Hecuba

Euripides

Euripides. The Plays of Euripides, Translated into English Prose from the Text of Paley. Vol. II. Coleridge, Edward P., translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1891.

  1. Woe and tribulation
  2. were made my lot in life, when Alexander first cut his beams of pine in Ida’s woods, to sail across the heaving sea
  3. in quest of Helen’s bed, loveliest woman on whom the sun-god turns his golden eye.
Chorus
  1. For here begins trouble’s cycle,
  2. and, worse than that, relentless fate; and from one man’s folly came a universal curse, bringing death to the land of Simois, with trouble from an alien shore. The strife the shepherd decided
  3. on Ida, between three daughters of the blessed gods,
Chorus
  1. brought as its result war and bloodshed and the ruin of my home;
  2. and many a Spartan maiden too is weeping bitter tears in her halls on the banks of fair Eurotas, and many a mother whose sons are slain,
  3. is smiting her gray head and tearing her cheeks, making her nails bloody in the furrowed gash.
Maid-servant
  1. Oh! ladies, where is Hecuba, our queen of sorrow, who conquers all in tribulation, men and women both alike?