Ajax

Sophocles

Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 7: The Ajax. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891.

  1. Menelaus, the beneficiary of this expedition.
Teucer
  1. I see him; he is not hard to recognize when near.
    Menelaus
    1. You there, I tell you not to lift that corpse for burial, but leave it where it lies.
    Teucer
    1. Why do you waste your breath on this arrogant command?
    Menelaus
    1. It conveys my decree, and the decree of the army’s supreme ruler.
    Teucer
    1. Would you mind, then, telling me what reason you pretend?
    Menelaus
    1. This—that when we had hoped we were bringing Ajax from home to be an ally and a friend for the Greeks, we found him on closer examination to be an enemy worse than the Phrygians,
    2. since he plotted the murder of the entire army and marched by night against us in order to take us with his spear. And if some god had not smothered this attempt, we would have been allotted the fate which he now has, and we would be dead and lie prostrate by an ignoble doom,