤siß t0nd’ ƒst≥ to∏ß te nertvroiß ka≥ to∏ß £nwqen p$sin ånqr*poiß: Ø noıß t0n katqanÎntwn z[i m†n oÇ, gn*mhn d’ πcei åq3naton ejß åq3naton ajqvr’ ƒmpes*n. Indeed, all people, both above and below the earth, are accountable for their deeds: when people die, their mind does not remain alive, but it has an immortal consciousness, combining with the immortal ether.

Hartung and Dindorf found these lines so incongruous that they deleted them; but this seems an extreme measure.136 There 132 Anaxagoras (DK59 A91): cf. [anon.], de Nilo (FGH 647 F1). See Dale (1967) 69 and Guthrie (1965) 311, 324. 133 Aesch. Suppl. 559 (also fr. 300 Radt): discussed by Kannicht (1969, 2. 16) and Jouan and Van Looy (1998, 292 n. 35). The date of Anaxagoras’ arrival in Athens is thought to be 460 bc. 134 Sophocles too (fr. 882 Radt) made reference to this idea. Herodotus (2.22) disagreed; Aristides (Or. 36.13) later disputed the theory with speciﬁc reference to the Helen passage: p0ß oˆn, _ sof*tate EÛrip≤dh, leuk[ß take≤shß ciÎnoß årde»ei Ne∏loß Ajg»ptou g»aß; (‘how, then, most clever Euripides, does the Nile irrigate Egypt’s ﬁelds with white, melting snow?’). Euripides himself reused the idea in Archelaus (fr. 228a. 1–5 Kannicht). 135 See Ch. 3 above. 136 The reading of the main manuscript (L) is unproblematic in sense and style. It might seem that these ideas occur somewhat abruptly in the argument (which would run on smoothly from 1012 to 1017 with the deletion). However,

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seems no reason to doubt that the lines are genuine. Nevertheless, the concept of posthumous repayment for one’s deeds, and the theory that the mind has some form of eternal existence in the ether, are certainly not ordinary Greek beliefs. Dale adds another objection to the lines, that they lack internal coherence: ‘how,’ she asks, ‘does a t≤siß apply to a piece of consciousness ﬂoating in the ether?’ She concludes that the passage is ‘a piece of high-toned but vague mysticism appropriate to Theonoe, who reasonably excuses herself from further elaboration by „ß oˆn parain0 m¶ makr3n’ (‘so I shall not go on at length’, 1017).137 I think that Dale overstates the incoherence and irrelevance of these lines. She points out, rightly, that the ideas as presented here do not quite correspond to any single surviving authority; but it is clear that they are somehow related to a current philosophical debate. A certain amount is known about this debate.138 The cosmological theories of Anaximenes, Anaxagoras, Empedocles and others seem to have been variations on the important idea that air (å&r), or ether (ajq&r, the upper air), in addition to being vital for human life, is a fundamental constituent of the universe.139 Some writers, including Euripides himself, referred to a belief that there was something divine about the ether, not just because the gods lived there, but because the ether possessed its own powers.140 All of these theories, like the passage from Helen, they do have an undeniable relevance (whatever one makes of it) to the point at issue—the moral character of both Theonoe and Proteus—as Kannicht (1969, 2. 261) and Dale (1967, 132) point out. 137 Dale (1967) 132. Sansone (1985, 29), similarly, asks ‘what do the notorious lines 1013–16 mean (if, indeed, they are intended to mean anything at all)?’ and points out their lack of connection with the previous lines, ‘which they purport to explain’. 138 Wright (1995, 109–25) lists and discusses many of these important sources. 139 Anaximenes (DK 13 A5, A6, A10, B2) held that å&r was the substrate of all things. Anaxagoras (DK 59 B2, B7) distinguished between å&r and ajq&r, and thought that each had an important cosmogonic role. Empedocles (DK 31 B38, B100) listed ajq&r, ﬁre, sea and sky as the four elements. Diogenes of Apollonia (DK 64 B4–5) held that å&r was the fundamental element of humans, animals and the universe as a whole. 140 Ajq&r identiﬁed with Zeus: Heraclitus (DK 22 B120), Aeschylus fr. 70 Radt, Euripides fr. 877 Nauck; identiﬁed with Hera: Empedocles (DK 31 B6); air as a god: Diogenes (DK 64 B4–8), Eur. Iph. at A. 365. More references are supplied by Burnett (1960, 161).

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attempt to trace ‘a continuity between the individual life-form and the cosmic whole’.141 M. R. Wright suggests that the lines in question may relate to the tradition of ‘astral eschatology’, the belief that human souls have their origins in the stars and return to the stars after death. This belief is attested in, for example, Anaximander, Epicharmus and the Athenian inscription of 432 bc commemorating the dead of Potidaea,142 and Euripides refers to it in his Suppliant Women,143 but the tradition originally came from Egypt—which makes it a particularly appropriate belief for the Egyptian Theonoe to express.144 Nevertheless, it is hard to see a speciﬁc link between these various cosmological writings and Theonoe’s conception of the posthumous existence of the mind. Burnett’s opinion, that Euripides is innovating here by uniting concepts of cosmology with justice,145 makes sense but is impossible to prove. Even if Burnett is right, one is still left with the problem of the lack of any clear connection between these four lines and the other ideas in Helen. (However—in this case more than the previous passage about the Nile’s source—I think that there is more behind the allusion than it is now possible to see. This is suggested, in particular, by the prominence of the word ajq&r, whch recurs throughout all three escape-tragedies.146) All of these considera141

Wright (1995) 118. Anaximander (DK 12 A9, B1); Epicharmus (DK 23 B9); IG I2. 945.6: ajq¶r m†n yuc¤ß Ëpedvxato, s*mata d† cq*n. Dale (1967, 132) refers to this last sentiment as a cliché, and notes that it does not correspond precisely to Theonoe’s lines. 143 Euripides, Suppl. 533–4 (pneıma m†n prÏß ajqvra, | tÏ s0ma d’ ƒß g[n); ibid. 1139 (ajq¶r πcei nin ‡dh). 144 Wright (1995) 121–3. Herodotus (2.123.2–3) wrote that the Egyptians were the ﬁrst to claim that the soul is immortal. 145 Burnett (1960) 160–2. 146 Theonoe instructs her servants to purify the ether at her ﬁrst entry (865–7): Ógoı s» moi fvrousa lampt&rwn svlaß | qe≤ou te semnÏn qesmÏn ajqvroß muco»ß, | „ß pneıma kaqarÏn oÛranoı dex*meqa (‘you, lead on with torch-ﬂame, and fumigate the air of heaven in the holy ritual, so that we may receive the pure breath of the sky’). Helen’s phantom is made out of ether (583–4; but note the similar but not quite identical oÛranoı . . . £po at 34) and later disappears back into ether (605–6, 1219; this may be a reference to Anaximander et al. [note 141 above]). Zeus in his guise as a swan ﬂies through the ether (di’ ajqvroß, 216). The ‘real’ Helen is transported through the ether by Hermes (ƒn ptuca∏sin ajqvroß 44; cf. 246). References to ether occur in the other escape-tragedies also. In Andromeda, the Night is imagined as riding a chariot through the starry ridges of the ether (åsteroeidva n0ta . . . ajqvroß Èer$ß, fr. 114—note the epithet Èer$ß); 142

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tions mean that, in the absence of further information, one has to treat the passage as being of only minor signiﬁcance. Zuntz concludes, I think rightly, that it would be wrong to concentrate one’s attention on these four verses, because ‘the “theology”—sit venia verbo—of the Helena is . . . in the whole scene, or, rather, in the whole play’.147 If the concept contained in lines 1013–16 were really central to the cosmological or theological argument of the whole play, surely one would expect that it would be mentioned more than once?148 Whenever one comes across a philosophical allusion, even if it should seem to be irrelevant or incongruous, it may be worth giving it the beneﬁt of the doubt. For example, the following conversation between Teucer and Helen has caused some diﬃculties (119–23): TE. EL. TE. EL.

£llou lÎgou mvmnhso, m¶ ke≤nhß πti. o\tw doke∏te t¶n dÎkhsin åsfal[; aÛtÏß g¤r Ôssoiß ejdÎmhn, ka≥ noıß Ør$i. ‡dh d’ ƒn o÷koiß sŸn d3marti Menvlewß;

Teucer: Change the subject: do not talk about her any longer. Helen: Do you imagine that what you imagine you witnessed was real? Teucer: I saw it with my own eyes—and my mind sees. Helen: But is Menelaus now at home with his wife?

The words which signal an allusion are noıß Ør$i, which have been seen to refer to a saying of Epicharmus: noıß Ør[i ka≥ noıß Perseus too travels through the middle of the ether (di¤ mvsou . . . ajqvroß, fr. 124); and Andromeda wishes that a thunderbolt from the ether would destroy her (purfÎroß ajqvroß åst¶r, fr. 122). In Iphigenia, as in Helen, the heroine is transported to her land of captivity through the ether (29); Iphigenia tells her dream ‘to the ether’ (prÏß ajqvr’, e÷ ti d¶ tÎd’ πst’ £koß, 43—this, according to Cropp [2000, ad loc.], is an apotropaic formula: cf. Sophocles, Electra 424); her joy at reuniting with Orestes is so great that she fears it may ﬂy away to the ether (prÏß ajqvra 843); and the statue of Artemis is brought out beneath the ether (Ëp’ ajqvr’) in order to purify it (1177). It may be signiﬁcant that at the beginning of Ar. Thesm., the play which is so clearly based on the escape-tragedies, the character Euripides delivers some abstruse reﬂections on Ajq&r, there conceived of as a sort of divine entity (13–18). (Cf. Socrates’ invocation of Ajq&r at Clouds 265). 147 Zuntz (1960) 211. 148 One might, I suppose, object to this that Theonoe’s ‘omniscience’ lends her words a more authoritative status than those of other characters—but I shall return to ‘omniscience’ below (§4.4.2).

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åko»ei: t£lla kwf¤ ka≥ tufl3.149 However, Diggle (following Ribbeck) deletes lines 121–2.150 There may be linguistic grounds for this deletion (ejdÎmhn is found only in lyric passages elsewhere in Euripides),151 but it is more probably due to the fact that the lines ignore the request of 120 (Teucer has asked Helen to change the subject, but she carries on regardless). Dale, strangely, denies that there can be an allusion here at all, even if the lines are genuine: ‘the suddenness of the quotation, its allusiveness and brevity in the middle of plain dialogue, and the obscurity of the point here . . . make it improbable to the point of absurdity.’ It can hardly be denied that noıß Ør$i is sudden and brief; but, even if we cannot fully grasp the point, there is still no reason to doubt that Epicharmus is being alluded to.152 Kannicht (who retains 121–2) notes also that Euripides makes an almost identical allusion twice elsewhere.153 It is frustrating that we know too little about Epicharmus’ line of thought to pursue the connection;154 but, in any case, the point of the allusion is not obscure. In fact, it does relate to the play’s broader theme of sense-perception (and I shall return to this passage in §4.4.2 below). To resume the main argument, then, the most important ideas are not those which are (by design or accident) limited to allusions, but those which are thoroughly worked into the plot and structure. In the escape-tragedies, it is epistemological and ontological speculation that emerges, unmistakably, as being of 149

Epicharmus (DK 23 B12): ‘The mind sees and the mind hears: the rest is dumb and blind.’ 150 Dale (1967, ad loc.) also deletes. 151 Note that Gilbert Murray’s apparatus records an emendation by Reiske (e”don ©n ka≥ noıß) designed to remove this problem: Diggle does not judge this worthy of consideration. 152 Conacher (1998, 123 n. 6) also judges these lines of relevance, if not to Epicharmus, then at least to sophistic views of sense-perception in general: Teucer is ‘talking like a Sophist’. In this respect, I note that Empedocles also contrasts the ‘sight’ of the eyes and the mind (DK 31 B17), as does Antiphon (DK 87 B1; cf. Suda s.v. £tta 1.397.15–17 = Waterﬁeld [2000, 264] F15)— which, again, suggests that there is more to this subject than we can know. 153 Trojan Women 988 (Ø sÏß d’ jd*n nin noıß); fr. 909.6 (oÛ g¤r øfqalmÏß tÏ kr≤nein ƒstin, åll¤ noıß). 154 Cf. Solmsen (1934a, 121 n. 1): ‘ “in visu operatur intellectus”. So Professor Murray explains [ka≥ noıß Ør$i], rightly as I think. But can we understand it thus without assuming that there is a theory behind, which identiﬁes a÷sqhsiß and ƒpist&mh?’

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central importance.155 Put more simply, Euripides is concerned to explore the relationship between reality and various forms of illusion or delusion. What is the basis for believing anything to be as it is? If it turned out that we could not trust our own senses accurately to perceive reality, or that words and language could not adequately represent reality, what would be the consequences for our ‘knowledge’ of the world? These are the major philosophical questions which the escape-tragedies confront. It cannot be said that these were novel preoccupations in 412.156 Euripides himself had, in earlier plays, drawn attention to the issue of deceptive appearances—to such a remarkable extent, in fact, that even in 425 Aristophanes could parody this tendency. In his Acharnians Dicaeopolis explains why he has gone to Euripides for advice, saying: de∏ g3r me dÎxai ptwcÏn e”nai t&meron, | e”nai m†n Òsper ejm≤, fa≤nesqai d† m¶.157 These lines, with their characteristic word-play and neat dichotomy, are a quotation from Euripides’ Telephus—which shows that Euripides had been making use of ontological themes as early as 438.158 Euripides was not the ﬁrst or the only intellectual to concern himself with this area of thought, as a brief glance at the views of some of his contemporaries and predecessors shows.159 For 155 Guthrie (1971, 187) makes the excellent point that Greek ‘epistemology’ and ‘ontology’ are inseparable. This will become clear from the discussion which follows. 156 Kerferd (1981) 78 has more on the intellectual climate of Athens at this date. 157 Ar., Ach. 440–1 (‘for today I have to seem to be a beggar—to keep my own identity, but appear to be something else’). 158 Eur. Telephus, fr. 698 Nauck (the words e”nai t&meron must be Aristophanic); attrib. S Ar. Ach. 440. MacDowell (1995, 55) says that ‘the contrast between appearance and fact makes [the lines] characteristic of Euripides’; cf. Rau (1967) 19–42. Segal (1993, 38) remarks that the question of how reality and appearance relate to each other ‘is asked somehow or other in nearly every Euripidean play’. Some varied examples of Euripides’ exploitation of deceptive appearances are found at Alcestis 339, Phoen. 389, Medea 601–2, Iph. Aul. 338, Polyidus fr. 638, Phrixus fr. 833, etc. Nevertheless, it should be noted that, apart from the Telephus fragment, no other extant passage contains the same sort of neat word-play and symmetry found in the escape-tragedies. This means that we must slightly qualify MacDowell’s assessment of the lines as ‘characteristic’: the technique may not be as typically Euripidean (in a broad sense) as all that. 159 I could not claim that the summaries which follow do justice to the theories of these thinkers. This is not the place to discuss their ideas at length,

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instance, Parmenides’ discussion of ålhqe≤h (‘truth’ or ‘reality’) is based on a discrepancy between sense-perception and true being, contrasting the way of truth with the way of delusion.160 Heraclitus (and, later, Anaxagoras) likewise doubted the reliability of humans’ senses and judgement, believing that the true nature of reality tends to hide itself.161 The atomists Leucippus and Democritus believed that the universe is composed of particles which do not have qualities, which led them to distrust the evidence of the senses which perceive such qualities. The relativism of Protagoras has implications for sense-perception: that is, if things seem to any individual to be such-and-such, then they are such-and-such for that individual.162 Democritus’ view is comparable: sense-perception is subjective and individual, and may give no clue to reality.163 Melissus’ thoughts about the nature of existence also aim to undermine our reliance on the senses. He claims that what exists is single, and that it is incorporeal (in fact, has no sensible qualities): if it had solidity it would have parts, but if it had parts it would no longer be single. This being so, if we could perceive reality accurately with our senses, we would see that it is unchanging; but our senses perceive change, showing that our senses are unreliable.164 Whether or not we agree with his process of reasoning, it will become clear that Melissus’ theory (in particular, his questioning whether existence has anything to do with s*mata) is connected to the concerns of the escape-tragedies. As well as exploring the relationship between reality and sense-perception, these thinkers had also been questioning the relationship between reality and language.165 The sophist only to demonstrate the range of philosophical views current in and before Euripides’ time. 160 Parmenides (DK 28 B2); discussed by Wardy (1996) 9–14. 161 Heraclitus (DK 22 B55, B107, B123); Anaxagoras (DK 59 B21): cf. Guthrie (1965) 319–20. 162 Protagoras (DK 80 B1); cf. Plato, Cratylus 385e, Theaetetus 151e, Arist. Met. 1047a4–7; discussion in Kerferd (1981) 86–7, Conacher (1998) 70. 163 DK 67 A6–7, A19; DK 68 A112, A135, B117. 164 Melissus (DK 30 B8–9). 165 Guthrie (1971, 218–19) gives an excellent summary of various positions held in the late 5th and early 4th cents. Goldhill (1991, 24–36) shows that the relationship between names and their objects was an important issue even in Homer. For example, etymological play with ∞ Odusse»ß and the verb ød»ssesqai (Odyssey 1.62, 5.339–40, etc.) leads Goldhill to conclude that ‘the use and

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Antiphon is known to have had a particular interest in ørqÎthß ønom3twn, the ‘correctness’ of names in relation to their referents. His work On Truth seems to have argued that the deﬁning feature of things is their nature, not their name; thus words are often deceptive.166 Several decades after Euripides, Plato’s Cratylus took up the question of whether names were conventional or inherent in the nature of things. Plato provides further evidence of ﬁfth-century interest in this subject-area, mentioning such names as Protagoras, Prodicus and the sophists in general.167 However, the most important near-contemporary of Euripides to write on ørqÎthß ønom3twn seems to be Democritus, the author of a treatise On Homer or On the Correct Use of Language and Unusual Words,168 whose fragments—as we shall see—contain some very suggestive terminology.169 Euripides’ plays should be read in the light of all these theories; but it seems to me that the principal inspiration for the escape-tragedies came from Gorgias of Leontini, the sophist who came to Athens in 427. Gorgias’ treatise On What Is Not (or On Nature), famously, stated three propositions: (a) that nothing has being; (b) that, even if it did have being, no human could apprehend it; (c) that, even if it did have being and was apprehensible, we could not communicate it to anyone else.170 This manipulation of the name in the Odyssey indicates . . . a concern for the complex relations between man and his language, particularly in self-representation’. 166 Antiphon (DK 87 B14, B15): discussed by Guthrie (1971) 204–6. Antiphon illustrated the deceptiveness of words with the example of ‘Greeks’ and ‘barbarians’, who are (he says) all the same by nature but diﬀerent in name (DK 87 B44B: ƒn to»twi d† prÏß åll&louß bebarbar*meqa, ƒpe≥ f»sei p3nta p3nteß Ømo≤wß pef»kamen ka≥ b3rbaroi ka≥ E ﬁ llhneß e”nai ktl.). This is clearly relevant to Euripides’ provocative presentation of the Greeks and ‘barbarians’ of the escape-tragedies, which, as I argued (see Ch. 3 above), breaks down the ethnic distinction. 167 Plato, Crat. 384b, 391b–c; cf. Euthydemus 277e. 168 Democritus (DK 68 B20a): PERI OMHROU ∂ ORQOEPEIHS KAI GLWSSEWN. 169 Democritus (DK 68 B26). 170 Gorgias (DK 82 B1–4). B3: 2n mvn ka≥ pr0ton Òti oÛd†n πstin, de»teron Òti ej ka≥ πstin, åkat3lhpton ånqr*pwi, tr≤ton Òti ej ka≥ katalhptÎn, åll¤ to≤ ge ånvxoiston ka≥ ånerm&neuton t0i pvlaß. There are serious problems with the text of On What is Not, which survives in the form of two separate—and rather diﬀerent— epitomes (the ﬁrst by Sextus Empiricus; the second part of a composite peripatetic text, ‘MXG’). The problems of using either version to understand Gorgias’ real views are discussed by Wardy (1996, 15–16) and Kerferd (1981, 93–100).

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argument presents some diﬃculties. Aside from the textual diﬃculties, it cannot be said with conﬁdence whether Gorgias is talking about existence or predication. I have just translated his oÛd†n πstin as ‘nothing has being’, but equally possible are the translations ‘nothing is [such-and-such]’ or ‘nothing exists’.171 Nevertheless, Gorgias seems to be arguing that what we communicate is only ever words and never the objects themselves (which we cannot really know). This radical argument relates to fragments of other Gorgianic writings which contain similar views about the illusory relationship of words to reality. In his Defence of Palamedes, he wrote that, if it were possible for the truth about things to be made clear through words, judgement would be easy, since it would follow directly from what has been said; but this is not so.172 Elsewhere he wrote that words are a pale, quivering imitation of objects;173 and another, diﬃcult-totranslate fragment contrasts appearances unfavourably with reality.174 According to Gorgias, we are constantly limited by our inability to apprehend reality: dÎxa (‘seeming’ or ‘opinion’), rather than true knowledge, is the best that we can hope to attain.175 But external forces can powerfully aﬀect our dÎxa, as Gorgias later showed in his Encomium of Helen. 171 The Greek verb e”nai poses problems for the philosopher. Kerferd (1981, 93–5) in particular argues at length for ‘a massive shift of emphasis, away from the view that much of Greek philosophy was concerned primarily with problems of existence, and towards the view that it was rather in such cases concerned with what we would call problems of predication.’ He summarizes Gorgias’ argument thus (99): ‘if words are used to refer to things, . . . how is it that a word is accepted as referring to the things to which we say it does refer, and not to other things to which we say it does not refer?’ This interpretation brings On What is Not close to the concerns of Protagoras, Antiphon, Democritus and others; but Gorgias’ can still be understood equally well as referring to existence. The same problem is encountered in Plato’s Sophist (for which see more below): is this dialogue about the ambiguities of the verb e”nai? See Bluck (1975), esp. 21–2, and Brown (1986) 47–70. 172 DK 82 B11a §35: ej m†n oˆn Án di¤ lÎgwn t¶n ål&qeian t0n πrgwn kaqar3n te genvsqai to∏ß åko»ousi 〈ka≥〉 faner3n, eÇporoß #n e÷h kr≤siß ‡dh åpÏ t0n ejrhmvnwn: ƒpeid¶ d† oÛc o\twß πcei . . . Cf. B11 (Encomium) §11. 173 DK 82 B6.16: clwr¤ 〈mvn〉 ka≥ πnaima t¤ pr3gmata, trvmonta 〈dv〉 ka≥ ∑cr¤ t¤ gr3mmata. 174 DK 82 B26: πlege d† tÏ m†n e”nai åfan†ß m¶ tucÏn toı doke∏n, tÏ d† doke∏n åsqen†ß m¶ tucÏn toı e”nai. Does this mean ‘existence is unknown unless it acquires appearance, and appearance is feeble unless it acquires existence’? Or do we have the more pessimistic version ‘existence is unknowable because it does not have appearance’? (Cf. Guthrie [1971] 199 n. 1). 175 Cf. Segal (1962) 111; Kerferd (1981) 81.

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It is impossible to take On What is Not entirely at its face value because, if verbal communication of the nature of things really were impossible, Gorgias could not convey this truth to his audience by means of verbal communication! The argument is paradoxical and self-refuting: this is why scholars have often been unwilling to regard it as a serious work of philosophy.176 But a deliberately contradictory argument may be an eﬀective way to make one’s case obliquely or indirectly. As Wardy puts it, ‘the intention is to compel us to work through, and thus thoroughly understand, the paradoxes for ourselves’. The conclusion he draws is that Gorgias is trying to instil in his audience a more critical, sceptical attitude towards philosophical writings (lÎgoi).177 This is rather more optimistic a reading than that of Gomperz (who described Gorgias’ message as ‘philosophische Nihilismus’).178 In fact, knowing self-contradiction is a recognizable characteristic of Gorgianic philosophy, seen also in the Encomium, and it is another way in which the inﬂuence of Gorgias can be seen on Euripides. However, it remains to explain why Gorgias should be seen as the principal inspiration for the escape-tragedies. Why is Gorgias more important than anyone else? On What is Not, while it certainly puts forward an extreme argument, covers much of the same ground as the other philosophers which I have mentioned. To understand why Euripides should have turned to the theme of reality and illusion in 412 in particular, it is necessary to look at another Gorgianic work, the Encomium of Helen.179 The dating of this work, unlike that of the earlier treatise, is disputed, but I believe that it should be placed very closely before Euripides’ Helen and seen as a direct, crucially important inﬂuence on that play.180 176

See n. 125 above. Wardy (1996) 22: ‘philosophical logos will by itself carry precious little conviction, despite Parmenides’ attempt to monopolize persuasion.’ 178 Gomperz (1908) 35. 179 Gorgias (DK 82 B11). This work is not actually an ƒgk*mion but an åpolog≤a, as Isocrates (Helen 14) points out. See Wardy (1996) 25–8 on Gorgias’ transgression of genre: ‘a running theme of the Encomium will be the force and attractions of deceit: how better to convey them than by the text’s own partial occlusion of its central topic and true genre?’ 180 On What is Not is usually placed early in Gorgias’ career, in 444–441 (Olympiodorus, Commentary on Plato, Gorgias, pr. 9). There is no external evidence to date his two other substantial works, Encomium of Helen and 177

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The Encomium returns to the subject-matter of On What is Not, but from a quite diﬀerent angle. Here (as it has been nicely put) ‘epistemological concerns exist side-by-side with selfadvertisement and rhetorical posturing’.181 Gorgias is now concerned not so much with how things are (or are not) as with the power of various types of illusions, including visual appearances and (in particular) words. He undertakes to exonerate Helen from guilt, not by claiming that she was innocent of misdeed, but by arguing that she succumbed to the irresistible power of illusion. The questionable relationship between words, appearances and reality is seen very early on in the speech, where the contradictory stories of Helen’s parentage are discussed. Was Zeus or Tyndareus her father?—one seemed to be because he was, but the other’s claim was refuted because he said he was! (Ø m†n di¤ tÏ e”nai πdoxen, Ø d† di¤ tÏ f3nai ]lvgcqh).182 Where does the truth lie?—in doke∏n, e”nai or f3nai, seeming, being or appearing? Palamedes. Since Gorgias claims (§2) that at the date of writing no other poet had ever diverged from the usual account of Helen’s guilt, it seems that the Encomium must pre-date Euripides’ Helen (cf. my earlier—§2.3—argument about the ‘palinode’). A Gorgianic tone and content (especially, the connection between πrwß and b≤a) has been detected in Helen’s self-justiﬁcatory speech in Euripides’ Trojan Women (914–65), which Barlow (1986b, ad loc.) calls Euripides’ ‘Gorgianic play’. If Gorgias really was an inﬂuence, the date of the Encomium must be 415 or earlier. This is the view of Pohlenz (1920, 166), Freeman (1954, 363), Orsini (1956, 86) and Guthrie (1971, 192 n. 2). Preuss (1911, 9), however, argues that Gorgias’ speech was composed between Euripides’ Trojan Women and Helen—that is, c.414—which supposes a more complex series of inﬂuences. Neither Untersteiner (1954, 99 n. 59) nor Segal (1962, 100) goes further than stating that the Encomium belongs somewhere in the last quarter of the ﬁfth century. 181 Morgan (2000) 129. 182 Gorgias (DK 82 B11) §3. MacDowell (1982, 30) replaces ]lvgcqh with ƒlvcqh, a late reading which he admits may be a mediaeval conjecture, on the grounds that the manuscript reading does not make sense. I cannot understand why this should be so. As the text stands, the meaning is quite clear (as I translate above). MacDowell’s version, ‘the other was reputed to be because he said he was’, destroys the balance between the two clauses by having two verbs (πdoxen and ƒlvcqh) with essentially the same meaning. Wardy (1996, 31–2) elaborates on the meaning of the text as it stands: ‘the [visible] truth is so vivid that we need not fear deception or delusion’, since Helen’s k3lloß immediately gives the lie to the mortal’s pretension. However, in the light of Gorgias’ later comments about visual åp3th, we cannot really believe in such a thing as an obvious, visible truth; this is another way, then, in which Gorgias deliberately refutes himself by constructing arguments which he will later implicitly demolish.

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Gorgias does not now concern himself with answering this question, perhaps because of his claims elsewhere that it is ultimately impossible to discern truth or reality. He goes on to remind us of this earlier argument, saying that, if everyone had knowledge, speech would not have its power;183 but this power itself is his main point in the Encomium. Whether or not they are accurate representations of reality, words exert a powerful eﬀect on the listener which may override intellect or free will. Gorgias’ exoneration of Helen is based on the premise that all four possible reasons for Helen’s elopement (supernatural powers, force, persuasion, or love) are pardonable, on the grounds that they are irresistible. The third reason is of particular interest: if it was speech that persuaded Helen, this is defensible, for speech is a mighty ruler, which accomplishes superhuman feats even though its physical form is almost nonexistent.184 So mighty, indeed, that succumbing to language is comparable to succumbing to physical force.185 Elsewhere in the Encomium, words are compared to magic spells and drugs: they trip up the soul and deceive the opinions.186 In the hands of a skilled rhetor, who adds persuasion (peiq*) to speech, words can mould the listener’s mind.187 This, argues Gorgias, is why Helen did what she did, and why it is justiﬁable. The last possible reason for her action, that she fell in love, is cleverly linked to what has gone before, since Gorgias manages to draw connections between erotic love, persuasion and the rest of his theory.188 The common factor is appearances. We fall in 183 DK 82 B11 §11: ej m†n g¤r p3nteß per≥ p3ntwn e”con t0n paroicomvnwn mn&mhn t0n te parÎntwn 〈πnnoian〉 t0n te mellÎntwn prÎnoian, oÛk #n Ømo≤wß Òmoioß Án Ø lÎgoß. This last phrase is hard to translate. Kerferd (1981, 81) renders it ‘speech . . . would not resemble the knowledge’. Probably there is a textual problem (MacDowell obelizes Òmoioß). 184 DK 82 B11 §8: lÎgoß dun3sthß mvgaß ƒstin, ß smikrot3twi s*mati ka≥ åfanest3twi qeiÎtata πrga åpotele∏. For the idea of speech as a ‘ruler’, compare Hecabe 814–9 (where peiq* is a t»rannoß). The word s0ma seems slightly odd: perhaps Gorgias is playing on the familiar Ônoma–s0ma dichotomy. MacDowell (1982, 32) comments: ‘it is not safe to deduce . . . that [Gorgias] really believed that speech was a material substance’—but is this the point? 185 DK 82 B11 §12. 186 DK 82 B11 §10: yuc[ß Åmart&mata ka≥ dÎxhß åpat&mata. Cf. §14 (f3rmaka). 187 DK 82 B11 §13: Ó peiq° prosioısa t0i lÎgwi ka≥ t¶n yuc¶n ƒtup*sato Òpwß ƒbo»leto. Cf. Plato, Phaedrus 261a, 267a (for the concept of rhetoric as yucagwg≤a). 188 DK 82 B11 §15–19.

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love with someone, says Gorgias, because of the visual impression which they make on us; and this visual impression is directly comparable to, and no less powerful than, the verbal impression made by the power of persuasion. This section of the argument makes it unambiguously plain that words and appearances are to be seen as species of the same phenomenon—illusion. They may be equally deceptive (in relation to the real nature of things) and equally powerful on the one who sees or hears. The eﬀect of appearance (Ôyiß) upon the soul is described by Gorgias in exactly the same terms as the eﬀect of words (lÎgoi): as a ‘moulding’.189 In this case, visual art (painting or sculpture) is also a form of deception: in fact, it makes one’s eyes ‘ill’.190 As MacDowell explains, ‘there is something “wrong” with one’s eyes, because one seems to see a man when one is really looking at paint or stone’.191 Like On What is Not, the Encomium contains various selfrefuting features, whereby the argument is implicitly undermined at the same time as it is being constructed. This, paradoxically, reinforces the point about the deceptive, untrustworthy, seductive power of words. The most obvious and outrageous ‘self-refutation’ occurs at the very end, with the words ƒboul&qhn gr3yai tÏn lÎgon }Elvnhß m†n ƒgk*mion, ƒmÏn d† pa≤gnion (‘I wanted to write this speech as an encomium of Helen and a joke for myself’).192 However, there have been other occasions through the speech where a similar paradoxical ﬂavour can be detected. For example, Gorgias says that it is necessary to 189

DK 82 B11 §15: di¤ d† t[ß Ôyewß Ó yuc¶ kån to∏ß trÎpoiß tupoıtai. DK 82 B11 §18: Ó d† t0n åndri3ntwn po≤hsiß ka≥ Ó t0n ågalm3twn ƒrgas≤a nÎson Óde∏an parvsceto (‘the making of ﬁgures and the creation of statues provides a pleasant disease for the eyes’). There may be a slight ambiguity in Gorgias’ argument: although he describes the power of lÎgoß and Ôyiß in the same terms, here visual deception is a disease, whereas verbal deception is compared to a drug (f3rmaka §14). The primary sense of f3rmaka in the earlier passage seems to be that of spells; nevertheless, the word may also refer to a medicinal cure. If it is possible to read f3rmaka in this way, perhaps Gorgias wants us to consider lÎgoi stronger than—a potential cure to—the sickness of Ôyiß? This shade of meaning certainly ﬁts in with his rhetorical preoccupations. 191 MacDowell (1982) 39. Perhaps this Gorgianic passage is referred to at Euripides, Trojan Women 892–3 (where Hecabe warns Menelaus not to look at Helen). This is the view of Barlow (1986b, 207–8) and Wardy (1996, 50), but denied by MacDowell (1982, 12). 192 See n. 124 above. 190

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demonstrate by belief (dÎxa) the truth of his version of events;193 but since, if we are to believe him, language works precisely by deceiving or beguiling one’s dÎxa (which is unreliable and fallible), we could not possibly be convinced by a ‘demonstration’ of this kind. And in general, since Gorgias’ own theories are expounded in the form of words, we can conclude that his speech is no less likely than any other words to deceive us or give us a false idea of reality!194 As we shall see, this built-in self-contradiction, as well as the substance of the argument itself, is an important feature which Euripides shares with Gorgias. The reason why Gorgias is so crucial, then, is because he provides an answer to two questions—ﬁrst, why Euripides should have turned his attention with such intensity to the reality-and-illusion theme in 412 (even though he had touched on it previously); and second, why Euripides should have chosen to explore this theme through the myth of Helen in particular (even though, with a little ingenuity, one could examine the same philosophical question with reference to almost any myth). The escape-tragedies are, I believe, an explicit nod to Gorgias—indeed, more than just a nod. Study of the plays in detail will reveal just how thoroughly Gorgianic subject-matter, thought and style have been absorbed by Euripides. Even if we cannot assign a precise date to the Encomium, it seems unlikely to be coincidental that two works should deal in a similar way with the same philosophical theme and the same myth at more or less the same time: one must, surely, be reacting to the other.195 This means that we should treat Euripides’ intellectual content very seriously indeed. Euripides is responding directly to a new, exciting, ‘cutting-edge’ philosophical debate: this means that we should see the escape-tragedies not just as philosophical but extremely topical. Although (as I warned earlier) it is impossible to say just how original Euripides is, it seems that he is not just alluding to, or rehashing, the Gorgianic material. Instead, he is doing some193

DK 82 B11 §9: de∏ d† ka≥ dÎxhi de∏xai to∏ß åko»ousi. Cf. Wardy (1996) 51: ‘logos itself has seduced us, the audience of Gorgias, into pitying Helen and execrating Paris.’ 195 It is not impossible that Euripides’ Helen came ﬁrst. However, the Gorgianic echoes which have been detected in the earlier Trojan Women (see note 180 above), and Gorgias’ seeming lack of knowledge of any outré versions of the Helen myth (DK 82 B11 §2), make this improbable. 194

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thing more ambitious, taking Gorgias’ ideas further and presenting them from new angles. Euripides can be seen as responding to a challenge posed (implicitly) in the opening section of the Encomium, where Gorgias claims that all previous poets have been unanimous in blaming Helen.196 Gorgias himself goes on to ‘exonerate’ Helen, not by means of denying her elopement, but by justifying her acts. Euripides, however, has found another way of ‘exonerating’ Helen, not attempted by Gorgias—that is, by providing an alternative myth! Gorgias tells his audience early on in his speech that he does not propose to relate the myth of Helen, on the grounds that it is too well-known already.197 MacDowell comments that ‘this is disingenuous, since Helen’s guilt is too well-known also. . . . It is possible, as others (Euripides and/or Stesichorus) did, to justify Helen by providing an alternative account of her behaviour’.198 But, if Gorgias predates Euripides (and if, as I have argued, Stesichorus’ ‘palinode’ had nothing to do with exonerating Helen),199 we do not need to see Gorgias as disingenuous. It is rather that Euripides is doing something which did not occur to Gorgias.200 However, Euripides’ original contribution lies not in his novel defence of Helen (if that is what it really is), but in the fact that he has combined the separate theories of Gorgias’ Encomium and On What is Not into a single, uniﬁed argument. In addition, he has taken this argument signiﬁcantly further, by applying Gorgias’ conclusions about reality and language to myths. Now Gorgias had made use of mythical characters (in the Encomium and also the Defence of Palamedes); but, although he had drawn some parallels between poetry, tragedy and other areas of 196

DK 82 B11 §2. DK 82 B11 §5. 198 MacDowell (1982) 30–1. 199 See Ch. 2 above. 200 This is yet another reason why we should not be paying very much attention to Stesichorus. If we are looking for inﬂuences behind Euripides which will help us to understand the plays, Gorgias is clearly a better bet. This is seen by Solmsen (1934a, 120), who adds that ‘there is in fact no possibility that Stesichoros or any other Greek poet who lived before Euripides speculated on the diﬀerence of ønÎmata and pr3gmata (or s*mata)’. Solmsen also notes that Euripides started exploiting the contrast between these terms only around the time of Helen—but he does not quite make the connection between Gorgias and the escape-tragedies. 197

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his theories,201 Gorgias had not applied his conclusions to the mythical tradition itself. Where do myths ﬁt into the relationship between reality, illusion and deception? Can we believe myths? Are myths true or lies? These are questions which the escapetragedies pose. Thus they are ‘philosophical tragedies’ in a very special sense. By questioning ‘mythical reality’ as well as ‘real reality’, they bring the typical preoccupations and subjectmatter of tragedy into a broader critical and intellectual framework. Some of the Presocratics had brought together poetic subject-matter and philosophy together—usually from a theological perspective.202 But the combination of epistemology, ontology and tragic myth in Euripides is extraordinary. 4.4 reality, illusion, delusion 4.4.1 Reading the trilogy So far, because of the signiﬁcance of Gorgias, I have been talking mainly about Helen. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Helen is the most explicitly ‘philosophical’ of the escape-tragedies, in its highly concentrated and verbally explicit presentation of ideas. Nevertheless, the theme of reality and illusion is also shared by Andromeda and Iphigenia. This has not previously been acknowledged (one fairly negative comment on Iphigenia judges that play to be a ‘tentative adumbration’ of some of the themes of 201 Gorgias referred to poetry as ‘language with metre’ (lÎgon πconta mvtron, B11 §9), which makes explicit that poetry is just another type of lÎgoß, subject to the same problematic relationship with reality. Elsewhere, Gorgias wrote that tragedy aimed speciﬁcally at deception of its audience (DK 82 B23). Segal (1962) attempts at length to explain Gorgias’ work in terms of a rudimentary psychological/aesthetic theory of literature. His argument is ingenious; but there is no sign from Gorgias that we should read his works as relating only to the literary or rhetorical sphere: they are clearly ‘philosophical’ in a wider sense. Segal’s conviction that Gorgias’ subject was really ‘the psychology of the logos’ may explain why his interesting essay (1971) on Euripides’ Helen uses a modern framework (structuralism and the work of Northrop Frye), rather than an ancient one, for interpreting the play. Nevertheless, it is still rather odd that he does not pursue further the obvious connections between Gorgias and Euripides. He merely (560–1) links Euripides in general to ‘the concerns of the late ﬁfth century’ (Cf. Kannicht [1969] 1. 57–60). This is all very well, but we cannot blame ‘the late ﬁfth century’ for everything, without looking for individual inﬂuences! 202 e.g. Xenophanes’ criticisms of Homeric and Hesiodic gods (DK 21 B10–16).

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Helen, but does not refer speciﬁcally to the philosophical content).203 The question arises, of course, to what extent one should look for coherence and connectedness between these three plays, even if, as I am arguing, they form a trilogy. I think it would be excessively schematic and dull to expect each play to treat the same ideas in exactly the same way; and, clearly, they do not do this. The intense word-play of the Helen, if repeated to the same degree in all three tragedies, would no doubt bring about fatigue in even the most highbrow members of the audience. However, the plays, though not identical, do ﬁt together coherently. I have already argued that Helen is the ﬁrst play of the trilogy— and we can now see a particular reason for this position. The function of the whole play is, in a sense, programmatic. Euripides is making clear, right at the beginning, his Gorgianic aﬃnities and the nature of his philosophical ideas, identifying the main themes of interest which will recur, in some form or other, throughout the trilogy. Thus, even though Andromeda and Iphigenia have slightly diﬀerent preoccupations, they will still be read in the light of Helen. If the whole of Helen is programmatic, its prologue is especially so: it is not just ‘scene-setting’, but clearly directs its audience how to read the play (and the trilogy). Even the most cursory glance will show that practically all the themes which the plays explore are (implicitly or explicitly) signalled there. The diﬃculty, or impossibility, of distinguishing reality from illusion; the connection of names to their objects; diﬀerent forms of illusion, delusion and deception; the problematic relationship of myth to reality—all are introduced in the prologue’s one hundred and sixty-six lines.204 However, rather than starting there and reading the plays sequentially from beginning to end, I am going to arrange what follows (approximately) by themes, in order to elucidate their argument more clearly. 203 Podlecki (1970) 418: ‘The dominant motifs of Helen, like the basic situation, are adumbrated already in I.T. in a tentative and even unsure way . . . what one misses is the insistent reiteration of themes that Helen exhibits, and I.T. seems to be without the unity which its dominant themes give to Helen.’ 204 Reality versus illusion: 4, 18–21, 27, 34–6, 42–3, 54, 66–7, 72–7, 108, 117–22, 137–40, 160–1. Names: 7, 9–10, 11–14, 16–17, 22, 24, 66–7, 148–50. Deception/delusion: 20, 34–6, 126, 132. Scepticism towards myth: 17–21, 99, 137–40.

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That argument, in brief, is as follows. It is impossible for human beings to make any ﬁrm statements about reality, existence, or personal identity; it is impossible to tell the diﬀerence between reality and illusion, or even what ‘reality’ is. Much of human action is based on delusion. We cannot believe the evidence of our eyes and ears; we cannot trust language to represent reality; and we cannot believe myths (which are just one particular form of language). In short, we cannot understand ourselves, other people, or the world. This Weltanschauung is radically nihilistic in a philosophical sense, but also dark and uncomfortable in a human sense. Euripides connects all of this speculation to tragedy’s generic depiction of human limitations and human suﬀering;205 he is showing how philosophy impinges on life, in individual terms as well as on a large scale. My summary—which might strike the reader as rather extreme—represents the escape-tragedies’ message in its most developed form. However, this message may be read on diﬀerent levels, as the full signiﬁcance emerges only gradually. The ‘counterfactual’ scenarios, as established in the prologues, may shock and disturb us, but their philosophical implications are initially less complex and less radical than they will later turn out to be. 4.4.2 Disillusionment Both Helen and Iphigenia in their prologue-speeches explain to the audience that they have been labouring under a delusion. The familiar myths, they say, are untrue: the real events were not as they previously seemed to be. The Trojan War was fought not for Helen’s sake but for a phantom which only resembled her; and Agamemnon sacriﬁced not Iphigenia but a hind. Before you sat down in the theatre on this spring day in 412, you never suspected this. Instead, you were misled, by the gods, by your deﬁcient senses, by false opinion, by speech (and so on), into believing lies. But now, at last, we are presenting you with the real version of events. To accept even so much has serious consequences, since it causes us to re-evaluate the central events of the Trojan War and 205 As I said above (p. 42), tragedy in general explores human suﬀering: but we need not call this ‘the tragic’.

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the calamities of the Argive royal family. We are reminded, by frequent, unmissable references throughout the plays, of the horror of Iphigenia’s sacriﬁce,206 the murder of Agamemnon,207 Orestes’ matricide and madness,208 the destruction and massive loss of life at Troy209—yet all of this suﬀering is now seen to be for nothing. This is completely ‘disillusioning’, in the worst sense of the word.210 Helen’s miserable words in her prologue-speech (52–5) make the situation plain: yuca≥ d† polla≥ di’ πm’ ƒp≥ Skamandr≤oiß Âoa∏sin πqanon: Ó d† p3nta tl$s’ ƒg° kat3ratÎß ejmi ka≥ dok0 prodoıs’ ƒmÏn pÎsin sun3yai pÎlemon E ﬁ llhsin mvgan. Because of me, many souls perished by the streams of Scamander. And I have borne all manner of suﬀerings, yet I am cursed because it seems that I betrayed my husband and started a huge war for the Greeks.

Many souls perished—for nothing. Helen’s yuca≥ . . . polla≥ unmistakably recalls the wording of the ﬁrst lines of the Iliad,211 thus prompting the reﬂection that the heroic events described by Homer, and even the deﬁnitive epic poem itself, are now diminished in meaning and worth. Here and throughout the play, the emphasis is on suﬀering: not just the suﬀering of those who fought and died at Troy, but the suﬀering of Helen herself and her family which has been caused by mistaken opinion and 206 Iphigenia 6–9, 19–24, 26–9, 178, 210–17, 358–71, 565–6, 770–1, 783–7, 854–5, 1082–3, 1418. 207 Iphigenia 170–1, 199–200, 545–55, 663–5, 926–7 (238 and 1185 may also indirectly recall the event to mind). 208 Iphigenia 78–80, 281–94, 296–319, 556–9, 663–5, 924–35, 940–4, 1007–8, 1033, 1047, 1173–5, 1200. 209 Helen 33, 39–40, 44–5, 52–5, 73–4, 109–10, 128, 198, 248, 364, 384–5, 398–9, 539, 582, 603, 608–10, 683, 692–3, 703, 705–7, 716, 750, 766, 848–9, 876, 970, 1013–16, 1122, 1126, 1135–6, 1161, 1219–20, 1446. There are references to Helen’s guilt and the suﬀering and death at Troy in Iphigenia also: 8, 13–14, 355–7, 439–51, 521–6, 566. 210 Kannicht (1969, 1. 53–68) makes the pointlessness of the Trojan War central to his reading of Helen, interpreting it as, essentially, an ‘anti-war’ play. Grube (1961, 347) wrote that ‘it may not be too fanciful that the poet . . . is making us feel that all wars are fought for phantoms’. This is supported by the ﬁrst stasimon, in which the chorus sing that all who wage wars are fools (£froneß, 1151). Cf. Segal (1971) 568, 580; Alt (1962) 15–16; Vellacott (1975) 166–7; Seidensticker (1982) 198; Meltzer (1994) 238. 211 Hom. Il. 1. 3–4: poll¤ß d’ jfq≤mouß yuc¤ß ⁄∫di proºayen | Ór*wn.

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false appearances. We already know of the toils which Menelaus has undergone in order to retrieve his wife; but now we learn, from Teucer, that the shame of Helen’s supposed guilt has caused her mother Leda to hang herself.212 This disturbing fact is not altered by the revelation of the ‘truth’ about the phantom. Nobody will bring Leda, like Iphigenia, back from the dead; no one will restore to life and vigour those countless young men who perished by Scamander’s side. The futility of the war is made explicit in the words of the old messenger, when he learns that the gods have deceived everyone: t≤ f&iß; nefvlhß £r’ £llwß e÷comen pÎnouß pvri;213 What?—we suﬀered in vain, for a cloud?

Even the barbarian king Theoclymenus, when he learns of the phantom, exclaims: _ Pr≤ame ka≥ g[ Trwi3ß, 〈„ß〉 πrreiß m3thn (‘O Priam and the land of Troy, you were destroyed for nothing’, 1220)—a sentiment which (one might think) must have occurred to him previously—but its inclusion here again underlines the point. The world of Homer and heroic myth is thrown into doubt by the ‘truth’ about Helen. Male, heroic values are now seen to be of questionable worth.214 In this context, the klvoß—glory, fame, renown—of Troy becomes just another word, another instance of misleading language.215 It is in this light that the character of Menelaus and his reactions to the new situation should be interpreted—for this explains why he is not, as Burnett and others 212 Helen 133–6. Dale (1967, on 136) thinks this detail a Euripidean invention: see §2.3 above. 213 Helen 706–7. (Interestingly, these lines were used by Seferis as the epigraph for his own E } lvnh, a poem about the evils of war.) Earlier in the play, the same character has already told Menelaus that all his manifold toils have been in vain (603: lvgw pÎnouß se mur≤ouß tl[nai m3thn), but at that point, not knowing that there were two ‘Helens’, he was referring to the fact that the phantomHelen had disappeared: so his words are full of proleptic irony. 214 See Segal (1971) 574–7. 215 Helen 845, 1063–4. Wolﬀ (1973, 81) points out that in Helen klvoß is inseparable from the Trojan War. The exploitation of the two meanings of klvoß in Helen (‘glory’ or ‘report’) is discussed at (perhaps extreme) length by Meltzer (1994). Some of his conclusions are somewhat odd: for example, he claims (239) that the play ‘deconstructs the notion of a unitary, transcendent meaning of kleos’; but, since the word is (since Homer) already dual in meaning, there can have been no need for Euripides to ‘deconstruct’ such a notion.

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thought,216 a comical ﬁgure in an amusing predicament. In fact, as Podlecki points out, he is ‘a Homeric hero who now ﬁnds himself in a desperately serious situation to cope with which he can ﬁnd no tactics in his military manual’.217 Menelaus—unlike Odysseus—cannot survive out of his natural, Iliadic context. In particular, the scene in which Menelaus is verbally and physically abused by the old Portress is used to highlight his lack of status and unheroic behaviour.218 Even if Menelaus had behaved with valour and courage throughout the play, we would be forced to question his past actions; but, as it is, he is characterized in an extremely negative way. He is desperate, lowly and ineﬀectual, and in both intellect and action he takes second place to his wife. All of this further points up the disparity between apparent and genuine ‘heroism’. We can draw similarly grim conclusions from the plot of Iphigenia, where again the counterfactual myth causes us to reevaluate all that we previously thought we knew. The fact that Iphigenia was not sacriﬁced means that her mother need not have killed Agamemnon,219 and, in turn, that Orestes need not have killed Clytemnestra. Orestes, when the awful truth dawns on him, does not even wish to put it into words, even though Iphigenia presses him not once but several times for an explanation. When Iphigenia ﬁrst asks about Agamemnon, the following exchange occurs (548–54): OR. tvqnhc’ Ø tl&mwn: prÏß d’ åp*lesvn tina. IF. tvqnhke; po≤ai sumfor$i; t3lain’ ƒg*. 216 Burnett (1960) 155 (see §4.1 above); cf. Griﬃth (1953) 37; Grube (1961) 339–41; Alt (1962) 14–15; Bowie (1993) 218. 217 Podlecki (1970) 402–3. 218 Helen 437–82. Note especially the old woman’s words at 454: oÛkoın ƒke∏ pou semnÏß Ásq’, oÛk ƒnq3de (‘no doubt you were a big man somewhere or other— but not here’). Wolﬀ (1973, 81) notes that this negative attitude towards the Trojan ‘achievement’ is found at Hom. Od. 9.273 and Eur. Cycl. 283–4. This ﬁts in with Segal’s (1971, 572–4) characterization of Helen as an ‘Odyssean’ work of literature; however, I ﬁnd his identiﬁcation of ‘Odyssean’ with ‘romantic’ qualities unacceptably anachronistic and imprecise. 219 Cropp (2000, 229) thinks that there may be a deliberate ambiguity concerning Clytemnestra’s motivation—was it the sacriﬁce or her aﬀaire with Aegisthus that made her act as she did (cf. Pind. Pyth. 11.22–5)? I cannot agree with him. It is true that Euripides never gives a deﬁnite answer, but he implicitly links Iphigenia’s sacriﬁce and the murder in at least two places (545– 55, 926–7)—and, in any case, no mention whatsoever is made of Aegisthus.

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OR. t≤ d’ ƒstvnaxaß toıto; m0n pros[kv soi; IF. tÏn Ôlbon aÛtoı tÏn p3roiq’ ånastvnw. OR. dein0ß g¤r ƒk gunaikÏß o÷cetai sfage≤ß. IF. _ pand3krutoß Ó ktanoısa c∑ qan*n. OR. paısai nun ‡dh, m&d’ ƒrwt&shiß pvra. Orestes: The unfortunate man is dead: and he caused the death of another. Iphigenia: Dead? What happened to him? O, wretched me! Orestes: Why does that make you wail? Surely he had nothing to do with you? Iphigenia: I am lamenting his former prosperity. Orestes: He died terribly, murdered by his wife. Iphigenia: O thoroughly lamentable, the killer and her victim! Orestes: Stop right there, and do not ask me any more questions.

At this point, Orestes is unaware of Iphigenia’s identity, which means that his reticence is perhaps understandable; but the implicit signiﬁcance of his reluctance to answer questions will not escape the audience. Later on, after the recognition of brother and sister has taken place, they continue (924–7): IF. t¤ dein¤ d’ πrga p0ß πtlhß mhtrÏß pvri; OR. sig0men aÛt3: patr≥ timwr0n ƒm0i. IF. Ó d’ ajt≤a t≤ß ånq’ Òtou kte≤nei pÎsin; OR. πa t¤ mhtrÎß: oÛdv so≥ kl»ein kalÎn. Iphigenia: But how did you endure to commit those terrible acts against our mother? Orestes: Let us not speak about them. I was avenging our father. Iphigenia: But why did she kill her husband? Orestes: Drop the subject of our mother. It is not good for you to hear of it.

A few lines later Orestes refers again, euphemistically, to t¤ mhtrÏß taıq’ 4 sig0men kak3 (‘that awful business of our mother, about which we do not speak’, 940). This repeated silence, in the face of Iphigenia’s curiosity, is an extremely eﬀective way of emphasizing the pain of Orestes’ realization of the futility of his actions, in contrast to the explicit horror (t≤ f&iß;) of the messenger in Helen. Both Helen and Iphigenia begin, then, by encouraging us to reject our previous ‘knowledge’ of reality and replace it with a new, more accurate version. So far, however, there have been no very profound epistemological consequences. The message, on

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the face of it, is that people sometimes make mistakes. Now that the mistakes have been corrected, we are at liberty to accept the restoration of order, joyous reunions and ‘happy endings’ which the plays seem to oﬀer. Nevertheless, many members of the audience (especially bearing in mind the progress of the war in spring 412) will have found that the pervasive sense of futility and waste outweighs any positive aspects. Nor is that the only reason for unease. It becomes clear as the plays progress that we cannot accept the initial situations at their face value. The extent of human delusion may not be limited to just a couple of (albeit major) myths. 4.4.3 Is anything as it seems? The escape-tragedies present their material—not only the myths of Helen and Iphigenia but many other elements, major and minor—in such a way that we are led to question whether anything is as it seems. All appearances and words, including myths, are potentially deceptive, either because language is incapable of representing reality or because people deliberately use (or misuse) words in order to create persuasion or deception. Apart from the main ‘counterfactual’ myths, the plays contain many other instances of deceptive language and appearances. Words relating to language and sense-perception (such as dok0, Ør0, lvgousin, fas≤n, „ß lÎgoß, and so on) are so common that otherwise unremarkable statements are altered in meaning, becoming ambiguous and suspicious. (For example, the word doke∏n and its cognates occur, often in a pointed manner, explicitly or implicitly contrasting seeming with reality, some twenty-four times in Helen and twenty-ﬁve times in Iphigenia.220) Iphigenia is dead only in seeming (false);221 Agamemnon only seemed (falsely) to run his daughter through with a sword;222 Orestes says that his task is to remove the image of Artemis which they say (truly or falsely) fell from the sky;223 they say that 220 Helen 35, 36, 54, 119, 121, 307, 576, 611, 657, 658, 748, 758, 841, 917, 954, 956, 982, 993, 1020, 1392, 1661, 1683, 1690, 1691. Iphigenia 8, 44, 50, 69, 71, 176, 279, 299, 349, 390, 641, 678, 785, 802, 831, 855, 896, 956, 1029, 1030, 1164, 221 1219, 1336, 1402, 1443. Iphigenia 176: dok&masi. 222 Iphigenia 784–5: ©n πqus’ ƒmÏß pat¶r | dok0n ƒß Óm$ß øxŸ f3sganon bale∏n. 223 Iphigenia 87–8: labe∏n t’ £galma qe$ß Ò fasin ƒnq3de | ƒß to»sde naoŸß . . . pese∏n.

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Justice is the daughter of Zeus;224 Iphigenia’s joy at her reunion with Orestes is greater than words (more real);225 the chorus of Iphigenia comment that the events they have witnessed are beyond words;226 Thoas’ amazement at the escape of Iphigenia cannot be put into words;227 Menelaus is said (falsely) to be dead up and down Greece,228 and he later has to die in word (false);229 characters’ words are often inadequate reﬂections of their situations . . .230 and so on. (These are just a few examples, chosen at random; the sections which follow will explore more of the numerous passages throughout the plays which contrast the apparent and the real.) The characters frequently cannot be sure what is before their eyes. This is a problem posed particularly by Helen and her Doppelgänger (to which I shall return), but it arises in many other places. Indeed, none of the characters initially recognizes any of the others. For instance, the herdsmen who catch sight of Orestes and Pylades on the Tauric cliﬀs are deceived by their eyes into thinking that they are gods: oÛc Ør$te; da≤monvß tineß | q3ssousin oJde (‘Can you not see? Those are gods sitting there’).231 A little later, Orestes is plagued by Furies which he alone can see.232 He cries to his friend: Pul3dh, dvdorkaß t&nde; t&nde d’ oÛc Ør$iß | ﬁAidou dr3kainan; (‘Pylades, have you seen her? Do you not see this woman, this snake from Hades?’). Pylades cannot see the Furies, but they are real enough. The herdsman who narrates this occurrence conﬁrms their invisibility: 224 Andromeda fr. 151: t&n toi D≤khn lvgousi pa∏d’ e”nai DiÏß . . . Bubel (1991, 152) compares this to Helen 17 ﬀ ., but he thinks that lvgousi is a technique used simply to mark a common myth: ‘wie auch sonst haüﬁg teilt Euripides Realien der Mythologie, die hier auf Hesiod zurückgehen, unter Berufung auf eine communis opinio.’ 225 Iphigenia 836–7: _ kre∏sson ∂ lÎgoisin eÛtucoıs3 mou | t»ca: t≤ f0; qaum3twn | pvra ka≥ lÎgou prÎsw t3d’ åpvba. 226 Iphigenia 900: m»qwn pvra. 227 Iphigenia 1321: _ qaıma: p0ß se me∏zon ønom3saß t»cw; 228 Helen 126: „ß ke∏noß åfan¶ß sŸn d3marti klñizetai, 132: qan°n dv klñizetai kaq’ }Ell3da. 229 Helen 1150: bo»lhi lvgesqai m¶ qan°n lÎgwi qane∏n; 1152: 1toimÎß ejmi m¶ qan°n lÎgwi qane∏n. 230 Andromeda fr. 140: _ tl[mon, „ß so≥ t¤ß t»caß m†n åsqene∏ß | πdwc’ Ø da≤mwn, 231 mvga fronoısi d’ oÈ lÎgoi. Iphigenia 267–8. 232 Iphigenia 284–5. Note Cropp (2000) 195: ‘As in the other dramatic accounts, only Orestes can hear the Furies, but their imaginariness is not played on here as it is in Orestes (211–315).’

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par[n d’ Ør$n oÛ taıta morf[ß sc&mat’, £ll’ ]ll3sseto fqogg3ß te mÎscwn ka≥ kun0n Ël3gmata †4ß f$s’† E ∞ rinıß Èvnai mim&mata.233 it was not possible to see these ﬁgures; but [Orestes] was answered by the lowing of cattle and the barking of dogs, †which they say† the Furies emit, mimicking these creatures.

There are two layers of illusion in this episode: not only are the Furies visible-yet-invisible, but the way in which they speak is calculated to confuse the senses even further, for they mimic the noises of dogs and cows! So deceptive sounds—the Furies, the gruesomely inappropriate wedding-hymns and pipe-music at Aulis,234 the disembodied voice of Echo in Andromeda,235 the phantom who has Helen’s voice as well as her appearance,236 and so on—are seen to fall into the same category. Dreams are another form of deceptive appearance, made much of in Iphigenia.237 Dreams are, for whatever reason, a common motif in various versions of the Atreid myths: one thinks of Clytemnestra’s horriﬁc dreams of Agamemnon (in Stesichorus’ Oresteia) and Orestes (in Aeschylus’ Libation Bearers and Sophocles’ Electra).238 The play opens, after the initial details of myth and genealogy have been outlined, with Iphigenia’s account of the dream which she had during the previous night.239 In this dream, Iphigenia seemed to see the royal palace at Argos collapsing in ruin, except for a single pillar with remarkably human features; to this pillar Iphigenia gave a ritual sprinkling of water, as to one about to die. As it later transpires, the details of the dream are close (though not identical) to the truth. (It correctly represents the miserable state of the house of Atreus, and it preﬁgures the narrowly averted sacriﬁce 233 Iphigenia 291–4. Cropp (2000, ad loc.) thinks that line 294 is a ‘clumsy “explanatory” interpolation’ (cf. 299), but he does not take into account the frequent use of fas≤ (etc.) elsewhere in the play for deliberate eﬀect. 234 Iphigenia 365–8. 235 Andromeda fr. 118. 236 Helen 608–15. Note that Homer’s Helen (Od. 4. 277–9) mimicked the voices of the wives of the men hidden inside the Wooden Horse, in an attempt to expose their deception! 237 See Devereux (1976) 259–312; Cropp (2000) 175–6. 238 Stesichorus fr. 219 Davies; Aesch. Cho. 22, 514; Soph. El. 417. 239 Iphigenia 43–60.

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and bogus puriﬁcation ritual, as well as anticipating Iphigenia’s return to Greece and her ritual duties at Brauron. However, the geography and the temporal sequence are distorted.) It is Iphigenia’s interpretation of the dream, based on what seems to be true (dÎxa),240 that is erroneous: she thinks that Orestes is dead. The events of the play show that the dream was genuinely prophetic, but Iphigenia persists in saying that it was false: yeude∏ß Ôneiroi, ca≤ret’: oÛd†n Át’ £ra (‘Farewell, false dreams: so you were nothing after all’, 569). The details of the dream, and the manner in which it is fulﬁlled, make it less straightforward than other tragic dreams. As Devereux points out, one of its functions, in terms of plot, is the creation of suspense by falsely anticipating later actions: ‘it decreases Orestes’ chances of being recognized, and increases the risk that he will be sacriﬁced.’241 Nevertheless, the real signiﬁcance of Iphigenia’s dream is that, true or false, it emphasizes human misunderstanding and the suﬀering which it can bring. Dreams are a form of illusion with a genuine connection to reality, but we cannot trust our senses or our dÎxa to explain or communicate that reality. The main characters use words and appearances as a means to an end, rather than a reﬂection of truth. Deliberate deception forms a recurrent motif throughout the plays.242 There are many scattered references to deception (åp3th): for example, the transformation of Zeus into a swan in order to consummate his passion by trickery;243 Aphrodite’s cheating in the beautycontest;244 the misleading beacons which Nauplius lit on Euboea in order to sink Greek ships;245 the trickery of Odysseus which devised Iphigenia’s sham marriage with Achilles;246 and the deceptive dreams which Zeus sends to mortals in order that 240

Iphigenia 44 (πdox’), 50 („ß πdoxv moi). Devereux (1976) 270. 242 Downing (1990) discusses uses of åp3th in Helen. 243 Helen 20 (ß dÎlion eÛn¶n ƒxvprax’). 244 Helen 25–30. 245 Mentioned not once but twice (Helen 766–9, 1126–30): their connection to the themes not just of deceptive appearances but also of the dangers of the sea (see §3.4 above) is clear. It is possible that there is a provocative allusion here to Gorgias’ Defence of Palamedes (DK 82 B11a), whose date is unknown (see Segal [1962] 100 and my note 180 above for the problems of dating Gorgias), but which might well have inﬂuenced Euripides: see especially Palamedes §6–7, with its remarks on the role of speech in conspiracy. 246 Iphigenia 24–5, 361–77, 538–9. 241

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Apollo should retain his prophetic honour.247 However, the most prominent use of deception is in the plot itself. In the ﬁrst half of each play, all the characters struggle to separate reality from delusion: a process which culminates in the recognition-scenes. But in the latter half, the main characters immediately start deceiving the barbarians and concealing their newly regained identity, so that once again—this time ironically—appearances and reality fail to coincide. Both heroines dissemble at length, spinning their captors completely fabricated accounts of bogus rituals.248 As has been pointed out elsewhere, Helen’s own deception is described in terms very similar to the deception brought about by the phantom.249 Iphigenia and Orestes use words to persuade the women of the chorus to assist them, not by speech but by silence, for a loyal tongue is a ﬁne thing.250 The category of deceptive words can thus include deceptive silence too.251 Iphigenia promises that, if the women help her escape, she will rescue them—a promise which may or may not be genuine but which achieves its aim.252 Later on, when the chorus speak to the Tauric messenger and Thoas, their words are completely false.253 Similarly, in Helen, the chorus is asked by Helen (with the same promise of safety as bait) to guard their mouths;254 and they later lie to Theoclymenus (even though, as Dale 247

Iphigenia 1234–82. Iphigenia 1129–1233; Helen 1193–300. 249 Helen 610, 813, 930, 1034, 1049, 1091, 1621: cf. Downing (1990) 11–12. 250 Iphigenia 1063–4: sig&saq’ Óm∏n ka≥ sunekpon&sate | fug3ß: kalÎn toi gl0ss’ Òtwi pist¶ par[i. For more examples of mendacious words from complicit choruses, see Cropp (2000) 237. 251 Andromeda fr. 126, spoken by (?)Perseus, concerns the interpretation of silence, as opposed to words: sig$iß: siwp¶ d’ £poroß ‰rmhneŸß lÎgwn (‘you are silent: but silence is no use as an interpreter of words’). The lack of context makes it hard to understand, but it clearly connects to the same theme. Jouan and Van Looy (1998, 174) compare this line to Hippolytus 911 (sig$iß: siwp[ß d’ oÛd†n πrgon ƒn kako∏ß, ‘you are silent; but in diﬃcult times silence is of no avail) and the tantalizing fr. incert. 977 (Ó g¤r siwp¶ to∏ß sofo∏sin åpÎkrisiß, ‘for silence is a response to the wise’). 252 Did Iphigenia really mean to help the Greek women escape? No mention of this is made in the escape-plans which follow, and it is not clear how Iphigenia will eﬀect their rescue. Nevertheless, Athena’s closing words ex machina (1467–9) do indeed provide for the women’s safe return to Greece. See Cropp (2000) 60, 237, 264 (he believes that there is a lacuna in 1468) and Kovacs (2000). 253 Iphigenia 1293–1301; cf. 1308 (yeud0ß πlegon). 254 Helen 1387–9: ka≥ s† prospoio»meqa | eÇnoun krate∏n te stÎmatoß . . . 248

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notes, ‘Theoclymenus is too angry to notice the disingenuous remark’).255 Illusions and delusions abound. As the plays contrast appearances and reality, they establish a series of verbal antitheses which are exploited prominently (especially in Helen, as beﬁts its ‘programmatic’ status). For example, Helen contrasts her name with her physical identity, saying: ej ka≥ kaq’ }Ell3d’ Ônoma duskle†ß fvrw, | m& moi tÏ s0m3 g’ ƒnq3d’ ajsc»nhn Ôflhi (‘even if my name has an inglorious reputation throughout Greece, here in Egypt my body may avoid disgrace’).256 When talking of the beauty-contest on Ida, Helen says (42–3): proutvqhn ƒg° m†n oÇ, tÏ d’ Ônoma toÛmÎn (‘I was set up as a prize—not I myself, but my name’), again making the same distinction. Solmsen long ago noted the frequent occurrence of this contrast between Ônoma (‘name’) and s0ma (‘body’),257 but this is not the only source of word-play. Language and reality are contrasted in other ways, too: for instance, the Greek servant, expressing surprise that he has not been molested by barbarians, exclaims: qaum3st’, πlasson toÇnom∞ ∂ tÏ pr$gm∞ πcon (‘It is amazing!—even the word ‘amazing’ cannot express the fact of the matter’).258 Reality is also juxtaposed with appearance or seeming, often with reference to the phantom: for instance, Helen says of Paris that doke∏ m’ πcein, | ken¶n dÎkhsin, oÛk πcwn (‘he believes he possesses me, but he does not: it is an empty belief’).259 Despite what some critics think,260 this is more than mere word-play. Rather, the recurring words form a framework for interpreting what we see in front of us: the plays are designed to make us think in terms of polar opposites. As others have 255 Helen 1619–20. Dale (1967, ad loc.) interprets their words there as an attempt to divert suspicion from themselves, noting that (as such) the purpose diﬀers from that of the actively deceptive chorus in Iphigenia. 256 Helen 66–7; cf. 588, 601, 1100 for similar expressions. 257 Solmsen (1934a). 258 Helen 600–1. Cf. 792 (Ônoma–pr$gma). It will be noted here and elsewhere that these Greek sentences are diﬃcult to render into English which is accurate and which retains the sophistication of the original. 259 Helen 35–6: cf. 611. 260 Dale (1967, xvi), for example, wrote: ‘There is much play with such antitheses as s0ma–Ônoma, and ﬂashes of irony from this source point the dialogue; but there is no metaphysical or psychological depth here, nor would anything of the kind be appropriate.’ I have been arguing against this type of approach throughout this chapter.

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observed, the use of antithesis and word-play is a characteristically sophistic mode of organizing thought, found especially in the so-called Dissoi Logoi but also widely elsewhere.261 In general, the various antitheses can be seen to correspond to a single schema as set out in Table 4.1. Table 4.1 Illusion

Reality

old false delusion Iphigenia sacriﬁced wicked Helen Ônoma (‘name’) doke∏n (‘seem’) lÎgoß (‘word’)

new true knowledge hind sacriﬁced phantom s0ma (‘body’) e”nai (‘be’) πrgon (‘deed’, ‘fact’)

This schema itself reﬂects the epistemological ideas of many of the Presocratics and sophists discussed above (§4.3). Its polarities make it attractive for those who, like Charles Segal, give a structuralist reading of Helen. I follow Segal’s lead in presenting these ideas in the form of a table;262 but it will be clear that my own interpretation is somewhat diﬀerent from his. Table 4.1 suggests that the plays conform to a neat, unambiguous pattern. Segal does, indeed, give a satisfyingly coherent interpretation of Helen, mapping on to this basic framework many other elements from the play (for example, Theonoe and Theoclymenus, morality, justice, gender, and so on); but, while his argument is ingenious, it does not entirely work. This is not (or not only) because it is over-schematic, but, more importantly, because the play does not lend itself to a neat analysis. Segal’s reading is based on two beliefs: ﬁrst, that Helen is a romance, and second, 261 Dissoi Logoi (DK 90). Rusten (1991) 7–17, on lÎgoß and πrgon in Thucydides, provides interesting comparative material. Parallels between sophistic antitheses and Euripidean language are noted by Solmsen (1934a); Kannicht (1969) 1. 57–8; Wolﬀ (1973) 77–9; Conacher (1998). Other examples from Euripides of sophistic word-play are to be found at Orestes 390, 454–5 (Ônoma–s0ma) and Hipp. 500–1 (Ônoma–πrgon). Pohlenz (1954, 1. 386), wittily, calls the plot of Euripides’ Helen a ‘dissos muthos’. 262 Segal (1971) 574, 582, 591.

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that it has (on the whole) a ‘happy ending’.263 These beliefs (both of them erroneous) have caused him to play down the negative aspects of the play. I have already given one reason why the plays’ apparent optimism is hard to swallow—but, ‘disillusionment’ aside, it is simply not true that Helen or the other escapetragedies clarify our former delusions. The escape-tragedies do not do what they at ﬁrst seem to be doing, viz. simply replacing false, deluded opinion with true knowledge. If it were really possible to describe every problematic ‘fact’ in the plays as either real or illusory, then there would be no problem; but as the plays progress it becomes impossible to assign a deﬁnite truth-value to anything. It is not just certain speciﬁc ‘facts’, but the whole basis for our ‘knowledge’ of reality, that is being challenged. The tidy schema in Table 4.1 is itself a delusion: its series of antitheses breaks down as soon as it has been established, and the polar relationship between reality and illusion is cast into doubt. The deconstruction of the dichotomy can be seen on the level of word-play, where, confusingly, familiar verbal contrasts are altered and structurally opposite terms exchange positions. For example, Teucer, remarking on the identical appearance of Helen and the phantom, says (to Helen) that, although she may resemble Helen in body, her personality is quite diﬀerent (}Elvnhi d’ Òmoion s0m∞ πcous’ oÛ t¤ß frvnaß | πceiß Ømo≤aß åll¤ diafÎrouß pol»).264 This distorts the usual antithesis of Ônoma (illusory) versus s0ma (real), and instead replaces it with s0ma (illusory) versus frvneß (real). A little later, Helen bewails her lot, saying: åll¤ p3nt’ πcousa dustuc[ | to∏ß pr3gmasin tvqnhka, to∏ß d’ πrgoisin oÇ.265 This again disturbs the usual contrast: instead of Ônoma (illusory) versus pr$gma (real), or lÎgoß (illusory) versus πrgon (real), she makes two ‘real’ terms opposed to each other. So what do Helen’s words here mean? ‘I am dead in deed, but not in fact’? Morwood translates the phrase as: ‘I am as good as dead and yet I am alive’,266 which is probably the most obvious mean263 Segal does, it is true, detect certain unresolved tensions at the end of the play (1971, 607–10), but he does not press these tensions far enough, preferring ‘ambiguity’ and ‘lack of resolution’ to a deﬁnite (either positive or negative) 264 interpretation. Helen 160–1. 265 Helen 285–6. 266 Morwood (1997) 127. See also Dale (1967) ad loc., comparing Hecabe 431 and Soph. Oed. Col. 782.

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ing; but the mode of expression is both confusing and slightly sinister. ‘Alive’ and ‘dead’, like ‘reality’ and ‘illusion’, ought to be a ﬁxed and unambiguous antithesis, but in Iphigenia, notably, it is not. Even though the plot is based on Iphigenia’s having been saved, not slain, at Aulis, Iphigenia repeatedly refers to herself as ‘dead’.267 The ﬁrst lines of her letter to Orestes state that Iphigenia is both ‘alive’ and ‘not alive’, a typically Euripidean paradox: Ó ∞ n AÛl≤di sfage∏s’ ƒpistvllei t3de | z0s’ ∞ Ifigvneia, to∏ß ƒke∏ d’ oÛ z0s’ πti (‘She who was killed at Aulis sends you this message, Iphigenia who is alive, though no longer alive so far as those there are concerned’).268 Thus more confusion is created. Which version is true? The familiar lÎgoß-s0ma dichotomy is deconstructed also at a number of points in Iphigenia. First of all, Orestes says that, even if he is killed, his name will live on if Pylades survives and returns to Argos (Ônom3 t’ ƒmoı gvnoit’ £n, 697). This is a reversal of the usual situation, in which one’s Ônoma is less, not more, durable than one’s s0ma. A little earlier, Orestes had made a similar point, telling Iphigenia that she may sacriﬁce his body but not his name (tÏ s0ma q»seiß toÛmÎn, oÛc≥ toÇnoma, 504). The lÎgoß–s0ma contrast returns later, when Iphigenia is instructing Pylades to take her letter (as she imagines, over the dangerous seas) to Orestes. She has made Pylades swear an oath to deliver the letter safely, but Pylades fears that the sea may prevent him against his will from carrying out her request (755–8): ƒxa≤retÎn moi dÏß tÎd’: ‡n ti naıß p3qhi, c] dvltoß ƒn kl»dwni crhm3twn mvta åfan¶ß gvnhtai, s0ma d’ ƒks*sw mÎnon, tÏn Òrkon e”nai tÎnde mhkvt’ πmpedon. 267 Iphigenia 8 (πsfaxen), 20 (sfage∏san), 27 (ƒkainÎmhn), 177 (sfacqe∏s’), 359–60 (m’ . . . πsfazon), 541 (pa∏ß πt’ oˆs’ åpwlÎmhn), 563 (qanoısan), 770 (sfage∏san), 920 (pat¶r πkteinv me). 268 Iphigenia 770–1. This is rather similar to a famous fragment of Euripides’ Polyidus (638 Nauck): t≤ß d’ o”den ej tÏ z[n mvn ƒsti katqane∏n, | tÏ katqane∏n d† z[n k3tw nom≤zetai; (‘Who can tell if “life” is really death, or if “death” is really life?’) In addition, the phrase oÈ ƒke∏ (‘the people there’) is sometimes used euphemistically for the dead (e.g. Soph. Electra 356, Ajax 855, Antigone 76). Clearly, the primary meaning of to∏ß ƒke∏ here is—as Platnauer (1938, ad loc). has it—those back in Argos, to∏ß ƒn ⁄rgei—but might the riddling nature of these lines contain a provocative hint of the other meaning? . . .

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Grant me this exception: if something should happen to the ship, and the letter, along with the goods, should disappear in the waves, and I can save only my own body, that this oath shall no longer be binding.

Iphigenia consents (764–5): IF. ∂n d’ ƒn qal3sshi gr3mmat∞ åfanisq[i t3de, tÏ s0ma s*saß toŸß lÎgouß s*seiß ƒmo≤. If the written message should disappear in the sea, by saving your body you will save my words for me.

This dialogue exhibits considerable word-play and paradox. Neither lÎgoß nor s0ma here corresponds straightforwardly to ‘real’ or ‘illusory’, but (as with Orestes’ lines above) it is clear that the survival of words is more important than that of the body. However, the very fact of the letter, by giving a physical, tangible form to words, bridges the gap between the seemingly opposite terms. This is seen in Iphigenia’s distinction between gr3mmata (physical, written words) and lÎgoi (spoken, invisible words). In addition, there is considerable linguistic dexterity here. As Cropp points out, another common verbal contrast, between cr&mata (goods) and s0ma (one’s self), is exploited in 756–7.269 One might add that the similarity in sound between cr&mata and gr3mmata (surely no coincidence) further enhances the word-play. The word used each time to express the likely fate of Pylades, rather than ‘perish’, is ‘become invisible’ (åfan¶ß, åfanisq[i); while this is a common enough euphemism, its repeated use here, in a play so much concerned with deceptive (dis-)appearances, may be important. The assonance of s0ma and derivatives of s*izw, and the sigmatism in the last line quoted above, all add to the bizarre, unsettling eﬀect. In general (word-play aside), the relationship between reality and illusion is more complex than a simple structure admits. Because the plays contain so much that is deceptive or illusory, and so many varying levels of ambiguity, we are bound to reﬂect that the words and appearances which are presented as true are no diﬀerent in kind from those which are presented as false. We have no way of knowing which ones correspond to reality—and it becomes increasingly possible that none of them does. What proof is there? There is nothing intrinsically more credible or 269 Cropp (2000, ad loc.) gives, as 5th-cent. examples, Democritus (DK 68 B40, B280) and Thuc. 1.141.5, 2.53.2.

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authoritative about the ‘new’ Helen and Iphigenia. They may seem plausible enough, but the only reason we have for accepting this new ‘knowledge’ is what Helen and Iphigenia say, and what we see in front of us.270 (How else can humans communicate reality, except by means of words and appearances?) Gorgias in the Encomium showed how Helen was overpowered by words (lÎgoi) and outward appearance (Ôyiß); now we, the audience, are being beguiled by the persuasive—why not deceptive?—lÎgoi and Ôyiß of drama. In other words, Euripides has created a situation which he proceeds to undermine. This in-built ‘self-refutation’, it has already been noted, is a characteristically Gorgianic feature. In fact, it can be seen to be a recurring strategy of presentation, whereby our initial expectations are later frustrated.271 We have already seen, for example, Euripides’ eﬀorts to create extraordinary settings for his plays, only to ignore them and, indeed, to make his ‘barbarian’ places and characters more like Greek ones.272 In the chapter which follows, I shall show that the plays’ supernatural powers are not quite as they seem. We cannot straightforwardly believe anything which is put before our eyes . . . including the plays themselves or their characters! The ‘new’ Helen and Iphigenia themselves are deeply ambiguous. Both of them are transformed from passive victims to active, deceptive aggressors. Iphigenia, far from being helpless, poses an active threat to her rescuers; she is the priestess of a savage cult, who even after her rescue is portrayed as a witch, uttering loud barbarian shrieks.273 (And was she killed at Aulis or not?) Helen is initially presented—or, rather, presents herself (a highly signiﬁcant fact)—as a demure, chaste wife, the total opposite of the ‘old’ Helen of tragic myth. Yet the events of the play, to a large extent, undermine this initial presentation. In what follows, Helen is once again the object of male pursit; as before, 270 Cf. Zuntz (1960) 224: ‘So perplexing must the kain¶ E } lvnh have seemed . . . that many a spectator may have felt about as much diﬃculty in accepting her for what she claimed to be as, soon afterwards, Teucer and Menelaus were to show on stage.’ 271 Cf. Podlecki (1970) 407: ‘Often in Euripidean drama an early scene has more than its surface importance and “means” more than it contributes to the straightforward development of the play’s action.’ 272 See Ch. 3 above. 273 Iphigenia 348; 1336–7 (see §3.3 above).

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she inspires love and strife, as two men contend with each other to possess her as a wife. The play ends with a sea-battle between Greeks and eastern adversaries fought for her sake, in which many men are killed on the sea’s waves as Helen stands on the ship’s prow shouting out poı tÏ TrwikÏn klvoß; (‘where is the glory of Troy?’).274 Even after the recognition-scene, Menelaus persists in saying that the Trojan War was fought over this Helen, not the phantom but the woman in front of him.275 ‘Reality’ and ‘illusion’, ‘new’ and ‘old’, are not, after all, so far apart. All of this means that Helen is not, as it seems to be, an exoneration or rehabilitation of Helen; Iphigenia is not about the killings at Aulis and Argos. Rather, these plays are about knowledge—or the lack of knowledge. This being so, the presence of a purportedly omniscient character is clearly provocative. In fact, Theonoe’s ‘omniscience’ is probably another illusion: again, our expectations are aroused only to be disappointed. Theonoe is said to be omniscient—indeed, a reference to this quality accompanies practically every mention of her name—but there is surprisingly little evidence of this superior knowledge.276 The facts which she reveals to the other characters from time to time do not seem particularly impressive or revelatory. Theonoe announces that the gods are still debating the fate of Helen and Menelaus (878–91), but does not reveal the outcome of the debate. Her privileged information about Menelaus is given up far too late for it to bring either comfort or surprise. (Perhaps it is seventeen years too late: why has Helen never asked her about Menelaus before?277) She reveals that Menelaus is alive long after Helen and the audience have already discovered this for themselves;278 and, unless her diﬃcult-to-decipher words about con274

Helen 1602–3; cf. Meltzer (1994). Helen 970 (t[sd’). 276 Helen 12–13: t¤ qe∏a g¤r | t3 t’ Ônta ka≥ mvllonta p3nt’ ]p≤stato (‘she understands the supernatural—all of it, both what is and what is to come’). Cf. 317–8 (t¤ p3nt’ ƒp≤statai, ‘she understands everything’), 530 (© p3nt’ ålhq0ß o”de, ‘she knows the truth of everything’), 823 (p3nt’ o”d’, ‘she knows everything’). 277 It seems that this is one of those implausibilities in tragedy which one simply has to accept, without asking too many questions based on logic or probability: cf. Dawe (1982) 6–22 and Waldock (1951) 163–4 on the plot of Sophocles’ Oedipus. 278 Helen 873. Cf. Zuntz (1960) 209: he points out that Theonoe, ‘the 275

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sciousness and the ether (see §4.3 above) are to be granted special status as true wisdom about the universe, there is no sign that she really is omniscient, or that there are any beneﬁts to be derived from omniscience. Theonoe’s main function is not to oﬀer a magical elucidation of the nature of existence, but to provide Helen and Menelaus with, ﬁrst of all, a potential foe and, later, an ally who will prevent Theoclymenus from hampering their escape. For all her ‘omniscience’, what aﬀects Theonoe’s decision to assist the Greeks is not superior wisdom but the power of rhetoric. Helen and Menelaus both make long speeches, employing great argumentative subtlety and appeals to both reason and emotion, in order to achieve persuasion.279 Menelaus rounds oﬀ his speech with a plea: you may decide to kill us both, if you think it right, but rather let me persuade you otherwise by my speech (to∏ß ƒmo∏ß pe≤qou lÎgoiß, 994). Theonoe immediately yields: their words (true or false) have achieved the desired result. The obvious conclusion is that language, although deceptive, is more powerful than knowledge: the very point that Gorgias made in the Encomium. 4.4.4 Recognitions The concealment and subsequent revelation of identity is a welldocumented characteristic of tragic plots in general. Scenes of recognition, in which certain characters come to recognize the identity of others (in most cases, friends and relatives), appear in tragedies of all periods.280 Most studies of tragic recognition (ånagn*risiß), inﬂuenced by Aristotle’s Poetics, are broadly narratological: that is, the recognition is seen as a plot device and studied from the point of view of the play’s structure and unity.281 There are, according to Aristotle, six species of recognition: those arising from tokens; those contrived by the poet; ci-devant fairy godmother’, has a grasp of the situation as it is, but has no mastery over the future. 279 Helen 894–995. 280 I mean 5th-cent. Greece in particular, but recognition, a motif in literature since the Odyssey, is found in literature of many genres, periods, and cultures: see the wide-ranging study of Cave (1988). 281 Arist. Poet. 1450a33–b20, 1452a12–b8 and 1454b19–1455a18 are concerned with ånagn*risiß. Perrin (1908), Burnett (1971) and Goward (1999) in particular exemplify the ‘plot-based’ sort of approach.

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those arising from memory; those arising through a process of reasoning; those based on false inference; and those which come about naturally.282 Although it might seem that this characteristically taxonomic scheme is too rigid, Aristotle does not specify that all recognitions must conform exclusively to a single type. The recognition-scene in the Iphigenia, in fact, is mentioned under two (or is it three?283) diﬀerent headings. Orestes’ speed at making himself known, after Iphigenia’s letter has been read, is said to be contrived (the second type);284 but this scene also conforms to the last (and ‘best’) kind, since it was natural that Iphigenia should want to send a letter.285 Both Helen and Iphigenia are marked by prominent and protracted recognition-scenes, which are certainly important in terms of plot. They occur roughly in the centre of the plays and are structurally climactic. As I remarked above, in each play the direction of the plot completely changes after the recognition has taken place: from ignorance and confusion to deliberate 282 Arist. Poet. 1454b19–1455a21. The ﬁrst type is di¤ t0n shme≤wn; the second pepoihmvnai; the third di¤ mn&mhß; the fourth ƒk sullogismoı; the ﬁfth ƒk paralogismoı; and the sixth ƒk t0n pragm3twn. See Lucas (1968) ad loc. for discussion. (Are there ﬁve or six types?) Perrin (1908, 403–4) reﬁned Aristotle’s scheme, dividing all recognition-scenes into just two basic types: (I) spontaneous and (II) induced by proof of some sort. 283 Aristotle (Poet. 1455a6–8) mentions Iphigenia under the fourth heading; but it is unclear whether it is Euripides’ play or a work by Polyidus the sophist that is under discussion. The text runs: ka≥ Ó Polu≤dou toı sofistoı per≥ t[ß I∞ figene≤aß: ejkÏß g¤r πfh tÏn O ∞ rvsthn sullog≤sasqai Òti Ó t’ ådelf¶ ƒt»qh ka≥ aÛt0i sumba≤nei q»esqai (‘There is also the recognition mentioned by Polyidus the sophist concerning Iphigenia: for he said that it was probable for Orestes to reason that he was going to be sacriﬁced because his sister had been sacriﬁced’). The problem hinges on the word πfh (which Kassel’s OCT retains, but it is not in the best mss). If πfh is correct, then it means that Polyidus made a comment on Euripides’ Iphigenia; but the comment does not exactly reﬂect the content of that play. It would not be logical, in any case, for Orestes to ‘reason’ (sullog≤sasqai) that he was going to be sacriﬁced because his sister had been sacriﬁced. It seems better to remove πfh (with Lucas and others), meaning that Polyidus himself was the author of a tragedy (or other work) on Iphigenia. (See Lucas [1968] 170–1.) Alternatively, in Heath’s (1996, 27) translation, the passage is understood as referring to a suggestion that Polyidus made for [a possible improvement to?] Euripides’ play. Polyidus’ ‘version’ is mentioned again at Poet. 1455b10, where again it is impossible to say what this version was or how the comment applies to Euripides. It is interesting to note once again that here the interests of Euripides and the sophists coincide. 284 Arist. Poet. 1454b30–35. 285 Ibid. 1455a16–19.

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concealment, deception and escape-stratagem.286 In terms of narrative time (what the narratologist Génette calls durée),287 they are marked, since the action (histoire), the moment of recognition itself, occupies a much smaller period of real time than the dramatic presentation of that moment (récit). The recognitionscenes are a focal point for the characters’ emotions, and they are marked by music and song, in the form of beautiful lyric duets performed by the main characters.288 However, it is clear that here recognition is more interesting than a plot-device; it is (as even its etymology shows) an epistemological topos, profoundly connected to the plays’ treatment of ideas in general.289 The recognition-scenes encapsulate the main themes of the plays: how are appearances and reality connected, and how do we deﬁne personal identity? Of course, this sense of ånagn*risiß is also present in the Poetics. As Aristotle saw, most tragedies involve, in some sense, a change of state: at the end of the plays, the characters (and the audience?) tend to know more than they did at the beginning.290 Aristotle deﬁnes ånagn*risiß as a change from ignorance to knowledge, leading either to aﬀection or enmity; he adds that it marks a turningpoint in the fortunes of the characters involved, which explains why he deals with it alongside peripvteia (‘reversal’).291 A recent 286 Burnett (1971) in her discussion of complex plots refers to this type of peripvteia as ‘mixed reversal’. Cf. Perrin (1908) 371; Lucas (1968) 292. 287 Génette (1980). 288 Helen 627–97, Iphigenia 827–99. Cf. Soph. El. 1233–87; Eur. Ion 1437– 509. See Hall (1999) on actors’ song in tragedy. 289 Helen’s description of recognition raises the possibility that its signiﬁcance is not just epistemological but theological: qeÏß g¤r ka≥ tÏ gign*skein f≤louß (‘Recognition of one’s friends might even be called a god’, 560). The phrase is rather diﬃcult to translate: is recognition actually a god, or is a god responsible for recognition? Goward (1999, 131) renders the words as: ‘Yes, there’s a god at work in recognition.’ Kannicht (1969) vol. 2, ad loc. lists some other expressions from drama (not all of them strictly comparable to this passage) in which characters, usually in times of distress or shock, perceive a divine presence at work in aﬀairs (e.g. Eur. Phoen. 506, Aesch. Suppl. 731–2, Menander fr. 223). Helen is expressing surprise, but we need not, perhaps, press the theological point too far. Dale (1967, ad loc.) thinks the words ‘whimsical’ and unimportant. 290 Lucas (1968, 292) writes that tragic plots are typiﬁed by ‘misapprehension over vital matters’. Cave (1988, 10), also with reference to Aristotle, describes tragedy and epic as ‘epistemological ﬁctions’. 291 Arist. Poet. 1452a29–32: ånagn*risiß dv, ¿sper ka≥ toÇnoma shma≤nei, ƒx ågno≤aß ejß gn0sin metabol&, ∂ ejß fil≤an ∂ ejß πcqran, t0n prÏß eÛtuc≤an ∂ dustuc≤an

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study of literary recognition-scenes (by the French linguisticians Greimas and Courtés) clariﬁes Aristotle’s position slightly: ‘the narrative pivot, of a cognitive order and called “recognition”, is not the passage from ignorance to knowledge, but the passage from a certain knowledge (erroneous) to another knowledge (true)’.292 These reﬂections hold true for most tragedies; but then Helen and Iphigenia are not most tragedies. The cognitive status of the recognition-scenes in our plays is rather diﬀerent because the whole nature of knowledge, sense-perception and reality has been radically questioned. All that Euripides allows us here is (to use Greimas and Courtés’ phrasing) the passage from a certain ‘knowledge’ (potentially erroneous) to another ‘knowledge’ (potentially erroneous). We cannot be conﬁdent that genuine recognition really has taken place, or could ever take place. Thus it is impossible to take the recognition-scenes, like so much else, at their face value. Their extravagant joy is undercut by a darker mood of uncertainty and doubt. This is especially true of the recognition-scene in Helen. Since the ‘real’ Helen and the phantom are indistinguishable, recognition is not just undermined but completely impossible. Teucer’s meeting with Helen in the prologue, which is a sort of botched non-recognition-scene, demonstrates the insuperable diﬃculty of the situation. When Teucer enters, he immediately sees that the woman in front of him looks like Helen: but reason tells him (wrongly) that it cannot be Helen (72–7). _ qeo≤, t≤n’ e”don Ôyin; ƒcq≤sthß Ør0 gunaikÏß ejk° fÎnion, ~ m’ åp*lesen p3ntaß t’ !caio»ß. qeo≥ s’, Òson m≤mhm∞ πceiß E } lvnhß, åpopt»seian. ej d† m¶ ∞ n xvnhi ga≤ai pÎd’ e”con, t0id’ #n eÛstÎcwi pter0i åpÎlausin ejkoıß πqaneß #n DiÏß kÎrhß. „rismvnwn (‘Recognition is, as the name signiﬁes, a change from ignorance to knowledge, in the case of friendship or enmity, on the part of people destined for good or bad fortune’). At ﬁrst, it seems that Aristotle understands ånagn*risiß as the realization that a peripvteia has taken place, but it turns out, from the illustrations which he gives, that he means it exclusively in the sense of recognition of people’s identity. Cf. Lucas (1968) 131: ‘it causes confusion that the word means both recognition of people and realization of circumstances.’ 292 Greimas and Courtés (1989) 570–1; cf. Goward (1999) 131–3.

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O gods! What is this sight that I have seen? I see the murderous image of a most hateful woman, who has destroyed me and all the Achaeans. May the gods spit you out, so close is your likeness to Helen! If I were not on foreign soil, you would have met your death from this arrow’s sure aim, reaping the reward for being the image of Zeus’ daughter.

Teucer curses her vehemently,293 unable to trust the evidence of his eyes. His mistake, and the fact that Helen and the phantom are completely indistinguishable, are emphasized by his calling the real Helen an ‘image’ or ‘likeness’—not once but four times in the space of six lines. Teucer has got everything the wrong way round; but he cannot be called particularly stupid or naïve (although he has conveniently forgotten to ask her name). Yet again, a few lines later, the same point is made. When Helen asks Teucer if he has seen the unfortunate Helen, he replies: ¿sper sv g’, oÛd†n ¬sson, øfqalmo∏ß Ør0 (118). ‘With these eyes, as clearly as I see you now’—the irony is almost unbearable. The dialogue continues (119–22): EL. skÎpei d† m¶ dÎkhsin e÷cet’ ƒk qe0n. TE. £llou lÎgou mvmnhso, m¶ ke≤nhß πti. EL. o\tw doke∏te t¶n dÎkhsin åsfal[; TE. aÛtoß g¤r Ôssoiß ejdÎmhn, ka≥ noıß Ør$i. Helen: Watch out, in case it was an illusion from the gods that you saw. Teucer: Change the subject: do not talk about her any longer. Helen: Do you imagine that what you imagine you witnessed was real? Teucer: I saw it with my own eyes—and my mind sees.

This is the context in which these notorious ‘Epicharmean’ lines (see p. 266) occur. And it now becomes clear that their meaning, too, is ironic. Helen is preparing Teucer for an amazing revelation, with the threefold repetition of words for ‘seeming’ (dÎkhsin, doke∏te, dÎkhsin) and gentle questions about the nature of his ‘knowledge’. Can Teucer be quite sure that he left Helen by the shore? Of course he cannot, for Helen is standing in front of him (or is she?) . . . Nonetheless, he repeats conﬁdently that he saw Helen with his eyes—and not only his eyes, but also his mind. The audience knows, and Helen knows, that neither his eyes nor his mind saw what they seemed to see. Teucer’s 293 Interestingly, the emphatic (and unusual) word åpopt»w is found again at 667: Helen is using it there, and this time what is being ‘spat out’ is another deceptive illusion—speech (lÎgon).

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ignorance about the relationship of illusions and reality is total— intellectual as well as sensory. He is totally wrong; and quoting Epicharmus will not make him less ignorant. (Indeed, the quotation suggests that philosophy itself is subject to the same universal delusions.) Teucer leaves the stage convinced that Helen is still safely housed in the Greek ship. His parting words, already quoted, reinforce the ironical eﬀect of the scene: E } lvnhi d’ Òmoion s0m’ πcous’ oÛ t¤ß frvnaß | πceiß Ømo≤aß åll¤ diafÎrouß pol» (‘your body resembles that of Helen, but your character does not—it is diﬀerent by far’, 160–1). Even though this ﬁrst, failed recognition-scene is full of ambiguities, it is logically more satisfying than the second, ‘successful’ recognition-scene between Menelaus and Helen which follows.294 This recognition has already been fatally undermined, but Helen’s own words, spoken to the chorus in the ﬁrst episode, further weaken the eﬀect of the eventual recognition. If Menelaus were alive, she says, they would recognize each other at once by means of secret tokens known only to each other.295 As we see, this turns out to be untrue: and so these sentiments are rather poignant. Segal believes that ‘a gulf separates Helen and Menelaus’, in contrast with Iphigenia, where (he says) the lost pair feel instinctive aﬃnity.296 (He is right to point out the lack of rapport between husband and wife, but I think he overstates the straightforwardness of the relationship in Iphigenia, which is not without its diﬃculties.) When Menelaus ﬁnally comes face-to-face with Helen, he (like Teucer) immediately perceives the ‘likeness’ between her and his wife. Helen, too, at once recognizes that this ragged man is ‘like’ her husband (563–4): ME. E } lvnhi s’ Ømo≤an d¶ m3list’ e”don, g»nai. EL. ƒg° d† Menvle*i ge sv: oÛd’ πcw t≤ f0. 294 Nevertheless, logic and realism are not the only criteria according to which recognition-scenes should be judged. Cave (1988, 2–4) makes the good point that all recognition-scenes in literature are characterized by their unrealistic quality: recognition is ‘the mark or signature of a ﬁction, so that even if something like it occurs in fact, it still sounds like ﬁction and will probably be told as such.’ 295 Helen 291–2: ej m†n g¤r πzh pÎsiß, ånegn*sqhmen #n, | ejß x»mbol’ ƒlqÎnteß 4 faner¤ mÎnoiß #n Án. However, Diggle (1993) 574–8 questions the authenticity of these lines. 296 Segal (1971) 580.

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Menelaus: You look extraordinarily like Helen, lady. Helen: And you look like Menelaus, too: I am at a loss what to say.

Sadly, the recognition is only one-sided. Menelaus conﬁrms that Helen has identiﬁed him correctly (πgnwß g¤r ørq0ß £ndra dustucvstaton), but when Helen tries to embrace him, he repels her, unwilling to believe that she is his wife. Helen attempts to persuade him of her identity—not, as one would have thought, by explaining about the phantom, but, most oddly, by resorting to the one argument that cannot possibly convince him! EL. oÛk πstin £llh s& tiß ånt’ ƒmoı gun&. ME. oÇ pou fron0 m†n eˆ, tÏ d’ Ômma moı nose∏; EL. oÛ g3r me le»sswn s¶n d3marq’ Ør$n doke∏ß; ME. tÏ s0m’ Òmoion, tÏ d† safvß g’ åpostate∏. EL. skvyai: t≤ soi de∏ p≤stewß safestvraß;297 Helen: You have no other wife except me. Menelaus: What? Have I lost my reason? Is my eye diseased? Helen: When you gaze on me, do you not think you see your wife? Menelaus: Your appearance is the same—but I have no evidence. Helen: Look at me! What need have you of any clearer proof?

Does he not think (doke∏n again) he sees his wife? Can there be any clearer proof than appearance? These questions are manifestly ironic. Menelaus’ confused replies are interesting, not just because of the contrast between s0ma and tÏ safvß, which, as previously noted, blurs the ‘reality’ vs. ‘illusion’ antithesis (in which s0ma corresponds to ‘reality’), but also because Menelaus thinks that his eyes must be ‘ill’. This expression, which prima facie seems picturesque and slightly odd, is, surely, an allusion to Gorgias’ discussion, in the Encomium, of the visual power of works of art: he writes that statues made by skilled sculptors resemble their subjects to such a degree that they make one’s eyes ill (by deceiving them).298 Menelaus, like Teucer above, describes the real Helen in terms more appropriate to an artistic copy. Appearances are not enough to convince Menelaus of Helen’s identity; therefore they have to resort to words—which are, as we 297 Helen 574–8. The text is uncertain here: see Dale (1967), Kannicht (1969, vol. 2) and Diggle (1993) ad loc. 298 Gorgias (DK 82 B11) §18. See nn. 190–1 above (and further discussion of artistic images in §4.4.6 below).

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have seen, no more reliable. Words will not prove that this is the real Helen. But it is the words of the Greek servant—in particular, his report of the words of the phantom as it disappeared for ever—that suﬃce to convince Menelaus. The servant himself clearly did not believe the words of the phantom, for as soon as he sees Helen he exclaims (616–19): _ ca∏re, L&daß q»gater, ƒnq3d’ Ásq’ £ra: ƒg° dv s’ £strwn „ß bebhku∏an mucoŸß ‡ggellon ejd°ß oÛd†n „ß ËpÎpteron dvmaß foro≤hß. Greetings, daughter of Leda—so you were here all the time! I came here with the news that you had gone to a hidden place among the stars, completely ignorant of the fact that you could ﬂy.

There is yet more irony in his words ejd°ß oÛd†n (‘completely ignorant’), since he is even now mistaken. But his story is enough for Menelaus, who says that he now understands everything: xumbeb$s≤ moi lÎgoi | oÈ t[sd’ ålhqe∏ß. It is words, he says, that have convinced him: but, in the light of what we have already discovered about words, we have to be sceptical. How does he know that they are true (ålhqe∏ß)? In any case, the reunited husband and wife embrace and burst into song: it is almost as if recognition were really unproblematic. More incongruities follow. When the recognition-scene is over, the ‘new’ Helen begins to look rather like the ‘old’ Helen, as she explains that another man is attempting to marry her. A telling exchange follows: it turns out that, despite the emotional scene which has just taken place, Menelaus does not trust Helen an inch. He subjects her to questions, but obviously does not believe her answers, since he goes on to ask for proof of her ﬁdelity (793–6): EL. p3nt’ o”sq’ £r’, „ß πoikaß, åmf’ ƒm0n g3mwn. ME. o”d’: ej d† lvktra divfugeß, tÎd’ oÛk πcw. EL. £qikton eÛn¶n ÷sqi soi seswmvnhn. ME. t≤ß toıde peiq*; f≤la g3r, ej saf[ lvgeiß. Helen: You know everything, then, so it seems, about my marriage. Menelaus: I do know; but I still do not know whether you tried to avoid the union. Helen: You can be sure that I preserved my chastity for you. Menelaus: What proof is there of that?—Of course this is good news, if what you claim can be believed.

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Menelaus still, it is clear, thinks of Helen in terms of an unfaithful deserter. Helen’s parenthetic „ß πoikaß (‘so it seems’) is hardly reassuring; nor is Menelaus’ saf[ (‘plausible’ rather than ‘true’); for we remember the chorus’ saying that many statements may be perfectly plausible but completely false (pÎll’ #n lvgoito ka≥ di¤ yeud0n saf[, 309). Even after Helen has shown him the ‘proof’ (the site of her supplication at Proteus’ tomb), Menelaus remains doubtful and suspicious. He asks her what would happen to them if they were caught trying to escape, and she replies (833–4): EL. qan[i: gamoımai d’ Ó t3lain’ ƒg° b≤ai. ME. prodÎtiß #n e÷hß: t¶n b≤an sk&yas’ πceiß. Helen: You will die; and I, unfortunate woman, will be married by force. Menelaus: Treacherous woman! You are using ‘force’ as an excuse!

His is an odd and insensitive response, ‘an explosion of jealousy’, as one critic has described it.299 Menelaus will never, it seems, be quite convinced of the wifely virtues of the ‘new’ Helen—but perhaps he is right to be suspicious. However that might be, it ﬁnally takes a suicide pact to convince him of his wife’s loyalty. Thus the recognition-scene in Helen is hardly what it seems to be—a positive celebration of the recovery of identity and the reunion of a loving husband and wife. The recognition-scene of the Iphigenia, by contrast, is less awkward—mainly because there are no phantom doubles to cause confusion. Nevertheless, a living Iphigenia is still, as far as Orestes is concerned, an impossibility. This time, a coup de théâtre—the letter-device,300 so admired by Aristotle—prompts the recognition. When Iphigenia starts reading out the letter, which begins with her name, Orestes cries out poı d’ πst’ ƒke≤nh; katqanoıs’ ~kei p3lin; (‘Where is she? Has she come back from the dead?’ 772). Indeed his sister has, in a sense, come back from the dead . . . but does Iphigenia’s reply, ~d’ ©n Øra∏ß s» (‘she is here, the person whom you see in front of you’), alert us to a possible double-meaning, in the light of what we have learnt about faulty appearances? We have already had our senses questioned suﬃciently to wonder whether what Orestes can see is really proof enough. When 299 300

Dale (1967) ad loc. I return to this device below (§4.4.7).

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Iphigenia reminds her brother that she is a priestess, practising human sacriﬁce in a barbarian country, he is utterly perplexed (778–80): he calls confusedly on Pylades for support; words fail him (t≤ lvxw;); and he is completely disorientated (poı pÎt’ Ônq’ hËr&meqa;), invoking the gods as it might be for assistance (_ qeo≤). The normal conventions of truth and illusion, identity, and geography, have all broken down. This should be a joyful recognition, as it shortly seems to become; but its eﬀect is soured by this terrible doubt and confusion. As in Helen, the recognition is initially only one-sided (which somewhat gives the lie to the ‘instinctive aﬃnity’ detected here by Segal). Orestes, following his initial perplexity, accepts the bizarre explanation of Iphigenia’s presence,301 but Iphigenia, by contrast, ﬁnds it diﬃcult to accept that her brother, who should be in Argos, is here. When Orestes points out to his sister that her opinion (dÎxa) is mistaken,302 she, in turn, believing that his words (lÎgoi) are deceptive, tells him sharply to stop talking (801–5). OR.

m& m’ åpostrvfou, πcous’ ådelfÏn oÛ dokoıs’ 1xein potv. IF. ƒg* s’ ådelfÏn tÏn ƒmÎn; oÛ pa»shi lvgwn; tÏ d’ ⁄rgoß aÛtoı mestÏn ~ te Naupl≤a. OR. oÛk πst’ ƒke∏ sÎß, _ t3laina, s»ggonoß. Orestes: Do not turn away from me, now that you hold your brother, whom you thought you would never meet again. Iphigenia: What? My brother? Stop this at once! His haunt is Argos, and Nauplia. Orestes: Unfortunate woman—your brother is not there.

It is so unnatural, even impossible, for Orestes to be in the Tauric land that Iphigenia concludes (wrongly) that this must be someone else. As in the case of Menelaus and Helen, the weird location (Egypt or the Black Sea) somehow aﬀects not only people’s own identities but also their ability to identify others: who they are depends, at least in part, on where they are. 301 That is, unless we take the ‘disbelieving arm’ with which he embraces her (åp≤stwi . . . brac≤oni 796) as an expression of scepticism, rather than, as seems more likely, a ﬁgure of speech designed to add emphasis to his surprise (see Stinton [1976a] and the discussion in §2.4 above). 302 Her delusion is described in language reminiscent of Paris’ delusion that he had Helen: Helen 35–6, 611.

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(Compare Orestes’ confused words above, poı pÎt’ Ônq’ hËr&meqa;). The role of geography in the deﬁnition (or deconstruction) of personal identity is surprising; but it can be seen as yet another level of signiﬁcance of the barbarian settings which I discussed in the previous chapter. Culture and ethnicity are joining forces with epistemology to deny us knowledge about ourselves. Eventually the siblings realize that appearances are not enough. Unlike Helen and Menelaus, they resort to proofs, not one but three—Iphigenia’s tapestry, ritual locks of hair, and Pelops’ spear. Paradoxically, these proofs are not real, physical artefacts, but only words: the characters talk about them, but they are never produced (perhaps unsurprisingly, given the circumstances). Iphigenia asks Orestes a series of questions, thinking that, if he answers them correctly, he must be her brother.303 This, in the light of all that we have heard about the limitations of words, considerably limits the power of these verbal ‘proofs’ to prove anything. Furthermore, it emerges that Orestes himself only knows about two of these three tokens because somebody else has told him!304 When Iphigenia is satisﬁed, and their recognition duet has ﬁnished, the chorus members describe what has happened as completely remarkable, beyond words; and they add that they have witnessed these events personally, rather than hearing about them second-hand (ƒn to∏si qaumasto∏si ka≥ m»qwn pvra | t3d’ e”don aÛt¶ koÛ kluoıs’ åp’ åggvlwn, 900–1). Thus the inadequacy of Orestes’ proofs is implicitly stressed. Neither recognition-scene, then, oﬀers what it seems to oﬀer; the plays’ message becomes increasingly negative. 4.4.5 Words and names So far, in the recognition-scenes and elsewhere, we have seen that words cannot be trusted. As I said before, the problem is not simply that people sometimes make mistakes, but rather that language is fundamentally inadequate. The escape-tragedies both conﬁrm and explore further the Gorgianic idea that reality cannot be communicated by means of words. Words are always 303 304

Iphigenia 809–26. Iphigenia 811: lvgoim’ #n åko[i pr0ton H ∞ lvktraß t3de.

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just words, with their own autonomous power to persuade, beguile or deceive.305 In many places throughout the plays, we are, frustratingly, denied any conﬁrmation that words are true or false—even (or especially) when matters of life and death are under discussion. For example, when Helen asks Teucer whether her brothers are alive or dead, her question requires the answer yes (true) or no (false). However, Teucer avoids answering the question directly (Helen 137–40): EL. oÈ Tund3reoi d’ ejs≥n ∂ oÛk ejs≥n kÎroi; TE. teqn$si koÛ teqn$si: d»o d’ ƒstÏn lÎgw. EL. pÎteroß Ø kre≤sswn; _ t3lain’ ƒg° kak0n. TE. £stroiß sf’ vmoiwqvnte f3s’ e”nai qe*. Helen: The sons of Tyndareus: are they alive or dead? Teucer: They are dead and not dead: there are two stories. Helen: Which is the more powerful? O woe, how I am suﬀering! Teucer: It is said that they are gods, transformed into the likeness of stars.

As in the case of Helen herself, there are conﬂicting (in fact, diametrically opposite) stories (lÎgoi) pertaining to the Dioscuri, and no way of telling which is accurate. One would expect Helen to ask Teucer which lÎgoß is the true one, but instead she asks which is the ‘stronger’, exploiting the double-meaning inherent in lÎgoß (‘story’ and ‘argument’)! This is an explicit reference to Protagoras’ dictum that in the case of everything there are two lÎgoi, a weaker (i.e., less convincing) and a stronger (more convincing) argument, opposed to each other.306 It is not the truth or falsehood of the lÎgoß, but its power to persuade the listener, that is seen to be at issue. Teucer’s reply is qualiﬁed by fas≤— whether or not it is true, ‘they say’ that the Dioscuri have been deiﬁed. (In fact, as we see at the end of the play, this lÎgoß is partially false: Castor and Polydeuces have not been transformed into stars, at least, because they appear on horseback.307) We may recall Helen’s earlier recounting of the lÎgoß of her birth, where 305

Gorgias (DK 82 B1–4, B6, B11, B11a, B26): see §4.3 above for discussion. Protagoras (DK 80 A1, B6). Perhaps one might compare the slightly odd expression of Andromeda fr. 138a, in which a character asks [Aphrodite?] to pick the ‘best’ of her words: ƒk d† t0n lÎgwn | 1lou t¤ bvltisq∞ . . .? 307 Helen 1664–5. Cf. Heracleidae 845–8 for the catasterism, or other supernatural manifestation, of the brothers. 306

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again she gave two completely diﬀerent versions of her parentage. Similarly, Helen refrained from saying there whether or not Zeus or Tyndareus was her true father, but ended with the odd phrase ‘if this tale can be believed’ (ej saf&ß o˜toß lÎgoß).308 The use of saf&ß (‘clear’? ‘plausible’?) rather than the more natural ålhq&ß (‘true’) makes the same point: ‘believe this story if you wish.’ Plausibility is not the same as truthfulness, as the following exchange between Helen and the chorus makes clear: CO. E } lvnh, tÏn ƒlqÎnq’, Òstiß ƒst≥n Ø xvnoß, m¶ p3nt’ ålhq[ dox3shiß ejrhkvnai. EL. ka≥ m¶n saf0ß g’ πlex’ ølwlvnai pÎsin. CO. pÎll’ #n lvgoito ka≥ di¤ yeud0n saf[. EL. ka≥ t£mpal≤n ge t0nd’ ålhqe≤aß πpi.309 Chorus: Helen, do not believe that this newcomer—whoever the stranger is—has told you the whole truth. Helen: But he said clearly that my husband had perished. Chorus: Many statements may be clear but false. Helen: And the reverse of this, where true statements are concerned.

A similar point is made, in equally epigrammatic language, by Andromeda (or Perseus) in Andromeda: m& moi prote≤nwn ƒlp≤d’ ƒx3gou d3kru. gvnoitÎ t#n pÎll’ —n dÎkhsiß oÛk πni.310 Do not make me cry by oﬀering me hope. In many situations appearances may be deceptive.

Plausible words can be false, and implausible words can be true—so how could one know which ones were which? And does it make any diﬀerence? It is as if the connection of the words to real people or events were completely irrelevant. This, in turn, may make us wonder (like Gorgias) if there is any reality underlying the words in question. The ‘metamythology’ of the escape-tragedies, which I dis308 Helen 17–21: cf. ibid. 259, on the egg in which they say Leda gave birth to Helen from Zeus (ƒn —i me L&dan fas≥n ƒk DiÏß teke∏n). These passages have been discussed at greater length in §2.4 above. 309 Helen 306–10. The lines as printed by Diggle incorporate several emendations in the interest of pointedness and clarity: see Diggle (1993), Dale (1967) and Kannicht (1969, vol. 2) ad loc. 310 Andromeda fr. 131. Bubel (1991, 134) attributes the first line to Andromeda and the second to Perseus.

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cussed in an earlier chapter, begins to make more sense in this new context. In my earlier discussion,311 I concluded that all the myths in the escape-tragedies were somehow problematized; that is, they were characterized by improbability and contradiction, and thus laid open to doubt and scepticism. As in the passages above, it was impossible to assign a truth-value to the myths in question. Earlier I could only provisionally explain why Euripides should have decided to present myths in this way. It is often said, rightly, that many of Euripides’ plays ‘question’ myths—but why? We should not be satisﬁed by a variation on the explanation that Euripides is simply being provocative (for that has too much in common with the ‘comedy of ideas’ approach), or by a sociopolitical solution (Euripides as ‘questioner of society’ or ‘embodiment of the Zeitgeist’). In the case of our three plays, at least, the real reason is becoming clear. ‘Questioning myths’ is an activity with serious philosophical consequences. The reason why Euripides wants his audience to doubt the mythical tradition is that myths are another form of written or spoken language, which fail to reﬂect reality (either because they fundamentally misrepresent it or because there is no reality). Myths are words; and words are just words. It is not just language in general that is challenged by Euripides, but names in particular (as witness the frequent contrast of Ônoma–s0ma). As I mentioned above, intellectuals such as Protagoras, Prodicus and Antiphon inquired whether or not names correspond to the people or things for which they are used. The escape-tragedies suggest strongly that they do not. In this respect, I think that Euripides’ attitude owes a lot to the theories of Democritus on the ‘correctness of names’ (ørqÎthß ønom3twn): in particular, fragment 26 (part of Proclus’ commentary on the Cratylus) seems relevant. According to Proclus, Democritus gave four reasons to explain why names (ønÎmata) are conventional rather than natural: ﬁrst, the same name is sometimes used to describe diﬀerent objects; second, diﬀerent names are sometimes used to describe the same object; third, names can be changed; fourth, one can conceive of things for which no name exists.312 It seems that special attention is drawn to the names of practically every character in the escape311

See §2.4 above.

312

Democritus (DK 68 B26).

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tragedies; and that these names explore all four problematic categories which Democritus identiﬁes. The ﬁrst character to be named in Helen is Proteus, the former king of Egypt. It was well known (although Euripides does not allude to the fact directly) that Proteus could change his shape at will.313 Proteus’ name (Ônoma), in other words, can be used to describe more than one object (s0ma)—Democritus’ ﬁrst point exactly. The same is true of Zeus’ deceptive metamorphosis into a swan (Helen 18–21): same Ônoma, diﬀerent s0ma. Of course, Helen herself is the most striking illustration of this phenomenon: both the ‘real’ and the phantom-Helen shared the same Ônoma, leading to terrible complications which we have already seen. In a number of places, names are changed, with the result that the same Ônoma is made to describe more than one person or place (Democritus’ ﬁrst and third points). For instance, the excuse which Teucer gives for his presence in Egypt is that he is en route to Cyprus, which Apollo told him to inhabit and rename: instead of Cyprus, it will henceforth be called Salamis (148–50). ƒß g[n ƒnal≤an K»pron, o˜ m’ ƒqvspisen ojke∏n !pÎllwn, Ônoma nhsiwtikÏn Salam∏na qvmenon t[ß ƒke∏ c3rin p3traß. to the sea-girt land of Cyprus, where Apollo predicted that I should live, giving it the island name of Salamis after my native land.

It is not commented on by Helen, but it surely cannot have slipped Teucer’s mind that there is already a (rather famous) Salamis. This incidental reference to name-changing might seem almost gratuitous. Since Salamis and Cyprus are irrelevant to the context (and are not mentioned again), their inclusion here has no purpose except that of highlighting again the unsatisfactory relationship of names to real places. The accumulation of such small details enhances the overall eﬀect of confusion and baﬄement. A similarly ‘irrelevant’ name-change is eﬀected in the aetiological passage at the end of Helen. No sooner have the Dioscuri said that Helen has ﬁnished ‘lending’ her name to the gods (to∏ß qeo∏ß parvsce toÇnom’, 1653) than they announce that in future she will be lending it to something else. This time, it is not a phantom 313

Helen 4–6; cf. Hom. Od. 4. 349–570.

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but an island, which until now has been called Akte (modern Makronnisi, oﬀ Sounion): }Elvnh tÏ loipÏn ƒn broto∏ß kekl&setai (‘for the rest of time, people will call it Helen’, 1674). The inclusion of this small detail is extremely incongruous (Dale writes, correctly, that this detail ‘brings Hermes widely oﬀ course for Egypt, and Euripides has here deﬂected the more usual legend which makes Helene a stage-post on the way to or from Troy’).314 Not only does this detail highlight Euripides’ extraordinary attitude to myth, but it also emphasizes the absurdity of names. Once again, by divine will, there will be two ‘Helens’! At the close of Iphigenia, as in Helen, the aetiological digression involves the assignation of names. Athena instructs Orestes to name the temple which he will establish to her at Halae after the Tauric land. This, as Cropp points out, is in fact a false etymology: Artemis’ title TauropÎloß, by which she was worshipped at Halae, means ‘bull-herd’ and is not derived from the Tauri.315 The confusion which names can thus create is illustrated in the speech of Menelaus which leads up to the problematic recognition-scene in Helen. Here, the old Portress has told him that there is a woman called Helen—the daughter of Zeus, the daughter of Tyndareus, who once lived in Sparta—living in Theoclymenus’ palace. This information causes Menelaus great distress. Can it be that another woman with the same name as his wife is living here? Can there be a man called Zeus in Egypt? For a moment his comprehension of language and reality breaks down completely (489–99): DiÏß d’ πlexe pa∏d3 nin pefukvnai. åll’ Á tiß πsti ZhnÏß Ônom’ πcwn ån¶r Ne≤lou par’ Ôcqaß; eÍß g¤r Ò ge kat’ oÛranÎn. Sp3rth d† poı g[ß ƒsti pl¶n Jna Âoa≥ toı kallidÎnakÎß ejsin EÛr*ta mÎnon; diploın d† Tund3reion Ônoma kl&izetai, Lakeda≤monoß d† ga∏3 tiß xun*numoß 314 Dale (1967) 168. Pausanias (1.35.1–2) later gave the same aetiology as Euripides for the name of the island of Helen. (See also §2.4 above for discussion of this passage in terms of ‘metamythology’.) 315 Cropp (2000) 267; cf. Lloyd-Jones (1983a) 97. In the 5th cent. and later, both explanations of TauropÎloß were current: see Apollodorus (FGH 244 F111), Phanodemus (FGH 325 F14) and Ister (FGH 334 F18) for different etymologies (and cf. TauropÎla, Soph. Aj. 172).

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Tro≤aß t’; ƒg° m†n oÛk πcw t≤ cr¶ lvgein. pollo≥ g3r, „ß e÷xasin, ƒn poll[i cqon≥ ønÎmata taÇt’ πcousi ka≥ pÎliß pÎlei gun¶ gunaik≤ t’: oÛd†n oˆn qaumastvon. She said that she was the daughter of Zeus. But can there really be a man called Zeus by the banks of the Nile? No, there is only one Zeus, the one who lives in heaven. But where in the world is Sparta, except by the streams of the Eurotas with its lovely reeds, and there alone? Are there two people called Tyndareus? Is there some other land called Sparta, and some other Troy? I do not know what I should say. For it seems that in the whole world many people have the same names—one city has the same name as another city, one woman as another woman . . . So there is nothing to cause astonishment.

The frightening possibilities are true. There are indeed two ‘Helens’; as Teucer’s words showed, there will also be two ‘Salamises’; there may not be a man called Zeus, but there was once a swan called Zeus . . . As Helen will later say, a name can be everywhere, but a body cannot (toÇnoma gvnoit’ #n pollacoı, tÏ s0ma d’ oÇ, 588). Menelaus, as we see, is a naïve and not very perceptive character, but, in a sense, his reaction is an exaggerated version of the reaction of the audience to the peculiar epistemological situation that has been created. Anyone in this nightmarish situation would be excused for toppling into confusion. Note also that here, as in the recognition-scene in Iphigenia (see above), geography is used to problematize identity, as Menelaus’ (literal) disorientation is used to express his sense of intellectual alienation and incomprehension. The names of the barbarian characters, including their etymologies, are emphasized in the prologues of each play. One of these characters, notably, has more than one name: Proteus’ daughter Eido, whose name was later changed to Theonoe.316 She thus illustrates Democritus’ second and third points: two diﬀerent names are used to describe the same person, involving a change of name from one to the other. (Theonoe/Eido is not the only character to be known by two names: Helen’s Trojan lover also has two names, Paris and Alexander, both of which are used indiscriminately, in Helen and in general throughout Greek literature.317) The question arises whether ‘Eido’ or ‘Theonoe’ more accurately represents the true nature of Proteus’ daughter. 316

Helen 12–13.

317

Helen 24, 28, 29, 32.

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Confusingly, the answer is that both names do. Not unusually for Euripidean names, both Ejd* and QeonÎh are etymologically signiﬁcant. They have a clear connection with words for cognition (jd-, novw, noıß, etc.),318 and the latter name corresponds to its owner’s prophetic function, as Helen goes on immediately to explain: kaloısin aÛt¶n QeonÎhn: t¤ qe∏a g¤r | t3 t’ Ônta ka≥ mvllonta p3nt’ ]p≤stato (‘they call her Theonoe: for she understands the supernatural—all of it, both what is and what is to come’, 13–14). So the names Eido and Theonoe are simultaneously appropriate (in that they accurately express the attributes of their owner) and problematic (in that they are plural and not single). Furthermore, can it be entirely accidental that Ejd* so closely resembles e÷dwlon?319 The names of Proteus’ wife and son are also given: like Theonoe/Eido, they are unusually appropriate for their owners. ‘Psamathe’ (Yam3qh) is suggestive of sandy beaches, a distinctive feature of Egyptian geography, and ‘Theoclymenus’ (Qeokl»menoß) seems to tell us something about its owner’s pious nature.320 In Iphigenia, the name of the Taurian king is also etymologized: ‘Thoas’ is so called, apparently, on account of his swiftness of foot (QÎaß, ß ∑kŸn pÎda tiqe≥ß ÷son ptero∏ß | ƒß toÇnom’ Álqe tÎde podwke≤aß c3rin).321 This is less appropriate than the other ‘signiﬁcant’ names. In the event, Thoas does not run quickly enough to stop the escapees, but this early mention of swiftness does perhaps contribute to the sense of danger and the threat which he poses to the Greeks. Since the plots of Helen and Iphigenia are based on concealed identity, it is unsurprising that there is a certain amount of 318 Plato, indeed, includes the name QeonÎh in his discussion of the meaning of names (Cratylus 407b), explaining it as Ó t¤ qe∏a nooısa (‘one who understands the divine’). Cf. Kannicht (1969, 2. 20). 319 Remarked on by Downing (1990) 4–5. 320 Kannicht (1969, 2. 18) explains its meaning as ‘durch einen Gott berühmt’, comparing Qeo-kl»menoß, qeÎkleitoß, Qeokl[ß and cognates to Perikl»menoß, perikleitÎß, Perikl[ß, etc. See §3.3 above for discussion of Theoclymenus’ god-fearing character. Both Kannicht and Diggle delete part of lines 9-10 [Òti d¶ qeoŸß svbwn | b≤on di&negk’], which gives an etymological explanation of Theoclymenus’ name, on grounds of authenticity. 321 Iphigenia 32–3. Cf. Aristophanes, Lemnian Women fr. 373 K, where Thoas is the name of Hypsipyle’s father: he is also said to be the slowest runner in the human race—which is probably a joke based on the Euripidean etymology. See Sommerstein (1994) 194.

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provocative play on names, and unknown names, in the dialogue up to and including the recognition-scenes. This is seen in the conversation between Iphigenia and the herdsman who saw Orestes and Pylades on the rocks by the shore (248–51): IF. oÛd’ Ônom’ åko»saß o”sqa t0n xvnwn fr3sai; BO. Pul3dhß ƒkl&izeq’ ‹teroß prÏß qatvrou. IF. t0i xuz»gwi d† toı xvnou t≤ toÇnom’ Án; BO. oÛde≥ß tÎd’ o”den: oÛ g¤r ejshko»samen. Iphigenia: Did you not hear the strangers’ names? Can you not tell me who they are? Herdsman: One of them was calling the other Pylades. Iphigenia: And his companion: what was his name? Herdsman: No one knows: we did not hear it.

Pylades alone is named, for the plot demands that Orestes remain nameless for the moment. Even when the recognitionscene is in progress, the tension is sustained, since Orestes will not tell Iphigenia his name even when asked. (It will be another two hundred and ninety lines before Orestes is ﬁnally named.322) Instead, he gives a false name, ‘Unfortunate’, saying (as we have already seen) that she can sacriﬁce his s0ma but not his Ônoma. IF. so≥ d’ Ônoma po∏on πqeq’ Ø genn&saß pat&r; OR. tÏ m†n d≤kaion Dustuc¶ß kalo≤meq’ £n. IF. oÛ toıt’ ƒrwt0: toıto m†n dÏß t[i t»chi. OR. tÏ s0ma q»seiß toÛmÎn, oÛc≥ toÇnoma.323 Iphigenia: What sort of name did your father give you? Orestes: By rights I ought to be called Unfortunate. Iphigenia: That is not what I am asking—leave that to fortune. Orestes: It is my body, not my name, that you are going to sacriﬁce.

Even though it is not his real name, Dustuc&ß—as Orestes points out—is appropriate to describe his situation. At any rate, ‘Unfortunate’ is a better reﬂection of reality than the soubriquet of Agamemnon—‘the fortunate’ general—which Iphigenia later mentions (t≤ d’ Ø strathgÏß n lvgous’ eÛdaimone∏n;). Orestes replies that the person whom he knows does not correspond to this name (t≤ß; oÛ g¤r Òn g’ ƒg_ida t0n eÛdaimÎnwn).324 322

Iphigenia 792. Iphigenia 499–501 and 504 (the lines in the order adopted by Barthold: see Cropp [2000] ad loc.) 324 Iphigenia 543–4. Cropp (2000, ad loc.) compares Helen 453, 457 and Orestes 351–5 for this appellation. 323

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Words and names, then, are confusing. Sometimes they seem appropriate, sometimes inappropriate. Sometimes they seem deﬁnitely to identify people, places or objects, but just as often they do not. What we call things may have nothing to do with their real nature.325 For Euripides, as for both Gorgias and Democritus, language is a pale shadow of reality.326 In this sense, and in the deceptive, persuasive or perplexing power which they exert on humans, words are directly analogous to other sorts of image. 4.4.6 Images and reality H ﬁ ra d† memfqe∏s’ o\nek’ oÛ nik$i qe¤ß ƒxhnvmwse t£m’ !lex3ndr0i lvch, d≤dwsi d’ oÛk πm’ åll’ Ømoi*sas’ ƒmo≥ e÷dwlon πmpnoun oÛranoı xunqe∏s’ £po Pri3mou tur3nnou paid≤: ka≥ doke∏ m’ πcein, ken¶n dÎkhsin, oÛk πcwn.327 Hera, full of reproach because she had not beaten the goddesses in the contest, turned my marriage with Paris into thin air; it was not me that she presented to king Priam’s son, but a breathing phantom resembling me, put together from air. He believes he possesses me, but he does not: it is an empty belief.

Helen’s double is an e÷dwlon which Hera has put together from air. But what is an e÷dwlon? It is usually translated ‘phantom’, but its meaning will bear a little more exploration. The word also corresponds to the English ‘image’, ‘likeness’, ‘reﬂection’, or ‘representation’. There are several places in tragedy where characters use e÷dwlon as a metaphor for weakness or old age.328 It is a standard word for the ghost of a dead person,329 a substitution, a phantom-image sent usually by the gods to replace some325 See Iphigenia 36: ⁄rtemiß ƒort[ß, toÇnom’ ¬ß kalÏn mÎnon (‘the festival of Artemis—a festival fine in name alone’); Helen 27: toÛmÏn d† k3lloß, ej kalÏn tÏ dustucvß (‘and my beauty—if such a wretched quality can be “beautiful” ’), etc. 326 Democritus (DK 68 B145): lÎgoß g¤r πrgou ski& (‘language is a shadow of reality’). Cf. Gorgias’ description of pallid words (DK 82 B6, quoted below). 327 Helen 31-6. 328 Soph. Ajax 126, Phil. 947, Oed. Col. 110, fr. 659 TGF (Radt); Eur. Phoen. 1543–5 (where Oedipus, notably, describes his feebleness in old age as a phantom, a shadow, a dream and a corpse). 329 e.g. Aesch. Pers. 681 (e÷dwlon Dare≤ou).

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one,330 or an image fashioned by human hands as a replacement for a dead or absent person, usually a wife or lover.331 What all its various usages in Greek have in common is that e÷dwla are always insubstantial and inferior to real objects. Democritus’ saying lÎgoß g¤r πrgou ski& (‘language is a shadow of reality’),332 which I quoted above, is remarkably similar to an apophthegm of Solon which states: Ø m†n lÎgoß e÷dwlon t0n πrgwn (‘language is a phantom of reality’).333 Indeed, the signiﬁcance of Democritus’ lost writings is, I think, far greater than we can know. Another fragment of Democritus demonstrates his concern with e÷dwla, here in the sense of images which the gods send to us through our pores while we are asleep. These e÷dwla are explained, in a related fragment, as the only form in which we have ‘knowledge’ of gods; however (as seems to be the most natural interpretation of Democritus’ words), this is not real knowledge, because what we see is not the gods themselves, but deceptive, inferior images of them. And—what is more—the air (å&r) is said to be full of these images.334 This reminds us of the escape-tragedies’ numerous references to air,335 again suggesting, as before, that there is some signiﬁcance here that we cannot quite grasp. It is also worth looking at the signiﬁcance of the word e÷dwlon in post-Euripidean philosophy. Several Platonic writings (Sophist, Cratylus, Gorgias, Theaetetus) consider the relationship between e÷dwla (representations) and the genuine objects which they represent.336 According to Plato, e÷dwla are spurious 330 Hom. Il. 5.449, 5.451, Od. 11.213, Hdt. 1.51, 6.58, etc. (More references are given in §2.3.2 above.) 331 e.g. Alcestis (Eur. Alc. 348–54) and Protesilaus (Apollodorus 3.30, Hyg. Fab. 104: these sources may reflect the plot of Euripides’ Protesilaus, according to Vernant [1983, 310]). The chorus of Aeschylus’ Theoroi (fr. 78a Radt) thank another character for making e÷dwla which resemble them exactly. 332 Democritus (DK 68 B145). 333 Diog. Laert. 1.58. 334 Democritus (DK 68 A77, A78; cf. B30): the theory is mentioned (obscurely) by Cicero, Nat. D. 1.12.29 and Augustine, Ep. 118. Guthrie (1965) 474–81 discusses these passages but finds them unclear and cryptic. However, he says, on the basis of the meaning of e÷dwla elsewhere, that ‘it is more likely that Democritus believed that e÷dwla were thrown off by gods rather than being the gods’. 335 See §4.3 and note 146 above. 336 See esp. Sophist 234c–240a, Cratylus 432b–c, Gorg. 463d1–2; discussion in Bluck (1975), Steiner (2001) 56–78, Robinson (2001).

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versions of real things: they have no rationality, and exist only to give pleasure. For example, rhetoric is an e÷dwlon of politics. These e÷dwla are consistently shown to be not only deceptive but also dangerous, since they aﬀect our ability to discern truth from lies. For Plato, the sophists, paradoxically, as well as showing interest in the ‘seeming versus being’ (doke∏n–e”nai) theme, also embodied the dichotomy in their own status as purveyors of apparent-but-not-real knowledge. Alcidamas, the pupil of Gorgias and author of a treatise On the writers of written speeches, uses the word e÷dwlon in a signiﬁcant way. He argues that written-down speeches and orally delivered speeches are substantially diﬀerent and should not be called the same thing: the written version, he says, should be called not ‘words’ (lÎgoi) but ‘phantoms’ (e÷dwla): they are pale ‘imitations’ (mim&mata) of the real thing.337 Furthermore, Alcidamas advises that we should have the same opinion of written-down speeches as of works of art and statuary: all of these things give us pleasure, but they are completely useless in terms of real life. This is similar to Gorgias’ view, in the Encomium (see below), that words and works of art are analogous. Both Alcidamas and Gorgias mention the pleasure that words or images arouse in the listener or viewer; but, rather than (as Gorgias) stressing the deceptiveness of verbal ‘phantoms’, Alcidamas highlights their uselessness and lifelessness. The type of word spoken ex tempore, straight from the heart, is alive, spirited and like real bodies, compared with the utter lack of life and energy of the written word.338 (But note that Helen’s phantom, in contrast, is described by Euripides as ‘living’ or ‘breathing’, πmpnoun).339 Alcidamas’ imagery clearly alludes to, and breaks down, the sophistic distinction between words (lÎgoi) and bodies (s*mata), by showing that one can have lÎgoi which are like s*mata. But the important observation to be made about Alcidamas is that, like Euripides, he uses the concept of the e÷dwlon in connection with words and bodies 337 Alcidamas 27: Ógoımai d’ oÛd† lÎgouß d≤kaion e”nai kale∏sqai toŸß gegrammvnouß, åll’ ¿sper e÷dwla ka≥ sc&mata ka≥ mim&mata lÎgwn. 338 Ibid. 28: o\tw ka≥ lÎgoß Ø m†n åp’ aÛt[ß t[ß diano≤aß ƒn t0i paraut≤ka legÎmenoß πmyucÎß ƒsti ka≥ z[i ka≥ to∏ß pr3gmasin 1petai ka≥ ålhqvsin åfwmo≤wtai s*masin. Ø d† gegrammvnoß ejkÎni lÎgou t¶n f»sin Ømo≤an πcwn Åp3shß ƒnerge≤aß £moiroß kaqvsthken. For a similar view, see also Pl. Phaedrus 274c–277a, Letters 2.314b–c, 7.341b3–345a. 339 Helen 36.

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and works of art. Alcidamas is not alone: Plato and Aristotle use the analogy of art to make the same point about the diﬀerence between written and spoken words.340 Nevertheless, Euripides in the escape-tragedies had done the same thing several decades earlier. How can we use this fourth-century evidence to help us to understand Euripides? The evidence of Plato, especially, is far from straightforward. Plato’s dialogues and, in particular, his representations of the sophists, are coloured by his own distinctive intellectual views to such a degree that we cannot tell exactly what the earlier philosophers thought (for example, it does not seem likely that Plato’s Gorgias represents the real Gorgias or his ideas).341 Nor can we extract from the fourth-century writings precisely what was being thought or said in 412 or earlier. Nevertheless, Plato, Alcidamas and others help us to situate the escape-tragedies in the context of a serious intellectual debate: they reﬂect the fact that the sophists were interested in the relationship of words and appearances to reality; that a debate about what is and what is not (tÏ Ôn and tÏ m¶ Ôn) was roughly contemporary with Euripides; and that the terminology of the e÷dwlon was common to all these thinkers. (The extant writings of Gorgias do not, however, contain the word e÷dwlon: this may signify Euripides’ originality in synthesizing elements from myth, philosophy and rhetoric.) In other words, Euripides can be seen as anticipating—or inﬂuencing—the arguments of Plato and the fourth-century rhetoricians. Vernant ﬁnds another (rather diﬀerent but clearly related) signiﬁcance of the word e÷dwlon, in terms of what he calls ‘the psychological category of ‘the double’.342 Statues, funerary monuments and images in dreams, according to him, ‘fall within a category of very clearly deﬁned phenomena to which the term e÷dwla is applied. As well as the yuc&, which is a shade, and the kolossÎß, which is a crudely-formed idol, this category includes, 340 Plato, Phaedrus 276a contrasts ‘living’ words with written words, which he calls e÷dwla. Plato’s Eleatic Stranger (Sophist 234c–d) says that sophists trick people by means of e÷dwla legÎmena (‘spoken phantoms’). Aristotle (Rhetoric 3. 1413b–1414a) also contrasts written and spoken speeches, using the image of painting (skiagraf≤a). 341 See e.g. Dodds (1959) 6–10 and Havelock (1957). 342 Vernant (1983) 305–20 (the quotation is from p. 308); cf. Zielinski (1927) for a similar, though less explicit, view.

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for instance, the dream-image (Ôneiroß), the shade (ski3), and the supernatural apparition (f3sma).’ In all these cases, writes Vernant, the mind apprehends the image-double as the equivalent of the real thing: therefore the images have ‘something of the eﬀect of a trick, a deception, a snare, åp3th’.343 The double may have a further function, that of ritual substitution. For example, Segal notes that in Euripides’ ‘tragicomedies’ (Alcestis, Helen, Iphigenia) the heroines triumph over death by various means which, though diﬀerent, nevertheless can be seen as acts of ritual substitution.344 Helen’s replacement with the phantom thus corresponds, in terms of the structural interpretation of the myth, to Iphigenia’s replacement with the hind (and, if Iphigenia really was replaced by a phantom in Hesiod,345 this variation would, clearly, be exactly equivalent in function). The ritual signiﬁcance of phantom-doubles is seen also in certain Spartan burial practices. Whenever a man died in battle but his body could not be recovered, an e÷dwlon was used in place of the lost body, so that the necessary rites could still take place even without a corpse.346 In this respect, it is interesting to note that missing bodies are called to mind several times in Helen. Menelaus tells that of those who went to Troy only the names, not the bodies, of the dead came back home: this is an unusually moving use of the name-body (Ônoma–s0ma) antithesis.347 Menelaus’ corpse, on the other hand, is absent because it does not exist; Theoclymenus asks: t≤ d’; πst’ åpÎntwn t»mboß; ∂ q3yeiß ski3n; (‘What?—a tomb for absent bodies?—or are you going to bury a shadow?).348 One very prominent signiﬁcance of images (e÷dwla, åg3lmata 343

Vernant (1983) 309. Segal (1993) 37–50. 345 See §2.3.2 above. 346 This practice is attested by Herodotus (6.58, 7.238) in the case of royal burials (Agesilaus is given as an example). Toher (1999, 114) argues that these ‘effigies’ were more widespread. The use of substitute ‘corpses’ is not just Spartan burial customs but a wider phenomenon: for example, the 13th-cent. bc graves at Midea (Dendra) discussed by Vernant (1983, 306). 347 Helen 399: nekr0n fvrontaß ønÎmat’ ejß o÷kouß p3lin. 348 Helen 1240; cf. 1243, on supposed Greek customs for those who die at sea: keno∏si q3ptein ƒn pvplwn Ëf3smasin (‘bury them in an empty shroud of woven cloth’); 1261: lvktra s*matoß ken3 (‘a bier without a corpse’); 1546, where a messenger says that Helen is performing burial without a body (~d’ åpÎnta kenotafe∏). 344

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and others) is in the sense of works of art—sculpture and painting. In particular, Gorgias’ remarks (in the Encomium) on visual art are reﬂected in several places in the escape-tragedies: that is, the power of images to beguile and deceive is comparable to the power of words and other sorts of illusion. However, Gorgias was not the only intellectual to make this comparison in one form or another.349 Democritus’ name crops up again, suggestively: a fragment from his writings expresses the view that names are images (åg3lmata) of their objects.350 The little-known Hierocles is also said to have described those who ﬁrst assigned names to objects as ‘image-makers’ (ågalmatopoio≤), in the sense that they ‘manufactured’ names as images (ejkÎneß) of the functions (dun3meiß) of their objects.351 Perseus, on his ﬁrst entry, mistakes the bound Andromeda for a lovely statue, whose appearance has a great eﬀect on him: πa, t≤n’ Ôcqon tÎnd’ Ør0 per≤rruton åfr0i qal3sshß; parqvnou t’ ejk* tina ƒx aÛtomÎrfwn la≤nwn tukism3twn sof[ß £galma ceirÎß.352 Ah! What is this rock that I see, washed around by the foam of the sea? It is the statue of a young girl, fashioned out of a piece of solid stone, the work of a skilled hand.

Perseus is completely taken in by the deception, thinking that what he sees is a statue, the work of a ‘skilled’—or ‘clever’—hand (sof[ß ceirÎß).353 The situation here beautifully reﬂects Gorgias’ linking of outward appearances, statues and erotic love, since Perseus does indeed fall in love with Andromeda.354 Also, the 349 One might compare Simonides’ view that painting is ‘silent poetry’ and poetry ‘speaking painting’ (quoted or alluded to by Plutarch several times: Mor. 18a, 58c, 347a, 748; Life of Homer 216). 350 Democritus (DK 68 B142): åg3lmata fwn&enta ka≥ taıt3 [ØnÎmata] ƒsti (‘these names are images which speak’). 351 Quoted by Olympiodorus (on Plato, Philebus 12c), and listed by Diels– Kranz, along with the fragment of Democritus just quoted (B142). 352 Andromeda fr. 125. (Cf. Ovid, Met. 4. 675, where Andromeda is described as a marmoreum opus.) 353 The use of the adjective sofÎß may be marked; it is used elsewhere of other statues: Eur. Alc. 348-9; Eurystheus fr. 372 Nauck. See also Steiner (2001) 44–8 on the accomplishment (sof≤a) of artists. 354 The ‘sexual appeal’ of statues is seen also in Euripides, Hecabe 560–1: masto»ß t’ πdeixe stvrna q’ „ß åg3lmatoß | k3llista (‘she displayed her naked breast, as beautiful as a sculpted statue’). Cf. Michelini (1987) 77.

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possibility of a statue which exactly resembled Andromeda raises similar questions of identity as did the phantom which exactly resembled Helen. (The possibility that Andromeda, or someone else, was petriﬁed in the course of the play355 opens up more such questions: would a petriﬁed Andromeda be Andromeda any less than the ﬂesh-and-blood version?) It is unusual for someone to mistake a person for a statue; one would have thought it much more likely to happen the other way around. Does this mean that the real Andromeda somehow lacks the lifelike quality which a real human being would possess? Not only Andromeda but also Helen is described in terms which seem deliberately reminiscent of works of art. First of all, Teucer’s ﬁrst glimpse of Helen in the prologue lead him (as we have seen) to make a similar mistake to Perseus, since he describes her in the same breath as an Ôyiß (‘vision’), an ejk*n (‘image’) and a m≤mhma (‘likeness’).356 Later on, Helen, saying that her beauty has been responsible for her misfortunes, expresses the wish that she could change her appearance, scraping oﬀ her beauty like paint from an £galma (‘statue’ or ‘painting’).357 e÷q’ ƒxaleifqe∏s’ „ß £galm’ aˆqiß p3lin a÷scion e”doß πlabon ånt≥ toı kaloı, ka≥ t¤ß t»caß m†n t¤ß kak¤ß 4ß nın πcw E ﬁ llhneß ƒpel3qonto. Would that I had been cleaned like a statue [or painting] and begun afresh, taking an uglier appearance instead of this lovely one! In that 355

See §2.3.4 above. In Helen 72–7, quoted in §4.4.4 above. 357 Helen 262–5. Is this a painting or a statue? Dale (1967, ad loc.) thinks a painting, ‘not as more usually a figure in the round, since ƒxale≤fw must mean obliterate, not wipe clean’. Must it? Kannicht (1969, 2. 89–90) is not so sure, and quotes instances of £galma in both senses. In any case, Dale’s reasoning is wrong: a painting wiped clean would leave a blank piece of wood with no trace of the former picture, but a statue wiped of its paint would still resemble Helen. One could ‘obliterate’ a statue in the sense of smashing it, and ƒxale≤fw is found metaphorically in the sense of ‘destroy’ (Iphigenia 698, Hipp. 1241; Aesch. Choeph. 503, Seven 15; Hdt. 7.220); but the text here could not possibly support such a muddle of literal and metaphorical meanings. The same verb is used by Euripides elsewhere in the sense of scrubbing out a picture (Peleus fr. 618 Nauck): tÏn Ôlbon oÛd†n oÛdamoı kr≤nw broto∏ß, | Òn g’ ƒxale≤fei Â$ion ∂ graf¶n qeÎß (‘I consider that human prosperity is completely meaningless, because a god scrubs it out more easily than if it were a picture’). To conclude, then, Helen is talking about scraping off paint, from either a statue or a painting. 356

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case the Greeks would have forgotten the evil fortune which now dogs me.

Helen in these lines acknowledges the similarities between her own body and works of art: both exert an irresistible power on the beholder, and both are (in various ways) deceptive. The point at issue is not just deceptive appearances, but personal identity. Helen wishes to remove her beauty; but Helen’s beauty is so integral to her identity, and such an essential characteristic of her mythical tradition, that she cannot easily be imagined without it. An ugly Helen would be as ‘counterfactual’ as a chaste, innocent Helen. Here, again, the dichotomy between ‘truthful’ bodies (s*mata) and ‘false’ names (ønÎmata/lÎgoi) is distorted; for Helen’s body itself, she now claims, is unreal, responsible for misleading people about her true nature. These words contain an alarming implication. If Helen’s identity could be detached from her name and her body, how else could it be deﬁned? Would she still exist at all? Iphigenia makes much of another representational image: this time it is the cult statue (brvtaß, also described as an £galma) of Artemis. As in the passage above, this image raises questions of identity (albeit of a somewhat diﬀerent kind). Images of deities diﬀer in status from images of human beings, since they have a ritual purpose: in the context of the temple and the sacriﬁcial worship, the statue not only represents Artemis, but in some sense it is Artemis, and is seen to be invested with divine powers. (For example, it moves, and closes its eyes, of its own accord—a clear sign that it is far from inanimate.358) It is unclear just what form the Tauric statue in the play is imagined as taking: was it ‘representational’ in an anthropomorphic sense? Pausanias describes not one but two statues of Artemis in the sanctuary at Brauron in his time: an archaic wooden totem (which may have been the one which Orestes brought from the Tauric land) and a ﬁfth-century marble statue.359 When Orestes takes the statue of Artemis to Athens, this is symbolic of his transferring the religious rituals of Artemis to Athens.360 So the statue in 358

Iphigenia 1165–7. Steiner (2001, 80–95) tries to chart the progression from crude, primitive images to more highly developed anthropomorphic works of art, giving examples of the various types of image. 360 See §5.2 below. 359

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Iphigenia both is and is not ‘really’ Artemis. (One might compare the views of both Heraclitus and Democritus, who took a deeply sceptical view of the status of divine images, openly doubting whether the images were actually gods, whether they had anything numinous about them, or whether they were like gods in any respect at all.361) A word often to be found in association with statues is c3riß. Usually rendered in English as ‘charm’ or ‘grace’, but in fact virtually untranslatable, c3riß is a quality thought to be desirable in images, a quality which skilled artists might impart. Classical painting and sculpture was preoccupied with accurate, mimetic representation: the aim of artists was the exact reproduction of their subjects. But, as Deborah Steiner’s recent book on Greek art and philosophy makes clear, it is not skill at creating a mere visual likeness, but skill at creating a semblance of life, which was seen to be important.362 C3riß is therefore a deceptive quality, a form of appearance which deliberately misrepresents reality. (Perhaps we will think of Pindar’s statement, apropos of the poet’s art, that c3riß makes the incredible credible.363 We may well recall, too, Aeschylus’ description of Menelaus’ empty house, furnished with statues of Helen which possess so much c3riß that they are hateful to him.364) Appropriately, bearing all this in mind, the word c3riß occurs with extraordinary frequency in the escape-tragedies, often in an ambiguous or suggestive way.365 Of course, the word c3riß has other meanings as well. As ‘favour’, it is an ethical concept, embodying reciprocity and related principles;366 as ‘(feminine) charm’, it can refer 361

Heraclitus (DK 22 B5), Democritus (DK 68 B195). Steiner (2001) 46. She lists Aeschylus, Theoroi fr. 78a Radt and Euripides, Eurystheus fr 372 Kannicht, which both contain examples of statues designed to deceive viewers into thinking that they are looking at real human beings. 363 Pind. Ol. 1. 28–32: C3riß d’, ‹per ‹panta te»cei t¤ me≤lica qnato∏ß, | ƒpifvroisa tim¤n ka≥ £piston ƒm&sato pistÎn | πmmenai tÏ poll3kiß (‘Grace, which accomplishes all that is delightful for mortals, bringing renown and more often than not making the incredible credible’). 364 Aesch. Ag. 410-26. Vernant (1983, 310), oddly, thinks that they lack c3riß. 365 Andromeda fr. 129. Helen 150, 175, 655, 806, 902, 921, 940, 1000, 1006, 1234, 1254, 1273, 1331, 1373, 1378, 1397, 1402, 1411, 1420, 1449. Iphigenia 14, 33, 455, 507, 566, 600, 602, 631, 847, 1147, 1444. 366 MacLachlan’s (1993) study of c3riß in Greek literature takes a social/ reciprocal view. See especially pp. 149–57, which deal with Helen (albeit opaquely). In Alcestis, c3riß approximates to xen≤a (‘guest-friendship’ or 362

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to real women as well as statues; and in the accusative case (‘because of’), c3rin is simply a preposition. Nevertheless, when Helen invokes c3riß to persuade Theonoe to help her (dÏß t¶n c3rin moi t&nde, ‘grant me this favour’, 940), and when she says to Theoclymenus, after tricking him into giving her a ship, ~d’ Ómvra soi t¶n ƒm¶n de≤xei c3rin,367 there is a great sense of irony. In each case, Helen’s surface meaning relates to reciprocal goodwill and gratitude. However, other senses are in play beneath the surface, for Helen’s eﬀect, not only on the Egyptian twins but also on the audience, is as bewitching as that of any statue. In Steiner’s words, ‘equipped with all the persuasive, beguiling powers that images possess, Helen inspires in those who witness her a response analogous to that elicited by works of art’.368 In all of the passages above it can be seen that words and visual images may be comparable in an epistemological sense. As forms of illusion, they exert an autonomous power, irrespective of their relationship to reality. 4.4.7 Illusions on the stage This might seem an odd place to start discussing stagecraft;369 but it is clear that the physical staging of the plays reﬂects and enhances the major philosophical themes. Just as the idea of reciprocal hospitality): see Conacher (1998). On c3riß in tragedy, see also Fraenkel (1950, on Aesch. Ag. 354); Taplin (1992) 59-60; Mossman (1995) 27–8. 367 Helen 1420. One could translate this as, for instance: ‘This day will show you how grateful I am for your help’, or perhaps ‘this day will make clear to you the full extent of my charms’: either version is deliberately ironic. 368 Steiner (2001) 56. 369 Time and space prevent me from including a separate chapter on this aspect. For the moment, this brief methodological note may suffice to explain my attitude. Many studies of stagecraft are unsatisfactory, because they concentrate on entrances, exits and other largely unanswerable questions along the lines of ‘what might I have done if I wanted to direct this play myself?’ (Halleran [1985], Seale [1982] and Ley [1991] exemplify this type of approach; Taplin [1977] and [1978] is a notable exception to the rule; Goldhill [1989] provides an excellent critique.) Unless one is specifically interested in the paraphernalia and actors of the Attic theatre, this type of speculation is conceptually unsatisfying. Rather, we should be attempting to link the physical productions (so far as we can tell anything about them) to the imaginative, thematic aspects of the plays. Whether Orestes comes on to the stage from the left parodos or the sk∂n∂ door is interesting only if it helps us to understand the play better.

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deceptive appearances is explored in the script on a verbal level, it is exploited on the stage on a visual level.370 One important way in which the Attic theatre diﬀered from modern theatre or cinema is in its presentation of reality. If any audience is to engage with a play or ﬁlm, its members will have to accept that what is before their eyes is ‘real’, temporarily detaching themselves from ‘real reality’ and succumbing to the conventions of the medium. (One might compare Gorgias’ view that tragedy is a collusion in deception between playwright and audience.371) Despite Aristotle’s description of it as a representation (m≤mhsiß) of reality, Greek tragedy makes comparatively little attempt to represent reality realistically. What the audience sees is only ever the circular theatre of Dionysus and its minimalist trappings, with the Attic landscape as the backdrop372—yet, for the purposes of the drama, they have to disregard appearances and view the scene as Mycenae, Thebes, Corinth—or, as in these plays, Egypt, Ethiopia or the Black Sea! Because of these bizarre settings, the gap between words and what the audience can actually see is rather larger than normal. This may have led them to question their ‘suspension of disbelief’—especially since, as it turns out, there is actually little eﬀort to render these settings credibly exotic.373 The lack of realism in tragedy is scarcely a new observation, but it is worth mentioning in this context because the ‘illusion’—or ‘deception’—in tragedy is achieved as much through words as through visual appearances. This aspect of the Greek theatre happens to ﬁt in nicely with Gorgias’ point that words and appearances are parallel. This being so, one might have expected Euripides to draw attention to the illusory nature of the plays themselves (qua plays), and to remind us that we are watching not heroes and heroines in Egypt (etc.) but actors on a stage. No doubt many spectators would have made links in their own minds between the plays’ treatment of deceptive appearances and the theatrical ‘illusion’; but in fact the plays contain almost nothing which could be described as metatheatrical. This (perhaps disappointing) fact can be explained by the all-important consideration of 370 371 372 373

Cf. the brief remarks of Burnett (1960, 154) and Muecke (1982, 29). Gorgias (DK 82 B23): cf. Wardy (1996) 36. In §3.1 above I discuss the outdoor theatre and skhnograf≤a. See §3.2 above.

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genre. That is, tragedy on the whole, unlike comedy, never entirely disrupts the theatrical ‘illusion’ in order to indulge in metatheatrical play.374 Nevertheless, there is one passage in Helen which approaches metatheatricality, drawing attention to the theatrical convention of the mask. This is the passage which I quoted in the last section, where Helen expresses the wish that she could change her appearance (262–5): e÷q’ ƒxaleifqe∏s’ „ß £galm’ aˆqiß p3lin a÷scion e”doß πlabon ånt≥ toı kaloı, ka≥ t¤ß t»caß m†n t¤ß kak¤ß 4ß nın πcw E ﬁ llhneß ƒpel3qonto. Would that I had been cleaned like a statue [or painting] and begun afresh, taking an uglier appearance instead of this lovely one! In that case the Greeks would have forgotten the evil fortune which now dogs me.

These lines may well cause us to reﬂect that the male actor playing Helen could in fact wipe away the paint from his mask, or take it oﬀ altogether, to change his appearance.375 If the intended eﬀect here is metatheatrical, it might be suggested that this is an example of Euripides’ ‘genre-bending’, incorporating features which are out of place in tragedy. But this is diﬀerent from comic metatheatricality, which is far more overt and explicit. As Muecke points out, ‘in Euripides, play with the theatrical illusion is for the sake of the play with ideas in the drama, while in Aristophanes contrast between reality and illusion is used for the sake of reﬂecting on theatrical illusion itself’.376 This is quite right. But one can go further and point out that, although Helen’s words here can be read as implicitly metatheatrical, their more obvious meaning relates to the theme of Helen’s beauty and the remarks of Gorgias and Democritus about works of art. We should not expect to ﬁnd metatheatricality, then; but we can see other ways in which the staging represents the epistemological themes of the plays. Perhaps the most obvious is the creation of confusion. The construction of the plot of Helen, for example, seems designed to create the impression that the play 374

Taplin (1986) 168–70 (cf. §1.1 above). E. M. Hall (1997) xxiv. 376 Muecke (1982) 29 (comparing the metatheatricality of Aristophanes’ parodies of the escape-tragedies). 375

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has ended at line 385, when both Helen and the chorus exit, leaving the stage empty. Menelaus makes his entrance at 386 onto an empty stage and begins a speech in the style of a prologue: _ t¤ß teqr≤ppouß Ojnom3wi P∏san k3ta | Pvloy Åm≤llaß ƒxamillhqe≤ß pote (‘O Pelops, you who once competed in the chariot-race with Oenomaus at Pisa’).377 This highly unconventional technique is confusing. So, too, is the very fact of Menelaus’ presence; not just its fortuitous timing (why should he be in Egypt, of all places?) but because until this point it seemed—owing to deceptive words—that he was dead. A further striking feature of this entrance is that Menelaus is dressed uncharacteristically in rags (to which I shall shortly return): this means that the audience will have been initially unsure of his identity. His opening lines about Pelops and Oenomaus do not entirely give the game away, and it is several tantalizing lines before he reveals himself as Menelaus. Menelaus’ ‘second prologue’ is just one example of the doubling of motifs (or ‘gemination’, as Segal called it).378 The importance of elements which are not what they seem, which resemble other elements but are really quite diﬀerent, is clearly of great relevance; and, again, its eﬀect is to confuse and baﬄe the audience. Helen contains two ‘prologues’, two sets of twins (the Dioscuri and the children of Proteus), two deception-scenes, two recognition-scenes, two shipwrecked Greek sailors who question Helen (Teucer and Menelaus), two ‘reported deaths’ of Menelaus (both false) and two messengers. In Iphigenia a pair of rescuers (Orestes and Pylades) rescue not one but two female ﬁgures (Iphigenia and Artemis). In Andromeda the heroine’s plight, and her words, are echoed within the caves by Echo, and there seem to have been two separate perils from which Andromeda had to be rescued (the monster and Cepheus?).379 Clearly, Helen contains more ‘gemination’ of elements than do 377 Burnett (1971, 80), noting this ‘breaking with tragic conventions’, adds that ‘Menelaus does not say anything which he could not have said to the chorus’. 378 Segal (1971) 562: ‘This doubling of the motifs reflects the mirror-like confusion with which “reality” in this play confronts the human participants.’ 379 See Webster (1967) 192–9 and Bubel (1991) 45–63. One of the vase-paintings of Euripides’ Andromeda (Trendall and Webster [1971] 3.3.12 = Matera 12538) depicts two Pans: their relevance is unclear (but note Sophocles’ Andromeda fr. 136 TGF [Radt], which also mentions Pans in the plural).

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the other two plays individually; but if the escape-tragedies are a trilogy, the cumulative eﬀect of three tragedies with virtually identical plots, which resemble each other visually and in terms of plot and structure,380 will have heightened still further this confusing feeling that things are not what they seem. Costumes are used in Helen to create more confusion. Costumes and masks are, apart from the words spoken, our only indications of a character’s identity, since each of the three actors played more than one character. But another function of costume is to alter or disguise one’s appearance. At the same time as the audience’s trust in personal identity and names is shaken up by the characters’ words, changes in appearance are also used to confuse them as to the identity of the characters.381 Both major characters in Helen completely change their appearance halfway through the play. Helen, who has been dressed in white robes and (as seems likely) a beautifully painted mask, changes into black mourning robes and a mask representing tears and bloody scratches from her ﬁngernails, and cuts oﬀ her hair.382 Menelaus, who has previously been clad in a shipwrecked beggar’s appalling rags,383 is dressed (by Helen!) in ﬁne clothes and dons heroic armour.384 This discontinuity, which is unparalleled in tragedy, would have been as disorientating as, say, a modern ﬁlm version of Helen in which the actors playing the lead characters were suddenly changed!385 Certainly the disguise is so successful that Theoclymenus, failing to recognize the short-haired, blackclad woman in front of him, at ﬁrst imagines, wrongly, that 380

See §1.2 above. Note that Aristophanes’ parody of these plays in Thesmophoriazusae is based primarily on costumes and disguises as a means of deception. 382 Helen 1053–4, 1087–9, 1186–90, 1224. 383 Helen 420–4, 554, 1079–80. 384 Helen 1281–4, 1379–84. 385 This would strike a modern audience as most peculiar: for obvious reasons, there are comparatively few cinematic examples of such a technique. David Lynch’s postmodern thriller Mulholland Drive (2001) reversed the roles of the two lead actresses mid-way through the film. Woody Allen’s Deconstructing Harry (1997) uses different actors to blur the distinctions between real and fictional characters. Ed Wood Jr’s decision to change the main actor in Plan 9 From Outer Space (1956) came about by accident (Bela Lugosi died mid-shoot) rather than design, and the resulting film is ludicrously hard to follow. Of course, the audiences of long-running soap-operas are far more accustomed to different actors playing a single character—but here I am talking about high art . . . 381

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Helen has escaped from the house. On the point of setting men and chariots in pursuit of her, he recognizes her and shouts (1184–90): ƒp≤scet’: ejsor0 g¤r oÙß di*komen parÎntaß ƒn dÎmoisi koÛ pefeugÎtaß. a\th, t≤ pvplouß mvlanaß ƒx&yw croÏß leuk0n åme≤yas’ πk te kratÏß eÛgenoıß kÎmaß s≤dhron ƒmbaloıs’ åpvqrisaß clwro∏ß te tvggeiß d3krusi s¶n parh≤da kla≤ousa; Stop! I can see our quarry here in the house; she has not got away. You, Helen, why have you changed your white garments and clothed your body in black? And why have you shorn the hair from your noble head with a knife? And why are you crying, drenching your face with fresh tears?

Helen answers his question with a completely fabricated tale: her new appearance resembles the customary attire of mourning ritual, because the escape-plan depends on the pretence that Menelaus is dead. In other words, the primary reason for these changes of appearance is the deliberate deception of Theoclymenus. Both words and appearances (as in Gorgias’ Encomium) are to work together in order both to persuade and to deceive. To the news of the ‘death’ Theoclymenus replies excitedly (1197– 8): oÛdvn ti ca≤rw so∏ß lÎgoiß, t¤ d’ eÛtuc0: p0ß o”sqa; m0n soi QeonÎh lvgei t3de; I do not rejoice at all in your words; but on the other hand I am fortunate. How do you know Menelaus is dead?—surely not from Theonoe?

These words (whether or not the ﬁrst line is genuine)386 are 386 Diggle deletes, perhaps because the extra line breaks up the passage of stichomythia which otherwise runs uninterrupted from 1195 to 1277; but the line occurs very near the beginning of this passage, before any momentum has been gained. Dale (1967, ad loc.) writes: ‘either of these lines separately is a possible response to 1196. Together they are less happy.’ She adds that 1197 removes some of the ‘surprised’ tone of p0ß o”sqa; Nevertheless, I should keep both lines. Theoclymenus’ language here, from his entry onwards, is jerky, full of exclamations, ‘false starts’ and changes of addressee (1165, 1169, 1171, 1176, 1180, 1184), which means that his response to Helen’s news is not incongruous. The slight awkwardness which Dale detected in the shape of 1197 is removed by Heath’s emendation t¤ d’ (t3d’ L). As they stand, the lines register, first of all, Theoclymenus’ instinctive reaction of surprise and barely-suppressed joy,

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unconsciously ironical. Theoclymenus has little reason indeed for rejoicing in these deceptive words, and his ‘good fortune’ too will be a short-lived delusion. The abrupt question which follows—how does Helen know that Menelaus is dead?—is highly pertinent in a trilogy concerned with the shaky basis of knowledge. Theoclymenus is interested only in the immediate context, but his question has a wider epistemological signiﬁcance. His suggestion that Theonoe might have revealed the sad news may cause us again to wonder why neither Theoclymenus nor Helen thought to ask Theonoe about Menelaus’ fate at any time during the previous seventeen years (or whether Theonoe’s ‘omniscient’ words are really a stable clue to reality). We might well recall, also, Theoclymenus’ enquiring, only seven lines earlier, why Helen might be upset: is it, he suggests, because of a dream or a rumour from home?387 Both dreams (as we have seen in Iphigenia) and rumours (as we have already seen in this play),388 like Helen’s own deceitful words, are deeply unsatisfactory sources of ‘knowledge’. Costumes are signiﬁcant, then, in the sense of disguises, analogous to deceptive words. However, this is not their only function. Menelaus’ two costumes are used to explore further the question of personal identity which has already been addressed from various angles: to what extent is a person’s nature or identity deﬁned by their clothing? When Menelaus enters the stage dressed as a beggar, is it just a disguise (albeit an accidental one, not deliberately feigned)? Or has the hero actually become a beggar (as Muecke puts it, ‘the costume dictating the character’)?389 The initial confrontation between Menelaus and Helen is used to bring out this problem. Here, as we saw, the recognition does not occur instantaneously, not only because of the cognitive which then changes to a more rational incredulity: how on earth could Helen know of this ‘death’? 387 Helen 1190–2: pÎteron ƒnn»coiß pepeismvnh | stvneiß øne≤roiß ∂ f3tin tin’ o÷koqen | kluoısa l»phi s¤ß divfqarsai frvnaß; (‘Why do you lament? Is it because of a convincing dream in the night, or have you heard some rumour from home that has destroyed your spirit with grief?’) 388 For example, the emphatic final words of the parodos (Helen 250–1): tÏ d’ ƒmÏn Ônoma par¤ Simount≤oiß Âoa∏si | may≤dion πcei f3tin (‘my name has a vain report by the streams of Simois’). 389 Muecke (1982) 28.

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diﬃculties presented by the phantom, but also because it is impossible to identify Menelaus on the basis of his appearance. Despite his reassurance that he intends her no harm, Helen is still deceived by his clothing into being wary.390 ME. oÛ kl0pvß ƒsmen oÛd’ Ëphrvtai kak0n. EL. ka≥ m¶n stol&n g’ £morfon åmf≥ s0m’ πceiß. Menelaus: I am not a thief or a criminal! Helen: And yet your body’s clothing, indeed, is ugly.

The word s0ma implies that Menelaus’ body alone, without the disguise of clothes, might provide a clue to his real identity—but is this true? It is not just Menelaus’ clothing that characterizes him as a beggar, but the whole situation in general. In this case, it might be that appearances do correspond to reality! This possibility is denied by Menelaus in his later conversation with Helen (789–92): EL. po≤oiß ƒpist¤ß barb3roiß pul*masin; ME. to∏sd’, πnqen ¿sper ptwcÏß ƒxhlaunÎmhn. EL. oÇ pou pros&iteiß b≤oton; _ t3lain’ ƒg*. ME. toÇrgon m†n Án toıt’, Ônoma d’ oÛk e”cen tÎde. Helen: At whose gates in this barbarian country did you stand? Menelaus: These ones, from which I was being driven away just like a beggar. Helen: Surely you were not begging for food? Oh, misery! Menelaus: That is indeed what happened, but I did not call myself a beggar.

Nevertheless, we have seen Menelaus in his rags, wretched and washed-up, oppressed by need, lacking food and clothes. He has considered scavenging for provisions; but when he ﬁnally knocks desperately at the palace door, pleading for assistance, it is to be humiliated and ejected by the old Portress.391 This esurience is not a pose: in his circumstances, and the manner in which he is treated, Menelaus really is a beggar. This means that his denial 390 Helen 553–4. These are among the lines which Burnett (1960) found so amusing: see pp. 231–2 above. 391 Helen 408: t3laß nauagÎß (‘an unfortunate, shipwrecked man’); 420–1: cre≤a d† te≤rei m’: oÇte g¤r s∏toß p3ra | oÇt’ åmf≥ cr0t’ ƒsq[teß (‘necessity is ravaging me: I have no food nor clothes on my body’); 428–9: mÎnoß d† nost0, to∏ß ƒke∏ zht0n f≤loiß | t¤ prÎsfor’ ‡n pwß ƒxereun&saß l3bw (‘I have come back alone, in search of provisions, if I can manage to find some, for my companions on the beach’); Menelaus is humiliated by the servant at lines 437–482.

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(the word-play with πrgon and Ônoma, and the use of ¿sper to qualify ptwcÏß) cannot be taken too literally. The fact that Menelaus did not call himself a beggar had no eﬀect on the reality of the situation, but rather serves to highlight again the unreliability of names, as well as the instability of personal identity. Words aside, if one’s actual status as an aristocratic hero or a lowly beggar results from circumstances rather than one’s nature, the implications in terms of social class are disturbing. One might compare the words of the lowly Greek messenger, who uses words to blur the boundaries between ‘servile’ and ‘noble’, ‘free’ and ‘slave’, and to bring out the diﬀerence between what we are called and what we are. Social status, rather than resulting from one’s nature or birth, may be far more arbitrary: is a ‘noble slave’ really as much of a paradox as it seems? ƒg° m†n e÷hn, kej pvfuc’ Òmwß l3triß, ƒn to∏si genna≤oisin ]riqmhmvnoß do»loisi, toÇnom’ oÛk πcwn ƒle»qeron, tÏn noın dv.392 I should like to be counted among noble slaves, even though I am of servile nature; I may not be called free, but I have a free mind.

As the details of the escape-plan evolve, costume resumes its deliberately deceptive function. Although to begin with Helen may have been appalled at Menelaus’ embarrassment, she later comes to realize that his ragged dress might prove useful to them (1079–82): ME. ka≥ m¶n t3d’ åmf≤blhstra s*matoß Â3kh xumm3rturvß soi nautik0n ƒreip≤wn. EL. ƒß kairÏn Álqe, tÎte d’ £kair’ åp*lluto: tÏ d’ £qlion ke∏n’ eÛtuc†ß t3c’ #n pvsoi. Menelaus: These coverings I am wearing round my body, made of tattered remnants from the ship, will surely act as witnesses on your behalf. Helen: They are exactly what we need—though previously your loss was untimely; so it may be that wretched fortune may in fact turn out for the best. 392 Helen 728–31. The same paradox is expressed by the servant at the end of the play: prÏ despot0n | to∏si genna≤oisi do»loiß eÛklevstaton qane∏n (‘For noble slaves, to die on behalf of their masters is most glorious, 1640–1). Cf. Ion 854. (The series of maxims in Helen 728–33 have struck some critics as unconnected or garbled: Diggle, following Willink, deletes the lines; cf. Dale [1967] 115–16.)

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The use of the word kairÎß (‘the right moment’ or ‘timeliness’) is interesting, recalling its use as a quasi-technical term by sophists and rhetors—including, notably, Gorgias (it is even possible that Gorgias wrote a treatise with the title Per≥ kairoı).393 Just as it is important to use words at the right moment in order to make one’s speech as persuasive as possible, so it is important for Helen and Menelaus’ deception-plan to use appearances at the right moment.394 The rhetorical, litigious ﬂavour is emphasized further by the image of Menelaus’ clothes as ‘witnesses’ (xumm3rtureß). So the signiﬁcance of Gorgias emerges in another, slightly diﬀerent way, which is immediately linked in to the big picture. Clothes, like words, can have a kairÎß; and, like other forms of outward appearance, they can perform the same persuasive or deceptive function as words. In addition, the question of the ‘correctness of words’ (ørqÎthß ønom3twn) recurs in these few lines. Can words really correspond to the nature of things, if we can use diﬀerent words for the same things depending on circumstance? Previously, the words £kaira (‘untimely’) and £qlion (‘wretched’) could be applied to Menelaus’ rags, but now the directly opposite terms ƒß kairÏn (‘timely’) and eÛtuc†ß (‘fortunate’) are used for the same rags, which have not changed. The correctness of words, then, is relative: which, as so many times before, makes us question how far language really represents reality. Menelaus’ beggarly grovelling is now part of the escapees’ ruse (although nothing has really changed; he is still, for all practical purposes, a beggar). More irony follows, as Theoclymenus catches sight of him crouching on the ground and remarks on his disreputable appearance, for Helen supposes that ‘her husband also’ looks like this (dok0 m†n kåmÏn —d’ πcein pÎsin, 1205). This time, she is not deluded in her supposition, but Theoclymenus is the one deceived. It is because of the success of the deception that Theoclymenus agrees to equip Menelaus with everything he 393 Importance of kairÎß: Gorgias (DK 82 B13), Dionys. Halicarn. De Comp. Verb. 12, Diog. Laert. 9.52 (who gives the title Per≥ kairoı, though most believe that the work was called Tvcnh), Isoc. Paneg. 7–9; see Guthrie (1971) 272, Kerferd (1981) 82. 394 One might compare Iphigenia 907–8: sof0n g¤r åndr0n toıto m¶ ∞ kb3ntaß t»chß, | kairÏn labÎntaß, Ódon¤ß £llaß labe∏n (‘wise people do not let luck pass them by, but seize the right moment and obtain even more pleasure’), in which Cropp (2000, ad loc.) detects something of ‘a sophistic tone’.

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wants. You will not go away from here empty-handed, he tells Menelaus, since he sees what a lowly state the man is in (ƒpe≥ nın g’ åql≤wß 〈s’〉 πconq’ Ør0, 1284). More irony abounds: Theoclymenus would have done better not to believe what he sees. The appearance of the Greek sailors (not staged, but reported by the messenger) is also calculated to achieve deception: they are all dressed in rags; their disgusting appearance belies the fact that they are ﬁne specimens of manhood; they all have concealed weapons; and they are shedding counterfeit tears.395 Everything about them, in fact, is deceptive: as it turns out, they are not mourners but murderers. When, after the second stasimon, Menelaus re-emerges, prepared to perform the bogus rituals, he is carrying a shield and spear and wearing armour (1376–8). As before, his outward appearance reﬂects, rather than misrepresents, reality: he is about to behave heroically, replaying Troy. His behaviour onboard ship, as reported by the messenger a little later, seems completely diﬀerent from before, and perhaps it is, at least partly, due to his new costume. We are bound to ask: does outward appearance dictate reality, rather than vice versa? Costume, then, has a complex and changing function related to the play’s themes and it is not at all straightforward. In Iphigenia there does not seem to have been as much play on costume: Orestes and Pylades are required to don veils in order to take part in the sham puriﬁcation ritual (1207), but the deception is not as marked as in Helen. However, there is an extraordinary moment in the play which is not only memorable in theatrical terms but also an eﬀective visual form of an epistemological motif. This is Iphigenia’s letter to Orestes, which is instrumental in bringing about the recognition. Iphigenia hands the letter to Pylades, with elaborate instructions to deliver it to her brother, who she thinks is in Argos, but Pylades simply carries it across the stage and hands it to the previously unidentiﬁed Orestes (791–4). PU. jdo», fvrw soi dvlton åpod≤dwm≤ te, Orvsta, t[sde s[ß kasign&thß p3ra. OR. dvcomai: pare≥ß d† gramm3twn diaptuc3ß, t¶n Ódon¶n pr0t’ oÛ lÎgoiß aÈr&somai. 395

Helen 1538–40, 1574–5, 1547.

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Pylades: See, I have a letter to give to you, Orestes, from this woman, your sister. Orestes: I receive it—but I shall cast aside the written tablets, and take pleasure not in mere words.

Letters are to be found elsewhere in tragedy,396 but this particular use of the letter-device is a brilliantly-judged coup de théâtre, a memorable and deﬁning moment of the play (indeed, several of the vase-paintings of Iphigenia are based on the moment at which the letter is handed over).397 The scene is clearly of great interest from a narratological point of view: Patricia Rosenmeyer, in her study of letters in Greek literature, observes that ‘Euripides used letters in his dramas primarily as a means to vary the conventions of tragic narrative’ . . . they are ‘agents in the plot, provoking reactions and directing events kinetically’.398 Rosenmeyer points out also that the presence of a letter in a work of ﬁction may be more important than its contents: she distinguishes ‘communicative’ letters (whose contents are of vital importance) from ‘kinetic’ letters (whose function is to advance the plot, regardless of their actual contents). The letter in Iphigenia falls into the second, ‘kinetic’ category, as far as the audience is concerned; but for Orestes the communicative function is just as important. So this scene plays a crucial part in the plot,399 but it is equally interesting in intellectual terms. In the ﬁrst place, the letter gives a physical form to words: that is, paradoxically, lÎgoi acquire a s0ma. At the same time, the letter-device reinforces most eﬀectively Euripides’ message that words are inferior to reality. This is, in part, because there is no real need for the letter at all: Iphigenia, rather than reading the letter out,400 merely repeats its 396 Cf. Soph. Trach., Eur. Hipp., Iph. at Aul., Theseus (fr. 382 Nauck). Taplin (1978, 95), writing of Phaedra’s letter in Hippolytus, calls it ‘an unusually small and naturalistic prop for Greek tragedy’. 397 Trendall and Webster (1971) 3. 27, 30(a), 30(b) (= Ferrara Spina T 1145, Moscow 504, Sydney 51.17); LIMC (s.v. ‘Iphigenia’) 19–26, 56, 57. 398 Rosenmeyer (2001) 63–5. 399 Cf. Burnett (1971) 52–6; Goward (1999) 139–40. 400 Can Iphigenia read? The letter had to be written for her by one of her previous Greek victims (Iphigenia 584–6). See Cropp (2000) 213–14. Phaedra in Hipp. can (probably) write, which raises wider questions of literacy (and in particular women’s literacy) in Greek society. Thomas (1992) deals with this and related issues. The most important question for our purposes is whether Euripides’ audience would have found an illiterate Iphigenia odd—and, if so,

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contents from memory.401 It is not the written but the spoken word that brings about the desired eﬀect—the same point, more or less, which Alcidamas was to make in On the writers of written speeches.402 However, the uselessness of the letter is seen more strikingly in the fact that Orestes throws it away!—this action can be seen to symbolize the redundance not just of this letter but of words in general. Orestes says that his pleasure at recognizing his sister has nothing to do with words. It corresponds to reality, rather than illusion—or so he thinks. 4.4.8 A nihilistic conclusion Euripides’ ideas, far from being superﬁcial or unimportant, are at the very centre of the plays and cannot be taken seriously enough. Their ‘philosophy’, as I have shown, is an extreme version of the epistemological and ontological theories of Gorgias and various other sophists and Presocratics. What is reality? If anybody or anything has being, it is impossible for humans to understand or communicate it; there is no knowledge, only illusion and delusion. Everything that we previously held to be sources of knowledge—appearances, words, and myths—is shown to be deceptive or, at best, confusing and contradictory. In the end, the only answer that the plays give about reality is that it is beyond human grasp. This is not a philosophical quandary for the amusement or ediﬁcation of the intelligentsia; it is not an academic problem to be considered in a vacuum. Rather, because these are tragedies of ideas, Euripides appeals not just to our intellect but to our emotions. He has brought philosophy into contact with tragic myth, and in doing so he emphasizes the extent to which humans have suﬀered, and will continue to suﬀer, as a result of ignorance. The escape-tragedies could not be further from optimism or comedy. They are among Euripides’ most pessimistic tragedies, depicting humans not unlike ourselves struggling to comprehend a world which confounds and disappoints. whether the elaborate, circuitous way in which the letter-device is worked into the plot is doubly marked. 401 Seen by Rosenmeyer (2001) 76; Knox (1979) 287. 402 Cf. Burnett (1971) 53: ‘it is speech that must be obtained if this scene is to succeed’.

5 The Tragic Universe

DIONUSOS ƒp≤qeß libanwtÏn ka≥ sŸ d¶ lab*n. EURIPIDHS kal0ß: 1teroi g3r ejsin oÍsin eÇcomai qeo∏ß. DIONUSOS ÷dio≤ tineß sou, kÎmma kainÎn; EURIPIDHS ka≥ m3la.1

5.1 introduction This ﬁnal chapter is concerned with the role of supernatural forces—the gods, fate and luck—in the escape-tragedies. There are a number of ways in which the ‘role’ of such powers might be understood. Critics from Aristophanes onwards have been concerned with Euripides’ religious beliefs, however they are to be deﬁned: the texts have often been treated as repositories of (perhaps heterodox) theological views. On the other hand, many studies of tragedy in the last two decades have been concerned with ‘religion’ in the speciﬁc sense of ritual practice and the way in which it is reﬂected in the action and imagery of the drama. I shall begin (§5.2) with a brief critical survey of such approaches, arguing that both literary and cultural-historical readings may be valuable. However, my own approach to the ‘religion’ of the escapetragedies (§5.3) is somewhat diﬀerent. I want to investigate the signiﬁcance of the supernatural element in a speciﬁc sense, very closely related to the intellectual themes which I have already explored (so, in a sense, this is a continuation of the previous chapter). As I have shown, Euripides uses the language and ideas of contemporary philosophy to express the inability of humans to apprehend or to communicate reality. The theological mean1 Ar. Frogs 888–90. ‘Dionysus: Now it’s your turn to take some incense and make a libation. Euripides: Very well: but the gods I worship are diﬀerent. Dionysus: Do you mean private ones, a special coinage of your own? Euripides: Precisely.’

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ing of the plays, too, is tied up with human ignorance. It is all about trying, and failing, to make sense of reality. In all Greek tragedies, the characters (like the people in the audience) attempt to explain why things happen as they do and, in particular, why they suﬀer. The explanations to which they resort are not just based on rational factors, such as human motivation. In addition, they invariably look outwards to the ‘big picture’, searching for metaphysical, cosmic reasons. This general summary is equally true of the escape-tragedies. However, the metaphysical issues take on a new depth here because the nature of physical reality, and what we can know about it, has been questioned to such an alarming extent. That is, if we cannot even trust language and sense-perception to tell us what is happening, we cannot be conﬁdent that we know why it is happening. In this context, both beliefs and rituals appear in a new light. 5.2 tragedies as ‘religious’ texts In older (and some not so old) books on Euripides, one frequently comes across the view that the poet was an atheist; or, at least, that his view of the gods was fundamentally at odds with that of other Athenians of the same time.2 This point of view, like the notion that tragedy and philosophy do not mix, seems to derive from the comedies of Aristophanes. In passages which have been quoted as ‘proof’ of Euripides’ atheism, we encounter a female garland-seller who complains that Euripides, by persuading people that there are no gods, has ruined her business; a caricatured ‘Aeschylus’ who describes his rival as an enemy of the gods; a ‘Euripides’ who insists on praying to his own ‘private gods’ (Ether, Tongue, Intellect, and Nostrils), and so on.3 It is also possible to quote certain lines from the tragedies which, taken out of context,4 seem to illustrate Euripides’ unorthodox 2 On the critical tradition, ancient and modern, see Allan (2000a) 234–5, Kovacs (1990) 1–32 (esp. 11–12), Michelini (1987) 11–27, Muir (1985). 3 Ar. Thesm. 450–1 (nın d’ o˜toß ƒn tragwid≤aiß poi0n | toŸß £ndraß ånapvpeiken oÛk e”nai qeo»ß); Frogs 936 (_ qeo∏sin ƒcqrv), 885–93 (the lines quoted as the epigraph to this chapter). Quoted and discussed by Lefkowitz (1987) and (1989); see also Parker (1996) 205. 4 This is, of course, the reason why the views expressed in the fragments seem more outré than those which can be situated in complete plays: see Dover (1974,

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views: for example, Hippolytus’ notorious attitude to oathtaking;5 Bellerophon’s outright denial that there are gods in heaven, and his view that gods who behave shamefully are not gods;6 and Heracles’ expression of disbelief in the traditional stories about the gods’ actions.7 By the time that Diogenes Laertius wrote his Lives of the philosophers, the tradition of Euripides as heterodox was well advanced. For example, Diogenes quotes the well-known statement of Protagoras, ‘concerning the gods I have no means of knowing either that they exist or that they do not exist; for many are the obstacles that impede knowledge’,8 before, a little later, saying that Protagoras read and discussed his work at Euripides’ house in Athens. Plutarch depicts Euripides as joining with such philosophers as Diagoras of Melos, Theodorus of Cyrene, and Euhemerus of Tegea in saying that there are no gods at all.9 In a late source of somewhat dubious value, we even read that Euripides was prosecuted for impiety (åsvbeia): a spurious ‘fact’ which seems to derive from over-literal readings of Aristophanes.10 As we have seen in the previous chapter (§4.2.1), 14–16) on the danger of treating tragic lines in isolation as if they were moral recommendations. 5 Hippolytus 612 (Ó gl0ss’ øm*moc’, Ó d† fr¶n ån*motoß, ‘it was my tongue that swore—not my mind!’); parodied by Aristophanes (Thesm. 274–6) and quoted by Aristotle (Rhet. 1416a29–35), who records that the lines were used as evidence against their author in a perjury trial! 6 Bellerophon fr. 286 Nauck (fhs≤n tiß e”nai d[t’ ƒn oÛran0i qeo»ß; | oÛk ejs≤n, oÛk e÷s’, e÷ tiß ånqr*pwn qvlei | m¶ t0i palai0i m0roß ¯n cr[sqai lÎgwi, ‘does anyone say that there are really gods in heaven? There are none, none, I tell you, unless one is foolish enough to adhere to old stories’). Compare fr. 292 (ej qeo≤ ti dr0sin ajscrÎn, oÛk ejs≥n qeo≤, ‘if the gods act shamefully, they are not gods’). 7 Heracles 1340–4 (ƒg° d† toŸß qeoŸß oÇte lvktr’ 4 m¶ qvmiß | stvrgein nom≤zw desm3 t’ ƒx3ptein cero∏n | oÇt’ ]x≤wsa p*pot’ oÇte pe≤somai | oÛd’ £llon £llou despÎthn pefukvnai. | de∏tai g¤r Ø qeÎß, e÷per πst’ ørq0ß qeÎß, | oÛdenÎß. åoid0n oJde d»sthnoi lÎgoi, ‘I do not believe that the gods commit adultery, or bind each other in chains: I never believed it and I shall not be persuaded now; nor do I believe that one god is master over another. Gods, if they are really gods, lack nothing. These are wretched tales of poets’). Discussed by Stinton (1976a, 83–4) and Brown (1978); I shall return to these lines later apropos of Iphigenia 380–91, which are similar in sentiment. 8 Protagoras (DK 80 B4): per≥ m†n qe0n oÛk πcw ejdvnai, oÇq’ „ß ejs≥n oÇq’ „ß oÛk ejs≥n oÇq’ Øpo∏o≤ tineß jdvan: poll¤ g¤r t¤ kwl»onta ejd†nai ktl. Cf. Diog. Laert. 9.24; Philostratus 1.10.2 (= DK 80 A2). Discussed by Guthrie (1965, 226–35). 9 Plut. De Plac. Phil. 1.7 (Moralia 880d–e). 10 Satyrus, Life of Euripides, P. Oxy. 1176 col. X (= Kovacs [1994] fr. 39): ËpÏ m†n g¤r Klvwnoß toı dhmagwgoı t¶n t[ß åsebe≤aß d≤khn πfugen (‘he was acquitted

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Euripides came to be associated with the intellectual avantgarde—whether he was or not. Whatever its merits, this image of Euripides persisted into more recent times. One can without much diﬃculty ﬁnd, from the last hundred years or so, numerous assertions of Euripides’ heterodoxy. Among the most outrageous is Coleridge’s statement that Euripides was ‘like a modern Frenchman, never so happy, as when giving a slap at the Gods altogether’.11 Nietzsche’s view of Euripides in Die Geburt der Tragödie, which I have already discussed in the previous chapter, connects the poet’s religious iconoclasm with his general attitude to knowledge and society; Nestle, and later Reinhardt, held similar views of Euripides’ godless rationalism.12 Gilbert Murray found in Euripides ‘a rather diﬀerent attitude towards the pieties of the common man,’ an obscure mixture of ‘moral revolt’ and ‘denial’ alongside ‘wonder and surmise’.13 For L. H. Greenwood, Euripides was ‘a religious heretic and satirist’.14 Gilbert Norwood thought that ‘Aristophanes’ idea of Aeschylus . . . closely resembles our own; and even what he says about Euripides never bewilders us.’ Indeed, Euripides, for Norwood and many of his readers, was ‘a vaguely agnostic soul and a wit’.15 Kitto’s approach is similar in some respects. While, like the others just quoted, he claims that Euripides (along with his audience) did not believe literally in anthropomorphic gods, he argues that Euripides believed symbolically in the powers or the psychological states which (so he says) those gods represented.16 of the charge of impiety brought against him by the demagogue Cleon’). This is widely thought to be an invention, again based on the faulty evidence of Aristophanes and the ‘biographical’ tradition. See Dover (1988) 138–9 and 148–51; Kovacs (1990) 11–12; Lefkowitz (1987). Note that another papyrus fragment (P. Oxy. 24.2400), a list of topics for rhetorical exercises dating from the third century ad, includes that of Euripides’ self-defence against the charge of impiety. 11 Table Talk, 29 December, 1822; I am grateful to Malcolm Davies for this quotation. 12 Nietzsche (1872); Nestle (1901) 124–41; Reinhardt (1957). 13 Murray (1918) 96–7. 14 Greenwood (1953) 18. 15 Norwood (1954) 2, 8. 16 Kitto (1961) 250: ‘Euripides is thinking of [the gods] as he thinks of the love of Phaedra and the fanatical anti-love of Hippolytus: as psychological forces which take entire possession of their victims and drive them where they

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A major inﬂuence on these and other English-speaking scholars during much of the twentieth century was the Cambridge critic A. W. Verrall. In his 1895 book Euripides the Rationalist (the date is important), Verrall, like Aristophanes, argued that Euripides was an opponent of popular religion. The purpose of Euripides’ unusual attitude to myth, which I have been discussing at length, was seen by Verrall as the ridiculing of the Olympian gods. ‘The creed of Euripides,’ he writes, ‘was that of nascent philosophy, science, and rationalism; between which and the worship of the regular gods there was a war to which modern religious controversies oﬀer no parallel . . . it was the purpose and eﬀect of his plays to destroy the old religious beliefs.’ Verrall goes on: ‘if we wanted to ﬁnd any sort of parallel in our own life, it must be by supposing that some eminent Positivist or Agnostic were appointed for one Sunday in every month . . . to preach the sermon in Westminster Abbey.’17 I think Verrall is wrong; but what he says is extremely suggestive. The most obvious criticism to make (as hindsight makes possible) is that his interpretation is very much of its time. His reference to ‘modern religious controversies’ recalls the clash between Darwinian evolutionists and clerics, and the growing mood of rationalism, in Victorian Britain.18 Whether this has anything to do with ﬁfth-century Athens is questionable.19 (Even Verrall’s hundred-year-old statement of the situation now seems quaintly archaic, and scarcely less alien than Euripides himself.) Although we cannot avoid a certain degree of anachronism in twenty-ﬁrst-century readings of tragedy (however much we might try to discard our own conceptual baggage), it is important to attempt to examine the plays from a ﬁfth-century perspective. In the area of religious belief and practice (perhaps more than will.’ Ibid., 377: ‘Dionysus, or what he typiﬁes—for we need not tie Euripides to a literal belief in his mythology—exists, and that is enough.’ Grube’s (1961, 41–62) account of Euripidean religion, while more judicious, hints at a similar interpretation. Lloyd-Jones (1983b, 145–55) protests, convincingly, against this ‘symbolic’ type of reading. 17 Verrall (1895) 82–4. 18 On which now see the excellent study of A. N. Wilson: God’s Funeral (London, John Murray, 1999). 19 Religion and scientiﬁc rationalism were not separate, exclusive categories of 5th-cent. thought (as they were in Victorian thought): see e.g. Hippocrates, On the Sacred Disease.

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any other), where a great gulf separates Euripides’ audience from ourselves, a broadly historicizing approach is called for. There are other problems, too, with Verrall’s view. In the ﬁrst place, he (along with all the other scholars cited above) assumes that the plays provide, in some form, a statement of Euripides’ own religious creed. However, the diﬃculty with this assumption is one which we have already encountered when attempting to extract a ‘philosophical view’ from the texts.20 That is, they are mimetic, dramatic works, in which no authorial voice can be directly identiﬁed. So we should be interested, not in Euripides’ own religious views, but in the way in which the plays, either individually or collectively, present a view of the gods and the universe. In the second place, when Verrall states that Euripides’ purpose and function was ‘to destroy the old religious beliefs’, and compares Euripides’ plays to sermons at Westminster Abbey, he is making certain untested assumptions about the nature of a tragic performance. Could a play really destroy someone’s religious belief? Are tragedies really the same sort of things as religious sermons? Rather than making questionable claims of this sort, one should be examining the way in which tragedy was perceived and interpreted by its original audience, and asking in what sense tragic performances or texts are ‘religious’. A third problem associated with the work of Verrall, and several critics inﬂuenced by him, is their method of interpreting the views found in the text. A considerable stumbling-block which they encountered was that Euripides’ tragedies do not consistently deny the existence of the gods. It is possible to locate a handful of stray quotations (such as I give above) which can be used to ‘prove’ the playwright’s atheism. Nevertheless, there are comparatively few such passages;21 and, in any case, lines (such as the quotations from Bellerophon and Heracles) which appear to be stark denials of the existence of gods often assume a completely diﬀerent, or more nuanced, meaning when they are read in the context of the rest of the play.22 Furthermore, a comparison with Aeschylus and Sophocles shows that the gods 20

See §4.2.1 above. As noted by Yunis (1988, 60), who adds that statements of atheism (as such) were extremely rare in general at this date. Cf. Feeney (1991) 22. Diagoras of Melos (Diod. Sic. 13.6–7) was a notable exception: see Dover (1988) 137–8. 22 A seemingly obvious point, but one which is infrequently stressed (however, cf. Sourvinou-Inwood [1997] 162 and Allan [2000a] 235). 21

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appear far more prominently in Euripides’ plays—surely not a sign of atheism or secularism?23 In order to get round this ‘diﬃculty’, critics like Verrall resorted to irony. That is, they assumed that Euripides was prevented by convention from expressing his views explicitly, but that, whenever a divine character appears in a play, or whenever one of the characters voices what seems to be an orthodox view, one should disregard it or assume that there is a hidden meaning. The more enlightened members of the audience (we are invited to believe) would have interpreted the ‘real’ meaning of such words and appearances as veiled criticism, or denial, of the gods.24 I think that we should be uncomfortable with the idea of plays which can be understood only by certain members of the audience, and with the readiness of many critics to interpret selected portions of plays as ‘ironic’ and others as ‘non-ironic’. The basis on which one might make the selection is unclear. What Verrall and the others are advocating is, in essence, a type of reading which ignores the texts and claims that ‘meaning’ is completely arbitrary: we can take the plays to mean exactly what we want. Since not only the text but also the historical context was neglected by most scholars of the time, this critical position seems wilfully dishonest.25 (Nevertheless, this is not to deny that ‘irony’ is, in some sense, a useful concept for understanding tragic theology—as I shall go on to argue.) 23 Euripides’ plays frequently feature divine characters, often but not always at the beginning and end (Dionysus in Bacchae, Apollo in Orestes, the Dioscuri in Helen and Electra, Thetis in Andromache, Aphrodite and Artemis in Hippolytus, Apollo, Death and Heracles in Alcestis, Athena in Iphigenia, Poseidon in Trojan Women, Hermes and Athena in Ion, Iris and Lyssa in Heracles, Athena in Suppliant Women, the Muse in Rhesus). In Sophocles and Aeschylus, divine appearances are rarer (Heracles in Philoctetes; Athena in Ajax; Athena and Apollo in Eumenides; Zeus, Kratos, Hephaestus, Hermes in Prometheus Bound). It could be that the contrast is exaggerated by the greater number of surviving plays by Euripides in comparison with the other two: Lefkowitz (1989, 70 nn. 1–2) surveys some of the evidence from the fragments. See also Taplin (1977) 444–5; Allan (2000a) 233. 24 Verrall (1895) 138: ‘On the Euripidean stage whatever is said by a divinity is to be regarded, in general, as ipso facto discredited. It is in all cases objectionable from the author’s point of view, and almost always a lie.’ An almost precisely similar view is to be found in Greenwood (1953) 1–26; cf. Norwood (1954) 1–49; Vellacott (1975) 1–22. Griﬃth (1953, 198–9), Grube (1961, 45–6), and Michelini (1987, 25–6) provide succinct criticism of the ‘ironic’ approach. 25 This critical irresponsibility resulted, in Verrall’s case at least, in interpretations which were so bizarre as to be almost ludicrous: his (1905) reading of Helen is a case in point.

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One does not have to look very hard to ﬁnd objectionable views in the pages of such scholars as I have been quoting. It may be thought that these easy targets are not worth the eﬀort of shooting down, especially since more recent scholarship (in the last twenty-ﬁve years or so) has been reacting against the legacy of these critics, oﬀering reﬁnements and more nuanced views.26 Nevertheless, it is still relevant to mention this earlier trend in scholarship, because the issues raised have not been entirely laid to rest. The two basic areas of debate are, ﬁrst of all, the nature of religious belief in ﬁfth-century Athens, and, second, the type of ‘religious’ content one should expect to ﬁnd in tragedy. The solutions to these problems are far from easy to ﬁnd, chieﬂy (as so often) owing to the lack of evidence. However, a little further clariﬁcation is desirable. First, then, our notion of ‘atheism’ is a modern one, inﬂuenced more strongly by Judaeo-Christian theology than by anything in Greek culture. Whatever a ﬁfth-century Athenian understood by ‘atheism’, it was not the same as the conception of Verrall and the Victorian Church of England. Indeed, it seems that there was considerable intellectual freedom for individual Athenians to think and say what they liked about gods.27 Harvey Yunis, for example, has used Plato’s Laws to reconstruct what he calls three ‘fundamental beliefs’ of Greek polis religion. These are, ﬁrst, that the gods exist; second, that the gods pay attention to humans; and third, that there is reciprocity of a kind between humans and gods.28 Within these broad limits there is, in fact, 26 Notably, Mikalson (1983) and (1991); Lefkowitz (1987) and (1989); R. Parker (1983), (1996) and (1997); Seaford (1994); Sourvinou-Inwood (1990) and (1997); Yunis (1988). Burkert (1985, 7) apologizes for his failure to deal with tragedy in his major study of Greek religion: ‘the reader may regret the absence of a satisfactory account of the religion of the tragedians, but this question is too subtle to be treated within the space of a few pages.’ 27 Guthrie (1965, 226–49) outlines a variety of theological positions held in the 6th and 5th cents., which encompass ‘agnosticism’ and ‘atheism’: for example, the well-documented views of Xenophanes, Protagoras, Diagoras, Prodicus and Critias. Cf. Dover (1988); Muir (1985) 202; Sourvinou-Inwood (1997); Lefkowitz (1989) 72–3; Obbink (1996) 1–4. Parker (1996) 199–217 contains an interesting discussion of Socrates’ trial in relation to the religious climate of Athens in the late ﬁfth and early fourth centuries (was there a religious ‘crisis’ ?). 28 Yunis (1988), esp. 29–51. The three ‘fundamental beliefs’ are based on Plato, Laws 10. 885b4–9; dissidents fall into three classes: the sophists and relativists (ibid. 886d2–3), those who believe that the gods do not pay attention

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possibility for a huge diversity of belief. There is no evidence to show that these Platonic principles ever represented normative views, nor that they were current in Euripides’ time; but it does seem, as Yunis demonstrates at length, that Euripides’ plays correspond to the three fundamental beliefs. Even a brief comparison between ancient and modern beliefs shows that it is useless to use either one as a model for understanding the other. Judaeo-Christian ‘religion’ has a very ﬁxed and well-deﬁned body of religious texts, in the sense of scriptures—the Torah, the Bible—and a clearly delineated set of religious occasions for ritual and worship, as well as a preoccupation with rules and commandments which must be followed. But Greek religion, so far as we know, did not have scriptures—at least, none survives—and it is much harder to separate ‘religious’ from ‘non-religious’ activity, because so many occasions in everyday social, personal and political life, which we would consider secular, contained elements of ritual and observance.29 So ‘religion’ and the gods, for ﬁfth-century Athenians, are inextricably bound up with the institutions of the polis and with conditioned modes of social behaviour. (To say that Euripides did not believe in the gods might be comparable, in some ways, to saying that one does not ‘believe in’ the British royal family.) The fact that impiety-trials in the ﬁfth and fourth centuries were (almost without exception) politically motivated seems to conﬁrm this view.30 Greek religion was polis religion, which was, seemingly, more concerned with outward participation in cult than with inward beliefs: it was the rituals of the polis, rather than texts, which constituted religious authority.31 This speculation leads on to the second major question which Verrall left unanswered: what sort of entities are Greek tragedies? It is not the same thing to argue that they are ‘religious’ as it is to to men (899d8–900b3), and those who think that the gods can be bribed by gifts (905d4–c6). Cf. Plato, Symp. 188b on reciprocity between humans and gods. 29 This is the perspective of Easterling’s (1985b) study of poetry and Greek ‘religious’ activity; cf. Osborne (1985) 178–87. 30 On impiety-trials in general, see Dover (1988), Yunis (1988, 59–66) and Muir (1985, 209–18). 31 See Easterling (1985b) 44; Sourvinou-Inwood (1990); Parker (1996). Dodds (1973b) ponders the question of what rituals meant to ‘the ordinary man’ in classical Greece, concluding—but by no means proving—that ideas had little place in the religion of everyday life. Mikalson (1983) has a similar view.

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argue that they are ‘philosophical’ (as I have done above). Tragedies are obviously ‘religious’ in some sense: they were performed at a festival of Dionysus, they often have divine characters, and they are invariably concerned with theology and theodicy;32 but their status, in comparison with other types of ‘religious’ text and ‘religious’ experience, is unknown. In fact, just as it is hard to distinguish between ‘religious’ and ‘nonreligious’ activity, it is extremely diﬃcult either to distinguish between ‘literary’ and ‘religious’ texts, or to say how far the gods and theology in literature related to ‘real-life’ Athenian religion—but this is fundamental to the whole problem. Uncertainty over how to interpret the available evidence is as serious as the shortage of evidence itself. We do not know just how Greeks thought about ‘religion’; this is why imposing our own conceptual framework on the evidence is a diﬃcult hazard to avoid. Comparatively little material survives from an identiﬁably ritual context, and what little there is can be interpreted in widely diﬀering ways.33 The bulk of our evidence for what Athenians actually did, and thought, and believed during worship comes from texts belonging to a miscellaneous collection of genres and contexts: epic and didactic poetry, hymns, lyric poetry, prose historians, philosophers, orators’ speeches— and, of course, tragedy itself. (Imagine if our only evidence for late twentieth-century religion in the UK consisted of the Narnia books of C. S. Lewis, the Jewish Chronicle and Monty Python’s Life of Brian!) However, to look at the problem from a diﬀerent angle, the fact that there were no authoritative, canonical, Greek religious texts is very important. The absence of scriptures is a fundamental quality of Greek religion. The key to understanding it all is diversity: there was seen to be no need for authorized versions of mythic or religious texts, but rather among the diﬀerent Greek states there was a need for variety. Homogeneity is emphatically not a Greek characteristic, in any area of life.34 Nevertheless, we have still not answered the question of what type of text tragedy was (though it may be that the question is 32

I have touched on these deﬁning features of tragedy in §1.1 above. On types of evidence and their uses, see especially Burkert (1985) 4–7 and Parker (1996) 1–9. 34 See Purcell (1990). 33

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ultimately unanswerable). I have mentioned the various types of text in which theological views are found; but we cannot assume that all these types of writing had similar, or comparable, status. That is, tragedy may not have been viewed in the same way as (say) hymns or epic poetry as a source of religious belief. Did Athenians think that some genres of literature were more authoritative guides than others to belief, or more relevant to cult practice? It is impossible to say for certain. The extent to which an individual’s beliefs and outlook may be altered by diﬀerent sorts of experience (talking, worshipping, performing rituals, reading, watching plays, and so on), and the connections which people make between life and literature, are variable and largely irreducible to rules. It is possible to observe that the gods are portrayed slightly diﬀerently in each of the diﬀerent types of text. Some have traced, in philosophy and literary criticism of the classical period, a growing feeling that ‘real’ philosophical theology is separable from ‘poetic’ theology. Xenophanes, for example, is well known to have criticized Homer and Hesiod for teaching everyone that the gods were anthropomorphic and immoral; but he also adds that Homer’s stories about the gods are inventions (pl3smata). Theagenes defends Homer’s portrayal of the gods by explaining that it is the product of literary form (åpÏ t[ß lvxewß) rather than true reality. The writer of the sophistic Dissoi Logoi argues that poetry is autonomous; that it must be judged on its own terms rather than by reference to general notions of ‘truth’. This point of view is seen also in Aristotle’s Poetics, which states that poetry has its own distinct function (tvloß).35 Of course, philosophers and critics, with their often polemical content, may hold views very diﬀerent from those of the majority of tragedy’s audience members. Nevertheless, if we assume that the authors just quoted are broadly representative in their general approach (if not their exact details), we may follow up this line of thought in a number of directions. First, we may return to the idea that religious authority was independent of speciﬁc texts or doctrines. It may be that the 35 Xenophanes (DK 21 B10–22), Theagenes (DK 8 B1–2), Dissoi Logoi (DK 90 B3), Arist. Poet. 51a36–b11; cf. Feeney (1991) 6–16, who gives a succinct summary of the views of these writers and the ‘intellectual environment’ inhabited by the poets and their readers.

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Athenians were happy to interpret the gods according to the rules of the particular context—that, if they were peforming a ritual, or reading philosophy, or watching a play, their theological views—or perhaps responses—would change accordingly. This is, clearly, very diﬀerent from our own approach to religious thought. As Denis Feeney writes (in a wide-ranging study of the ‘religion’ of epic poetry), genre and context are allimportant. ‘In a fundamental sense, the gods existed for the ancients according to the rules of the particular context in which they were encountered, whether that be epic, lyric, cult or philosophy’ (or, one might add, tragedy).36 Feeney recognizes, correctly, that ‘a frame of mind which arranged belief according to occasion or setting is exceedingly diﬃcult for inheritors of a revealed, Church tradition to recapture’.37 However, it remains to be seen whether he is right to insist on the separability of all these types of ‘encounter’: are the rules of context or genre really more important than what literature and ritual have in common?38 I think we can at least begin to appreciate the importance of context, even in our own, largely post-Christian, society. Let us consider, for instance, Monty Python’s Life of Brian.39 This British ﬁlm is a comic version of the history of early Christianity, its hero Brian closely resembling Christ. Like Christ, he is eventually cruciﬁed (upon which he sings the song ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life’). Now there are several ways in which this ﬁlm is a genuine representation of, and comment on, Christian beliefs (or, at least, as the makers claimed, ‘organized religion’). The ﬁlm caused a considerable amount of controversy 36 Feeney (1991) 45. Cf. R. Parker (1997, 146) for a similar view: it is ‘generic expectations and conventions’, rather than ‘personal experience’, that help readers and audiences make sense of certain elements in drama. (For example, we are able to interpret the deus ex machina at the end of many tragedies without believing that gods actually behave in that way.) However, he adds that it is seldom a simple ‘either/or’ situation: is real life not shaped by 37 certain generic expectations and conventions? Feeney (1991) 16. 38 It will be clear that I disagree with Feeney where tragedy is concerned, but I should add that Feeney, although he is making some wide-ranging claims about literary genres and religion, does not speciﬁcally discuss tragedy. Nevertheless, his argument concerns poetry in general; and his use of the Greek critics, who were preoccupied as much with tragedy as with epic, means that his conclusions are certainly applicable to Euripides. 39 Directed by Terry Jones (Hand Made Films, 1979).

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when it was released in 1979, with many Church leaders publicly denouncing it as blasphemous, and several regional cinemas refusing to show it. Nevertheless, many Christians seem to enjoy the ﬁlm on its own terms; and the writers, in fact, were Christians. Whatever one’s view of its moral content, it would, I think, be foolish to see the ﬁlm’s purpose as that of inciting atheism. In general, it gives a distorted reﬂection of Christianity (no one would claim, for instance, that Christ’s message to the planet was always to look on the bright side of life); yet the ﬁlm and its reception could be used, with caution, as evidence for serious religious attitudes or beliefs. Life of Brian is a ﬁlm, and as such would not normally be described as a ‘religious’ text. But if it had been shown in Westminster Abbey during Matins, it may well have provoked a diﬀerent response. Interpretations, then, may depend on genre, context and occasion. However, the degree to which they alter in each context may be only partial. A slightly diﬀerent (but basically comparable) approach to the problem is that of Jon Mikalson, who shows partiality towards certain types of text, on the grounds that some are more truthful or authoritative than others. Tragedies are not among his privileged texts: in fact, Mikalson argues for a total disjunction between tragic and ‘real-life’ religion. He writes that ‘the gods of poetry are . . . the products of literary fantasy and genius, not of the Greek religious spirit’.40 This is not a new point of view (as Xenophanes, Theagenes and others show), but what is new about Mikalson’s thesis is that it values prose texts above poetic ones. He claims that the writings of historians and orators are the only reliable source for ‘real-life’ popular religion (that is, what Athenians actually said, believed and did), whereas poetic texts are closer to what we would call ﬁction. For Mikalson, Euripidean ‘religion’ is a composite, which (like Homer’s language) never really existed. He believes that the gods of tragedy are diﬀerent from the gods whom ‘real-life’ Athenians worshipped. For example, they made sacriﬁces to Athena Polias, Athena Skiras, Athena Hygieia, whereas (he claims) tragedy just 40 Mikalson (1991) outlines his general approach in pp. 1–12 (the quotation is from p. 5). His argument draws heavily on his earlier (1983) book on Athenian popular religion. Although many will disagree with his outlook, the value of both books is that they collect and classify a huge amount of material from diﬀerent literary contexts.

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has one homogenized ‘Athena’. If we accept Mikalson’s view, it means that, even if Euripides were criticizing the gods, he would not ipso facto be criticizing contemporary religious belief or practice; his gods are just a literary device. Is Mikalson right or wrong? I think that his position can be criticized on several grounds. In the ﬁrst place, to say that the gods of tragedy are a ‘literary device’ is an easy way of avoiding an answer to the main question—comparable (as Feeney puts it) to ‘criticizing the carburettors or pistons in a car as an engineering device’.41 Second, there is no basis in fact for supposing that prose texts represent ‘facts’ and poetic texts ‘ﬁction’. Not only does this supposition ignore the social context and uses of diﬀerent types of text in Greek antiquity,42 but it also seems an exceptionally banal antithesis, whatever the cultural context under discussion. Third, and most seriously, it would have been impossible for Athenian audiences to interpret tragic religion completely independently of ‘real-life’ ritual. These plays, after all, describe gods with the same names as the ones whom they worshipped, with the same attributes; the plots of the tragedies and the cults themselves are based on identical myths; the plays make references to genuine cults at Athens (this is particularly important, as we shall see, in the case of Iphigenia). How, then, could tragic religion have been seen as completely fantastic? Finally, there is Plato’s view, in the Republic, of the power of tragedy to alter one’s perceptions for the worse:43 this suggests strongly that many people in the audience would not have separated real life and ﬁction to the degree suggested by Mikalson. Christianne Sourvinou-Inwood, contra Mikalson, makes another important point: that the cult titles of the gods are not neglected in tragedy.44 This again suggests that Athenians did not consider Athena Polias, Athena Skiras, Athena Hygieia (and 41

Feeney (1991) 2. One might compare the false antithesis of ‘verse literature’ and ‘prose philosophy’, which I discussed in §4.2.1 above. R. Parker (1997, 158–9), answering Mikalson, points out that all genres have their own conventions and their own opacities, and that none of them (prose or verse) is a direct route to Athenian religious thoughts or beliefs. 43 Pl. Rep. 2.376–3.398, 10.595–607. 44 Sourvinou-Inwood (1997) 161–9. Cult-titles in tragedy include Zeus E } rke∏oß (Soph. Ant. 487), Zeus Kt&sioß (Aesch. Ag. 1038, Suppl. 445), Artemis Loc≤a (Iphigenia 1097), etc. 42

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so on) to be diﬀerent gods, and that the plays make reference to real cult worship as well as abstract beliefs. There is evidence from elsewhere in literary sources and from religious iconography that divinities were indeed perceived as having a single identity across their diﬀerent cults.45 To sum up so far: despite certain contextual diﬀerences, tragedies contain many similarities to real religious practice. We cannot know exactly how the audience’s religious behaviour was aﬀected or altered by the plays, but we must consider tragedy as a religious experience. This means that it is not acceptable to discuss the plays as if they were works of ﬁction. Many readings of tragedy (and epic) are inadequate precisely because they approach the gods as if they were entirely literary constructs— ﬁctional ‘characters’, independent of anything in real life outside the texts. Such a reading has, perhaps, a certain attractiveness, in the light of the numerous unanswered—and unanswerable?— questions which accumulate around ‘real life’. The defender of a purely ‘literary’ interpretation may argue that it is more satisfying—that is, it seems more self-contained; it has fewer gaps; its conclusions are less provisional. But interpretations of this sort miss out too much. We need to consider all the angles together— ritual practice in society, as well as intellectual and literary ideas—even if deﬁnite conclusions cannot be reached. Having said all this, it may seem strange that, in what follows, I am not going to spend very much time considering the rituals of Helen and Iphigenia. There are two reasons for this decision. The ﬁrst is that the work of other scholars in the area has been so thorough that there is nothing substantial to add, in the way of either material or interpretation. The second, more important, reason is that my own reading of the gods and rituals of the escape-tragedies (as I said earlier) takes a rather speciﬁc angle of approach, linked to the intellectualism of the previous chapter. Nevertheless, it is still necessary to ask what the presence of elements from cult ritual added to the audience’s interpretation of the plays. 45 Literary and epigraphic sources are collected by Sourvinou-Inwood (1997) 165–9. Allan (2000a, 238) notes that visual art from the seventh century shows gods behaving in the characteristic manner of epic and other types of poetry—but this does not answer the question of how far visual art represents ‘religion’.

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The signiﬁcance of ritual motifs varies from play to play, but in general it seems that such elements exist in order to make meaningful connections between myth and real-life religion: for example, explaining certain deﬁning features of cult or emphasizing the extent of continuity between past and present. There may be political as well as religious issues at stake. According to Richard Seaford, for example, many tragedies are seen as using ritual to dramatize a historical transition in society, from aristocratic reciprocity to the organization of city-states: a process which results in ‘the communal cohesion of polis ritual’.46 Sometimes (as in Iphigenia) the similarities between myth, plot and contemporary ritual are very pronounced. In other cases, such signiﬁcance as we can appreciate seems to take the form of suggestive images, allusions and underlying structural similarities to ritual, which may add complexity to one’s interpretation without necessarily, or obviously, constituting the main point of the play. Without venturing too far into this area, it is worth making a few brief remarks about the interpretation of rituals in the escape-tragedies. It seems clear that Iphigenia in particular is deeply concerned with ritual. Indeed, the whole play may be read as an extended aetiology of the cults of Artemis at Halae and Brauron. As I have said in an earlier chapter (§3.3 above), Iphigenia explores the process by which the Taurian Artemis was civilized and brought to Greece, and it may go some way towards explaining why her worship contains certain ‘darker’ elements. These aspects of the play have been covered very thoroughly in a number of recent studies.47 Helen’s preoccupation with ritual, on the other hand, is 46

Seaford (1994), esp. 328–405. Strachan (1976) and Sansone (1975) and (1978) are concerned with the theme of sacriﬁce; Lloyd-Jones (1983) deals with a variety of sources other than Euripides in a survey of the cults of Halae and Brauron; Wolﬀ (1992a) tries to interpret the meaning of allusions to ritual in Iphigenia, concluding, interestingly (331), that it is hard to say whether the play reinforces the viability of ritual or creates ambiguity and disturbance; Sourvinou-Inwood (1997, 171–5) tries to reconstruct an ‘ancient reading’ of Iphigenia, in which references to cult are ‘zooming’ devices (I shall return to this view); Cropp (2000, 50–6) provides an admirably concise summary of a huge amount of literary and archaeological evidence for the cults at Brauron and Halae; Scullion (2000) deals brieﬂy with the concluding aetiology; Tzanetou (2000) tries to show that Iphigenia can be understood in the light of ‘underlying structural similarities’ to female rites of passage at Brauron and Mounichia, even though there are no direct parallels or references in the text: she seems to add little to the other works just cited. 47

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less obvious for most of its length. Like Iphigenia, that play concludes with an aetiology which mentions the heroine’s eventual deiﬁcation and cult worship, but in much of what has preceded there has been little interest—in terms of what happens in the plot, at least—in ritual practices. However, it has been argued that Helen’s use of imagery (in particular, its allusions to the myth of Demeter) adds another level of ritual signiﬁcance to the play.48 The ways in which diﬀerent readers identify ‘similarities’ between plays and rituals vary. Where allusions can deﬁnitely be seen, in the form of direct (if ﬂeeting) verbal references to rituals, sanctuaries, signiﬁcant geographical locations, cult titles and attributes of gods, and so on, it is easy to accept that a meaningful connection is being made between drama and real-life religion—even if one might not be able to grasp the full signiﬁcance of the allusion. However, when it is the case that underlying structural parallels (only) are detected, one might be forgiven for adopting a more sceptical or provisional attitude. This is not to say that such interpretations are never valid: quite the opposite.49 It is rather that the same method is, naturally, capable of producing sound and unsound interpretations, without its ever being possible to prove or disprove them. It cannot be said that every supposed ‘underlying similarity’ is equally illuminating. Of course, each individual spectator or 48 Foley (1992): see below for discussion. West (1975), although his interest does not lie speciﬁcally in Euripides’ play, presents a series of structural parallels between the myth(s) of Helen and various Near-Eastern nature myths (including the Rgveda and Latvian folk-songs). He argues that the ‘persistent tradition’ of Helen in Egypt has no organic connection with the saga of Troy, and derives instead from Helen’s status in Spartan ritual as a nature goddess who, like Demeter, had temporary absences corresponding to the seasons. This interpretation is ingenious but, like other ‘underlying’ readings of ritual, ultimately unprovable. 49 Seaford’s (2000) defence of his own method against the criticisms of Griﬃn (1998) is instructive in this regard. See esp. p. 38: ‘The answer to G.’s question “can we really be happy to interpret the plays primarily in the light of something that is mentioned elliptically or not at all?” (53) is (leaving aside the ‘primarily’, which he has introduced to make the view easier to dismiss) a resounding yes. And indeed there are numerous other practices of the Athenian polis that, even though mentioned in tragedy either not at all or far less frequently than herocult is, cannot be ignored by serious interpreters of tragedy: democracy, philosophy, written law, the mysteries, the development of rhetoric, the legal position of women, the Peloponnesian war, to name but a few.’

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reader may interpret the play in front of him in any number of ways; but the vital factor to be considered is, surely, the conceptual framework of the original audience (so far as this can be determined). Would it have occurred to an Athenian of 412 to read Helen and Iphigenia (etc.) in the light of oblique resemblances to rituals? To think this is true, one would need to give the ancient audience a lot of credit for thinking in the same way that modern structuralists do; but there is no evidence that they did. An additional problem (even if we assume for the moment that Euripides’ audience did interpret their dramas in terms of deep structures) is that certain structural models are conceived of in such vague, broad terms that they could, with a little ingenuity, be applied to almost any situation. I am thinking, in particular, of the wide application among critics of van Gennep’s model of Greek rites de passage.50 Van Gennep’s analysis concludes that such rites conform to a tripartite structure, consisting of: (1) separation from the community; (2) a transitional phase; (3) reincorporation into the community. Following this model, Foley interprets the plot of Helen as corresponding to three stages: (1) separation in the form of abduction; (2) a transitional period in Egypt; (3) rescue and reintegration into the civilized world. Foley believes that the particular rites to which Helen corresponds are those of Demeter (whose daughter or counterpart, Kore, similarly, underwent abduction, a transitional period in the lower world, and eventual rescue and return to the upper world).51 This connection is made on the basis of scattered references to Demeter in the text of Helen, as well as the general similarity in their situations, which (Foley believes) may have prompted audience members to draw comparisons between the women.52 However, the allusions are not all that numerous; and the women’s situations are strikingly diﬀerent in some respects. Helen’s ﬂight to Egypt cannot exactly be said to correspond to Kore’s kathodos to the lower world—though she does, admittedly, ﬁnd herself crouching by a tomb at the start of her play—and, as Foley herself notes, Helen is a middle-aged, married woman, whereas Kore is a young virgin. So we cannot be sure—nor can we rule out the 50 51 52

Van Gennep (1960). Foley (1992), esp. 134–5. Helen 167–90, 1301–68. Parallels are noted also by Wolﬀ (1973) 62–8.

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possibility—that (some of) Euripides’ audience would have interpreted Helen’s situation in the light of the Demeter/Kore myth. In the end, Foley settles for a judicious compromise, in which allusions to ritual are seen to ‘bring to each play not a scenario to imitate in any literal fashion, but a set of implications and expectations that colour the action and enrich its signiﬁcance’.53 Foley’s reading is backed up, however provisionally, by the text itself. By contrast, Tzanetou’s application of van Gennep’s schema to the plot of Iphigenia is less convincing because it is not textually grounded.54 Tzanetou begins by identifying three stages of the plot which are said to provide the underlying structure: (1) Iphigenia and Orestes are separated from Argive society; (2) they undergo a transitional period in the Tauric land; (3) they are ﬁnally reintegrated into Greek society. She then asserts that the ritual being evoked is the Arkteia, as practised at the sanctuaries of Brauron and Mounichia. This is of course possible, given the prominence of Artemis in the play as a whole, but (as Tzanetou admits) there is no verbal reference and no direct parallel between the situations. In that case, it is diﬃcult to be convinced by this interpretation. Why should one believe that the Arkteia, in particular, is signiﬁcant? After all, if (as van Gennep claims) many rites shared the same basic structure, how could one ever know, in the absence of any direct sign in the text, which ritual is being referred to? And does it matter? (If, for example, I decided that the ritual of the Tauropolia was the key to understanding Helen, the underlying structures would be exactly the same, but my interpretation distinctly questionable.) Again, the question arises as to who is imagined as perceiving these structures and similarities. As Tzanetou expresses it, Iphigenia’s plot ‘unfolds in accordance with an underlying ritual sequence that evokes the Arkteia’.55 The italicized words (my italics) are crucial, but their meaning is vague. In interpretations of this sort, one must be clear what sort of intellectual activity is under discussion—whether the reaction of (some of? all of?) the audience members, the unknowable intentions of Euripides, or the ingenuity of modern critics who make of the texts whatever they wish. 53 54

Foley (1992) 137. Tzanetou (2000), esp. 201–3.

55

Ibid. 200.

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Whether or not we care for schematic readings, another, less questionable, signiﬁcance of ritual can be seen at the closure of many tragedies. Helen and Iphigenia, in common with various other plays, conclude with aetiological speeches delievered by divine characters ex machina. Such aetiologies are commonly seen as constituting positive, or clearly resolved, endings, which oﬀer a satisfactory outcome of the play’s action in the form of continuity between past and present.56 In what follows, I want to modify this view. Although the plays do often end by aﬃrming the value of ritual to the polis, ritual closure may be interpreted on diﬀerent levels, not all of them positive. It is not just that uncomfortable details and ambiguities very often persist, but also that ritual meaning is to some degree separable from intellectual meaning. Let us begin with those ritual elements which do not quite add up. A fundamental problem in assessing such elements is, as usual, the lack of evidence for Greek cult activity. Whether or not the cult descriptions or allusions in Euripides are factually accurate (a question which we cannot entirely answer), it may be that certain details are deliberately incongruous. The possibility is occasionally raised that Euripides sometimes invents cults, or gives ﬁctional aetiologies for real cults.57 This suggestion is comparable to the view that Euripides invents myths; but it should be taken less seriously, because it is essentially a variation on the view that literature does not represent real religion. Scullion, who argues this viewpoint, defends it, in the ﬁrst place, by arguing that ‘no Athenian could have participated in anything like the full complement of distinct rituals for distinct divinities performed in Attica in a given year, or been familiar with all the aitia traditionally attached to them’.58 He adds that real-life cults were not conservative or unchanging, and that cults could be conceived of as having more than one aition.59 The evidence, such as it is (including passages from 56 Michelini (1987) 107 puts it succinctly: ‘The aition that so often closes Euripidean plays has the . . . eﬀect of reminding the audience that the myth is not only a real event from the past . . . but also a symbolic or signiﬁcant event, diﬀerent from ordinary events, and having deep roots in the religious and civic present.’ Seaford’s (1994) approach to tragedy is based on the positive, aﬃrma57 tory value of ritual. Dunn (1996); Scullion (2000). 58 Scullion (2000) 218. 59 Ibid. 230–1.

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Helen and Iphigenia), can be made to ﬁt Scullion’s hypothesis; but incongruous-seeming details may have made perfect sense to (at least some of) the original audience. There is simply not enough evidence to allow us to decide.60 Tragedy is considered to be one of the few reliable sources for genuine cults: if we start distrusting the evidence of certain tragedies, the implications for our ‘knowledge’ of any cults at all are serious. (Are we to reject only those tragic passages which prima facie seem odd, or are we compelled to reject all drama as a source of evidence?61) In any event, the most eﬀective counter-argument is that Scullion does not oﬀer a reason why Euripides should have chosen to ﬁctionalize real cults. Indeed, it is diﬃcult to imagine such a reason. The closest that Scullion comes to an explanation is the suggestion that Euripides might have done it ‘for literary purposes’ (232): but what literary purposes? This is, essentially, a variant on the commonly found view that Euripides’ outlook on myths or ideas is witty, ludic, clever or provocative; but, as we have already seen, there is usually more to Euripides than this view suggests. One might argue, perhaps, that Euripides’ purpose in altering details of rituals reveals a fundamental disbelief in those rituals or the gods behind them—but this is not a very natural conclusion. If Euripides’ descriptions of real (albeit obscure) cults had been inaccurate, or if the plays had given aetiologies for rituals which nobody at all practised, their eﬀect would have been totally bizarre. Again, it is the reaction of the audience that we must consider: at whom is the ‘meaning’ of the 60 In the case of Iphigenia, Scullion (2000, 226–8) argues that the aetiology of the Choes (945–60) is invented, because there is no other evidence to connect this ritual with pollution; and that the ﬁnal details relating to the Tauropolia at Halae (1446–67) are invented, because this ritual is described diﬀerently elsewhere (Menander, Epitrep. 451–7). Hollinshead (1985), mentioned by Scullion, shows that it is diﬃcult to reconcile Euripides’ evidence with the archaeological evidence. Scullion (p. 220) also thinks that Helen 1664–9, an aetiology for Helen’s receiving worship (qeoxen≤a) along with the Dioscuri, is an invention. The fact that this ritual is also mentioned at Orestes 1635–7 is taken by Scullion as strengthening the case that Euripides invented it; but multiple references are more naturally taken as evidence that the ritual actually did exist. However, in all these cases it seems that the problem of interpretation cannot be separated from the lack of information: we do not know enough about the rituals to tell whether these details are in fact incongruities. 61 Mikalson (1991, 231) implies that it is not safe to treat Euripides as an authoritative source for real-life Athenian cult: it follows from his general approach (outlined above) that no ‘literary’ text can be used in this way.

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play aimed? Assuming that Scullion is right and that certain aetiologies are ﬁctional, how many of the audience members would have appreciated the point? Not very many, if (as he argues) comparatively few of them were familiar with any given cult. This conclusion combines two views, neither of which seems to me to be very attractive: either Euripides is seen to be writing primarily for his own amusement (in the knowledge that he can ‘get away with’ subversive material), or he is seen to be writing primarily for a minority of his audience. I do not take Scullion’s suggestion very seriously. However, there remain certain oddities and incongruities which seem to complicate or undermine the ‘positive’ eﬀect of ritual closure. In both Helen and Iphigenia, as we have seen, the heroines are presented in a distinctly ambivalent manner, at the same time as they are being celebrated in ritual terms. In the aetiology which concludes Helen, Helen’s brothers predict, rather vaguely, that she will share in their cult feast (xen≤a or xenismÎß), but they conspicuously fail to mention a very famous cult of Helen and the Dioscuri at Therapne: the absence of this detail has been thought to undermine the positive, integrative eﬀect of the ritual ending.62 In Iphigenia, important questions about the nature and will of Artemis are left unanswered: what sort of a goddess is it whom the Athenians worship? Does the goddess delight in human sacriﬁce or not? Iphigenia’s contradictory nature as both willing and unwilling participant in the Taurian rites is partially responsible for this uncertainty, as is her statement—never conﬁrmed or denied—that the Taurians have ascribed to Artemis their own murderous habits.63 Wolﬀ’s study of the rituals in Iphigenia sees this unresolved tension as being of central importance to the play: he concludes that the diﬀerent views of ritual constitute a ‘balancing act’, in which it is hard to say whether the play reinforces or questions the viability of ritual.64 One should bear in mind, however, that the cults themselves 62 Helen 1668. For the cult at Therapne, see Alcman fr. 7 PMG, Pindar Pyth. 11.61–4, Isoc. Hel. 63. For discussion of the undermining, or complicating, eﬀect of its omission, see Foley (1992) 147–8. 63 I discuss the theme of human sacriﬁce in §3.3 above (pp. 186–90). See Iphigenia 380–91 for Iphigenia’s statement of (seeming) disbelief: further discussion can be found in Stinton (1976a) 60–89 and Cropp (2000) 201. 64 Wolﬀ (1992), esp. 309, 331.

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were complex entities. The ‘celebration’ of cults should not be imagined as covering every aspect of that word in English usage, nor should an aﬃrmation of the viability of ritual be expected to oﬀer a straightforward explanation of every mystery. A more positive approach to the presence of seemingly disturbing elements is that of Sourvinou-Inwood, who interprets tragic ‘religion’ as a mixture of ‘zooming’ and ‘distancing’ elements. ‘Zooming’ elements are direct verbal references, allusions, images and cult titles, which signalled to the original audience that they should understand the gods of the plays in terms of speciﬁc cults. In Iphigenia, for example, ‘zooming’ devices include (apart from the obvious aetiologies) scattered references here and there to Artemis’ cult title fwsfÎroß, which show that the ‘Artemis’ of the play is to be understood with reference to the ‘Artemis’ of the Attic cults.65 ‘Distancing’ devices, on the other hand, are elements (such as human sacriﬁce) which do not correspond to cult activity. Rather than stressing (as Wolﬀ does) the disturbing lack of homogeneity in the plays’ rituals, Sourvinou-Inwood argues that Euripides’ point was to present to the audience ‘an exploratory construct, through which aspects of their cult are articulated, problematized, and explored’.66 Exploring, she maintains, is not the same thing as criticizing: again, we must try not to look at the problem through JudaeoChristian eyes.67 I think that Sourvinou-Inwood is largely right; but it is still possible to detect a disturbing or ambivalent tone in other ways, which cannot be accounted for with reference to ‘zooming’ and ‘distancing’ techniques. One way is to be found in the mechanics of the plot: it is not the details of the ritual that are incongruous, but the manner in which closure is brought about. At the end of Helen, for example, the gods who appear to round oﬀ the action might seem an odd choice. As usual in tragedy, the epiphany is appropriate to the play’s action and themes in one obvious sense: the Dioscuri, as Helen’s brothers and sons of Zeus, with their role in Spartan cult, are clearly relevant.68 However, there is a 65

Iphigenia 21, 1097–105. Sourvinou-Inwood (1997) 175. 67 Ibid. 185. 68 In Iphigenia, also, Athena’s connection to the city of Athens where the cults are to be established makes her appropriate. Athena had a similar role to play in the aetiologies of the Oresteia, Orestes, Ion, Suppliant Women and Erechtheus, in 66

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note of discord, since the play has led us to believe that Castor and Polydeuces were either dead or catasterized (neither of which tales, it now seems, is true).69 Can we really believe in these gods, or the evidence of our own eyes and ears? The unusual abruptness with which both Helen and Iphigenia end has also been thought to undermine their overall eﬀect of ‘resolution’. When it seems that events have reached impasse, the gods suddenly appear from nowhere and shout ‘Stop!’ (ƒp≤sceß, paısai)—an extremely emphatic and unusual technique.70 What strikes one is its artiﬁciality: the endings have been imposed in what seems a perfunctory manner.71 Has the action really been rounded oﬀ, in any satisfactory sense? Has resolution really been achieved? Perhaps not—but a god willed it. The last couple of sentences above could be seen as summing up the gods’ role and function in the whole escape-trilogy. It also brings us to the other reason (apart from assorted and variously plausible ‘incongruities’) why ritual closure does not entirely provide positive, resolved endings. As I stated above, the plays’ ‘ritual meaning’ is separable from their ‘intellectual meaning’. It seems to me that there is nearly always a discrepancy between ritual resolution and theological irresolution. The escapeall of which she is connected with Attic institutions. Cropp (2000, 260), Allan (2000a, 250–8) and Dunn (1996, 63) all remark on the signiﬁcance of Athena, to make it clear that these plays with their diverse settings are nevertheless connected to Attica. 69 Helen 137–40. See §4.4.5 above. Deiﬁcation and catasterism need not be seen as mutually exclusive categories—it may be that the Dioscuri, as gods, were at liberty to assume diﬀerent forms from time to time—but the play’s presentation of this issue remains ambiguous and misleading. 70 At Helen 1642, Castor’s ﬁrst word from the mechane, to Theoclymenus, is ƒp≤sceß. The entry of the Dioscuri is doubly striking from the point of view of staging, since it appears that the actors were swung in on horseback (dummy horses?—see Dale [1967] ad loc.). Wooden horses, at the end of a play where echoes of the Trojan War have been accumulating thick and fast (see §4.4.3 above), may add a further level of disturbing signiﬁcance. Athena’s words to Thoas at Iphigenia 1435–7 are: po∏, po∏ diwgmÏn tÎnde porqme»eiß, £nax | QÎaß; £kouson t[sd’ !qhna≤aß lÎgouß. | paısai di*kwn Âeım3 t’ ƒxorm0n stratoı (‘Where, where are you taking this pursuit, King Thoas? Hear these words of Athena: put a stop to your pursuit and hold back the ﬂood of your forces’). The only comparably abrupt ending is that of Ion (1320). See Dunn (1996) for further discussion. 71 Some, indeed, argue that all epiphanies ex machina are to be interpreted as ironic, on the grounds that they resemble nothing at all in real-life, experienced Greek religion. See Parker (1999) 22 (with n. 41).

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tragedies (along with many other tragedies) leave one with a feeling that the problems of morality and divine justice have not been solved by the imposition of ritual, and that the value of these rituals is to be questioned in the light of the nature of the gods and of human belief. These two diﬀerent levels of religious meaning, the ritual and the intellectual, should be seen in juxtaposition to each other—a combination of ‘positive’ ritual and ‘negative’ theology. Tragedy uses ritual to conﬁrm the political and religious authority of the city, while at the same time acknowledging that the gods can never really be understood in intellectual terms. The plays’ closure is ultimately ambivalent, both resolved and unresolved.72 As with so many other elements in the escape-tragedies, Euripides has created a situation only to undermine it. To conclude, then: if we are going to understand, or attempt to understand, the role of religion in our plays, we must examine the literary as well as the ritual angle. In the next section, I shall turn to the theological views expressed by the characters, and suggest a possible method for interpreting those views. 5.3 making sense of the universe I am interested in the escape-tragedies’ theology in terms of the characters’ strategies of interpretation. As the characters act and suﬀer, they try to comprehend what is happening, and to situate their experience in a wider, metaphysical context. However, it is a diﬃcult task—for characters and audience alike—to make sense of the universe. If one examines all the theological and cosmological views expressed by the characters, one ﬁnds an incoherent, muddled and contradictory collection of ideas. I want to suggest, in the light of the previous chapter, that this incoherence is precisely the point—and that the reason behind it is somewhat more subtle than the supposed atheism or agnosticism of the playwright. Rather, it seems that the plays are exploring theological discourse as an epistemological theme. The characters’ words relating to the gods, fate and luck reveal 72 This type of interpretation is a compromise between ‘ritualist’ interpretations and Taplin’s (1986 and 1996) view of tragedy’s generic predilection for ‘open’ endings and unanswered questions (see §1.1 above).

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another aspect of the limitations of human knowledge and of the uselessness of words to express reality. To put it brieﬂy: there is often a large diﬀerence between what the characters and chorus members say about the gods, fate and luck and what is really true about gods, fate and luck (to judge by the words of the divine characters and the events themselves). Irony is therefore of central importance—but not the ‘irony’ of Verrall et al.,73 which is based on inscrutable ‘hidden meanings’ aimed at subversive intellectuals. Rather, meaning is created through the tension between, on one hand, the apparent meaning of the characters’ words and, on the other, the way in which their explanations are borne out by the eventual outcome of the play.74 Some of the characters’ words might seem to be more authoritative or accurate than others. For example, the prologuespeeches, with which Helen and Iphigenia (along with many other tragedies) open,75 are deceptively reliable as a source of meaning. Like the messenger-speeches, they are more akin to narrative than to drama in mode, which causes them to appear more objective, and simple to interpret, than the bulk of the lines of dialogue. In these prologue-speeches, the characters deliver what purports to be authoritative accounts of mythical history and genealogy, including the reasons (divine and human) why things are as they are. Helen and Iphigenia explain exactly what has happened to them and why, assuming, for the duration of the prologue, a sort of temporary omniscience (or, at least, seeming omniscience) which they later on abandon.76 This ‘omniscience’ is a convention of the genre, which has practical uses in terms of 73

See p. 344 and n. 24 above. Compare the approach of Budelmann (2000, 139) to Sophoclean gods: ‘I will look for the gods not so much in the events of a play . . . but rather pay close attention to how characters speak about the gods.’ Of course, the problems of the Sophoclean critic are somewhat diﬀerent from those of the Euripidean, because the gods scarcely ever appear in person in Sophocles’ plays: ‘critics have therefore tried to grasp Sophocles’ gods mostly where they see nothing but their traces’ (ibid. 134). 75 See p. 158 (with n. 3) above. 76 Goward (1999, 1–26) also discusses ‘authoritative’ prologue-narratives. In plays which have divine prologue-speakers (Hippolytus, Alcestis, Bacchae, Trojan Women, Ion), the interpretative status of their words is rather diﬀerent, but there is still the possibility of irony or (most importantly) statements which are misleading or only selectively revealing. 74

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the exposition of plot; but nevertheless it may be revealing or suggestive in other ways. It is hard to know just how to interpret it, or to reconcile their temporary omniscience with their later ignorance. Probably we are meant to accept it as a convention without questioning its realism too closely; but it causes problems if we want to assess the extent to which the human characters really understand what is happening to them. This is certainly the case in the prologue of Helen, where Helen seems to have knowledge of the plans of Zeus and the real cause of the Trojan War (t¤ d’ aˆ DiÏß | boule»mat’ £lla to∏sde sumba≤nei kako∏ß, 36–7), as well as a prophecy of Hermes (56–8) which stated that she will be reunited with Menelaus and return to Sparta. However, even elsewhere in the prologue her acquaintance with Zeus seems limited (she does not even know for sure whether or not he is her father), and later on in the play she seems to have no knowledge at all of the gods’ workings, relying on Theonoe for (unhelpful) advice in this area. Also the prophecy of Hermes is later ignored: Teucer’s false report of Menelaus’ death causes Helen to disbelieve it (277), even though one would have thought that the direct word of a god was more authoritative than that of a man. There is a dramatic reason for the rejection of the prophecy: the plot requires excitement and tension, whereas Hermes’ words eﬀectively remove all threat to the heroine and her husband. But, in that case, Euripides need not have included the detail at all. The fact that he did reinforces the point that humans cannot comprehend reality. Even when the evidence is there, in the form of direct revelation from the gods, people persist in misunderstanding or ignoring this evidence. The choral songs of tragedy present themselves as another particularly authoritative source of meaning. They seem to provide moments of insight and clariﬁcation in between the episodes, exploring the wider ramiﬁcations of what has happened. In particular, the chorus tends to make causal links between past and present, frequently oﬀering reasons on a cosmic scale.77 However, the attempts of the chorus to ﬁnd meaning turn out to be no more reliable than those of any other 77 e.g. Helen 214–6, 758–60, 1137–50, 1688–92; Iphigenia 196–202, 1117–22, 1234–82; Andromeda fr. 119–20, 137, 152, 153 (all of these fragments quoted by Stobaeus for their gnomic properties).

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human characters. It is not just that their sweeping generalities may have little to do with the particular situation, but also that they resort to exactly the same range of explanations as everyone else.78 In general, when the gods appear in plays as characters and speak lines, we might think that their words represent a deﬁnitive, authoritative meaning. This is, largely, true—but with the important qualiﬁcation that the gods, or their prophets, are often selective as to how much information, or how much clariﬁcation, they oﬀer. In many cases, the full extent of the gods’ will, or the full meaning of the oracle (etc.), becomes clear only at the end of the play, if at all.79 These general remarks apply equally to the escape-tragedies, where the situation is relatively uncomplicated: there are no divine manifestations (except indirectly, in the form of dreams and oracles) before the ﬁnal epiphanies of the Dioscuri and Athena.80 Each of these types of utterance has what might be called a diﬀerent interpretative status. None of them can be said to give direct access to the meaning of life, the universe and everything; but in general it seems safe to assume that the words of the deities have the highest status. Ultimately, the audience members interpret theological ‘meaning’ by weighing up all these words and appearances against each other and against their own knowledge of the myths. In the remainder of this chapter, I shall illustrate this process, outlining the ways in which the characters hopelessly and incoherently try to make sense of things, and the diﬀerence between their words and the truth. Attitudes to prophecy are as good a place as any from which to start. In tragedy in general, and Helen and Iphigenia in particular, the revealed word of god always turns out to be true, but (despite this) it is usually subjected to severe disbelief or doubt.81 78 Cf. Dodds (1929) 80: ‘The opinions hardest to assess are those of the Chorus. It is certain that in many cases the Chorus are content to draw the conventional moral from the events of the play, although it is equally certain that this was not the moral that Euripides meant us to draw.’ 79 Cf. Parker (1999) on the inscrutability of Sophocles’ gods, especially in the matter of revelations of divine will: ‘in the admittedly small sample the gods prove very economical as to how much they will or can reveal’ (p. 13). 80 With the partial exception of the words of the phantom (Helen 608–14). 81 Is there a topical reference to prophets in Helen and Iphigenia? Thucydides (8.1) describes the Athenians’ hostility in 413–2 to the prophets who had played a role in the sending of the Sicilian expedition. No doubt some of the members

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I have already mentioned Helen’s changing attitude to the word of Hermes, as well as (in §4.4.4 above) the uselessness of the prophetic Theonoe’s advice to Helen; but far more important in Helen is the attitude of the disillusioned Greek servant. Realizing that the prophecy of Calchas led the Greeks to war for nothing, he attacks not only Calchas but the art of prophecy in general, in a speech which begins: πstai t3d’, _nax, åll3 toi t¤ m3ntewn ƒse∏don „ß faıl’ ƒst≥ ka≥ yeud0n plva . . .82 It shall be so, master; but I now realize how shabby a business, and how full of lies, is prophecy . . .

There is nothing healthy about inspecting burnt-oﬀerings; only a fool would think (the word doke∏n again) that prophecy helps mortals . . . the servant’s words are a vehement denunciation of the prophetic art. He cannot understand why Calchas did not tell them that the Trojan War was pointless—was it because the god did not want them to know? The speech concludes: e÷poiß £n, o\nec’ Ø qeÏß oÛk ]bo»leto. t≤ d[ta manteuÎmeqa; to∏ß qeo∏si cr¶ q»ontaß, ajte∏n ågaq3, mante≤aß d’ ƒ$n. b≤ou g¤r £llwß dvlear hËrvqh tÎde, koÛde≥ß ƒplo»ths’ ƒmp»roisin årgÏß •n. gn*mh d’ år≤sth m3ntiß ~ t’ eÛboul≤a. You might say that it all happened because the god did not want us to know—but why, in that case, do we consult prophets? We should make sacriﬁces to the gods, and request that they grant us good things, but leave prophecy alone. It is a worthless thing, invented to entice us; but no idle man has ever become rich through divination. Good sense and sound judgement are the best prophets.

There is an element here of criticism of the gods (to∏ß qeo∏si cr¶ . . .), but the speech is more obviously an attack on human attempts to understand the gods than an attack on the gods themselves. The six lines quoted above (751–7), along with certain of the audience would have made a connection between the play and real life in this respect (the view of Mikalson [1991] 110); but, as Dale (1967, 118) and Cropp (2000, 213) point out, a sceptical attitude to prophecy is found in tragedies of all periods. 82 Helen 744–57. On all textual points raised by this passage see Dale (1967) and Kannicht (1969, vol. 2) ad loc.

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others in the speech, are deleted by Diggle and others, on the grounds that the train of thought is confused and there are too many gnomic platitudes. However, one should not be too quick to excise lines: in this case, there are at least a couple of reasons for thinking that the incoherence is deliberate, adding to, rather than detracting from, the eﬀect. First, it may be that it is a means of characterizing the servant as a foolish, emotional old man: Dale notes that a similar technique is sometimes used by Euripides elsewhere (but she deletes lines 746–8, 752 and 755–7 anyway).83 More importantly, incoherence and desperate moralizing are not conﬁned to the words of this character, but (as I am arguing) can be seen as characterizing the presentation of ideas on the whole.84 I should follow Kannicht and Murray in retaining all the lines. Calchas’ name is also mentioned in the prologue of Iphigenia (15–16), where Iphigenia describes the storm at Aulis and the prophet’s revelation that Iphigenia must be sacriﬁced. Here no notably pejorative tone attaches to the craft or motivation of the seer, but it is clear that, as often, Calchas’ prophecy is selective and partial, revealing only a small fraction of future events. The same is true of the most prominent prophecy in Iphigenia, the word of Apollo to Orestes. This oracle is ﬁrst mentioned by Orestes, in tones of frustration and uncertainty, shortly after his ﬁrst appearance on stage. He begins with the question: _ Fo∏be, po∏ m’ aˆ t&nd’ ƒß £rkun ‡gageß | cr&saß; (‘O Phoebus, where have you led me this time—into this snare—with your oracle? 77–8). Orestes cannot make sense of his suﬀerings. Although, as he will go on to explain, he has already wandered far and wide, he has once again been forced to make a voyage, this time into a snare (as he sees the bleak and hostile Taurian land). His wanderings will, he trusts, eventually lead to puriﬁcation from his matricidal stain, but in the meantime he can only place blind faith in Apollo, not knowing what is in store. Apollo’s instructions, we learn, are 83

e.g. the same servant at Helen 726–7; cf. the Nurse at Medea 119–30. However, this does raise a methodological problem which is diﬃcult to solve. Textual emendation is often carried out on the basis of improving coherence; but if we assume that Euripides is adopting incoherence as a deliberate stylistic device, this makes the decision whether or not to emend almost impossible (an unusual variation on the rule diﬃcilior lectio potior?). Mossman (2001) deals with a similar problem relating to women’s speech in Eur. El. 84

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baﬄingly incomplete (tÏ d’ ƒnqvnd’ oÛd†n ƒrr&qh pvra, ‘nothing was said about what would follow’, 91), but Orestes has no choice but to follow them. The manner in which Orestes expresses his adherence to Apollo’s will strikes me as markedly odd (120–1): oÛ g¤r tÏ toı qeoı g’ a÷tioß gen&somai pese∏n £crhston qvsfaton. I shall certainly not be held responsible for the failure of Apollo’s oracle.

If this version of the text (Heath’s emendation, adopted by Diggle and Cropp) is correct, Orestes is made to emphasize that he will not be the cause of the failure of the prophecy. The image of humans consciously striving to perform actions which have been predestined by a god—so as not to bring the god’s name into disrepute (?)—is most unusual. (Cropp likens this to Orestes’ later view that the gods will be more likely to help those who exert themselves,85 but this is, surely, a somewhat diﬀerent point.) One might perhaps be tempted to alter the text back to a÷tion gen&setai (the manuscript reading), in which case a translation would run: ‘Apollo for his part will not be the cause of the failure of his word.’ But even this is problematic: in this case the train of thought is disrupted, since 119 and 121–2 are concerned with the men’s own eﬀorts, not those of the god. On balance, although it contains an irregular point of view, it may be preferable to retain a÷tioß gen&somai, on the grounds that a similar point of view is expressed by Iphigenia in her prayer to Artemis later on in the play (1084–5): s0sÎn me ka≥ nın toısde t’: ∂ tÏ Lox≤ou oÛkvti broto∏si di¤ s’ ƒt&tumon stÎma. Rescue me now, and these people too!—otherwise because of you the word of Apollo will no longer be true for mortals.

This request for divine help sounds almost like blackmail— unless Artemis rescues the Greeks, no one will trust Apollo’s oracle. Both this prayer and Orestes’ words contain the same jumble of ideas. They ignore the fact that oracles always turn 85 Iphigenia 910–11: ∂n dv tiß prÎqumoß Ái, | sqvnein tÏ qe∏on m$llon ejkÎtwß πcei. A similar sentiment is expressed at Eur. El. 80–1.

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out to be true, and that, if events really are predestined, they will happen whether or not one makes an eﬀort. And, if Apollo’s word may be false, what is the point of trying to prove it true? As in the case of Hermes’ prophecy in Helen, attitudes to Apollo’s oracle ﬂuctuate at diﬀerent points during the play. It is in times of special distress or perplexity that characters tend towards doubt and disbelief. Although Orestes begins, as we have seen, by aﬃrming his faith in Apollo, he wavers when it seems that he will be killed by Iphigenia. The gods, he now says, may appear to be wise, but they are no less deceptive than dreams (oÛd’ oÈ sofo≤ ge da≤moneß keklhmvnoi | pthn0n øne≤rwn ejs≥n åyeudvsteroi, 570–1); and only a little later he directly accuses Apollo of being a liar (Óm$ß d’ Ø Fo∏boß m3ntiß ¯n ƒye»sato, 711). However adamant Orestes’ asseverations, it is clear that confusion, rather than genuine disbelief, lies behind them, since, immediately after calling the gods false, he adds that there is much confusion in divine and human aﬀairs: polŸß taragmÏß πn te to∏ß qe≤oiß πni | kån to∏ß brote≤oiß, 572–3).86 In the end, it turns out that Apollo’s word is, after all, true. This fact is conﬁrmed by the events of the play and celebrated in the play’s third stasimon (1231–82), which contrasts divine omniscience with human ignorance. Even when the gods have provided (partial) clariﬁcation through their word, the human characters are at a loss. Their misunderstanding is, naturally, far more profound when there is no direct clue who or what is responsible for events. In all three escape-tragedies, the haphazard and unsatisfactory explanations to which the characters resort include—more or less indiscriminately, separately or in combination—named individual gods,87 anonymous ‘god’ or ‘gods’ (qeÎß or qeo≤),88 86

These lines are deleted by Cropp (2000, ad loc.) on the grounds that they are unconnected with 570–1. But here again the lack of connection has a point (see n. 84 above). 87 Helen 2, 31, 36, 44–6, 238, 261, 569, 586, 608, 670, 672, 700, 878–91, 964, 960, 1025–7, 1093, 1441, 1495, 1584–8; Iphigenia 354, 711–3, 747–62, 782–8, 936–7, 1012–15, 1082, 1234–82, 1398, 1416; Andromeda fr. 122, 136, 151. 88 Helen 74, 119, 273, 560, 640, 663, 700, 878, 930; Iphigenia 388, 560, 572, 895, 909–11, 1230–4; Andromeda fr. 153. On this ‘vague’, anonymous use of qeÎß, see Jones (1913).

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unspeciﬁed ‘powers’ (da≤moneß or da≤mwn),89 ‘destiny’ (pÎtmoß),90 ‘fate’ (mo∏ra),91 and ‘chance’ (t»ch).92 It would take many pages to discuss every one of these passages, but a few examples from Helen will suﬃce to illustrate the contradictory and overdetermined scheme of causation which the plays present. Helen, wondering why her life has been so miserable from the start, blames two factors (as it seems, more or less equally): on one hand Hera, and on the other her beauty, is responsible (t¤ m†n di’ ﬁHran, t¤ d† tÏ k3lloß a÷tion, 261). However, just a few lines earlier she implied that a third factor, her destiny, was involved (f≤lai guna∏keß, t≤ni pÎtmwi sunez»ghn; 255). Elsewhere, Helen says that the gods, as a plural, unnamed collective, were responsible for her imprisonment in Egypt (qeo≤ m’ åfidr»santo g[ß | ƒß b3rbar’ ‡qh, 273–4). Menelaus, when he ﬁnally appears, confuses the situation further. His bewilderment, although exaggerated in the interests of characterization, in some sense mirrors the audience’s own diﬃculty in making sense of events. We have already encountered Menelaus’ notion that there must be two Zeuses;93 now one might add that, at the end of his speech about the dual nature of appearances, Menelaus comforts himself with a gnomic reﬂection about necessity that makes no reference at all to the gods: lÎgoß g3r ƒstin oÛk ƒmÎß, sof0n dv tou, | dein[ß ån3gkhß oÛd†n jsc»ein plvon (‘there is a saying—not my own, but some wise man’s—that there is no force stronger than dread necessity’, 513–14). Later still, after more baﬄing revelations, Menelaus declares, overconﬁdently, that he understands the workings of the divine (]isqÎmhn t¤ t[ß qeoı, 653), and that everything that has happened is a ‘present’ from the gods (p3nta d0ra daimÎnwn, 89 Helen 455, 1075; Iphigenia 157, 202–4, 267, 391, 570, 913–5; Andromeda fr. 140, 152. 90 Helen 255, 669, 1115, 1286; Iphigenia 864, 913. 91 Helen 212, 1318; Iphigenia 207; Andromeda fr. 122, 152. 92 Helen 27, 146, 163, 180, 236, 264, 267, 277, 285, 293, 304, 321, 345, 360, 403, 412, 417, 463, 565, 645, 699, 715, 719, 738, 742, 855, 857, 891, 925, 1030, 1082, 1143, 1195, 1197, 1213, 1249, 1290–1, 1296, 1300, 1369, 1374, 1409, 1424, 1445, 1450, 1636; Iphigenia 15, 89, 329, 352, 441, 473, 475, 478, 489, 500, 501, 511, 535, 560, 607, 616, 630, 647, 694, 722, 837, 841, 850, 851, 867, 874, 907, 909, 958, 1003, 1065, 1067, 1121, 1183, 1209, 1232, 1265, 1321, 1410, 1481, 1490; Andromeda fr. 115, 136, 138, 140, 142, 143, 150, 153, 154. These ﬁgures include forms of tugc3nw, eÛtuc≤a, dustuc≤a (etc.): see n. 100 below. 93 Helen 491–2: discussed at greater length in §4.4 above.

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663)—but he still cannot understand why Hera would want to ruin him and his wife (ﬁHra; t≤ n0in cr&izousa prosqe∏nai kakÎn; 673). The barbarian characters also make widely diﬀering attempts to explain events, with about as much success. Theonoe’s conception of the universe, bizarrely, involves ajq&r (‘ether’) and noıß (‘intellect’) in addition to—or perhaps instead of?—gods.94 When Helen has ﬁnally made her escape, Theoclymenus and his servant explain her actions with reference to diﬀerent abstract forces: chance brought her to Egypt, but necessity took her away again (QE. åll’ πdwken Ó t»ch moi. DM. tÏ de cre°n åfe≤leto, 1636). None of these explanations, considered individually or all together, brings about clariﬁcation. It is when the various supernatural forces are mentioned in relation to each other that the characters’ confusion is most evident. The precise status of each force or deity, the relative power of each, and the way in which these forces work together all remain obscure, despite (or perhaps because of) these elaborate, often emotional explanations. Among the most memorable of such expressions of bewilderment are the words of the chorus in the ﬁrst stasimon of Helen: Òti qeÏß ∂ m¶ qeÏß ∂ tÏ mvson t≤ß fhs’ ƒreun3saß brot0n; makrÎtaton pvraß h˜ren ß t¤ qe0n ƒsor$i deıro ka≥ aˆqiß ƒke∏se ka≥ p3lin åmfilÎgoiß phd0nt’ ånelp≤stoiß t»caiß [. . .] oÛd’ πcw †t≤ tÏ safvß Òti pot’ ƒn broto∏ß tÏ t0n qe0n πpoß ålaq†ß e˜ron†. What is a god, and what is not a god, and what is in between? Can any human say, even when he has investigated the question? The man who observes the workings of the divine leaping this way and that and back again, in confusing, unexpected changes of fortune—it is he who is closest to an answer. [ . . .] But I cannot answer the question clearly; concerning the gods I can ﬁnd no true account among men (1137–42; 1148–50).

This is a frank statement, not of disbelief, but of ignorance: the chorus are admitting defeat. It is acknowledged that the gods 94 Helen 1013–16 (quoted and discussed in §4.3 above). These are the lines which Sansone (1985, 27) calls ‘eschatological mumbo-jumbo’.

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exist, but that they are are completely baﬄing; and they are thought to be linked somehow to fortune (though the form of expression, and the connection of t¤ qe0n to t»ch, is vague). The changeability and unpredictability of the divine is clearly thought to be one of the obstacles to knowledge. Compare the reﬂection of the Greek servant a little earlier in the play (711–15): Ø qeÏß „ß πfu ti poik≤lon ka≥ dustvkmarton, eˆ dv pwß p3nta strvfei ƒke∏se kåke∏s’ ånafvrwn: Ø m†n pone∏, Ø d’ oÛ pon&saß aˆqiß Ôllutai kak0ß, bvbaion oÛd†n t[ß åe≥ t»chß πcwn.95 How subtle, and how diﬃcult to interpret, is the god! Somehow he directs everything for the best, moving the pieces around this way and that. One man toils, while another does no work and then perishes wretchedly; he can never rely on fortune at all.

Again, this time even more vaguely, the power of the god (anonymous qeÎß, more or less equivalent to tÏ qe∏on) is somehow seen to be connected with that of fortune (t»ch). The word ånafvrwn, a metaphor from the game of draughts,96 also connotes the unpredictable. The same inscrutability and changeability is expressed, in almost identical language, in a fragment of choral song from Andromeda (fr. 152), where the chorus link the divine power not to fortune but to fate (mo∏ra):97 tÏ daimÎnion oÛc Ør$iß †Òphi mo∏ra diexvrcetai;† strvfei d’ £llouß £llos’ ejß Åmvran. Do you not see the divine power—how fate is working its purpose out? It moves diﬀerent people in diﬀerent directions from day to day.

However, in another fragment which may be from the same song (fr. 153), qeÎß and t»ch are connected, to strengthen—or further obscure—the same argument:  m†n Ôlbioß Án, tÏn d’ åpvkruyen qeÏß ƒk ke≤nwn t0n pote lampr0n: 95 Diggle deletes 713–15, again on the grounds of obscurity of thought: see comments on Helen 751–7 above. 96 Noted by Griﬃth (1953) 38: cf. Heraclitus (DK22 B52), Plat. Rep. 487b. Elsewhere in tragedy, the gods’ unpredictable will is likened to the throw of dice: Aesch. Seven 414, Eur. Suppl. 330–1, Rhesus 183, 446. 97 Cf. Eur. Suppl. 331, Meleager fr. 536 Nauck for similar expressions.

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ne»ei b≤otoß, ne»ei d† t»ch kat¤ pneım’ ånvmwn. While one man prospers, the god keeps another away from his former distinction. Life nods its head, fortune nods her head, along with the breath of the winds.

The detail about the mutability of human fortunes, hardly an original observation, is nevertheless expressed in very similar terms to those of Helen 713–15 (quoted above). The important observation to be made is that the same eﬀect is attributed, in the space of a few lines, to four diﬀerent causes (tÏ daimÎnion, mo∏ra, qeÎß, t»ch), without its being at all clear how these forces interact. (Incidentally, it is interesting to note that the image of gusts of wind is used of the unpredictability of life and fortune both in this passage from Andromeda and in Iphigenia: another meaningful link between the escape-plays.98) Like so many ‘meaningful’ proverbs about human life, the eﬀect of these generalities may strike us as either profound or banal. But, unlike many gnomic statements, they do not embody an ultimate moral certainty so much as the postponement of a deﬁnite answer. Not only the passages just quoted but various others reﬂect on the close connection, or as it might be the division of power, between the gods and fortune (t»ch). Before looking at these passages, it is worth noting that t»ch is in fact the most frequent explanation to which the characters (in all three plays) resort.99 In general, t»ch, tugc3nw and related words occur far more frequently in Euripides than in Sophocles or Aeschylus, and there are more occurrences in Helen and Iphigenia than almost any other extant play of Euripides.100 Even Andromeda is notable for the number of appearances of t»ch-words—in nine of its 98 See §3.4 (pp. 206–11) above for the signiﬁcance of winds and waves in the escape-tragedies. 99 References are provided in n. 92 above. 100 The words t»ch, tugc3nw, eÛt»chma, eÛtucvw, eÛtuc≤a, eÛtuc&ß, eÛtuc0ß, dustucvw, dustuc≤a, dustuc&ß, dustuc0ß and tuchrÎß occur in Helen 47 times and in Iphigenia 42 times. Only Ion (52) and Phoen. (47) match or excel this number; in other plays, the frequency is less, though often markedly high (Alc. 30, Andromeda 29, Bacch. 13, Cyc. 3, El. 24, Hec. 37, Hcld. 34, Hipp. 37, Heracles 37, Iph. at Aulis 38, Med. 28, Or. 40, Suppl. 28, Tro. 37, Rhes. 16). By contrast, t»ch-words occur signiﬁcantly less on average in the plays of Aeschylus (PV 16, Seven 17, Suppl. 13, Pers. 10, Ag. 33, Ch. 20, Eum. 10) and Sophocles (Phil. 13, OC 21, Ant. 14, Trach. 11, OT 29, El. 30, Aj. 19).

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forty-three fragments.101 This frequency has led certain critics, not unreasonably, to think that Euripides sees t»ch as being a particularly important force at work within the plays. Solmsen, followed by several others, even describes Helen and Iphigenia as ‘t»ch-plays’, in which t»ch is the dominant factor.102 Burnett argues that Iphigenia ‘takes the role of accident in human life more seriously than any other Euripidean tragedy does’,103 and she tries to show that ‘chance has . . . a curious, semi-demonic power’,104 stronger than humans but weaker than the gods. Whitman, similarly, writes that Iphigenia ‘is built on a wonderfully intricate interweaving of the forces of tyche and techne, chance and intrigue’.105 Recently, Cropp echoes these interpretations, writing of the importance of t»ch in Iphigenia as ‘the prevailing uncertainty of human experience’. In his view, the play teaches that ‘humans must manage their luck and their relations with the gods as best they can despite their limitations. The realization of this is an important ethical element of the play’.106 These and other scholars, like Euripides’ characters, take t»ch seriously as a supernatural power operating in the world. I want to suggest that we would understand the concept better if we viewed it, along with all the other interpretative strategies, as problematic and unsatisfactory. The very meaning of the word, both in tragedy and in other types of text, is vague, changeable and hard to pin down. In general, t»ch can mean success,107 good fortune,108 bad or change101 Andromeda fr. 115, 136, 138, 140, 142, 143, 150, 153, 154. This very high number may not, of course, be representative of the whole play (the tendency of doxographers to quote gn0mai, which by their nature contain more references to supernatural forces, may be responsible for the selection and survival of these and no other fragments), but at least it is highly suggestive. 102 Solmsen (1934b); Busch (1937); Matthiessen (1964) 180–5. 103 Burnett (1971) 66. 104 Burnett (1971) 69. She sees the power of t»ch especially in the storm which almost prevents the Greeks’ escape at the end of the play: ‘the report of the wave seems to testify to the existence of an unidentiﬁed force at large in creation, a force strong enough to destroy with ease the noblest of human achievements, but weak enough to be set aside by god with an even greater ease.’ 105 106 Whitman (1974) 51. Cropp (2000) 37–9. 107 Homeric Hymn to Athena 11.5; Pind. Ol. 13.115; Soph. Phil. 775; Eur. El. 593–5. (Here and in the notes that follow I give just a small sample of the many examples of each meaning.) 108 Pind. Ol. 8.67, Py. 8.53, Nem. 6.24; Bacchylides 17.130–2; Solon fr. 31 West; PMG fr. adesp. 882; Hdt. 1.118.2; Aesch. Ag. 668; Eur. El. 890–2.

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able fortune,109 or (often, but not always, in the plural) any situation or state of aﬀairs that comes into being.110 From an early stage, t»ch was conceived of as not only an abstract concept but also a living being, most usually a goddess,111 though cult worship of T»ch is not attested until the fourth century, and T»ch never appears as a divine character in drama until the time of New Comedy.112 The most important, and the most imprecise, feature of its meaning(s) is that t»ch is used to signify both cause and eﬀect—the powers that cause things to happen, as well as the circumstances which these powers bring about.113 Various examples of these diﬀerent senses of t»ch can be seen in the escape-plays. It carries the sense of ‘good fortune’ in the words of the chorus to Pylades, congratulating him on his prospective escape;114 likewise, the chorus in Helen express the opinion that future ‘good fortune’ is enough to compensate for past misery.115 At one point, Helen uses the word in a neutral 109 Thuc. 1.78.2; 1.144.4; Aesch. Ag. 333, 1058–9; Eur. Hec. 492, 785–6, 821, 956; Hcld. 714; Alc. 889; Rhes. 728; Ion 1512; Heracles 480. 110 Hdt. 7.236.2; Soph. Phil. 1317. 111 Homeric Hymn to Demeter 2.420; Hes. Theog. 349–62; Pind. Ol. 12.1–2; Empedocles (DK 31 B103); Soph. OT 1080; Chaeremon (TGF I [Snell] 71 fr. 2). Greek orthography often makes it diﬃcult to tell whether a personiﬁed god or an abstraction is the intended meaning: is it t»ch (lower-case tau) or T»ch (upper-case tau)? See e.g. Eur. Hipp. 1105–6, Ion 1512–5; Gorgias, Encomium of Helen (DK 82 B11) §6. The problem is discussed at length by Kershaw (1986) 1.1–26. Personiﬁed T»ch is very rare in tragedy, for reasons which I shall go on to mention. 112 Cult-worship of Tyche: IG II2 333c (a shrine of !gaq¶ T»ch in Athens in 335 bc); shrines also at Megara (Paus. 1.43.6), Sicyon (Paus. 2.7.5), Olympia (Paus. 5.15.6). See Nilsson (1948) 85–6 on tyche as a stage in ‘secularizing’ religion. In Menander’s Aspis, Tyche speaks the ‘postponed prologue’, 97–148; cf. also frs. 517 and 630. See Gomme and Sandbach (1973) 73–4 on Menander’s characterization of Tyche in relation to the fourth-century intellectual context. The rise of t»ch in the fourth century seems to signify a major change in attitudes to the gods and the supernatural. The politician and philosopher Demetrius of Phaleron (FGH 228 F39) wrote an essay On Tyche, asking who, ﬁfty years previously, could have foreseen such changes in circumstances or people’s attitudes. However, it should be noted that the personiﬁcation of abstractions in general was becoming more frequent in the fourth century. 113 Remarked upon by Giannopoulou (2000, 257), apropos of Ion 67 (‘factum’) and 1514 (‘agens’): she concludes that in Ion the role of t»ch, in relation to that of the gods, is left deliberately ambiguous, characterized by ‘shifting perspectives’. 114 Iphigenia 648–9: s† d† t»caß m3karoß, _ nean≤a (‘Young man, we call you blessed on account of your good fortune’). 115 Helen 698–9: ej ka≥ t¤ loip¤ t[ß t»chß eÛda≤monoß | t»coite, prÏß t¤ prÎsqen

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sense, to signify the ‘outcome’ of her escape-plans;116 and there are several other examples of the word referring to ‘circumstances’ or ‘what comes to pass’.117 More frequently, t»ch (singular or plural) bears the sense of ‘bad fortune’ or ‘disastrous circumstances’, closely equivalent to sumfor3. Iphigenia asks her brother if he has come to the Taurian land because of some ‘misfortune’,118 and later wonders if a new ‘disaster’ is in store.119 Helen, similarly, wonders what ‘misery’ awaits her,120 and wishes that her ‘bad circumstances’ could evaporate along with her beauty;121 her husband, too, laments his ‘suﬀerings’.122 The old portress tells Menelaus that there has been a ‘change of fortune’ in the house, since Theoclymenus has set his sights on Helen.123 All of these meanings just quoted correspond to t»ch as eﬀect; but t»ch as cause is also common. Sometimes it is envisaged as a completely independent power, in passages such as that in which Orestes says that ‘we must allow fortune to take its course’,124 or where Theoclymenus says that ‘fortune was responsible for bringing Helen here’;125 but more commonly the characters talk about t»ch as an entity which in some obscure way works in conjunction with the gods. This brings us back to the confusing manner in which the årkvsein £n (‘If it should happen that you meet with good fortune in the future, it would compensate for what has gone before’). 116 Helen 1409: πrcetai g¤r d& tin’ ƒß t»chn t3de (‘Yes, all this is moving towards some outcome’). 117 Iphigenia 475: t¤ß t»caß t≤ß o”d’ Òtwi | toia≤d’ πsontai; (‘who knows who will have experiences such as this?); Helen 320–1: prÏß t¤ß t»caß tÏ c3rma toŸß gÎouß t’ πce (‘rejoice or weep in accordance with circumstances’), 738: o˜ t’ ƒsmvn t»chß (‘our current situation’), 742: ƒß 2n . . . t»chß (‘in a single event’); Andromeda fr. 138: ƒsql0n Òtan t»cwsin t0n ƒrwmvnwn (‘whenever it comes about that people ﬁnd noble lovers’), etc. This is, of course, the most natural meaning of the verb tugc3nw in most of its occurrences. 118 Iphigenia 511: fug¤ß 〈d’〉 åp[raß patr≤doß ∂ po≤ai t»chi; (‘Did you leave your home as an exile, or as a result of some other sort of misfortune?’). 119 Iphigenia 875: t≤ß t»ca moi sugkur&sei; (‘What disaster will befall me?’). 120 Helen 293: t≤ d[t’ πti z0; t≤n’ Ëpole≤pomai t»chn; (‘Why then do I go on living? What misery is in store for me?’). 121 Helen 264–5: . . . ka≥ t¤ß t»caß m†n t¤ß kak¤ß 4ß nın πcw | E ﬁ llhneß ƒpel3qonto (‘[if only] the Greeks had forgotten the evils which dog me now’). 122 Helen 463: t¤ß ƒm¤ß stvnw t»caß (‘I am lamenting my own suﬀerings’). 123 Helen 477–8: πsti g3r tiß ƒn dÎmoiß | t»ch. I follow Dale’s (1967, ad loc.) translation. 124 Iphigenia 489: t¶n t»chn d’ ƒ$n cre*n. 125 Helen 1636: åll’ πdwken Ó t»ch moi.

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characters and chorus imagine the combination of supernatural powers. As in the passages already quoted (the ‘What is a god?’ ode and others), confusion and contradiction abound. Although the chorus members in Andromeda imply that the gods and t»ch operate independently,126 a character elsewhere in that play asserts that t»ch is subordinate to the gods—that, in fact, it is in the power of a god to bestow t»ch on mortals.127 The view that the gods are responsible for t»ch is seen elsewhere. For example, no good fortune is said to result from Orestes’ treatment by the gods;128 Iphigenia blames ‘god-sent’ t»ch—as well as destiny— for her misery;129 the chorus in Helen pray to the gods for good luck;130 Menelaus complains about the fortune which the gods have given him;131 a prayer imagines t»ch as being at Zeus’ ﬁngertips . . .132 and so on. In other places, however, the relationship is less clear. After the recognition-scene in Iphigenia, Orestes says (909–11):133 kal0ß πlexaß: t[i t»chi d’ o”mai mvlein toıde xŸn Óm∏n. ∂n dv tiß prÎqumoß Ái, sqvnein tÏ qe∏on m$llon ejkÎtwß πcei. You have spoken well: I reckon that responsibility rests with fortune and our own eﬀorts. When one eagerly strives for something, it seems likely that the divine power will be stronger. 126

Andromeda fr. 153 (quoted above). Andromeda fr. 140: _ tl[mon, „ß so≥ t¤ß t»caß m†n åsqene∏ß | πdwc’ Ø da≤mwn (‘Unhappy person: what pitiable fortune the god has bestowed upon you!’). 128 Iphigenia 560: åll’ oÛ t¤ prÏß qe0n eÛtuce∏ d≤kaioß •n (‘Although Orestes is in the right, he gets no good fortune from the gods’). 129 Iphigenia 864–7: åp3tor’ åp3tora pÎtmon πlacon. | £lla d’ ƒx £llwn kure∏ | da≤monoß t»cai tinÎß (‘My destiny was unfatherly, unfatherly treatment. But now matters are taking a diﬀerent turn from before, because of some god-sent fortune’). 130 Helen 855–6: _ qeo≤, genvsqw d& pot’ eÛtuc†ß gvnoß | tÏ Tant3leion (‘O gods, may the house of Tantalus enjoy good fortune at last’). 131 Helen 403: oÛk åxioımai toıde prÏß qe0n tuce∏n (‘I do not deserve this bad fortune which the gods have given me’). 132 Helen 1444–5: k#n £krai q≤ghiß cer≤, | ~xomen Jn’ ƒlqe∏n boulÎmesqa t[ß t»chß (‘With just a touch of your ﬁngertip we shall arrive at the good fortune we desire’). 133 With this passage Cropp (2000, ad loc.) compares Eur. Electra 610 and 890–2, where an equal division of responsibility is envisaged between t»ch and either Orestes or the gods. Other Euripidean passages in which characters contemplate the relative power of gods and t»ch include Hec. 488–93, Cycl. 606, fr. 901 Nauck. 127

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He is scarcely conﬁdent about this explanation of events (as is shown by the over-cautious qualiﬁcations, o”mai and ejkÎtwß πcei), but he seems to view t»ch and the gods as equivalent. Iphigenia’s words to Orestes, as she prepares to sacriﬁce him, could also be read in a similar way. Here, t»ch and the workings of the divine (t¤ qe0n) are seen as vaguely equivalent, if not exactly the same (475–8):134 t¤ß t»caß t≤ß o”d’ Òtwi toia≤d’ πsontai; p3nta g¤r t¤ t0n qe0n ƒß åfan†ß 1rpei, koÛd†n o”d’ oÛde≥ß safvß: Ó g¤r t»ch par&gag’ ƒß tÏ dusmaqvß. Who knows who will have experiences such as this? All the workings of the divine are obscure in outcome, and no one knows anything for certain, for fortune leads us astray into perplexity.

Both senses of the word—eﬀect (t¤ß t»caß) and cause (Ó t»ch par&gag’)—are present in these few lines: but, despite the continued lack of clarity, this passage hints at a solution to the problem of t»ch. Iphigenia is beginning to acknowledge the hopelessness of human attempts to make sense of the universe. Her words are an admission of ignorance: no one knows anything for certain. The signiﬁcance of t»ch, as Iphigenia says, is that it misleads us. What she might have added, if she had realized it, is that t»ch does not exist. In other words, the action and eventual resolution of the plays suggest very strongly that t»ch plays no part in the theological scheme. When, at the end of the plays, the characters and audience are ﬁnally enlightened as to the true causes of events by the speeches of the Dioscuri and Athena ex machina, no mention whatsoever is made of t»ch, but only of divine will, fate and necessity. If the gods’ words, which (as I said) possess a higher interpretative status than anything else, attribute nothing to t»ch, then we must conclude that the humans were wrong to invoke t»ch as a cause, for, as seems likely, there is no such power.135 134 Similar expressions can be found at (for example) Heracles 62, Bellerophon fr. 304 Nauck, Soph. OT 977–8. 135 Compare the view of Matthaei (1918, 158–62), who says that Greek tragedies tend to ‘eliminate the inexplicable’; the typical ‘surprise’ of Greek tragedy is ‘the surprise which can eventually be led back to a recognizable cause, this cause being some action of a human personality, not some accident in

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We will understand t»ch in the escape-tragedies if we see it not as a force at work in the universe but as a purely linguistic phenomenon. It is a strategy of interpretation which arises out of extreme uncertainty or perplexity, and as such its meaning is roughly equivalent to Iphigenia’s ‘no one knows anything for certain’ (oÛd†n o”d’ oÛde≥ß safvß). As the passages above suggest, t»ch is the explanation which characters employ faute de mieux in desperate situations. In this respect, it is interesting to compare a fragment of Democritus, whose theories about language and deceptive appearances were encountered in the previous chapter (§4.4.5). Here, too, it seems that Democritus may have exerted more of an inﬂuence on Euripides than we can now know. Democritus’ opinion was that humans created the image of t»ch in order to excuse their own lack of thought. The word which he uses to describe the real nature of t»ch will perhaps come as no surprise, since we have encountered it before—it is a phantom (e÷dwlon). 136 This highly important fragment helps us to see more clearly the connection between Euripides’ theological and epistemological ideas, for which I have been arguing. It is no coincidence that these plays which so greatly problematize the connection between language and reality, and so profoundly explore the failure of human knowledge, contain more references to t»ch than almost any other tragedy. T»ch bears the same relationship to the gods as appearances bear to reality. Like Helen’s double, it is a phantom, a name without a body, a deceptive false image. In this sense (rather than that of Solmsen), one might still with some correctness call the escape-tragedies ‘t»ch-plays’, in that t»ch is symptomatic of the inability of humans to comprehend the universe and of the inadequacy of language to express meaningful truths. nature.’ Although Matthaei claims to be discussing tragedy, her subject is really Aristotle’s view of the role—or, rather, the lack—of accident in human life (Phys. 2.5.197a and Metaphys. 1064b–1065b). Dover (1974, 138–41) draws a similar conclusion, though he is concerned not with tragedy but with popular morality in general. (He writes that ‘“chance” is no more than a useful word by which to distinguish the unintended from the intended.’) 136 Democritus (DK 68 B119): £nqrwpoi t»chß e÷dwlon ƒpl3santo prÎfasin jd≤hß åboul≤hß (‘Humans manufactured the phantom of fortune as an excuse for their own thoughtlessness’). Cf. the later view of Polybius (36.17), who wrote that in the case of things which it is diﬃcult or impossible for humans to explain, one may justiﬁably refer them, in one’s diﬃculty, to tyche.

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It is also possible to see in t»ch (and certain other faulty explanations) another connection between the theology of tragedy and the religious discourse of real-life Athenians. Mikalson’s study of Athenian popular religion discusses the range of techniques which people in prose texts, including history and oratory, employ in order to try to make sense of the universe. He notes that speakers tend to assign good and desirable events to gods (either named individual gods or a collective group of ‘gods’), but that it is disaster or wretched states of aﬀairs that are more often accounted for by resort to t»ch or da≤mwn (‘divine power’): t»ch is usually the explanation of last resort.137 This being so, references to t»ch are often emotionally or rhetorically charged— which gives another reason not to interpret them as true expressions of belief. (In this respect, t»ch can be seen to correspond to another, often misunderstood, type of theological outburst—the apparent disbelief noted by Stinton as a characteristic of tragic characters in extremis, which nearly always turns out to have another signiﬁcance.138) I have already discussed Mikalson’s views about the relationship of tragic to real-life ‘religion’, and found it impossible to agree with his opinion that the two are separable.139 The similarity of the use of t»ch and other ‘vague’ expressions (such as da≤mwn) in a variety of contexts outside tragedy provides another piece of evidence to support the opposite view. If the theological discourse of drama resembles more or less exactly that of real-life religion, this is surely yet another connection between the two spheres. For the greater part of the plays, then, the characters stumble around in the dark; but the ﬁnal appearances of the Dioscuri and Athena provide sudden, brilliant ﬂashes of illumination. This process closely resembles the disillusionment eﬀected by the 137 Mikalson (1983) 53–62, quoting Demosth. 2.22, 3.133, 18.192–4, Lysias 24.21–2, Xen. Hell. 7.4.3. R. Parker (1997, 155–6) takes a similar view, and adds Plutarch, Alcibiades 33.2 as an example. Cf. Dover (1974) 80. Kershaw (1986, 2.2) notes that the sense of t»ch as explanation of last resort was common in Hellenistic writers: ‘if [they] attempted to account for an occurrence and found that they had exhausted all the principles which might be classiﬁed as “natural”, and also those which can be associated with freedom of will and divine intervention, they would be left with a residuum still standing in need of an explanation.’ Kershaw suggests that this principle may account for the eventual cult-worship of T»ch in the ‘disillusioned’ 4th cent. and after. 138 Stinton (1976a): see §2.4 above. 139 See §5.2 above.

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heroines in their respective prologues. Just as the plays’ counterfactual plots required the audience members to abandon their previous ‘knowledge’ of reality, the epiphanies require the characters to abandon their previously held beliefs about divine causation, which—in common with so many other elements in the plays—were based on mistaken appearances. The real reasons for everything, the gods now reveal, include divine will, fate and necessity. At the end of Helen, the Dioscuri say that they have waited so long to rescue Helen because it was ‘necessary’ (ƒcr[n, 1651) for her to stay in Egypt until now. This might not exactly satisfy our desire for an explanation; but they continue (1658–61): p3lai d’ ådelf¶n k#n pr≥n ƒxes*samen, ƒpe≤per Óm$ß ZeŸß ƒpo≤hsen qeo»ß: åll’ ~sson Ámen toı peprwmvnou q’ ‹ma ka≥ t0n qe0n, oÍß taıt’ πdoxen —d’ πcein. We would have rescued our sister long before now, since Zeus made us gods; but we were weaker than the combined powers of destiny and the gods, who decided that things should turn out as they did.

The Dioscuri are no match for the combination of destiny and the gods, which is now conﬁrmed as the true cause, not only of the Trojan War and Helen’s incarceration, but also of the eventual deiﬁcation of Helen (ZeŸß g¤r —de bo»letai, 1669) and of Menelaus’ eventual home in the Isles of the Blessed (qe0n p3ra | . . . ƒsti mÎrsimon, 1676–7). Similar explanations are oﬀered by Athena in Iphigenia: everything happened as it did because it was fated (peprwmvnon, 1438) by Apollo’s oracle; it is Poseidon who controls the waves, as a favour to Athena (1444–5); but even the gods are subject to necessity (tÏ g¤r cre°n soı te ka≥ qe0n krate∏, 1486). However, the plays’ endings, even taking into account their cult aetiologies, leave a sense of dissatisfaction, for the gods’ words do not reveal all that we might wish to know. Far from it: the characters and audience ﬁnd out who is responsible for their suﬀerings, and they are given access to a partial hierarchy of the supernatural powers: but that is all. If we were expecting something more profound than that—moral justiﬁcation of what has happened, or some sign that the gods care about human life—we will be grievously disappointed. This absence of intellectual or

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spiritual meaning is the main reason why (as I argued above) the institution of ritual cannot be seen as a straightforwardly positive form of closure. In the place of theological profundity, the plays end on a note of emptiness—or, in the case of Helen, banality. The ﬁnal words of the Dioscuri (1678–9) are both trite and comfortless: toŸß eÛgene∏ß g¤r oÛ stugoısi da≤moneß, | t0n d’ ånariqm&twn m$llon †ejsin oÈ pÎnoi† (‘the gods do not hate those of noble birth, but they make them suﬀer more than the countless mass’).140 The play’s closing lines, sung by the chorus (1688–92), are similar in tone: polla≥ morfa≥ t0n daimon≤wn, poll¤ d’ åvlptwß kra≤nousi qeo≤: ka≥ t¤ dokhqvnt’ oÛk ƒtelvsqh, t0n d’ ådok&twn pÎron h˜re qeÎß. toiÎnd’ åpvbh tÎde pr$gma. The gods reveal themselves in many forms, Bring many matters to surprising ends. The things we thought would happen do not happen; The unexpected God makes possible: And this is what has happened here to-day.141

The glib way in which these commonplaces are trotted out as an ‘explanation’ of all the suﬀering that has preceded them may be intended to highlight, in a grimly ironic way, the pitilessness of the play’s outlook. (One also notes, in particular, the absence of t»ch from these concluding lines.) It is time for some concluding remarks. Euripides has created a situation in which it is very diﬃcult to discern real beliefs among the mass of deceptive words and appearances.142 Nevertheless, it seems clear that the plays’ view of the universe is 140 Dale (1967, ad loc.) ﬁnds the lines so outrageous that she suspects a textual problem, commenting: ‘It would be an extraordinary reversal of the content and spirit of the whole body of Greek legend if such a sentiment really rounded oﬀ the speech of the god from the machine.’ 141 The translation used here is that of Vellacott (1973)—its banality (for once) hits the mark completely. The same lines are found at the end of Alcestis, Andromache, Bacchae and (with a slight change) Medea, which has led some to suspect them: see Dale (1967) and Kannicht (1969.II) ad loc and Barrett (1963) ad Hipp. 1462–6. Roberts (1987), who examines the question of closing lines thoroughly, defends the lines. 142 Cf. Zuntz (1960, 221), whose ultimate view of Euripides’ theology is ‘the renunciation of a ﬁnal truth’.

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more complex than the ‘atheism’ which Aristophanes, Verrall and others were disposed to see in them. If the gods did not exist, then the plays would make no sense. Ultimately, it seems that the escape-tragedies are more concerned with human attempts to understand supernatural forces than with those forces themselves: this interpretation ﬁts in very closely with the plays’ philosophical concerns. Human perceptions of the gods, and the language which we use to describe them, are seen to be inadequate—just as human means of perceiving and expressing reality in general are inadequate. The terrible events which happen all around us may appear to happen at random, unexpectedly, inexplicably; but appearances, as we have learnt, are very often deceptive. At the end of the day, whatever else may be true or false, humans are seen to be at the mercy of the omnipotent gods. The gods’ motives may seem obscure or non-existent—indeed, there is no divine justice here143—but nothing in tragedy would happen without them. To know this may not comfort us (or the characters), nor does it necessarily, or ever, oﬀer a justiﬁcation of events which satisﬁes our desire for comprehensible moral or causal sense. Just because it is revealed, late on, that the gods’ plans were responsible for everything that happened to Helen, Iphigenia and the others, that still does not explain why Zeus, Apollo and Artemis decided to plan things in that way, causing so much unmerited suﬀering and wretchedness. We (the everyday Athenians in the audience) might also be led to reﬂect that, since real life contains nothing like the deus ex machina, we ourselves are doomed to continue living in ignorance and incomprehension, without even the limited illumination which the characters in the play obtain. Euripides’ tragic universe, it will be seen, is based on a divine scheme familiar from Homeric epic, in which fate, the will of Zeus and the other Olympians work together to govern a universe which seems unjust or incomprehensible to the humans in it.144 Euripides’ gods, like Homer’s, are omnipotent, capricious, cruel and unfathomable; like 143

Cf. the very similar view of Lloyd-Jones (1983b) 144–55. In Homer, one might add, there is no t»ch. There are a couple of references in the Homeric Hymns (see n. 107 and 111 above), but none at all in either Iliad or Odyssey. Of course, the gods and fate have a similarly indeterminate hierarchy from Homer onwards. 144

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Homer’s gods, they laugh while humans suﬀer.145 Nevertheless, that is just how the universe is. We cannot make sense of it, and there is no escape from it. 145 Zeus laughs (gvlase) at the self-interested behaviour of the young Apollo at the end of the third stasimon of Iphigenia (1274–5), an ode which celebrates the gods’ withholding of knowledge from humans. On divine laughter in the Iliad and the gulf which separates humans from gods, see especially Griﬃn (1980).

Afterword

‘Tragicomedies’, ‘melodramas’, ‘romances’, ‘comedies of ideas’, ‘failures’ . . . I hope I have shown in the preceding pages that none of these descriptions adequately ﬁts the escape-tragedies. Of course, I cannot be said to have proved that Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia are ‘tragic’ in any very meaningful sense of the word: indeed, as I explained in the opening chapter, the concept of ‘the tragic’ is largely an irrelevance and a distraction. However, what has emerged from the preceding chapters is that the escape-tragedies are a major dramatic and intellectual achievement. Far from being quirky oddities or light entertainment, as so many readers have supposed, these are serious dramas with a profound message about human existence and human suﬀering. I hope that I have persuaded at least some of my readers of the high quality and serious nature of the escape-tragedies: this was the real purpose of my insistence that the plays are ‘tragedies’. The reluctance of many previous scholars to take these plays seriously is what accounts, I think, for their failure to undertake a project like mine—of sustained criticism of the plays at a signiﬁcant length. However, as it turns out, there are rich rewards to be reaped from spending time investigating these plays. I believe that my approach to the plays, which has involved engaging with the texts and the critical literature in as objective a way as possible, has led me to make some salutary observations about these fascinating texts. In addition, along the way I have tried to situate the escape-tragedies more precisely in their contemporary intellectual context, as well as raising some important methodological issues about the criticism of tragedy in general. How do we approach tragedy in general, and how do we approach Euripides in particular? This book has tried to give some fresh answers to these problems by questioning a range of basic critical assumptions. Certain widely held ideas

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have been subjected to pressure, with some interesting, and perhaps surprising, results: for example, the relationship between tragedy and philosophy, Euripides’ manipulation of myth, the (un-) importance of Stesichorus for the Helen, the role of ethnicity, and the way in which we interpret tragic religion, as well as the nature of tragedy itself. Many of the odd-seeming features which have previously been thought to detract from the quality or generic status of these plays are not only compatible with the tragic genre as a whole but also, more importantly, at the very centre of the plays. Perhaps the most controversial aspect of this book will seem to be my suggestion that the escape-tragedies were a connected trilogy. But if tomorrow morning a papyrus fragment were unearthed which proved beyond doubt that Iphigenia was not produced with Helen and Andromeda at the Dionysia of 412,1 this fact would not materially alter very much of what I have written. It is neat and satisfying to believe that Helen, Andromeda and Iphigenia are a thematically connected trilogy, but, even if I am wrong in this belief, there is ample evidence in the pages above to show that the escape-tragedies are intimately connected. The plays undoubtedly share many features of form and content, and they deal with the same range of themes in a surprisingly coherent and integrated manner. The collective title ‘escapetragedies’ therefore remains both useful and appropriate, since the three plays are a coherent group in some sense: they form a distinct group within Euripides’ oeuvre, and no other plays seem to have resembled them. The range of themes treated by the plays, and the interconnection between these themes, will have emerged progressively from the discussions in each chapter. Myth, geography, ethnicity, philosophy, and theology are not separate, distinct areas of interest, but are all integrally joined together to form an intricate nexus of ideas. Central to all these themes are, as we have seen, the power of illusion, the failure of language and myth to express reality, and the problems of knowledge and personal existence. In other words, the reason for Euripides’ having 1 One might compare the publication, in 1952, of P. Oxy. 2256 (fr. 3.1b), which caused scholars to revise their ﬁrmly held convictions about the date of Aesch. Suppl. and the development of early tragedy in general: see Garvie (1969) for more details.

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composed these (on the face of it) rather bizarre tragedies, mangling together various strands of myths to present us with familiar mythical heroines in unfamiliar situations, is to explore and undermine tragic myth. ‘Myth’ in all its senses—history, knowledge, language, religion—is approached in a highly sceptical, radically questioning manner; the plays expose myth as a fundamentally inadequate representation of reality, but oﬀer no alternative. What we thought we knew about ourselves, our myths, our ethnic and personal identities and the supernatural forces which govern us may be completely wrong. We cannot trust our eyes or ears, our language, or our myths. We may appeal to the gods for help or enlightenment, but no help will come. As for escape, the plays seem to be saying that no one can really escape from a situation. Wherever we go, we will still be trapped by our human limitations, including, crucially, our inability to understand the nature of reality. This is not mere ﬂirtation with clever ideas from contemporary philosophy, but rather a fully worked-out, horribly bleak view of the world. The escape-tragedies present a coherent, but radically negative, view of the consequences for human life when our ‘knowledge’ of reality is revealed as irremediable ignorance. The ‘meaning’ of the escape-tragedies (if we want to talk in such terms) may be called a kind of epistemological nihilism. In most tragedies, awful events happen to the characters and terrible suﬀering takes place. But what we witness in the escapetragedies is far worse than that. Since Euripides fatally undermines human knowledge of reality (or even reality itself), the characters’ suﬀering cannot be alleviated by understanding. The world-view of the escape-tragedies is thus much more pessimistic than that of (say) Aeschylus’ Oresteia, in which—in the end—one can at least hope to learn something from one’s suﬀering: p3qei m3qoß. In Euripides, the possibility of knowledge is completely denied, which means that the characters can expect only unrelieved suﬀering. Nor can any crumb of comfort or justiﬁcation be expected from the inscrutable supernatural forces which govern the universe. This view of the world is absolutely comfortless and terrifying. The characters in the escape-tragedies may not, ultimately, be able to say very much about the universe or explain very much about why things happen, but their suﬀering is real enough.

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And, even though the characters and situations of tragedy are far removed from the experience of the audiences of tragedy (ancient or modern), we are bound to relate what happens on stage to our own lives. Here the implications for our own life, and our own knowledge of reality, are equally bleak and ‘disillusioning’ (in every sense of the word). Despite my capacious deﬁnition of tragedy in the opening chapter (which could be summed up, more or less, in the words polla≥ morfa≥ t0n tragwidi0n), it will be clear that my reading of the escape-tragedies is signiﬁcantly darker and more grim than any other available interpretations. Indeed, one might well be tempted to think that the plays qualify as ‘tragedies’ in some broader, less satisfactory sense of the word. But this is completely irrelevant. As I have argued, and as the plays themselves give us to believe, names may very often deceive us as to the true nature of things.

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Index Locorum

This is a complete list of passages cited from the escape-tragedies. References to the works of other authors are listed in the General Index. Andromeda fr. 114: 48 n. 164, 128 n. 222, 158 n. 3, 221 n. 229, 265 n. 146 fr. 115: 370 n. 92, 373–4 fr. 117: 175 n. 57 fr. 118: 287 fr. 119: 364 fr. 120: 364 fr. 121: 208 fr. 122: 219 n. 221, 266 n. 146, 369 n. 87, 370 n. 91 fr. 123: 122, 216 fr. 124: 128, 216, 266 n. 146 fr. 125: 54, 123, 128, 204, 321–2 fr. 126: 287 fr. 128: 214 fr. 129: 324 fr. 131: 309 fr. 136: 122, 369 n. 87, 370 n. 92, 373–4 fr. 137: 122, 364 fr. 138: 122, 370 n. 92, 373–4, 376 fr. 138a: 308 n. 306 fr. 139: 122, 197 n. 135 fr. 140: 286, 370 n. 89, 370 n. 92, 373–4, 377 fr. 141: 122 fr. 142: 122, 370 n. 92, 373–4 fr. 143: 122, 370 n. 92, 373–4 fr. 145: 208, 210

fr. 146: 212 n. 198 fr. 150: 370 n. 92, 373–4 fr. 151: 148 n. 285, 286 fr. 152: 364, 370 n. 89, 370 n. 91, 372 fr. 153: 209, 364, 369 n. 88, 370 n. 92, 372–4, 377 fr. 154: 370 n. 92, 373–4 Helen 1: 118, 127 1–3: 262–3 1–166: 279 3–7: 211, 311 9–10: 184, 195 11: 149 12–13: 296, 313 13–14: 314 16: 137 17–21: 142–3, 148 n. 283, 286 n. 224, 309, 311 20: 288 24: 313 25–30: 288, 313 27: 118, 316 n. 325, 370 n. 92 31–6: 316, 318 32: 313 33: 281 n. 209 34: 265 n. 146 35–6: 285 n. 220, 290, 306 n. 302 36–7: 364

416

Index Locorum

Helen (cont.): 39–40: 281 n. 209 41: 137 42–3: 290 44–5: 216, 265 n. 146, 281 n. 209 46–8: 118, 194 52–5: 141, 281–2, 285 n. 220 56–9: 118, 364 57–8: 137 62–3: 195 66–7: 290 68–70: 192 72–7: 300–1, 322 73–4: 281 n. 209 81: 142 87: 219 98–9: 144, 148 105: 137 109–10: 281 n. 209 118–22: 301–2 119–23: 266–7, 285 n. 220 126: 138, 209 n. 185 126–32: 208, 286 128: 281 n. 209 131: 178 n. 69 132: 138, 286 133–6: 282 136: 148 137–40: 308, 360 138: 147 143: 149 146: 370 n. 92 147: 209 n. 185 147–50: 167, 311, 324 156–7: 195 160–1: 292, 302 163: 370 n. 92 167: 222 170–1: 180 175: 324 180: 370 n. 92 191: 176 n. 61 192: 178 n. 69

198: 281 n. 209 203–4: 118 212: 370 n. 91 214–16: 364 223–8: 141, 178 n. 69 226: 209 n. 185 236: 370 n. 92 248: 281 n. 209 250: 142 250–1: 331 255: 370 257–9: 145–7, 178 n. 69, 309 261–3: 118, 370 262–5: 322–3, 327–8, 370 n. 92, 376 267: 370 n. 92 270–90: 141 n. 267 273–4: 370 274: 178 n. 69, 219 276: 178 n. 69 277–8: 118, 364, 370 n. 92 285–6: 292, 370 n. 92 287–9: 223 291–2: 302 292–3: 118, 370 n. 92, 376 294–7: 118, 178 n. 69 296–302: 195 304: 370 n. 92 306–10: 309 307: 285 n. 220 309: 305 314: 118 n. 189, 193 317–18: 296 320–1: 376 321: 370 n. 92 345: 370 n. 92 351–6: 118 360: 370 n. 92 364: 281 n. 209 375–80: 148 384–5: 281 n. 209 386–90: 151–2 387: 209 n. 185

Index Locorum 397: 209 n. 185 397–403: 208, 281 n. 209, 320 400: 209 n. 185 401: 209 n. 187 402–3: 209, 370 n. 92, 377 404–5: 170 n. 43 408: 332 409–10: 208 412: 370 n. 92 414–15: 167 417: 370 n. 92 420–4: 329, 332 423–4: 208 428–9: 167, 332 437–40: 191 437–82: 27–8, 198, 283, 332 453–4: 138, 315 n. 323 455: 370 n. 89 457: 315 n. 323 459: 167 461–3: 218, 370 n. 92, 376 477–8: 376 481: 194 489–99: 312–13 491–4: 198 501: 178 n. 69 503–4: 137 513–14: 370 520: 209 n. 185, 209 n. 187 530: 296 539: 281 n. 209 541–3: 195 553–4: 231, 332 554–5: 191, 329 560: 299 n. 289 561: 191 563–4: 302–3 565: 370 n. 92 574–5: 230 574–8: 302–3 576: 285 n. 220 582: 281 n. 209 583–4: 265

417

588: 290, 313 594–6: 219 598: 167, 178 n. 69 600: 178 n. 69 600–1: 193, 290 603: 281 n. 209, 282 n. 213 605–6: 198 n. 139, 216, 265 n. 146 608–10: 281 n. 209 608–15: 287, 365 610: 289 611: 285 n. 220, 290, 306 n. 302 616–19: 304 627–97: 299–307 645: 370 n. 92 653: 370 655: 324 657–8: 285 n. 220 663: 370–1 666: 178 n. 69 667: 301 n. 293 673: 371 669: 370 n. 90 683: 281 n. 209 692–3: 281 n. 209 698–9: 370 n. 92, 375 703: 281 n. 209 705–7: 281 n. 209, 282 711–15: 372–3 715: 370 n. 92 716: 281 n. 209 719: 370 n. 92 726–7: 367 n. 83 728–31: 333 738: 370 n. 92, 376 740: 167 742: 370 n. 92, 376 743: 178 n. 69 744–57: 366 748: 285 n. 220 750: 281 n. 209 758: 285 n. 220 758–60: 364

418

Index Locorum

Helen (cont.): 766: 281 n. 209 766–9: 288 767: 208 773–4: 209 n. 185 777: 209 n. 187 778: 224 784–5: 195 789: 178 n. 69 789–92: 332 792: 290 793–6: 304–5 800: 178 n. 69 800–1: 186 n. 94 806: 324 813: 289 823: 296 833–4: 305 841: 285 n. 220 843–4: 137 845: 282 848–9: 281 n. 209 855–6: 370 n. 92, 377 856–7: 168, 370 n. 92 863–4: 178 n. 69, 224 865–7: 265 873: 296 876: 209 n. 187, 281 n. 209 878–91: 296, 370 n. 92 894–995: 297 902: 324 917: 285 n. 220 921: 324 925: 370 n. 92 926–8: 141 n. 267, 142 930: 289 940: 324, 325 954: 285 n. 220 956: 285 n. 220 970: 281 n. 209, 296 982: 285 n. 220 993: 285 n. 220 998: 194

1000: 324 1002: 194 1006: 324 1013–16: 168 n. 37, 262 n. 131, 263–6, 281 n. 209, 371 1017: 264 1020: 285 n. 220 1025–7: 210 1030: 370 n. 92 1034: 289 1039–43: 213–14 1041–2: 167, 178 n. 69 1047–8: 213–14 1049: 120 n. 196, 289 1050: 208 1053–4: 329 1063–4: 282 1075: 370 n. 89 1079–82: 329, 333–4, 370 n. 92 1087–9: 329 1091: 289 1100: 178 n. 69, 290 1107: 209 n. 185 1107–10: 222 1115: 370 n. 90 1117: 178 n. 69 1122: 281 n. 209 1126–31: 208, 281 n. 209, 288 1132: 178 n. 69 1135–6: 281 n. 209 1137–50: 364, 371–2 1143: 370 n. 92 1150: 286 1151: 281 n. 210 1152: 286 1161: 281 n. 209 1165: 182 1165–6: 255–6 1170–1: 195 1175–6: 196 1176: 182 1180: 182 1184–90: 330

Index Locorum 1186–9: 118, 329 1190–2: 331 1193–300: 289 1195: 370 n. 92 1197–8: 330–1, 370 n. 92 1200: 178 n. 69 1204: 182, 231–2 1205: 334 1210: 179 1210–79: 197 1213: 370 n. 92 1219–20: 265 n. 146, 281 n. 209, 282 1224: 329 1229: 232 1231: 232 1234: 324 1240: 320 1241–2: 168 n. 37 1243: 320 1246: 182, 197 n. 138 1249: 370 n. 92 1254: 324 1256: 196 1258: 178 n. 69, 179, 213 1261: 320 1273: 324 1278: 196 1281–4: 329, 335 1286: 370 n. 90 1290–1: 370 n. 92 1296: 370 n. 92 1300: 370 n. 92 1301–5: 217 1301–68: 180–1 1318: 370 n. 91 1331: 324 1369: 370 n. 92 1373: 324 1374: 370 n. 92 1376–8: 335 1378: 324 1379–84: 329

1380: 178 n. 69 1387–9: 289 1390: 167 1392: 285 n. 220 1395–7: 208, 324 1402: 324 1409: 370 n. 92, 376 1411: 324 1420: 324, 325 1421: 168 n. 37 1424: 370 n. 92 1444–5: 370 n. 92, 377 1446: 281 n. 209 1449: 324 1450: 370 n. 92 1451: 222 1452: 219 1457: 211 1507: 178 n. 69 1513: 167 1516: 198 1530: 167 1538–40: 335 1546: 320 1547: 335 1574–5: 335 1584–7: 210 1594: 178 n. 69 1602: 137, 208, 223 1602–3: 296 1608: 178 n. 69 1611: 157 1615–17: 206 n. 167 1617–18: 157 1619–20: 290 1621: 120 n. 196, 189 1628: 197 1636: 370 n. 92, 371, 376 1640–81: 333 1642–79: 210, 361 1651–61: 381 1653: 311 1661: 285 n. 220

419

420

Index Locorum

Helen (cont.): 1664–5: 308 1664–9: 358 n. 60, 359, 381 1670–5: 153, 312 1676–7: 381 1678–9: 382 1683: 285 n. 220 1688–92: 364, 382 1690–1: 285 n. 220 Iphigenia 6–9: 120, 137, 190, 281 n. 206, 208 8: 52, 151, 281 n. 209, 285 n. 220 13–14: 281 n. 209 14: 324 15: 370 n. 92 19–24: 120, 190, 281 n. 206 20–1: 120, 151, 360 24–5: 288 26–9: 120, 190, 281 n. 206 27: 151 28–30: 216 29: 169, 266 n. 146 31: 179 n. 69 31–3: 184, 195 n. 129, 314, 324 34–41: 175 n. 52, 186 n. 95, 186–8 36: 190 n. 107, 316 n. 325 43: 266 n. 146 43–60: 287 44: 285 n. 220, 288 50: 285 n. 220, 288 53–4: 186 n. 95–7 63–4: 176 n. 61 67–70: 170 69–75: 185–6, 285 n. 220 70: 174 72: 175 n. 52, 186 n. 95–7 72–5: 186 77–8: 367 78–80: 281 n. 208 85: 169

87–8: 285 89: 370 n. 92 91: 368 94: 169, 174 96–9: 186 106: 169 106–9: 170, 219 113–29: 186 116–17: 209, 225 120–1: 368 123–5: 170, 171 n. 46, 204, 217 125: 212, 217–18 132–6: 170 157: 370 n. 89 170–1: 281 n. 207 176: 285 n. 220, 285 177: 151 178: 120, 190, 281 n. 206 179–81: 180 180: 179 n. 69 196–202: 364 199–200: 281 n. 207 202–4: 370 n. 89 207: 370 n. 91 210–17: 120, 190, 281 n. 206 218: 169, 212, 217–18 218–20: 217 220: 219, 220 n. 223 225–8: 186 n. 85–7 236–7: 170, 211 238: 281 n. 207 241: 171 n. 46, 212, 217–18 246: 192 248–51: 315 253: 169, 212, 217–18 253–4: 212 258–9: 186 n. 95, 189 260: 171 n. 46, 219 264–74: 210 267–8: 286, 370 n. 89 276–8: 175 n. 52 279: 285 n. 220 281–94: 281 n. 208

Index Locorum 284–5: 286 291–4: 286–7 296–319: 281 n. 208 299: 285 n. 220 324: 219 329: 370 n. 92 336–9: 186 n. 95, 189, 190 341: 169, 212, 217–18 342–3: 186 n. 95–7 348: 200, 295 349: 285 n. 220 352: 370 n. 92 354: 369 355: 171 n. 46 355–7: 281 n. 209 357–9: 189, 190 358–71: 120, 151, 190, 281 n. 206 361–77: 288 365–8: 287 380–91: 359 384–91: 186 n. 95 386–90: 144–5 388: 369 n. 88 389–91: 190 n. 107 390: 285 n. 220 391: 370 n. 89 393–7: 170–1, 172, 174 394–5: 212, 217–18 408–12: 205 n. 162 412: 205 n. 165 417: 179 n. 69 422: 172 422–38: 171–2 434: 212, 217–18 438: 169 439–46: 186 n. 95, 189, 190 439–51: 281 n. 209 441: 370 n. 92 447: 119 455: 324 456–8: 186 n. 95 464–71: 186 n. 95, 190 471–2: 186 n. 96

421

473: 370 n. 92 475: 370 n. 92, 376 475–8: 378 478: 370 n. 92 489: 370 n. 92, 376 495–541: 192 499–504: 315 500–1: 370 n. 92 504: 293 507: 324 511: 370 n. 92, 376 517: 138 517–69: 139 521–6: 281 n. 209 527: 139 532–4: 139, 209 n. 185 533–6: 139, 209, 370 n. 92 538–9: 288 541: 151 543: 139 543–4: 315 545–55: 281 n. 207, 283 n. 219 548–54: 283–4 556–9: 281 n. 208 560: 369 n. 88, 370 n. 92, 377 563: 141, 151 565–6: 120, 190, 281 n. 206, 281 n. 209 566: 324 569: 288 570: 370 n. 89 570–1: 369 572–3: 369 584–7: 186 n. 95–7, 336 599–600: 207, 209 n. 185 600: 324 602: 324 607: 370 n. 92 616: 370 n. 92 617: 186 n. 95, 188 621–4: 186, 187 629: 179 n. 69 630: 370 n. 92

422

Index Locorum

Iphigenia (cont.): 631: 324 641: 285 n. 220 647: 370 n. 92 648–9: 375 663–5: 281 n. 207–8 670–1: 140 n. 263 677–9: 140, 285 n. 220 694: 370 n. 92 697: 141, 293 698: 322 n. 357 711: 219, 369 711–13: 369 722: 370 n. 92 725–6: 186 n. 95–6 735: 174 739: 179 n. 69 744–6: 186 n. 95–7 746: 171 n. 46 747–62: 369 755–9: 208, 293–4 770–1: 120, 151, 190, 281 n. 206, 293 772: 305 775: 179 n. 69 778–80: 306 782–8: 369 783–7: 120, 190, 281 n. 206, 285 785: 285 n. 220 791–4: 335 792: 315 796: 306 n. 301 801–5: 306 802: 285 n. 220 809–26: 307 813: 144 827–99: 299–307 831: 285 n. 220 836–7: 286, 370 n. 92 841: 370 n. 92 843: 266 n. 146 847: 324 850: 370 n. 92

851: 370 n. 92 854–5: 120, 190, 281 n. 206, 285 n. 220 864: 370 n. 90 864–7: 377 867–9: 214, 370 n. 92 874: 370 n. 92 875: 376 884–91: 174, 214 886–7: 175, 179 n. 69 889–90: 171 n. 46 895: 369 n. 88 896: 285 n. 220 900: 286 900–1: 307 906: 179 n. 69 907–8: 334, 370 n. 92 909–11: 369 n. 88, 377 910–11: 368 913–15: 370 n. 89–90 920: 151 924–35: 281 n. 208, 284 926–7: 281 n. 207, 283 n. 219 936–7: 369 940–1: 281 n. 208, 284 945–60: 358 n. 60 956: 285 n. 220 958–60: 153, 370 n. 92 1003: 370 n. 92 1007–8: 281 n. 208 1012–15: 369 1029–30: 285 n. 220 1032: 120 n. 196 1033: 281 n. 208 1044–5: 186 1047: 281 n. 208 1063–4: 289 1067: 370 n. 92 1082–3: 120, 190, 281 n. 206, 369 1084–5: 368 1086: 179 n. 69 1089–90: 221, 222 1094–7: 219–20, 351 n. 44

Index Locorum 1109–10: 176 n. 61, 209 n. 185 1110–24: 221–2 1112: 179 n. 69 1117–22: 364, 370 n. 92 1123: 219 1129–233: 289 1138: 221 1147: 324 1153–4: 186 n. 95 1157–8: 186 1164: 285 n. 220 1165–7: 323 1170: 179 n. 69 1173–5: 281 n. 208 1174: 179 1177: 266 n. 146 1183: 370 n. 92 1185: 281 n. 207 1187: 199 1187–98: 213 1188–219: 199 1196–7: 211 1200: 281 n. 208 1205: 199 1207: 335 1209: 370 n. 92 1217: 199 1219: 285 n. 220 1220: 199 1230–4: 369 n. 88 1231–2: 369, 370 n. 92 1234–82: 289, 364, 369 1265: 370 n. 92 1274–5: 384

1286: 186 1293–301: 289 1308: 289 1321: 286, 370 n. 92 1325–6: 169 1336–7: 200, 285 n. 220, 295 1337: 179 n. 69 1373: 219 1388: 169, 212, 217–18 1389: 171 n. 46 1398: 369 1399–400: 219 1400: 179 n. 69 1402: 285 n. 220 1410: 370 n. 92 1416: 369 1418: 120, 190, 281 n. 206 1422: 179 1428–30: 199 1429: 175 n. 52 1433: 199 1435–7: 361 1435–89: 210 1438: 381 1443: 285 n. 220 1444: 324 1444–5: 381 1446–67: 358 n. 60 1467–9: 289 1474–8: 199 1481: 370 n. 92 1486: 381 1490: 370 n. 92

423

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General Index

Aeschylus 28, 30 n. 100, 33, 53–4, 71, 120 n. 196, 131, 149, 163–4, 166, 205 n. 165, 240–1, 242, 249, 255–6, 264 n. 140, 339, 343 Ag. 110–11, 117, 150 n. 294, 207 n. 178, 324, 351 n. 44, 374 n. 108 Cho. 176 n. 61, 181–2, 255–6, 287, 322 n. 357 Egyptians 128 n. 220, 175 n. 58 Eum. 161 n. 13, 203 n. 153 Iphigenia 119 n. 193 Niobe 122 n. 202 Oresteia 135, 161 n. 10, 387 Pers. 181, 207, 219 n. 14, 241, 316 n. 329 Philoctetes 75 Prometheus Unbound 124 Proteus 128 n. 220, 149 PV 127 n. 219, 161 n. 12, 184 n. 91 Seven 59 n. 8, 203 n. 153, 207 n. 175, 322 n. 357, 372 n. 97 Suppl. 127 n. 219, 175 n. 58, 193 n. 123, 263, 351 n. 44 Theoroi 317 n. 331, 324 n. 362 aetiologies 200, 311–12, 353–4, 357–62 Agamemnon 69, 190, 281, 283–4, 285, 315 Agathon 33, 71 n. 39 Alcaeus 207 Alcidamas 318–19, 337

Ameipsias 234 n. 32 Anaxagoras 166, 227, 244–5, 249–51, 256, 263–4, 269 Anaximander 265 Anaximines 264 Andromeda: embodies themes of trilogy 126 in mythical tradition 68, 121–9, 131 as statue 321–2 unites Greeks and Ethopians 201 Antiphanes 60, 208 n. 183 Antiphon 201–2, 267 n. 152, 270–1, 310 Apollo 174, 244–5, 311, 366–8 Apollodorus 128 n. 225, 203 n. 152, 312 n. 315, 317 n. 331 appearances: compared to drugs 275 connected with words 272–8 contrasted with reality 50, 52, 127, 156–7, 191–2, 197, 201–2, 231–2, 257, 268–79, 285–337, 382–3 Aristides 94–5, 263 n. 134 Aristophanes: and barbarians 169, 181 criticizes Euripides 19, 50 n. 169, 116, 242, 249–52, 253–4, 268, 339–40 and philosophy 234–5, 240 n. 55, 242, 249–54, 259

426

General Index

Aristophanes (cont.): parodies Euripides 1, 50–2, 129, 216 n. 209, 229, 329, 381 Ach. 113 n. 165, 169 n. 39, 181, 229 n. 14, 251 n. 93, 268 Birds 181, 184, 220 n. 225 Clouds 39, 81 n. 61, 234 n. 32, 235 n. 34, 249–54, 266 n. 146 Frogs 39, 81 n. 61, 120 n. 196, 122 n. 202, 159 n. 3, 202–3, 229 n. 14, 238 n. 45, 240–1, 250–1, 339 Lemnian Women 314 n. 321 Lys. 169 n. 39, 251 n. 93 Peace 229 n. 14 Thesm. 44, 50–4, 60, 116, 120 n. 196, 129, 169 n. 39, 229 n. 14, 251 n. 93, 266 n. 146, 329 n. 387, 339–40 Wasps 235 n. 34 Aristotle: on Aeschylus 164 on Euripides 1, 60–2 on recognition 297–9 on tragic myths and plots 30–1, 60–3, 71–4, 81 Poet. 11, 25 n. 73, 26 n. 81, 30–1, 39, 53, 65–6, 160–2, 237 n. 40, 238, 240, 297–9, 326, 348 Rhet. 319 n. 341, 340 n. 5 Artemis 51, 114, 170, 184 n. 90, 190, 200–1, 220, 224, 285, 312, 323–4, 351, 353–60, 368 Athena 289, 312, 351–2, 360 n. 68, 361 n. 70, 365, 378–82 Athenaeus 105 n. 134, 226 n. 2 Atreus 32, 144–5 barbarians 128–30, 132, 138, 164, 169 n. 39, 174–6, 177–202, 290, 313–14

biographical criticism 19, 102–3, 203, 241–3, 247–52, 340–1 Black Sea 130–1, 163–77, 204, 210, 215, 217–19, 306 map of 173 Burnett, A. P. 44, 228–33, 252–6, 265 Calchas 366–7 Callisto 148 captivity 204, 213–19, 222 Chamaeleon 99–102, 109 characterization 34, 65–6, 115–20, 282–5, 295–7, 312–13, 332–4, 367, 370 charis 324–5 Charition 183 chorus 26–7, 30, 35, 48, 74, 159, 175–6, 180–1, 189, 204, 217–23, 289, 299, 364–5, 369, 371, 372–3, 384 closure 36–8, 222–5, 285, 292, 312–13, 357–62, 378–84 Clytemnestra 69, 117, 283–4 colloquialism 27–8 Conacher, D. J. 256–8 costume 26, 118, 160, 176, 180, 191, 229, 231–2, 329–36 counterfactuals 58–60, 79, 113, 129–30, 150–2, 221 n. 227, 381 Cratinus 30, 234 n. 32, 251 n. 93 Cypria 85, 111 n. 158, 113–14 dating of works 44–8, 52, 54–5, 111–13, 272 n. 180 Demeter 180–1, 217, 222, 354–6 Democritus 258, 270, 271 n. 171, 294 n. 269, 310–16, 317, 321–4, 327, 379 Demosthenes 39, 380 n. 137 Diagoras 340 Dio of Prusa 75, 92, 96–9

General Index Diogenes of Apollonia 264 n. 139–40 Dionysus 41, 80, 202–3 Dioscuri 147–8, 153–4, 210, 216, 308, 311–12, 358 n. 60, 359–61, 365, 378–82 Dissoi Logoi 239 n. 51, 291, 348 Dodds, E. R. 246–8 dramatic festivals 1, 17, 24, 25, 347 dreams 287–9, 320, 331, 365 Echo 122, 204, 287, 328 Egypt 79, 83, 94, 97–8, 127–32, 153–4, 163–77, 306, 312–13 Eido, see Theonoe Empedocles 238–9, 241, 264, 267 n. 152 Epicharmus 157 n. 313, 265, 266–7, 301–2 Eratosthenes 128 n. 225 escape 43, 47, 54–5, 120, 124–7, 149, 213–16, 219, 220, 222–5, 289, 297, 329–31, 333–4, 387 Ethiopia 128–9, 163, 215 ethnicity 132, 162, 164, 166, 177–202 Eupolis 103 n. 130, 234 n. 32 Euripides: attitude to myth 133–5, 154–6 in biographical tradition 19, 102–3, 203, 241–3, 248–52, 340–1 career 21 ‘cleverness’ 235, 251–9 perceived atheism 339–45 perceived scepticism 154–6, 179, 242–5 ‘philosopher of the stage’ 226–7, 235–52, 318–19 similar to Aristophanes 229, 254

427

and Socrates 244–6 and sophists 257–9 Alc. 21, 34, 53, 124, 127 n. 218, 180 n. 73, 184 n. 91, 317, 320, 321 n. 353, 324 n. 366, 344 n. 23 Alcmaeon 53 Alexander 53 Andr. 169 n. 42, 207 n. 128, 215 n. 205, 217 n. 214, 220 n. 225, 344 n. 23 Antigone 59 n. 8 Antiope 258 n. 123 Archelaus 263 n. 134 Bacch. 21, 30 n. 102, 127 n. 218, 157 n. 313, 181 n. 79, 195 n. 129, 344 n. 23 Bellerophon 207 n. 174, 216 n. 209, 340, 343, 378 n. 134 Busiris 128 n. 220, 184 Cretans 53 Cyc. 54–5, 124, 127 n. 218, 180 n. 72, 182 n. 85, 283 n. 218, 377 n. 133 El. 59 n. 8, 111–13, 127 n. 218, 135–6, 182 n. 85, 255, 344 n. 23, 374 nn. 107–8, 377 n. 133 Erechtheus 131, 180 n. 72 Eurystheus 321 n. 353, 324 n. 362 Hcld. 127 n. 218, 136 n. 246, 193 n. 123 Hec. 127 n. 218, 136 n. 246, 197, 247 n. 83, 258 n. 123, 321 n. 354, 377 n. 133 Her. 127 n. 218, 136 n. 246, 143 n. 271, 180 n. 73, 184 n. 91, 207 n. 178, 378 n. 134

428

General Index

Euripides (cont.): Hipp. 34, 81 n. 61, 118 n. 188, 127 n. 218, 159 n. 4, 206–7, 211, 220 n. 225, 258 n. 123, 289 n. 251, 291 n. 261, 322 n. 357, 340, 344 n. 23, 366 n. 396 IA 81 n. 61, 119, 127 n. 218, 143 n. 270, 150 n. 294, 176 n. 61, 180 n. 73, 182 n. 85, 215 n. 205, 264 n. 140, 268 n. 158, 336 n. 396 Ion 159 n. 4, 176 n. 61, 182 n. 85, 195 n. 129, 220 n. 225, 254–5, 299 n. 288, 333 n. 392 Med. 51, 127 n. 218, 157 n. 313, 182 n. 85, 207 n. 178, 216 n. 209, 221 n. 227, 268 n. 158 Melanippe the Wise 136 n. 246 Meleager 372 n. 97 Or. 118 n. 192, 127 n. 218, 135 n. 244, 181 n. 79, 286 n. 232, 291 n. 261, 315 n. 323, 344 n. 23, 358 n. 60 Palamedes 53 Peleus 322 n. 357 Phaethon 208 n. 184 Philoctetes 75 Phoen. 59 n. 8, 127 n. 218, 135 n. 244, 175 n. 58, 176 n. 61, 181 n. 79, 182, 268 n. 158, 316 n. 328 Phrixus 268 n. 158 Polyidus 268 n. 158, 293 n. 268 Protesilaus 317 n. 331 Rhes. 34, 127 n. 218, 181 n. 79, 195 n. 129, 344 n. 23, 372 n. 96 Sisyphus 53

Stheneboia 206 n. 167, 216 n. 209 Suppl. 127 n. 218, 157 n. 313, 136 n. 246, 193 n. 123, 207 n. 175, 265, 344 n. 23, 372 n. 96–7 Telephus 53, 268 Theseus 336 n. 396 Tro. 27 n. 86, 53, 127 n. 218, 159 n. 4, 267 n. 153, 272 n. 180, 275 n. 191, 276 n. 195, 344 n. 23 fate 362–84 fortune 206, 209–10, 362–84 and ‘tyche-plays’ 374–9 Galaneia 211 genre: characteristic plots 31–3 comedy contrasted with tragedy 22, 26–7, 30–1, 234–5 and escape-theme 124–5 generic deﬁnitions 10, 13, 18–43 ‘relabelling’ approach to 6–12, 43 romance 11–13, 232, 283 n. 218 satyric drama 23, 125 and setting 128 n. 128, 158 n. 2 and ‘tone’ 9, 27–9, 228–33 tragedy and philosophy 227–35, 243–52 tragedy and religion 342–52 ‘the Tragic’ 4, 14–17 geography 127–33, 158–9, 163–77, 200, 202–25, 306–7, 313, 326 gods 111, 255, 317, 338–84 as causes 362–84 as characters 344

General Index cult titles 351–2 divine freedom 215–17, 221 in the ether 264, 317 ex machina 74, 111, 153–4, 208, 289 n. 252, 360–1, 365, 378–83 in ﬁfth-century belief 345–6, 351, 380 foreign gods 183–90 presentation in tragedy 34, 71–2, 350–2 as prologue-speakers 363 relation to fate and fortune 368–84 in the sea 209–11 tragic gods similar to Homeric 34, 383–4 at work in recognition 299 n. 289 see also ritual; theology Gorgias 227, 239, 256, 258–9, 261, 270–8, 308, 316, 318, 326–7, 334, 337 Defence of Palamedes 271, 277 Encomium of Helen 58 n. 6, 108–9, 258, 271, 272–8, 295, 297, 303, 318, 321, 330, 375 n. 111 On What is Not 258–9, 270–2, 275–8 Hall, E. M. 163–4, 168–78, 184–5, 192–9 Heath, M. 39–40, 239–40 Hecataeus 83, 131–2, 154 n. 304, 164 Helen: beauty 166–7, 322–3, 327 birth from egg 145–7 in Egypt 83 in Gorgias’ Encomium 272–8 guilt 58, 117, 123, 136, 141–2, 273–4

429

and Menelaus 302–7 in mythical tradition 67, 115–20, 125–6, 136 negative portrayal in tragedy 117–18, 141–2 parentage 142–4, 273–4, 308–9, 364 plans escape 167–8, 196–8, 208, 329–31 real or phantom? 82–6, 89–96, 100–1, 110–12, 136, 224, 280–5, 286, 290, 302–7, 316–22 in ritual 352–62 and Stesichorus 86–109 symbolic signiﬁcance of 116–17 and Theoclymenus 194–6 untrustworthy 295–6 Hellanicus 83, 131–2, 149 n. 291, 154 n. 304 Heraclitus 206, 237 n. 38, 237 n. 40, 240 n. 55, 249 n. 85, 264 n. 140, 269, 324, 372 n. 96 Herodotus 83, 95–6, 113–14, 117–18, 128–9, 131–2, 154 n. 304, 193, 194, 196 n. 134, 205 n. 163, 237 n. 40, 263, 265 n. 144, 317 n. 330, 320, 374 n. 108 as conceptual inﬂuence on Euripides 131–2 and ethnic identity 177–8 as evidence for geography 163–77 on foreign gods 184 on Taurians 184–90 heroism 137–8, 280–5 Hesiod 83, 64–6, 87, 99, 109–10, 134, 144 n. 272, 205, 211 n. 195, 218 n. 215, 236 n. 38, 348

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Hierocles 321 Hitchcock, A. 33 Homer 34, 87, 99, 102, 105–6, 136, 149, 238, 241, 280–5, 348, 383–4 Il. 83, 95, 109, 116 n. 179, 122 n. 202, 152, 181 n. 76, 195 n. 133, 281, 317 n. 330 Od. 12, 63, 70, 83, 131, 149, 154 n. 304, 205, 211 n. 195, 219 n. 220, 224, 283 n. 218, 317 n. 330 Homeric Hymns 203 n. 152, 374 n. 107, 375 n. 111, 383 n. 144 identity 299, 306–7, 312–13, 322–4, 331–5 illusion, see appearances intellectualism 38, 58, 226–7, 235–60, 319, 341 intertextuality 80–1, 84–115, 140 Iphigenia: and Artemis 175, 200–1, 359 dead or alive? 150–1, 293, 305–6 hates Greeks 189–90, 199–200, 223–4, 295 in mythical tradition 69, 113–15, 119–20, 125–6 phantom 84–6 as priestess 175, 186–90, 218, 223–4, 295, 306, 359 and ritual 352–62 sacriﬁce 58, 84, 113, 119–20, 123, 137, 190, 208, 281 n. 206, 293 sends letter 293–4, 298, 305–6, 335–7 similarity to Helen 120, 152 irony 157, 228–33, 234, 253, 272–6, 302–4, 331, 334–5, 344, 361 n. 71, 363 Isocrates 91–4, 104, 240

‘late Euripides’ 2, 19, 179, 242 Leda 282 Lucian 99, 203 n. 152 Lysias 106, 239 n. 48, 380 n. 137 Maximus of Tyre 91 Melissus 269 Menander 245, 358 n. 60 Menelaus 67, 83, 110, 137–8, 151–2, 167–8, 191, 198, 224–5, 229–32, 282–5, 286, 303–7, 312–13, 320, 327–34, 364 messenger-speeches 35, 159, 363 metatheatricality 30–1, 50–1, 135, 191, 255–6, 326–7 Mikalson, J. 350–2, 380 mimesis 30, 35, 326 music 180–1, 287, 299 myth: absence of mythical orthodoxy 71 ‘anti-myths’ 125–6, 224 as deﬁning feature of tragedy 31–3 diﬀerentiated from ‘plot’ 58–80 as form of illusion 277–8, 280–5 as form of language 154–7, 277–8, 280–5, 309–10, 387–8 as ‘knowledge’ 154–7, 277–8, 387–8 lacking sequels 224 ‘metamythology’ 133–57, 234 n. 30, 309–10 and ritual 71–2 undermined by escapetragedies 309–10, 387–8 ‘use of myth’ 56–8, 80–2, 83–115, 121–4, 132–3, 154–6 names 70, 141, 149–50, 270, 279

General Index n. 204, 290–5, 308–16, 320–3, 388 narratology 63–70, 76–80, 297–300 Nietzsche, F. 19, 242–6, 248–9, 252, 257, 259, 341 Nile 166–7, 215, 262–3 novelty 56–7, 120–1, 255 Odysseus 70, 209 Oedipus 32, 34, 61–3, 70 n. 36, 316 n. 328 Orestes 69, 114, 152–3, 172, 186–90, 219, 224–5, 281–4, 285–6, 293–4, 304–7, 315, 323–4, 334–7, 367 Paris 67, 70, 83, 313, 316 Parmenides 238, 241, 269 Pausanias 145 n. 274, 312 n. 314, 323 Peloponnesian War 46, 365 n. 81 peripeteia 37, 74, 223, 299 periplous 132 Perseus 68, 121–4, 215–16, 225, 321–2 pessimism 14–15, 46–7, 142, 222–5, 280, 307, 337, 387–8 phantoms 79, 82–6, 89–96, 100–1, 107, 110–12, 316–21, 379 philosophy 226–7, 232–5, 236–337 Philostratus 91, 128 n. 225, 144 n. 272, 203 n. 152 Phrynichus (comedian) 253 Phrynichus (tragedian) 33, 128 n. 220, 131, 175 n. 58 Pindar 71 n. 40, 83, 105, 151 n. 298, 169 n. 42, 237 n. 38, 283 n. 219, 324, 359 n. 62, 374 nn. 107–8 Pittacus 206

431

Plato 166 n. 30, 180 n. 72, 205 n. 165, 206, 210 n. 192, 235, 248, 250, 258 n. 122, 259, 269 n. 162, 317–19 inventor of Palinode quotation 105–10 and myths 72 n. 42, 105–10 on tragedy and philosophy 236–9, 248 Cratylus 270, 314 n. 318, 317 Euthydemus 270 n. 167 Gorgias 205, 239, 317 Hipp. Min. 239 n. 48 Laws 345–6 Phaedr. 88–109, 319 Rep. 38, 107 n. 146, 194 n. 126, 236–9, 237 n. 40, 240, 351, 372 n. 96 Symp. 23, 107 n. 146, 346 n. 28 Theaet. 317 Plautus 10 n. 26 plot: centrality of recognition 298–9 counterfactual scenarios 58–60, 79, 113, 121–3 diﬀerentiated from ‘myth’ 58–80 invention 114–15, 123, 125–6, 149–50 and philosophical ideas 233–4, 289 in tragedy 35, 48 see also myth Plutarch 41, 72 n. 42, 165 n. 28, 168 n. 36, 180 n. 72, 251 n. 95, 340 n. 9 Polyidus 119 n. 193, 298 n. 283 Poseidon 210 proagon 59 n. 11 Prodicus 239 n. 48, 249, 270, 310 prologues 74, 127–8, 129, 158–9, 328, 363–4

432

General Index

prophecy 46, 364, 365–9 Protagoras 234 n. 32, 249, 269, 270, 271 n. 171, 308, 310, 340 Proteus 100, 118, 183, 194, 211, 305, 311 rationalism 244–8, 341–3, 348–9 reality, see appearances reception: ancient 1–2, 226, 235–7, 239–42, 338, 339–45 modern 6–9, 15–22, 39–42, 243–8, 338, 339–45 recognition 286, 289, 297–307, 313–16, 328, 331–3 rescue 130–1, 223–5, 328 see also escape rhetoric 108–9, 122, 197–9, 254, 258, 272–8, 297, 334 ritual 71–2, 109, 120, 184–90, 196, 200–1, 212–13, 288, 312, 320, 323–4, 335, 338, 351, 352–62, 375 scene-painting 159–62, 204 n. 159 Scullion, S. 357–9 sea 128, 170–4, 203–25, 293–4 linked to fortune 206, 209–10 as metaphor 206–7, 214–15, 222–5 and sailing 167, 205–6 as setting for plot 211–14 Seaford, R. A. S. 41–2, 353–4 Segal, C. 11–12, 222–5, 278 n. 201, 291–2, 328 Seidensticker, B. 28–9 Semonides 206 Shakespeare, W. 11–12, 23–4, 29 n. 96, 232–3 Simonides 321 n. 349 Socrates 235 n. 34, 238 n. 43,

243–9, 253–4, 266 n. 146 Solon 317 sophists 237, 239, 260–2, 268–78, 290–1, 319, 334, 337 Sophocles 28, 160–2, 185 n. 92, 220 n. 225, 242, 263, 343, 363 n. 74, 365 Aj. 36, 161 n. 13, 207 n. 175, 293 n. 268, 316 n. 328 Andromeda 124, 328 n. 379 Ant. 39, 59 n. 8, 203 n. 153, 206–7, 293 n. 268, 351 n. 44 Chryses 114–15, 129 El. 266 n. 146, 287, 293 n. 268, 299 n. 288 Iphigenia 119 n. 193 OC 220 n. 225, 229 n. 14, 316 n. 328 OT 14, 63, 207, 378 n. 134 Phil. 75, 124–5, 170 n. 43, 215 n. 205, 229 n. 14, 316 n. 328, 374 n. 107 Retrieval of Helen 116, 124, 140 n. 262, 182 n. 82 Trach. 211 n. 195, 336 n. 396 Sourvinou-Inwood, C. 351–2, 360–1 Sparta 109, 127, 137, 320 staging: and actors in tragedy 48–9 in Andromeda 204 and foreign characters 180–2 non-realistic conventions 36 reﬂects plays’ themes 325–37 and sense of place 158–62, 175–6 statues 122–3, 275, 303, 321–5, 327 Stesichorus: Cycnus 185 n. 92 Helen 88, 90 Oresteia 287 Palinode 86–110, 133, 277

General Index Stinton, T. C. W. 146–8, 340 n. 7, 380 Strabo 149 n. 293, 218 n. 217 structuralist readings 40–1, 126, 130–1, 222–5, 227, 320, 354–7 surprise 56, 60, 113, 120, 127 Taplin, O. P. 22, 37–8 Taurians 79, 113–15, 129, 138–9, 163–77, 179, 182–90, 198–201, 218–19, 312, 359 Teucer 138, 167, 192, 219, 300–1, 308–11 textual discussion 111 n. 159, 137 n. 254, 145–7, 186–90, 217 n. 214, 263 n. 136, 267, 273 n. 182, 314 n. 320, 330 n. 386, 333 n. 392, 366–7, 368, 372 n. 95 textual tradition of Euripides 2 Theagenes 348 Theoclymenus 32, 149, 166–7, 175, 182, 191, 194–8, 289, 314, 325, 329–31, 371 theology 40, 71–2, 184, 266, 278, 338–84 Theonoe 32, 168, 175, 182, 191, 194–8, 263–6, 296–7, 325, 331, 364, 371 also called Eido 149, 313–14 Thoas 51, 149, 175, 182, 190–1, 198–9, 286, 289, 314 Thucydides 165, 239 n. 48, 291 n. 261, 294 n. 269, 365 n. 81, 375 n. 109 titles of plays 59–60 tragedy, see genre translations 27, 197 n. 136, 230–3, 254–6, 382 n. 141

433

trilogies and tetralogies 3, 21 n. 58, 25 escape-trilogy 43–55, 124–7, 278–80, 328–9, 386–8 ‘Trojan’ trilogy 53 Trojan War 32, 67, 69, 70, 86–109, 111, 117, 123, 136, 142, 222, 280–5, 296, 361 n. 70, 364, 366, 381 truth 101 n. 124, 236, 269–70 see also appearances tyche, see fortune Tzetzes 96 vase-paintings 1, 128, 185 n. 93, 191, 328 n. 379, 336 Verrall, A. W. 342–9, 363 Vitruvius 226 weather linked to fortune 209–11, 372–3 Winnington-Ingram, R. P. 252–6 word-play 234, 279, 292–5, 332–3 words: compared to visual images 316–25 correctness of 270, 310–16, 333–4 as form of illusion 272–8, 290–5, 303–7, 309–10, 321, 336–7, 363, 388 see also names writing and literacy 81, 251–2, 293–4, 336–7 Xenophanes 237 n. 38, 238, 240, 278 n. 302, 348 Xenophon 205