{"id":32,"date":"2017-06-24T20:36:20","date_gmt":"2017-06-24T20:36:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/the-bacchae-of-euripides-iv\/"},"modified":"2017-07-20T17:44:27","modified_gmt":"2017-07-20T17:44:27","slug":"the-bacchae-of-euripides-iv","status":"web-only","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/suny-geneseo-humanities1-1\/chapter\/the-bacchae-of-euripides-iv\/","title":{"raw":"The Bacchae of Euripides IV","rendered":"The Bacchae of Euripides IV"},"content":{"raw":"
\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n<\/div>\r\n
Kithaeron?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
The Mountain hath slain him!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Who first came nigh him?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
I, I, 'tis confess\u00e8d!\r\nAnd they named me there by him\r\nAg\u00e2v\u00ea the Bless\u00e8d!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Who was next in the band on him?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
The daughters. . .<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
The daughters?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Of Cadmus laid hand on him.\r\nBut the swift hand that slaughters\r\nIs mine; mine is the praise!\r\nBless ye this day of days!<\/div>\r\n

[The<\/i> Leader<\/span> tries to speak, but is not able<\/i>; Agave<\/span> begins gently stroking the head<\/i>.]<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Gather ye now to the feast!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Feast!\u2014O miserable!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
See, it falls to his breast,\r\nCurling and gently tressed,\r\nThe hair of the Wild Bull's crest\u2014\r\nThe young steer of the fell!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Most like a beast of the wild\r\nThat head, those locks defiled.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(lifting up the head, more excitedly<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

He wakened his Mad Ones,\r\nA Chase-God, a wise God!\r\nHe sprang them to seize this!\r\nHe preys where his band preys.<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(brooding, with horror<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

In the trail of thy Mad Ones\r\nThou tearest thy prize, God!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Dost praise it?<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
I praise this?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Ah, soon shall the land praise!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
And Pentheus, O Mother,\r\nThy child?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
He shall cry on\r\nMy name as none other,\r\nBless the spoils of the Lion!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Aye, strange is thy treasure!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
And strange was the taking!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Thou art glad?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Beyond measure;\r\nYea, glad in the breaking\r\nOf dawn upon all this land,\r\nBy the prize, the prize of my hand!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Show then to all the land, unhappy one,\r\nThe trophy of this deed that thou hast done!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Ho, all ye men that round the citadel\r\nAnd shining towers of ancient Th\u00eab\u00ea dwell,\r\nCome! Look upon this prize, this lion's spoil,\r\nThat we have taken\u2014yea, with our own toil,\r\nWe, Cadmus' daughters! Not with leathern-set\r\nThessalian javelins, not with hunter's net,\r\nOnly white arms and swift hands' bladed fall.\r\nWhy make ye much ado, and boast withal\r\nYour armourers' engines? See, these palms were bare\r\nThat caught the angry beast, and held, and tare\r\nThe limbs of him! . . . Father! . . . Go, bring to me\r\nMy father! . . . Aye, and Pentheus, where is he,\r\nMy son? He shall set up a ladder-stair\r\nAgainst this house, and in the triglyphs there\r\nNail me this lion's head, that gloriously\r\nI bring ye, having slain him\u2014I, even I!<\/div>\r\n

[She goes through the crowd towards the Castle, showing the head and looking for a place to hang it. Enter from the Mountain<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>, with attendants, bearing the body of<\/i> Pentheus<\/span> on a bier<\/i>.]<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
On, with your awful burden. Follow me,\r\nThralls, to his house, whose body grievously\r\nWith many a weary search at last in dim\r\nKithaeron's glens I found, torn limb from limb,\r\nAnd through the interweaving forest weed\r\nScattered.\u2014Men told me of my daughters' deed,\r\nWhen I was just returned within these walls,\r\nWith grey Teiresias, from the Bacchanals.\r\nAnd back I hied me to the hills again\r\nTo seek my murdered son. There saw I plain\r\nActaeon's mother, ranging where he died,\r\nAutono\u00eb; and Ino by her side,\r\nWandering ghastly in the pine-copses.\r\nAg\u00e2v\u00ea was not there. The rumour is\r\nShe cometh fleet-foot hither.\u2014Ah! 'Tis true;\r\nA sight I scarce can bend mine eyes unto.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(turning from the Palace and seeing him<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

My father, a great boast is thine this hour.\r\nThou hast begotten daughters, high in power\r\nAnd valiant above all mankind\u2014yea, all\r\nValiant, though none like me! I have let fall\r\nThe shuttle by the loom, and raised my hand\r\nFor higher things, to slay from out thy land\r\nWild beasts! See, in mine arms I bear the prize,\r\nThat nailed above these portals it may rise\r\nTo show what things thy daughters did! Do thou\r\nTake it, and call a feast. Proud art thou now\r\nAnd highly favoured in our valiancy!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
O depth of grief, how can I fathom thee\r\nOr look upon thee!\u2014Poor, poor, bloodstained hand!\r\nPoor sisters!\u2014A fair sacrifice to stand\r\nBefore God's altars, daughter; yea, and call\r\nMe and my citizens to feast withal!\r\nNay, let me weep\u2014for thine affliction most,\r\nThen for mine own. All, all of us are lost,\r\nNot wrongfully, yet is it hard, from one\r\nWho might have loved\u2014our Bromios, our own!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
How crabb\u00e8d and how scowling in the eyes\r\nIs man's old age!\u2014Would that my son likewise\r\nWere happy of his hunting, in my way,\r\nWhen with his warrior bands he will essay\r\nThe wild beast!\u2014Nay, his valiance is to fight\r\nWith God's will! Father, thou shouldst set him right. . . .\r\nWill no one bring him hither, that mine eyes\r\nMay look on his, and show him this my prize!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Alas, if ever ye can know again\r\nThe truth of what ye did, what pain of pain\r\nThat truth shall bring! Or were it best to wait\r\nDarkened for evermore, and deem your state\r\nNot misery, though ye know no happiness?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
What seest thou here to chide, or not to bless?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(after hesitation, resolving himself<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Raise me thine eyes to yon blue dome of air!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
'Tis done. What dost thou bid me seek for there?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Is it the same, or chang\u00e8d in thy sight?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
More shining than before, more heavenly bright!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
And that wild tremor, is it with thee still?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(troubled<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

I know not what thou sayest; but my will\r\nClears, and some change cometh, I know not how.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Canst hearken then, being changed, and answer, now?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
I have forgotten something; else I could.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
What husband led thee of old from mine abode?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Ech\u00eeon, whom men named the Child of Earth.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
And what child in Ech\u00eeon's house had birth?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Pentheus, of my love and his father's bred.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Thou bearest in thine arms an head\u2014what head?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(beginning to tremble, and not looking at what she carries<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

A lion's\u2014so they all said in the chase.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Turn to it now\u2014'tis no long toil\u2014and gaze.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Ah! But what is it? What am I carrying here?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Look once upon it full, till all be clear!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
I see . . . most deadly pain! Oh, woe is me!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Wears it the likeness of a lion to thee?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
No; 'tis the head\u2014O God!\u2014of Pentheus, this!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Blood-drenched ere thou wouldst know him! Aye, 'tis his.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Who slew him?\u2014How came I to hold this thing?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
O cruel Truth, is this thine home-coming?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Answer! My heart is hanging on thy breath!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
'Twas thou.\u2014Thou and thy sisters wrought his death.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
In what place was it? His own house, or where?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Where the dogs tore Actaeon, even there.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Why went he to Kithaeron? What sought he?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
To mock the God and thine own ecstasy.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
But how should we be on the hills this day?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Being mad! A spirit drove all the land that way.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
'Tis Dionyse hath done it! Now I see.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(earnestly<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Ye wronged Him! Ye denied his deity!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(turning from him<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Show me the body of the son I love!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(leading her to the bier<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

'Tis here, my child. Hard was the quest thereof.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Laid in due state?<\/div>\r\n

[As there is no answer, she lifts the veil of the bier, and sees.<\/i>]<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Oh, if I wrought a sin,\r\n'Twas mine! What portion had my child therein?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
He made him like to you, adoring not\r\nThe God; who therefore to one bane hath brought\r\nYou and this body, wrecking all our line,\r\nAnd me. Aye, no man-child was ever mine;\r\nAnd now this first-fruit of the flesh of thee,\r\nSad woman, foully here and frightfully\r\nLies murdered! Whom the house looked up unto,<\/div>\r\n

[Kneeling by the body.<\/i>]<\/p>\r\n\r\n

O Child, my daughter's child! who heldest true\r\nMy castle walls; and to the folk a name\r\nOf fear thou wast; and no man sought to shame\r\nMy grey beard, when they knew that thou wast there,\r\nElse had they swift reward!\u2014And now I fare\r\nForth in dishonour, outcast, I, the great\r\nCadmus, who sowed the seed-rows of this state\r\nOf Thebes, and reaped the harvest wonderful.\r\nO my belov\u00e8d, though thy heart is dull\r\nIn death, O still belov\u00e8d, and alway\r\nBelov\u00e8d! Never more, then, shalt thou lay\r\nThine hand to this white beard, and speak to me\r\nThy \"Mother's Father\"; ask \"Who wrongeth thee?\r\nWho stints thine honour, or with malice stirs\r\nThine heart? Speak, and I smite thine injurers!\"\r\nBut now\u2014woe, woe, to me and thee also,\r\nWoe to thy mother and her sisters, woe\r\nAlway! Oh, whoso walketh not in dread\r\nOf Gods, let him but look on this man dead!<\/div>\r\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Lo, I weep with thee. 'Twas but due reward\r\nGod sent on Pentheus; but for thee . . . 'Tis hard.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
\r\n\r\nMy father, thou canst see the change in me,\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n[A page or more has here been torn out of the MS. from which all our copies of \"The Bacchae\" are derived. It evidently contained a speech of Ag\u00e2v\u00ea (followed presumably by some words of the Chorus), and an appearance of<\/i> Dionysus<\/span> upon a cloud. He must have pronounced judgment upon the Thebans in general, and especially upon the daughters of<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>, have justified his own action, and declared his determination to establish his godhead. Where the MS. begins again, we find him addressing<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>.]\r\n
\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

And tell of Time, what gifts for thee he bears,\r\nWhat griefs and wonders in the winding years.\r\nFor thou must change and be a Serpent Thing\r\nStrange, and beside thee she whom thou didst bring\r\nOf old to be thy bride from Heaven afar,\r\nHarmonia, daughter of the Lord of War.\r\nYea, and a chariot of kine\u2014so spake\r\nThe word of Zeus\u2014thee and thy Queen shall take\r\nThrough many lands, Lord of a wild array\r\nOf orient spears. And many towns shall they\r\nDestroy beneath thee, that vast horde, until\r\nThey touch Apollo's dwelling, and fulfil\r\nTheir doom, back driven on stormy ways and steep.\r\nThee only and thy spouse shall Ares keep,\r\nAnd save alive to the Islands of the Blest.\r\nThus speaketh Dionysus, Son confessed\r\nOf no man but of Zeus!\u2014Ah, had ye seen\r\nTruth in the hour ye would not, all had been\r\nWell with ye, and the Child of God your friend!<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Dionysus, we beseech thee! We have sinned!<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Too late! When there was time, ye knew me not!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
We have confessed. Yet is thine hand too hot.<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Ye mocked me, being God; this is your wage.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Should God be like a proud man in his rage?<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
'Tis as my sire, Zeus, willed it long ago.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n

(turning from him almost with disdain<\/i>)<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Old Man, the word is spoken; we must go.<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
And seeing ye must, what is it that ye wait?<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Child, we are come into a deadly strait,\r\nAll; thou, poor sufferer, and thy sisters twain,\r\nAnd my sad self. Far off to barbarous men,\r\nA grey-haired wanderer, I must take my road.\r\nAnd then the oracle, the doom of God,\r\nThat I must lead a raging horde far-flown\r\nTo prey on Hellas; lead my spouse, mine own\r\nHarmonia, Ares' child, discorporate\r\nAnd haunting forms, dragon and dragon-mate.\r\nAgainst the tombs and altar-stones of Greece,\r\nLance upon lance behind us; and not cease\r\nFrom toils, like other men, nor dream, nor past\r\nThe foam of Acheron find my peace at last.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Father! And I must wander far from thee!<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
O Child, why wilt thou reach thine arms to me,\r\nAs yearns the milk-white swan, when old swans die?<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Where shall I turn me else? No home have I.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
I know not; I can help thee not.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Farewell, O home, O ancient tower!\r\nLo, I am outcast from my bower,\r\nAnd leave ye for a worser lot.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Go forth, go forth to misery,\r\nThe way Actaeon's father went!<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Father, for thee my tears are spent.<\/div>\r\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
\r\n\r\nNay, Child, 'tis I must weep for thee;\r\n\r\nFor thee and for thy sisters twain!\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
On all this house, in bitter wise,\r\nOur Lord and Master, Dionyse,\r\nHath poured the utter dregs of pain!<\/div>\r\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
In bitter wise, for bitter was the shame\r\nYe did me, when Thebes honoured not my name.<\/div>\r\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
Then lead me where my sisters be;\r\nTogether let our tears be shed,\r\nOur ways be wandered; where no red\r\nKithaeron waits to gaze on me;\r\nNor I gaze back; no thyrsus stem,\r\nNor song, nor memory in the air.\r\nOh, other Bacchanals be there,\r\nNot I, not I, to dream of them!<\/div>\r\n

[Agave<\/span> with her group of attendants goes out on the side away from the Mountain<\/i>. Dionysus<\/span> rises upon the Cloud and disappears<\/i>.]<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Chorus<\/span><\/h3>\r\n
There be many shapes of mystery.\r\nAnd many things God makes to be,\r\nPast hope or fear.\r\nAnd the end men looked for cometh not,\r\nAnd a path is there where no man thought.\r\nSo hath it fallen here.<\/div>\r\n
[Exeunt<\/i>.]<\/div>\r\n
\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\n

\u00a0NOTES ON THE BACCHAE<\/h2>\r\n

INTRODUCTORY NOTE<\/h3>\r\nThe Bacchae<\/i>, being from one point of view a religious drama, a kind of \"mystery play,\" is full of allusions both to the myth and to the religion of Dionysus.\r\n\r\n1. The Myth, as implied by Euripides. Semel\u00ea, daughter of Cadmus, being loved by Zeus, asked her divine lover to appear to her once in his full glory; he came, a blaze of miraculous lightning, in the ecstasy of which Semel\u00ea died, giving premature birth to a son. Zeus, to save this child's life and make him truly God as well as Man, tore open his own flesh and therein fostered the child till in due time, by a miraculous and mysterious Second Birth, the child of Semel\u00ea came to full life as God.\r\n\r\n2. The Religion of Dionysus is hard to formulate or even describe, both because of its composite origins and because of its condition of constant vitality, fluctuation, and development.\r\n\r\n(a<\/i>) The first datum, apparently, is the introduction from Thrace of the characteristic God of the wild northern mountains, a God of Intoxication, of Inspiration, a giver of superhuman or immortal life. His worship is superposed upon that of divers old Tree or Vegetation Gods, already worshipped in Greece. He becomes specially the God of the Vine. Originally a god of the common folk, despised and unauthorised, he is eventually so strong as to be adopted into the Olympian hierarchy as the \"youngest\" of the Gods, son of Zeus. His \"Olympian\" name, so to speak, is Dionysus, but in his worship he is addressed by numbers of names, more or less mystic and secret\u2014Bromios, Bacchios or Baccheus, Iacchos, Eleuthercus, Zagreus, Sabazios, &c. Some of these may be the names of old spirits whom he has displaced; some are his own Thracian names. Bromos and Sabaja, for instance, seem to have been Thracian names for two kinds of intoxicating drink. Bacchos means a \"wand.\" Together with his many names, he has many shapes, especially appearing as a Bull and a Serpent.\r\n\r\n(b<\/i>) This religion, very primitive and barbarous, but possessing a strong hold over the emotions of the common people, was seized upon and transfigured by the great wave of religious reform, known under the name of Orphism, which swept over Greece and South Italy in the sixth century B.C.<\/span>, and influenced the teachings of such philosophers as Pythagoras, Aristeas, Empedocles, and the many writers on purification and the world after death. Orphism may very possibly represent an ancient Cretan religion in clash or fusion with one from Thrace. At any rate, it was grafted straight upon the Dionysus-worship, and, without rationalising, spiritualised and reformed it. Ascetic, mystical, ritualistic, and emotional, Orphism easily excited both enthusiasm and ridicule. It lent itself both to inspired saintliness and to imposture. In doctrine it laid especial stress upon sin, and the sacerdotal purification of sin; on the eternal reward due beyond the grave to the pure and the impure, the pure living in an eternal ecstasy\u2014\"perpetual intoxication,\" as Plato satirically calls it\u2014the impure toiling through long ages to wash out their stains. It recast in various ways the myth of Dionysus, and especially the story of his Second Birth. All true worshippers become in a mystical sense one with the God; they are born again and are \"Bacchoi.\" Dionysus being the God within, the perfectly pure soul is possessed by the God wholly, and becomes nothing but the God.\r\n\r\nBased on very primitive rites and feelings, on the religion of men who made their gods in the image of snakes and bulls and fawns, because they hardly felt any difference of kind between themselves and the animals, the worship of Dionysus kept always this feeling of kinship with wild things. The beautiful side of this feeling is vividly conspicuous in The Bacchae<\/i>. And the horrible side is not in the least concealed.\r\n\r\nA curious relic of primitive superstition and cruelty remained firmly imbedded in Orphism\u2014a doctrine irrational and unintelligible, and for that very reason wrapped in the deepest and most sacred mystery: a belief in the sacrifice of Dionysus himself, and the purification of man by his blood.\r\n\r\nIt seems possible that the savage Thracians, in the fury of their worship on the mountains, when they were possessed by the God and became \"wild beasts,\" actually tore with their teeth and hands any hares, goats, fawns, or the like that they came across. There survives a constant tradition of inspired Bacchanals in their miraculous strength tearing even bulls asunder\u2014a feat, happily, beyond the bounds of human possibility. The wild beast that tore was, of course, the savage God himself. And by one of those curious confusions of thought, which seem so inconceivable to us and so absolutely natural and obvious to primitive men, the beast torn was also the God! The Orphic congregations of later times, in their most holy gatherings, solemnly partook of the blood of a bull, which was, by a mystery, the blood of Dionysus-Zagreus himself, the \"Bull of God,\" slain in sacrifice for the purification of man. And the Maenads of poetry and myth, among more beautiful proofs of their superhuman or infra-human character, have always to tear bulls in pieces and taste of the blood. It is noteworthy, and throws much light on the spirit of Orphism, that apart from this sacramental tasting of the blood, the Orphic worshipper held it an abomination to eat the flesh of animals at all. The same religious fervour and zeal for purity which made him reject the pollution of animal food, made him at the same time cling to a ceremonial which would utterly disgust the ordinary hardened flesh-eater. It fascinated him just because it was so incredibly primitive and uncanny; because it was a mystery which transcended reason!\r\n\r\nIt will be observed that Euripides, though certainly familiar with Orphism\u2014which he mentions in The Hippolytus<\/i> and treated at length in The Cretans<\/i> (see Appendix)\u2014has in The Bacchae<\/i> gone back behind Orphism to the more primitive stuff from which it was made. He has little reference to any specially Orphic doctrine; not a word, for instance, about the immortality of the soul. And his idealisation or spiritualisation of Dionysus-worship proceeds along the lines of his own thought, not on those already fixed by the Orphic teachers.\r\n\r\n
\r\n\r\nP. 80, l. 17, Asia all that by the salt sea lies, &c.], i.e.<\/i> the coasts of Asia Minor inhabited by Greeks, Ionia, Aeolis, and Doris.\r\n\r\nP. 80, l. 27, From Dian seed.]\u2014Dian=belonging to Zeus. The name Dionysus seemed to be derived from \u0394\u03b9\u1f78 \u03c2<\/i>, the genitive of \"Zeus.\"\r\n\r\nP. 81, l. 50, Should this Theban town essay with wrath and battle, &c.]\u2014This suggestion of a possibility which is never realised or approached is perhaps a mark of the unrevised condition of the play. The same may be said of the repetitions in the Prologue.\r\n\r\nPp. 82-86, ll. 64-169.\u2014This first song of the Chorus covers a great deal of Bacchic doctrine and myth. The first strophe, \"Oh blessed he in all wise,\" &c., describes the bliss of Bacchic purity; the antistrophe gives the two births of Dionysus, from Semel\u00ea and from the body of Zeus, mentioning his mystic epiphanies as Bull and as Serpent. The next strophe is an appeal to Thebes, the birthplace or \"nurse\" of the God's mother, Semel\u00ea; the antistrophe, an appeal to the cavern in Crete, the birthplace of Zeus, the God's father, and the original home of the mystic Timbrel. The Epode, or closing song, is full, not of doctrine, but of the pure poetry of the worship.\r\n\r\nPp. 86-95, ll. 170-369, Teiresias and Cadmus.]\u2014Teiresias seems to be not a spokesman of the poet's own views\u2014far from it\u2014but a type of the more cultured sort of Dionysiac priest, not very enlightened, but ready to abate some of the extreme dogmas of his creed if he may keep the rest. Cadmus, quite a different character, takes a very human and earthly point of view: the God is probably a true God; but even if he is false, there is no great harm done, and the worship will bring renown to Thebes and the royal family. It is noteworthy how full of pity Cadmus is\u2014the sympathetic kindliness of the sons of this world as contrasted with the pitilessness of gods and their devotees. See especially the last scenes of the play. Even his final outburst of despair at not dying like other men (p. 152), shows the same sympathetic humanity.\r\n\r\nPp. 89 ff., ll. 215-262.\u2014Pentheus, though his case against the new worship is so good, and he might so easily have been made into a fine martyr, like Hippolytus, is left harsh and unpleasant, and very close in type to the ordinary \"tyrant\" of Greek tragedy (cf. p. 118). It is also noteworthy, I think, that he is, as it were, out of tone with the other characters. He belongs to a different atmosphere, like, to take a recent instance, Golaud in Pell\u00e9as et M\u00e9lisande<\/i>.\r\n\r\nP. 91, l. 263, Injurious King, &c.]\u2014It is a mark of a certain yielding to stage convention in Euripides' later style, that he allows the Chorus Leader to make remarks which are not \"asides,\" but are yet not heard or noticed by anybody.\r\n\r\nP. 91, l. 264, Sower of the Giants' sod.]\u2014Cadmus, by divine guidance, slew a dragon and sowed the teeth of it like seed in the \"Field of Ares.\" From the teeth rose a harvest of Earth-born, or \"Giant\" warriors, of whom Ech\u00eeon was one.\r\n\r\nP. 92, l. 287, Learn the truth of it, cleared from the false.]\u2014This timid essay in rationalism reminds one of similar efforts in Pindar (e.g. Ol.<\/i> i.). It is the product of a religious and unspeculative mind, not feeling difficulties itself, but troubled by other people's questions and objections. (See above on Teiresias.)\r\n\r\nP. 92, l. 292, The world-encircling Fire.]\u2014This fire, or ether, was the ordinary material of which phantoms or apparitions were made.\r\n\r\nPp. 93-95, ll. 330-369.\u2014These three speeches are very clearly contrasted. Cadmus, thoroughly human, thinking of sympathy and expediency, and vividly remembering the fate of his other grandson, Actaeon; Pentheus, angry and \"tyrannical\"; Teiresias speaking like a Christian priest of the Middle Ages, almost like Tennyson's Becket.\r\n\r\nP. 95, l. 370.\u2014The goddess \u038c\u03c3\u03af\u03b1<\/i>, \"Purity,\" seems to be one of the many abstractions which were half personified by philosophy and by Orphism. It is possible that the word is really adjectival, \"Immaculate One,\" and originally an epithet of some more definite goddess, e.g.<\/i> as Miss Harrison suggests, of Nemesis.\r\n\r\nIn this and other choruses it is very uncertain how the lines should be distributed between the whole chorus, the two semi-choruses, and the various individual choreutae.\r\n\r\nPp. 97-98, ll. 402-430.\u2014For the meaning of these lines, see Introduction, pp. lxi, lxii.\r\n\r\nP. 100, l. 471, These emblems.]\u2014There were generally associated with mysteries, or special forms of worship, certain relics or sacred implements, without which the rites could not be performed. Cf. Hdt. vii. 153, where Telines of Gela stole the sacred implements or emblems of the nether gods, so that no worship could be performed, and the town was, as it were, excommunicated.\r\n\r\nP. 103, ll. 493 ff., The soldiers cut off the tress.<\/i>]\u2014The stage directions here are difficult. It is conceivable that none of Pentheus' threats are carried out at all; that the God mysteriously paralyses the hand that is lifted to take his rod without Pentheus himself knowing it. But I think it more likely that the humiliation of Dionysus is made, as far as externals go, complete, and that it is not till later that he begins to show his superhuman powers.\r\n\r\nP. 104, l. 508, So let it be.]\u2014The name Pentheus suggests 'mourner,' from penthos<\/i>, 'mourning.'\r\n\r\nP. 105, l. 519, Achelo\u00fcs' roaming daughter.]\u2014Achelo\u00fcs was the Father of all Rivers.\r\n\r\nP. 107, l. 556, In thine own Nysa.]\u2014An unknown divine mountain, formed apparently to account for the second part of the name Dionysus.\r\n\r\nP. 107, l. 571, Cross the Lydias, &c.]\u2014These are rivers of Thrace which Dionysus must cross in his passage from the East, the Lydias, the Axios, and some other, perhaps the Haliacmon, which is called \"the father-stream of story.\"\r\n\r\nP. 108, l. 579, A Voice, a Voice.]\u2014Bromios, the God of Many Voices\u2014for, whatever the real derivation, the fifth-century Greeks certainly associated the name with \u03b2\u03c1\u03ad\u03bc\u03c9<\/i>, 'to roar'\u2014manifests himself as a voice here and below (p. 136).\r\n\r\nPp. 109-112, ll. 602-641, Ye Damsels of the Morning Hills, &c.]\u2014This scene in longer metre always strikes me as a little unlike the style of Euripides, and inferior. It may mark one of the parts left unfinished by the poet, and written in by his son. But it may be that I have not understood it.\r\n\r\nP. 118, ll. 781 ff., Call all who spur the charger, &c.]\u2014The typical 'Ercles vein' of the tragic tyrant.\r\n\r\nPp. 120-124, ll. 810 ff.\u2014This scene of the 'hypnotising'\u2014if one may use the word\u2014of Pentheus probably depends much on the action, which, however, I have not ventured to prescribe. Pentheus seems to struggle against the process all through, to be amazed at himself for consenting, while constantly finding fresh reasons for doing so.\r\n\r\nP. 121, l. 822, Am I a woman, then?]\u2014The robe and coif were, in the original legend, marks of the Thracian dress worn by the Thracian followers of Dionysus, and notably by Orpheus. The tradition became fixed that Pentheus wore such a robe and coif; and to the Greeks of Euripides' time such a dress seemed to be a woman's. Hence this turn of the story (cf. above, p. 167).\r\n\r\nP. 125, ll. 877-881.\u2014The refrain of this chorus about the fawn is difficult to interpret. I have practically interpolated the third line (\"To stand from fear set free, to breathe and wait\"), in order (1) to show the connection of ideas; (2) to make clearer the meaning (as I understand it) of the two Orphic formul\u00e6, \"What is beautiful is beloved for ever,\" and \"A hand uplifted over the head of Hate.\" If I am wrong, the refrain is probably a mere cry for revenge, in the tone of the refrain, \"Hither for doom and deed,\" on p. 132. It is one of the many passages where there is a sharp antagonism between the two spirits of the Chorus, first, as furious Bacchanals, and, secondly, as exponents of the idealised Bacchic religion of Euripides, which is so strongly expressed in the rest of this wonderful lyric.\r\n\r\nP. 127, l. 920, Is it a Wild Bull, this?]\u2014Pentheus, in his Bacchic possession, sees fitfully the mystic shapes of the God beneath the human disguise. This second-sight, the exaltation of spirit, and the feeling of supernatural strength come to Pentheus as they came to the two Old Men. But to them the change came peacefully and for good; to Pentheus it comes by force, stormily and for evil, because his will was against the God.\r\n\r\nP. 131, l. 976, O hounds raging and blind.]\u2014i.e.<\/i> Spirits of Madness. This lyric prepares us for what follows, especially for Ag\u00e2v\u00ea's delusion, which otherwise might have been hard to understand. I have tried to keep the peculiar metre of the original, the dochmiac, with a few simple licences. The scheme is based on or the latter being much commoner.\r\n\r\nP. 133, ll. 997-1011.\u2014The greater part of this chorus is generally abandoned as unintelligible and corrupt. The last ten lines (\"Knowledge, we are not foes,\" &c.) will, I think, make sense if we accept a very slight conjecture of my own, \u1f00\u03ad\u03bd\u03c4\u03c9\u03bd<\/i>, \"let them blow\", instead of the impossible \u1f00\u03b5\u1f76 \u03c4\u0175\u03bd<\/i>. The four lines before that (\"A strait pitiless mind,\" &c.) are an almost literal translation of the MS. reading, which, however, is incorrect in metre, and therefore cannot be exactly what Euripides wrote.\r\n\r\nP. 134, l. 1036, And deem'st thou Thebes so beggared.]\u2014The couplet is incomplete in the MS. But the sense needed is obvious.\r\n\r\nP. 137, l. 1120, Let it not befall through sin of mine, &c.]\u2014This note of unselfish feeling, of pity and humanity, becomes increasingly marked in all the victims of Dionysus towards the end of the play, and contrasts the more vividly with the God's pitilessness. Cadmus is always gentle, and always thinking of the sufferings of others; and, indeed, so is Ag\u00e2v\u00ea, after her return to reason, though with more resentment against the oppressor.\r\n\r\nPp. 139-143, ll. 1165-1200.\u2014This marvellous scene defies comment. But I may be excused for remarking (1) that the psychological change of the chorus is, to my mind, proved by the words of the original, and does not in the least depend on my interpolated stage directions; (2) the extraordinary exultation of Ag\u00e2v\u00ea is part of her Bacchic possession. It is not to be supposed that, if she had really killed a lion, such joy would be the natural thing.\r\n\r\nP. 141, after<\/i> l. 1183, The Leader tries to speak<\/i>, &c.]\u2014It is also possible that by some error of a scribe two lines have been omitted in the MS. But I think the explanation given in the text more probable and more dramatic.\r\n\r\nP. 142, l. 1195, And Pentheus, O Mother?]\u2014The Leader mentions Pentheus, I suppose, in order deliberately to test Ag\u00e2v\u00ea's delusion, to see if she is indeed utterly unconscious of the truth.\r\n\r\nP. 146, l. 1267, More shining than before, &c.]\u2014The sight of the pure heaven brings back light to her mind\u2014that is clear. But does she mean that the sky is brighter because of her madness which still remains, or that it is brighter now, after having been darkened in her madness?\r\n\r\nP. 149, l. 1313, And now I fare forth in dishonour.]\u2014He has not yet been sentenced to exile, though he might well judge that after such pollution all his family would be banished. But probably this is another mark of the unrevised state of the play.\r\n\r\nP. 151, l. 1330, For thou must change and be a Serpent Thing, &c.]\u2014A prophecy like this is a very common occurrence in the last scenes of Euripides' tragedies. \"The subject of the play is really a long chain of events. The poet fixes on some portion of it\u2014the action of one day, generally speaking\u2014and treats it as a piece of vivid concrete life, led up to by a merely narrative introduction (the Prologue), and melting away into a merely narrative close. The method is to our taste undramatic, but it is explicable enough. It falls in with the tendency of Greek art to finish, not with a climax, but with a lessening of strain\" (Greek Literature<\/i>, p. 267).\r\n\r\nThe prophecy was that Cadmus and Harmonia should be changed into serpents and should lead a host of barbarian invaders\u2014identified with an Illyrian tribe, the Encheleis\u2014against Hellas; they should prosper until they laid hands on the treasures of Delphi, and then be destroyed. Herodotus says that the Persians were influenced by this prophecy when they refrained from attacking Delphi (Hdt. ix. 42).\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"
\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
Kithaeron?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
The Mountain hath slain him!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Who first came nigh him?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
I, I, ’tis confess\u00e8d!
\nAnd they named me there by him
\nAg\u00e2v\u00ea the Bless\u00e8d!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Who was next in the band on him?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
The daughters. . .<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
The daughters?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Of Cadmus laid hand on him.
\nBut the swift hand that slaughters
\nIs mine; mine is the praise!
\nBless ye this day of days!<\/div>\n

[The<\/i> Leader<\/span> tries to speak, but is not able<\/i>; Agave<\/span> begins gently stroking the head<\/i>.]<\/p>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Gather ye now to the feast!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Feast!\u2014O miserable!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
See, it falls to his breast,
\nCurling and gently tressed,
\nThe hair of the Wild Bull’s crest\u2014
\nThe young steer of the fell!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Most like a beast of the wild
\nThat head, those locks defiled.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(lifting up the head, more excitedly<\/i>)<\/p>\n

He wakened his Mad Ones,
\nA Chase-God, a wise God!
\nHe sprang them to seize this!
\nHe preys where his band preys.<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n

(brooding, with horror<\/i>)<\/p>\n

In the trail of thy Mad Ones
\nThou tearest thy prize, God!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Dost praise it?<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
I praise this?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Ah, soon shall the land praise!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
And Pentheus, O Mother,
\nThy child?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
He shall cry on
\nMy name as none other,
\nBless the spoils of the Lion!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Aye, strange is thy treasure!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
And strange was the taking!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Thou art glad?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Beyond measure;
\nYea, glad in the breaking
\nOf dawn upon all this land,
\nBy the prize, the prize of my hand!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Show then to all the land, unhappy one,
\nThe trophy of this deed that thou hast done!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Ho, all ye men that round the citadel
\nAnd shining towers of ancient Th\u00eab\u00ea dwell,
\nCome! Look upon this prize, this lion’s spoil,
\nThat we have taken\u2014yea, with our own toil,
\nWe, Cadmus’ daughters! Not with leathern-set
\nThessalian javelins, not with hunter’s net,
\nOnly white arms and swift hands’ bladed fall.
\nWhy make ye much ado, and boast withal
\nYour armourers’ engines? See, these palms were bare
\nThat caught the angry beast, and held, and tare
\nThe limbs of him! . . . Father! . . . Go, bring to me
\nMy father! . . . Aye, and Pentheus, where is he,
\nMy son? He shall set up a ladder-stair
\nAgainst this house, and in the triglyphs there
\nNail me this lion’s head, that gloriously
\nI bring ye, having slain him\u2014I, even I!<\/div>\n

[She goes through the crowd towards the Castle, showing the head and looking for a place to hang it. Enter from the Mountain<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>, with attendants, bearing the body of<\/i> Pentheus<\/span> on a bier<\/i>.]<\/p>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
On, with your awful burden. Follow me,
\nThralls, to his house, whose body grievously
\nWith many a weary search at last in dim
\nKithaeron’s glens I found, torn limb from limb,
\nAnd through the interweaving forest weed
\nScattered.\u2014Men told me of my daughters’ deed,
\nWhen I was just returned within these walls,
\nWith grey Teiresias, from the Bacchanals.
\nAnd back I hied me to the hills again
\nTo seek my murdered son. There saw I plain
\nActaeon’s mother, ranging where he died,
\nAutono\u00eb; and Ino by her side,
\nWandering ghastly in the pine-copses.
\nAg\u00e2v\u00ea was not there. The rumour is
\nShe cometh fleet-foot hither.\u2014Ah! ‘Tis true;
\nA sight I scarce can bend mine eyes unto.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(turning from the Palace and seeing him<\/i>)<\/p>\n

My father, a great boast is thine this hour.
\nThou hast begotten daughters, high in power
\nAnd valiant above all mankind\u2014yea, all
\nValiant, though none like me! I have let fall
\nThe shuttle by the loom, and raised my hand
\nFor higher things, to slay from out thy land
\nWild beasts! See, in mine arms I bear the prize,
\nThat nailed above these portals it may rise
\nTo show what things thy daughters did! Do thou
\nTake it, and call a feast. Proud art thou now
\nAnd highly favoured in our valiancy!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
O depth of grief, how can I fathom thee
\nOr look upon thee!\u2014Poor, poor, bloodstained hand!
\nPoor sisters!\u2014A fair sacrifice to stand
\nBefore God’s altars, daughter; yea, and call
\nMe and my citizens to feast withal!
\nNay, let me weep\u2014for thine affliction most,
\nThen for mine own. All, all of us are lost,
\nNot wrongfully, yet is it hard, from one
\nWho might have loved\u2014our Bromios, our own!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
How crabb\u00e8d and how scowling in the eyes
\nIs man’s old age!\u2014Would that my son likewise
\nWere happy of his hunting, in my way,
\nWhen with his warrior bands he will essay
\nThe wild beast!\u2014Nay, his valiance is to fight
\nWith God’s will! Father, thou shouldst set him right. . . .
\nWill no one bring him hither, that mine eyes
\nMay look on his, and show him this my prize!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Alas, if ever ye can know again
\nThe truth of what ye did, what pain of pain
\nThat truth shall bring! Or were it best to wait
\nDarkened for evermore, and deem your state
\nNot misery, though ye know no happiness?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
What seest thou here to chide, or not to bless?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n

(after hesitation, resolving himself<\/i>)<\/p>\n

Raise me thine eyes to yon blue dome of air!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
‘Tis done. What dost thou bid me seek for there?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Is it the same, or chang\u00e8d in thy sight?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
More shining than before, more heavenly bright!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
And that wild tremor, is it with thee still?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(troubled<\/i>)<\/p>\n

I know not what thou sayest; but my will
\nClears, and some change cometh, I know not how.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Canst hearken then, being changed, and answer, now?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
I have forgotten something; else I could.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
What husband led thee of old from mine abode?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Ech\u00eeon, whom men named the Child of Earth.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
And what child in Ech\u00eeon’s house had birth?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Pentheus, of my love and his father’s bred.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Thou bearest in thine arms an head\u2014what head?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(beginning to tremble, and not looking at what she carries<\/i>)<\/p>\n

A lion’s\u2014so they all said in the chase.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Turn to it now\u2014’tis no long toil\u2014and gaze.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Ah! But what is it? What am I carrying here?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Look once upon it full, till all be clear!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
I see . . . most deadly pain! Oh, woe is me!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Wears it the likeness of a lion to thee?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
No; ’tis the head\u2014O God!\u2014of Pentheus, this!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Blood-drenched ere thou wouldst know him! Aye, ’tis his.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Who slew him?\u2014How came I to hold this thing?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
O cruel Truth, is this thine home-coming?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Answer! My heart is hanging on thy breath!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
‘Twas thou.\u2014Thou and thy sisters wrought his death.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
In what place was it? His own house, or where?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Where the dogs tore Actaeon, even there.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Why went he to Kithaeron? What sought he?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
To mock the God and thine own ecstasy.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
But how should we be on the hills this day?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Being mad! A spirit drove all the land that way.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
‘Tis Dionyse hath done it! Now I see.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n

(earnestly<\/i>)<\/p>\n

Ye wronged Him! Ye denied his deity!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(turning from him<\/i>)<\/p>\n

Show me the body of the son I love!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n

(leading her to the bier<\/i>)<\/p>\n

‘Tis here, my child. Hard was the quest thereof.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Laid in due state?<\/div>\n

[As there is no answer, she lifts the veil of the bier, and sees.<\/i>]<\/p>\n

Oh, if I wrought a sin,
\n‘Twas mine! What portion had my child therein?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
He made him like to you, adoring not
\nThe God; who therefore to one bane hath brought
\nYou and this body, wrecking all our line,
\nAnd me. Aye, no man-child was ever mine;
\nAnd now this first-fruit of the flesh of thee,
\nSad woman, foully here and frightfully
\nLies murdered! Whom the house looked up unto,<\/div>\n

[Kneeling by the body.<\/i>]<\/p>\n

O Child, my daughter’s child! who heldest true
\nMy castle walls; and to the folk a name
\nOf fear thou wast; and no man sought to shame
\nMy grey beard, when they knew that thou wast there,
\nElse had they swift reward!\u2014And now I fare
\nForth in dishonour, outcast, I, the great
\nCadmus, who sowed the seed-rows of this state
\nOf Thebes, and reaped the harvest wonderful.
\nO my belov\u00e8d, though thy heart is dull
\nIn death, O still belov\u00e8d, and alway
\nBelov\u00e8d! Never more, then, shalt thou lay
\nThine hand to this white beard, and speak to me
\nThy “Mother’s Father”; ask “Who wrongeth thee?
\nWho stints thine honour, or with malice stirs
\nThine heart? Speak, and I smite thine injurers!”
\nBut now\u2014woe, woe, to me and thee also,
\nWoe to thy mother and her sisters, woe
\nAlway! Oh, whoso walketh not in dread
\nOf Gods, let him but look on this man dead!<\/div>\n

Leader<\/span><\/h3>\n
Lo, I weep with thee. ‘Twas but due reward
\nGod sent on Pentheus; but for thee . . . ‘Tis hard.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
\n

My father, thou canst see the change in me,<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

[A page or more has here been torn out of the MS. from which all our copies of “The Bacchae” are derived. It evidently contained a speech of Ag\u00e2v\u00ea (followed presumably by some words of the Chorus), and an appearance of<\/i> Dionysus<\/span> upon a cloud. He must have pronounced judgment upon the Thebans in general, and especially upon the daughters of<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>, have justified his own action, and declared his determination to establish his godhead. Where the MS. begins again, we find him addressing<\/i> Cadmus<\/span>.]<\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n

And tell of Time, what gifts for thee he bears,
\nWhat griefs and wonders in the winding years.
\nFor thou must change and be a Serpent Thing
\nStrange, and beside thee she whom thou didst bring
\nOf old to be thy bride from Heaven afar,
\nHarmonia, daughter of the Lord of War.
\nYea, and a chariot of kine\u2014so spake
\nThe word of Zeus\u2014thee and thy Queen shall take
\nThrough many lands, Lord of a wild array
\nOf orient spears. And many towns shall they
\nDestroy beneath thee, that vast horde, until
\nThey touch Apollo’s dwelling, and fulfil
\nTheir doom, back driven on stormy ways and steep.
\nThee only and thy spouse shall Ares keep,
\nAnd save alive to the Islands of the Blest.
\nThus speaketh Dionysus, Son confessed
\nOf no man but of Zeus!\u2014Ah, had ye seen
\nTruth in the hour ye would not, all had been
\nWell with ye, and the Child of God your friend!<\/p>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Dionysus, we beseech thee! We have sinned!<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Too late! When there was time, ye knew me not!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
We have confessed. Yet is thine hand too hot.<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Ye mocked me, being God; this is your wage.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Should God be like a proud man in his rage?<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n
‘Tis as my sire, Zeus, willed it long ago.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n

(turning from him almost with disdain<\/i>)<\/p>\n

Old Man, the word is spoken; we must go.<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n
And seeing ye must, what is it that ye wait?<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Child, we are come into a deadly strait,
\nAll; thou, poor sufferer, and thy sisters twain,
\nAnd my sad self. Far off to barbarous men,
\nA grey-haired wanderer, I must take my road.
\nAnd then the oracle, the doom of God,
\nThat I must lead a raging horde far-flown
\nTo prey on Hellas; lead my spouse, mine own
\nHarmonia, Ares’ child, discorporate
\nAnd haunting forms, dragon and dragon-mate.
\nAgainst the tombs and altar-stones of Greece,
\nLance upon lance behind us; and not cease
\nFrom toils, like other men, nor dream, nor past
\nThe foam of Acheron find my peace at last.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Father! And I must wander far from thee!<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
O Child, why wilt thou reach thine arms to me,
\nAs yearns the milk-white swan, when old swans die?<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Where shall I turn me else? No home have I.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
I know not; I can help thee not.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Farewell, O home, O ancient tower!
\nLo, I am outcast from my bower,
\nAnd leave ye for a worser lot.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
Go forth, go forth to misery,
\nThe way Actaeon’s father went!<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Father, for thee my tears are spent.<\/div>\n

Cadmus<\/span><\/h3>\n
\n

Nay, Child, ’tis I must weep for thee;<\/p>\n

For thee and for thy sisters twain!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
On all this house, in bitter wise,
\nOur Lord and Master, Dionyse,
\nHath poured the utter dregs of pain!<\/div>\n

Dionysus<\/span><\/h3>\n
In bitter wise, for bitter was the shame
\nYe did me, when Thebes honoured not my name.<\/div>\n

Agave<\/span><\/h3>\n
Then lead me where my sisters be;
\nTogether let our tears be shed,
\nOur ways be wandered; where no red
\nKithaeron waits to gaze on me;
\nNor I gaze back; no thyrsus stem,
\nNor song, nor memory in the air.
\nOh, other Bacchanals be there,
\nNot I, not I, to dream of them!<\/div>\n

[Agave<\/span> with her group of attendants goes out on the side away from the Mountain<\/i>. Dionysus<\/span> rises upon the Cloud and disappears<\/i>.]<\/p>\n

Chorus<\/span><\/h3>\n
There be many shapes of mystery.
\nAnd many things God makes to be,
\nPast hope or fear.
\nAnd the end men looked for cometh not,
\nAnd a path is there where no man thought.
\nSo hath it fallen here.<\/div>\n
[Exeunt<\/i>.]<\/div>\n
\n
\n

\u00a0NOTES ON THE BACCHAE<\/h2>\n

INTRODUCTORY NOTE<\/h3>\n

The Bacchae<\/i>, being from one point of view a religious drama, a kind of “mystery play,” is full of allusions both to the myth and to the religion of Dionysus.<\/p>\n

1. The Myth, as implied by Euripides. Semel\u00ea, daughter of Cadmus, being loved by Zeus, asked her divine lover to appear to her once in his full glory; he came, a blaze of miraculous lightning, in the ecstasy of which Semel\u00ea died, giving premature birth to a son. Zeus, to save this child’s life and make him truly God as well as Man, tore open his own flesh and therein fostered the child till in due time, by a miraculous and mysterious Second Birth, the child of Semel\u00ea came to full life as God.<\/p>\n

2. The Religion of Dionysus is hard to formulate or even describe, both because of its composite origins and because of its condition of constant vitality, fluctuation, and development.<\/p>\n

(a<\/i>) The first datum, apparently, is the introduction from Thrace of the characteristic God of the wild northern mountains, a God of Intoxication, of Inspiration, a giver of superhuman or immortal life. His worship is superposed upon that of divers old Tree or Vegetation Gods, already worshipped in Greece. He becomes specially the God of the Vine. Originally a god of the common folk, despised and unauthorised, he is eventually so strong as to be adopted into the Olympian hierarchy as the “youngest” of the Gods, son of Zeus. His “Olympian” name, so to speak, is Dionysus, but in his worship he is addressed by numbers of names, more or less mystic and secret\u2014Bromios, Bacchios or Baccheus, Iacchos, Eleuthercus, Zagreus, Sabazios, &c. Some of these may be the names of old spirits whom he has displaced; some are his own Thracian names. Bromos and Sabaja, for instance, seem to have been Thracian names for two kinds of intoxicating drink. Bacchos means a “wand.” Together with his many names, he has many shapes, especially appearing as a Bull and a Serpent.<\/p>\n

(b<\/i>) This religion, very primitive and barbarous, but possessing a strong hold over the emotions of the common people, was seized upon and transfigured by the great wave of religious reform, known under the name of Orphism, which swept over Greece and South Italy in the sixth century B.C.<\/span>, and influenced the teachings of such philosophers as Pythagoras, Aristeas, Empedocles, and the many writers on purification and the world after death. Orphism may very possibly represent an ancient Cretan religion in clash or fusion with one from Thrace. At any rate, it was grafted straight upon the Dionysus-worship, and, without rationalising, spiritualised and reformed it. Ascetic, mystical, ritualistic, and emotional, Orphism easily excited both enthusiasm and ridicule. It lent itself both to inspired saintliness and to imposture. In doctrine it laid especial stress upon sin, and the sacerdotal purification of sin; on the eternal reward due beyond the grave to the pure and the impure, the pure living in an eternal ecstasy\u2014”perpetual intoxication,” as Plato satirically calls it\u2014the impure toiling through long ages to wash out their stains. It recast in various ways the myth of Dionysus, and especially the story of his Second Birth. All true worshippers become in a mystical sense one with the God; they are born again and are “Bacchoi.” Dionysus being the God within, the perfectly pure soul is possessed by the God wholly, and becomes nothing but the God.<\/p>\n

Based on very primitive rites and feelings, on the religion of men who made their gods in the image of snakes and bulls and fawns, because they hardly felt any difference of kind between themselves and the animals, the worship of Dionysus kept always this feeling of kinship with wild things. The beautiful side of this feeling is vividly conspicuous in The Bacchae<\/i>. And the horrible side is not in the least concealed.<\/p>\n

A curious relic of primitive superstition and cruelty remained firmly imbedded in Orphism\u2014a doctrine irrational and unintelligible, and for that very reason wrapped in the deepest and most sacred mystery: a belief in the sacrifice of Dionysus himself, and the purification of man by his blood.<\/p>\n

It seems possible that the savage Thracians, in the fury of their worship on the mountains, when they were possessed by the God and became “wild beasts,” actually tore with their teeth and hands any hares, goats, fawns, or the like that they came across. There survives a constant tradition of inspired Bacchanals in their miraculous strength tearing even bulls asunder\u2014a feat, happily, beyond the bounds of human possibility. The wild beast that tore was, of course, the savage God himself. And by one of those curious confusions of thought, which seem so inconceivable to us and so absolutely natural and obvious to primitive men, the beast torn was also the God! The Orphic congregations of later times, in their most holy gatherings, solemnly partook of the blood of a bull, which was, by a mystery, the blood of Dionysus-Zagreus himself, the “Bull of God,” slain in sacrifice for the purification of man. And the Maenads of poetry and myth, among more beautiful proofs of their superhuman or infra-human character, have always to tear bulls in pieces and taste of the blood. It is noteworthy, and throws much light on the spirit of Orphism, that apart from this sacramental tasting of the blood, the Orphic worshipper held it an abomination to eat the flesh of animals at all. The same religious fervour and zeal for purity which made him reject the pollution of animal food, made him at the same time cling to a ceremonial which would utterly disgust the ordinary hardened flesh-eater. It fascinated him just because it was so incredibly primitive and uncanny; because it was a mystery which transcended reason!<\/p>\n

It will be observed that Euripides, though certainly familiar with Orphism\u2014which he mentions in The Hippolytus<\/i> and treated at length in The Cretans<\/i> (see Appendix)\u2014has in The Bacchae<\/i> gone back behind Orphism to the more primitive stuff from which it was made. He has little reference to any specially Orphic doctrine; not a word, for instance, about the immortality of the soul. And his idealisation or spiritualisation of Dionysus-worship proceeds along the lines of his own thought, not on those already fixed by the Orphic teachers.<\/p>\n

\n

P. 80, l. 17, Asia all that by the salt sea lies, &c.], i.e.<\/i> the coasts of Asia Minor inhabited by Greeks, Ionia, Aeolis, and Doris.<\/p>\n

P. 80, l. 27, From Dian seed.]\u2014Dian=belonging to Zeus. The name Dionysus seemed to be derived from \u0394\u03b9\u1f78 \u03c2<\/i>, the genitive of “Zeus.”<\/p>\n

P. 81, l. 50, Should this Theban town essay with wrath and battle, &c.]\u2014This suggestion of a possibility which is never realised or approached is perhaps a mark of the unrevised condition of the play. The same may be said of the repetitions in the Prologue.<\/p>\n

Pp. 82-86, ll. 64-169.\u2014This first song of the Chorus covers a great deal of Bacchic doctrine and myth. The first strophe, “Oh blessed he in all wise,” &c., describes the bliss of Bacchic purity; the antistrophe gives the two births of Dionysus, from Semel\u00ea and from the body of Zeus, mentioning his mystic epiphanies as Bull and as Serpent. The next strophe is an appeal to Thebes, the birthplace or “nurse” of the God’s mother, Semel\u00ea; the antistrophe, an appeal to the cavern in Crete, the birthplace of Zeus, the God’s father, and the original home of the mystic Timbrel. The Epode, or closing song, is full, not of doctrine, but of the pure poetry of the worship.<\/p>\n

Pp. 86-95, ll. 170-369, Teiresias and Cadmus.]\u2014Teiresias seems to be not a spokesman of the poet’s own views\u2014far from it\u2014but a type of the more cultured sort of Dionysiac priest, not very enlightened, but ready to abate some of the extreme dogmas of his creed if he may keep the rest. Cadmus, quite a different character, takes a very human and earthly point of view: the God is probably a true God; but even if he is false, there is no great harm done, and the worship will bring renown to Thebes and the royal family. It is noteworthy how full of pity Cadmus is\u2014the sympathetic kindliness of the sons of this world as contrasted with the pitilessness of gods and their devotees. See especially the last scenes of the play. Even his final outburst of despair at not dying like other men (p. 152), shows the same sympathetic humanity.<\/p>\n

Pp. 89 ff., ll. 215-262.\u2014Pentheus, though his case against the new worship is so good, and he might so easily have been made into a fine martyr, like Hippolytus, is left harsh and unpleasant, and very close in type to the ordinary “tyrant” of Greek tragedy (cf. p. 118). It is also noteworthy, I think, that he is, as it were, out of tone with the other characters. He belongs to a different atmosphere, like, to take a recent instance, Golaud in Pell\u00e9as et M\u00e9lisande<\/i>.<\/p>\n

P. 91, l. 263, Injurious King, &c.]\u2014It is a mark of a certain yielding to stage convention in Euripides’ later style, that he allows the Chorus Leader to make remarks which are not “asides,” but are yet not heard or noticed by anybody.<\/p>\n

P. 91, l. 264, Sower of the Giants’ sod.]\u2014Cadmus, by divine guidance, slew a dragon and sowed the teeth of it like seed in the “Field of Ares.” From the teeth rose a harvest of Earth-born, or “Giant” warriors, of whom Ech\u00eeon was one.<\/p>\n

P. 92, l. 287, Learn the truth of it, cleared from the false.]\u2014This timid essay in rationalism reminds one of similar efforts in Pindar (e.g. Ol.<\/i> i.). It is the product of a religious and unspeculative mind, not feeling difficulties itself, but troubled by other people’s questions and objections. (See above on Teiresias.)<\/p>\n

P. 92, l. 292, The world-encircling Fire.]\u2014This fire, or ether, was the ordinary material of which phantoms or apparitions were made.<\/p>\n

Pp. 93-95, ll. 330-369.\u2014These three speeches are very clearly contrasted. Cadmus, thoroughly human, thinking of sympathy and expediency, and vividly remembering the fate of his other grandson, Actaeon; Pentheus, angry and “tyrannical”; Teiresias speaking like a Christian priest of the Middle Ages, almost like Tennyson’s Becket.<\/p>\n

P. 95, l. 370.\u2014The goddess \u038c\u03c3\u03af\u03b1<\/i>, “Purity,” seems to be one of the many abstractions which were half personified by philosophy and by Orphism. It is possible that the word is really adjectival, “Immaculate One,” and originally an epithet of some more definite goddess, e.g.<\/i> as Miss Harrison suggests, of Nemesis.<\/p>\n

In this and other choruses it is very uncertain how the lines should be distributed between the whole chorus, the two semi-choruses, and the various individual choreutae.<\/p>\n

Pp. 97-98, ll. 402-430.\u2014For the meaning of these lines, see Introduction, pp. lxi, lxii.<\/p>\n

P. 100, l. 471, These emblems.]\u2014There were generally associated with mysteries, or special forms of worship, certain relics or sacred implements, without which the rites could not be performed. Cf. Hdt. vii. 153, where Telines of Gela stole the sacred implements or emblems of the nether gods, so that no worship could be performed, and the town was, as it were, excommunicated.<\/p>\n

P. 103, ll. 493 ff., The soldiers cut off the tress.<\/i>]\u2014The stage directions here are difficult. It is conceivable that none of Pentheus’ threats are carried out at all; that the God mysteriously paralyses the hand that is lifted to take his rod without Pentheus himself knowing it. But I think it more likely that the humiliation of Dionysus is made, as far as externals go, complete, and that it is not till later that he begins to show his superhuman powers.<\/p>\n

P. 104, l. 508, So let it be.]\u2014The name Pentheus suggests ‘mourner,’ from penthos<\/i>, ‘mourning.’<\/p>\n

P. 105, l. 519, Achelo\u00fcs’ roaming daughter.]\u2014Achelo\u00fcs was the Father of all Rivers.<\/p>\n

P. 107, l. 556, In thine own Nysa.]\u2014An unknown divine mountain, formed apparently to account for the second part of the name Dionysus.<\/p>\n

P. 107, l. 571, Cross the Lydias, &c.]\u2014These are rivers of Thrace which Dionysus must cross in his passage from the East, the Lydias, the Axios, and some other, perhaps the Haliacmon, which is called “the father-stream of story.”<\/p>\n

P. 108, l. 579, A Voice, a Voice.]\u2014Bromios, the God of Many Voices\u2014for, whatever the real derivation, the fifth-century Greeks certainly associated the name with \u03b2\u03c1\u03ad\u03bc\u03c9<\/i>, ‘to roar’\u2014manifests himself as a voice here and below (p. 136).<\/p>\n

Pp. 109-112, ll. 602-641, Ye Damsels of the Morning Hills, &c.]\u2014This scene in longer metre always strikes me as a little unlike the style of Euripides, and inferior. It may mark one of the parts left unfinished by the poet, and written in by his son. But it may be that I have not understood it.<\/p>\n

P. 118, ll. 781 ff., Call all who spur the charger, &c.]\u2014The typical ‘Ercles vein’ of the tragic tyrant.<\/p>\n

Pp. 120-124, ll. 810 ff.\u2014This scene of the ‘hypnotising’\u2014if one may use the word\u2014of Pentheus probably depends much on the action, which, however, I have not ventured to prescribe. Pentheus seems to struggle against the process all through, to be amazed at himself for consenting, while constantly finding fresh reasons for doing so.<\/p>\n

P. 121, l. 822, Am I a woman, then?]\u2014The robe and coif were, in the original legend, marks of the Thracian dress worn by the Thracian followers of Dionysus, and notably by Orpheus. The tradition became fixed that Pentheus wore such a robe and coif; and to the Greeks of Euripides’ time such a dress seemed to be a woman’s. Hence this turn of the story (cf. above, p. 167).<\/p>\n

P. 125, ll. 877-881.\u2014The refrain of this chorus about the fawn is difficult to interpret. I have practically interpolated the third line (“To stand from fear set free, to breathe and wait”), in order (1) to show the connection of ideas; (2) to make clearer the meaning (as I understand it) of the two Orphic formul\u00e6, “What is beautiful is beloved for ever,” and “A hand uplifted over the head of Hate.” If I am wrong, the refrain is probably a mere cry for revenge, in the tone of the refrain, “Hither for doom and deed,” on p. 132. It is one of the many passages where there is a sharp antagonism between the two spirits of the Chorus, first, as furious Bacchanals, and, secondly, as exponents of the idealised Bacchic religion of Euripides, which is so strongly expressed in the rest of this wonderful lyric.<\/p>\n

P. 127, l. 920, Is it a Wild Bull, this?]\u2014Pentheus, in his Bacchic possession, sees fitfully the mystic shapes of the God beneath the human disguise. This second-sight, the exaltation of spirit, and the feeling of supernatural strength come to Pentheus as they came to the two Old Men. But to them the change came peacefully and for good; to Pentheus it comes by force, stormily and for evil, because his will was against the God.<\/p>\n

P. 131, l. 976, O hounds raging and blind.]\u2014i.e.<\/i> Spirits of Madness. This lyric prepares us for what follows, especially for Ag\u00e2v\u00ea’s delusion, which otherwise might have been hard to understand. I have tried to keep the peculiar metre of the original, the dochmiac, with a few simple licences. The scheme is based on or the latter being much commoner.<\/p>\n

P. 133, ll. 997-1011.\u2014The greater part of this chorus is generally abandoned as unintelligible and corrupt. The last ten lines (“Knowledge, we are not foes,” &c.) will, I think, make sense if we accept a very slight conjecture of my own, \u1f00\u03ad\u03bd\u03c4\u03c9\u03bd<\/i>, “let them blow”, instead of the impossible \u1f00\u03b5\u1f76 \u03c4\u0175\u03bd<\/i>. The four lines before that (“A strait pitiless mind,” &c.) are an almost literal translation of the MS. reading, which, however, is incorrect in metre, and therefore cannot be exactly what Euripides wrote.<\/p>\n

P. 134, l. 1036, And deem’st thou Thebes so beggared.]\u2014The couplet is incomplete in the MS. But the sense needed is obvious.<\/p>\n

P. 137, l. 1120, Let it not befall through sin of mine, &c.]\u2014This note of unselfish feeling, of pity and humanity, becomes increasingly marked in all the victims of Dionysus towards the end of the play, and contrasts the more vividly with the God’s pitilessness. Cadmus is always gentle, and always thinking of the sufferings of others; and, indeed, so is Ag\u00e2v\u00ea, after her return to reason, though with more resentment against the oppressor.<\/p>\n

Pp. 139-143, ll. 1165-1200.\u2014This marvellous scene defies comment. But I may be excused for remarking (1) that the psychological change of the chorus is, to my mind, proved by the words of the original, and does not in the least depend on my interpolated stage directions; (2) the extraordinary exultation of Ag\u00e2v\u00ea is part of her Bacchic possession. It is not to be supposed that, if she had really killed a lion, such joy would be the natural thing.<\/p>\n

P. 141, after<\/i> l. 1183, The Leader tries to speak<\/i>, &c.]\u2014It is also possible that by some error of a scribe two lines have been omitted in the MS. But I think the explanation given in the text more probable and more dramatic.<\/p>\n

P. 142, l. 1195, And Pentheus, O Mother?]\u2014The Leader mentions Pentheus, I suppose, in order deliberately to test Ag\u00e2v\u00ea’s delusion, to see if she is indeed utterly unconscious of the truth.<\/p>\n

P. 146, l. 1267, More shining than before, &c.]\u2014The sight of the pure heaven brings back light to her mind\u2014that is clear. But does she mean that the sky is brighter because of her madness which still remains, or that it is brighter now, after having been darkened in her madness?<\/p>\n

P. 149, l. 1313, And now I fare forth in dishonour.]\u2014He has not yet been sentenced to exile, though he might well judge that after such pollution all his family would be banished. But probably this is another mark of the unrevised state of the play.<\/p>\n

P. 151, l. 1330, For thou must change and be a Serpent Thing, &c.]\u2014A prophecy like this is a very common occurrence in the last scenes of Euripides’ tragedies. “The subject of the play is really a long chain of events. The poet fixes on some portion of it\u2014the action of one day, generally speaking\u2014and treats it as a piece of vivid concrete life, led up to by a merely narrative introduction (the Prologue), and melting away into a merely narrative close. The method is to our taste undramatic, but it is explicable enough. It falls in with the tendency of Greek art to finish, not with a climax, but with a lessening of strain” (Greek Literature<\/i>, p. 267).<\/p>\n

The prophecy was that Cadmus and Harmonia should be changed into serpents and should lead a host of barbarian invaders\u2014identified with an Illyrian tribe, the Encheleis\u2014against Hellas; they should prosper until they laid hands on the treasures of Delphi, and then be destroyed. Herodotus says that the Persians were influenced by this prophecy when they refrained from attacking Delphi (Hdt. ix. 42).<\/p>\n

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