Agamemnon

epub:type="z3998:persona">Leader

Aye, vaunt thy greatness, as a bird beside his mate doth vaunt and swell.

Clytemnestra

Vain hounds are baying round thee; oh, forget them! Thou and I shall dwell
As Kings in this great House. We two at last will order all things well. The Elders and the remains of Agamemnon’s retinue retire sullenly, leaving the Spearmen in possession. Clytemnestra and Aigisthos turn and enter the Palace.

Endnotes

1. See my Four Stages of Greek Religion, p. 47. Cornford, From Religion to Philosophy, Chapter I. See also the fine pages on the Agamemnon in the same writer’s Thucydides Mythistoricus, pp. 144, ff. (E. Arnold 1907). ↩

2. The Watchman, like most characters in Greek tragedy, comes from the Homeric tradition, though in Homer (Od. IV 524) he is merely a servant of Aigisthos. ↩

3. Women’s triumph cry.⁠—This cry of the women recurs several times in the play: cf. line, line. It is conventionally represented by “ololû”; as the cry to Apollo, Paian is “I-ê,” line, and Cassandra’s sob is “ototoi” or “otototoi,” line. ↩

4. With this silent scene of Clytemnestra’s, compare the long silence of Cassandra below, and the silence of Prometheus in that play until his torturers have left him. See the criticism of Aeschylus in Aristophanes, Frogs, ll. 911⁠–⁠920, pp. 68, 69 in my translation. ↩

5. Sign of the War-Way.⁠—i.e. an ominous sign seen by the army as it started on its journey. In Homer, Iliad, ll. 305⁠–⁠329, it is a snake which eats the nine young of a mother bird and then the mother, and is turned into stone afterwards.⁠—All through this chorus the language of the prophet Calchas is intentionally obscure and riddling⁠—the style of prophesy. ↩

6. But I-ê, i-ê.⁠—(Pronounce Ee-ay.) Calchas, catching sight in his vision of the further consequences which Artemis will exact if she fulfils the sign, calls on Apollo Paian, the Healer, to check her. ↩

7. Zeus, whate’er He be.⁠—This conception of Zeus is expressed also in Aeschylus’ Suppliant Women, and was probably developed in the Prometheus Trilogy. See my Rise of the Greek Epic, p. 291 (Ed. 2).

   It is connected with the common Greek conception of the Tritos Sôtêr⁠—the Saviour Third. First, He who sins; next, He who avenges; third, He who saves. In vegetation worship it is the Old Year who has committed Hubris, the sin of pride, in summer; the Winter who slays him; the New Year which shall save. In mythology the three successive Rulers of Heaven are given by Hesiod as Ouranos, Kronos, Zeus (cf. Prometheus, 965 ff.), but we cannot tell if Aeschylus accepted the Hesiodic story. Cf. note on l. 246, and Clytemnestra’s blasphemy at line. ↩

8. Winds from Strymon.⁠—From the great river gorge of Thrace, N.N.E.; cf. below, line. ↩

9. Artemis.⁠—Her name was terrible, because of its suggestion. She demanded the sacrifice of Agamemnon’s daughter, Iphigenia. (See Euripides’ two plays, Iphigenia in Tauris and Iphigenia in Aulis.) In other poets Agamemnon has generally committed some definite sin against Artemis, but in Aeschylus the death of Iphigenia seems to be merely one of the results of his acceptance of the Sign. ↩

10. ’Tis a Rite of old.⁠—Literally “it is Themis.” Human sacrifice had had a place in the primitive religion of Greece; hence Agamemnon could not reject the demand of the soldiers as an obvious crime. See Rise of Greek Epic, pp. 150⁠–⁠157. ↩

11. The Third Cup.⁠—Regularly poured to Zeus Sôtêr, the Saviour, and accompanied by a paean or cry of joy. ↩

12. This Heart of Argos, this frail Tower:⁠—i.e. themselves. ↩

13. Glad-voiced.⁠—Clytemnestra is in extreme suspense, as the return of Agamemnon will mean either her destruction or her deliverance. At such a moment there must be no ill-omened word, so she challenges fate. ↩

14. A word within that hovereth without wings.⁠—i.e. a presentiment. “Winged words” are words spoken, which fly from speaker to hearer. A “wingless” word is unspoken. The phrase occurs in Homer. ↩

15. Beacon Speech. There is no need to inquire curiously into the practical possibility of this chain of beacons. Greek tragedies do not care to be exact about this kind of detail. There may well have been a tradition that Agamemnon, like the Great King of Persia, used a chain of beacons across the Aegean.⁠—Note how vividly Clytemnestra’s imagination is working in her excitement. She seems to see before her every leaping light in the chain, just as in the next speech she imagines the scene in Troy almost with the intensity of a vision. ↩

16. Victory in the first as in the last.⁠—All are Victory beacons; the spirit of Victory infects them all equally. Cf. line, where Agamemnon prays that the Victory which is now with him, or in him, may abide. ↩

17. A woman’s word.⁠—Her hatred and fear of Agamemnon, making her feel vividly the horrors of the sack and the peril overhanging the conquerors, have carried her dangerously far. She checks herself and apologizes for her womanlike anxiety. Cf. line. ↩

18. Seers they saw visions.⁠—A difficult and uncertain passage. I think the seers attached to the royal household (cf. Libation-Bearers, l. 37, where they are summoned to read a dream) were rather like what we call clairvoyants. Being consulted, they look into some pool of liquid or the like; there they see gradually emerging the palace, the injured King, the deserted room, and at last a wraith of Helen herself, haunting the place. ↩

19. This break in the action, covering a space of several days, was