Rhesus

Euripides

Euripides. The Rhesus of Euripides. Translated into English rhyming verse with explanatory notes by Gilbert Murray. Murray, Gilbert, translator. London: George Allen and Company, Ltd., 1913.

  1. What was his name or race,
  2. What the high God[*]( P. 40, 1. 703, What the High God.]—It would be unparalleled in classical Greek to describe a man by his religion; but this phrase seems only to mean: What is his tribal God? i.e. what is his tribe? Thus it could be said of Isagoras in Herodotus (v. 66) that his kinsmen sacrificed to Carian Zeus, suggesting, presumably, that he had Carian blood. ) by whom his sires have sworn?
DIVERS GUARDS
  1. This night must be Odysseus’ work, or whose?—
  2. Odysseus? Aye, to judge by ancient use.—
  3. Odysseus surely!—That is thy belief?—
  4. What else? It seems he hath no fear
  5. Of such as we!—Whom praise ye there?
  6. Whose prowess? Say!—Odysseus.—Nay,
  7. Praise not the secret stabbing of a thief!
CHORUS.
  1. He came once, of old,
  2. Up thro’ the city throng,
  3. Foam on his lips, a-cold,
  4. Huddled in rags that hung
  5. Covering just the sword
  6. Hid in his mantle’s pleat;
  7. His face grimed and scored,
  8. A priest of wandering feet,
  9. Who begged his bread in the street.
  10. Many and evil things
  11. He cast on the brother kings