Philoctetes

Sophocles

Sophocles the plays and fragments, Part 4: The Philoctetes. Jebb, Richard Claverhouse, Sir, translator. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1898.

  1. And for the sake of what did the Atreids after so long a time turn their thoughts so urgently towards this man,
  2. whom they were long since keeping an outcast? What was the desire that came over them, or what force? What avenging spirit sent by the gods to exact payment for evil deeds?
Merchant
  1. I will inform you of all that, since it seems that you have not heard. There was a seer of noble birth,
  2. a son of Priam, called Helenus, whom that man, out on a solitary night raid—that deceitful Odysseus, whose repute is all shame and dishonor—captured. Leading him back in bonds, he displayed him publicly to the Achaeans as his glorious prey.