Prometheus Bound
Aeschylus
Aeschylus, Volume 1. Smyth, Herbert Weir, translator. London; New York: William Heinemann; G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1922.
- Your urging meets my eagerness; for my four-footed winged beast fans with his wings the smooth pathway of the air; and truly he will be glad to rest his knees in his stall at home. Exit
- I mourn your unfortunate fate, Prometheus.
- Shedding from my eyes a coursing flood of tears I wet my tender cheeks with their moist streams. For Zeus, holding this unenviable power by self-appointed laws,
- displays towards the gods of old an overweening spirit.
- Now the whole earth cries aloud in lamentation; . . . lament the greatness of the glory of your time-hallowed honor,
- the honor that was yours and your brother’s; and all mortals who make their dwelling place in holy Asia share the anguish of your most lamentable suffering;
- And those who dwell in the land of Colchis, the maidens fearless in fight; and the Scythian multitude that inhabits the most remote region of the earth bordering the Maeotic lake;
- And the warlike flower of Arabia, which hold the high-cragged citadel near the Caucasus, a hostile host that roars among the sharp-pointed spears.
- One other Titan god before this I have seen in distress, enthralled in torment by adamantine bonds—Atlas, pre-eminent in mighty strength, who moans as he supports
- the vault of heaven on his back.
- The waves of the sea utter a cry as they fall, the deep laments, the black abyss of Hades rumbles in response, and the streams of pure-flowing rivers
- lament your piteous pain.
- No, do not think it is from pride or even from wilfulness that I am silent. Painful thoughts devour my heart as I behold myself maltreated in this way. And yet who else but I definitely assigned