The Trojan Women

Euripides

Euripides. The Plays of Euripides, Translated into English Prose from the Text of Paley. Vol. I. Coleridge, Edward P., translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1906.

  1. I have come, stricken with terror. Has a herald from the Danaids already arrived?
  2. To whom am I, poor captive, given as a slave?
Hecuba
  1. You are not far from being allotted now.
Second Semi-Chorus
  1. Alas! What man of Argos or Phthia will bear me in sorrow far from Troy, to his home, or to some island fastness?
Hecuba
  1. Ah! ah! Whose slave shall I become in my old age? in what land? a poor old drone, the wretched copy of a corpse, alas! set to keep the gate
  2. or tend their children, I who once held royal rank in Troy.
Chorus
  1. Alas, alas! What piteous dirge will you devise to mourn the outrage done you? No more through Ida’s looms
  2. shall I ply the shuttle to and fro. I look my last on my children’s bodies, my last; I shall endure surpassing misery, it may be as the unwilling bride of some Hellene (perish the night and fortune that brings me to this!);