Libation Bearers

Aeschylus

Aeschylus, Volume 2. Smyth, Herbert Weir, translator. London; New York: William Heinemann; G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1926.

  1. But when hope once again lifts and strengthens me, it puts away my distress and dawns brightly on me.
Electra
  1. To what could we more fittingly appeal than to those very miseries we have endured from the woman herself who bore us?
  2. She may fawn upon us, but they are past all soothing. For like a fierce-hearted wolf the temper we have acquired from our mother is implacable.
Chorus
  1. On my breast I beat[*](At the time of Agamemnon’s murder, when the women wailed with the extravagance of professional Asiatic mourners. Here they repeat those signs of mourning.) an Arian[*](Aria was a district of Persia. For Eranians (Old-Persian ariya) the Greeks used Ἄριοι; at least Herodotus says this was an ancient name of the Medes.) dirge in just the same fashion as a Cissian[*](Cissia formed part of Susiana.) wailing woman.
  2. With clenched fists, raining blows thick and fast, my outstretched hands could be seen descending from above, from far above, now on this side, now on that, till my battered and wretched head resounded with the strokes.