Supplices

Aeschylus

Aeschylus, Volume 1. Smyth, Herbert Weir, translator. London; New York: William Heinemann; G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1922.

  1. Abominable is the lustful race of Aegyptus and insatiate of battle; and you know that all too well.
  1. In ships, stout-timbered and dark-prowed, they have sailed here,
  2. attended by a mighty black host, and in their wrath overtaken us.
Danaus
  1. But they will find here a force with arms well-seasoned by the noonday heat.
  1. Do not leave me forlorn, I implore you, father. A woman abandoned to herself is nothing. There is no Ares in her.
  1. They are of evil mind, and guileful of purpose, with impure hearts, thinking no more of altars than carrion birds.
Danaus
  1. This would profit us well, my children, should they incur both Heaven’s hate and yours.
  1. Father, no fear of tridents or of things held sacred in the sight of Heaven will ever keep their hands from us.
  1. They are overweening, maddened, with unholy rage, shameless dogs that do not respect the gods.
Danaus
  1. Yet there is a saying that wolves are stronger than dogs; the papyrus-fruit does not conquer the wheat-ear.[*](Distinctive foods mark national differences—the Egyptians are no match for the Argives. Theophrastus, in hisHistory of Plants 4.8, reports that the inhabitants of Egypt chew papyrus, raw, boiled, or roasted.)
  1. Since they have the tempers of lewd and impious beasts, we must guard against them quickly.
Danaus
  1. A fleet in getting under way is not so speedy,
  2. nor yet in anchoring, when the securing cables must be brought ashore; and even at anchorage shepherds of ships do not feel immediately secure, above all if they have arrived on a harborless coast when the sun is sinking into night.
  3. In a cautious pilot night is likely to beget anxiety. Then, too, the disembarking of an army cannot be effected with success before a ship has gained confidence in her moorings. But, for all your terror, remember not to neglect the gods. I will return when I have secured aid. The city will find no fault with a messenger,
  4. old in years, but with youth in his heart and on his tongue. Exit
Chorus
  1. O land of hills, land of our righteous veneration, what is to be our lot? To what region in the Apian land are we to flee, if anywhere there be some dark hiding-place? Ah that I might become black smoke
  2. that draws near to the clouds of Zeus; or, soaring aloft without wings, vanish out of sight like viewless dust and dissolve into nothingness!
Chorus
  1. The evil is no longer escapable;
  2. my heart is darkened and trembling; the look-out my father held has brought me ruin. I am undone with terror. Rather would I meet my doom in a noose
  3. than suffer the embraces of a man I loathe. Death before that, with Hades for my lord and master!