Six Tragedies

by Seneca

  fears not death, desires to encounter danger,

  runs to the drawn sword.

  Mercy, gods, I pray your forgiveness for him,

  let the man live safe, though he touched the ocean.

  But the deep sea’s master is angry his realm

  now has been conquered.

  Boldly that boy* drove the eternal chariots,

  never paying heed to his father’s limits.

  600

  Wild, he scattered fires from the pole; the same fires

  took him and hold him.

  No one ever suffered from taking safe paths.

  * * *

  90

  medea

  Take the same way many have trod before you.

  Do not wildly break up the holy, sacred

  bonds of the cosmos.

  Each of those who entered that daring vessel,*

  seizing well-born oars from the sacred woodland —

  Pelion’s mountain glades* were deprived of thick shade—

  each of those who pushed through the wandering clifftops,

  610

  measured all that period of seaborne suffering,

  reached at last barbarian shores, took anchor,

  stole the gold from foreigners, sure of return,

  paid with awful death, having boldly broken

  laws of the deep sea.

  Ocean punished forcefully those who wronged it.

  Tiphys* first, the man who had tamed the waters,

  left his helm’s control to a clueless captain,

  far from home he died, in a foreign country,

  lying on a foreign shore, in a pauper’s tomb,

  620

  he lies among dead souls unknown to him.

  Aulis keeps in mind its lost king, and therefore

  makes the ships stop, keeps them in harbour, stagnant,

  though they resent it.

  Born the child of the tuneful Muse, Orpheus*

  at whose plectrum, plucking the strings in rhythm,

  waterfalls stood still and the winds were silent,

  at whose song birds ceased their own sweet singing, flying

  swift to him; the woods were his true companions;

  he lay scattered over the Thracian farmlands,

  630

  while his head bobbed, rolled by the scowling Hebrus.

  Styx he knew of old, and again he crossed it,

  never to come back.

  Hercules laid low the two sons of North Wind,*

  killed the sea-god’s offspring,* who always altered

  how he looked, changing to shapes unnumbered.

  After Hercules had brought peace to the land and ocean,

  opened up the kingdoms of savage Hades,

  living he lay down upon burning Oeta,

  gave his body up to the cruel furnace.*

  640

  Two destructive poisons* consumed the hero,

  gifts of his own bride.

  * * *

  medea

  91

  Death brought low Ancaeus:* the bristly wild boar

  gored him. Then, bad man, Meleager* slaughtered

  his uncle. His angry mother kills him

  with her own hands. All, all were guilty —

  no: the young boy,* snatched from the hero,

  Hercules, who searched but never found him.

  He died without guilt, seized in the quiet waters.

  Come now, heroes, pray to the sea, beseech its

  650

  dangerous fountains.

  Idmon* also, though wise in the ways of fortune

  lies beneath the Libyan sands: the serpent

  killed him. Mopsus,* truthful to all but himself,

  fell, and Thebes has lost her most faithful prophet.

  Thetis’ husband,* if he can tell the future,

  knows he must go wandering, an exile, homeless.

  Ajax,* killed by thunder and ocean, paid back

  father’s transgression.

  Nauplius* had planned an attack on Argos;

  660

  fire betrayed him, headlong he falls to deep sea.

  You reversed fate, wife,* for your Pherean husband,

  paid with your own life for the life of your man.

  Even he who ordered the quest and booty,

  ‘Bring me back the gold in the first of vessels!’

  Pelias, boiled up in the heated cauldron,

  burned, his limbs dispersed in the narrow waters.

  Now enough, O Gods, of your vengeance. Jason

  acted on orders.

  ACT FOUR

  nurse My soul is terrified; it shudders. Evil is near.

  670

  How great her bitterness is growing! Now it fires

  itself, and it restores the force that it had lost.

  I have often seen her in her rages, attacking the gods

  bringing down the sky. But horrors, greater horrors,

  Medea plans. She goes with feet of thunder

  out from the house to the sanctuary of death;

  there she spreads out all her treasures. Things that even she

  * * *

  92

  medea

  has feared for years, she now takes out, unpacks

  her whole array of evil, secrets long concealed.

  With her left hand she makes ready the uncanny rites:

  680

  she summons the powers of destruction: scorching heat

  from the sands

  of the Libyan desert, and the force of cold, which the mountains

  of Taurus freeze with Arctic ice, perpetual snow.

  She calls up every horror. Drawn by her magic spells

  the scaly ones slip from their holes. They are here.

  Here a savage serpent slithers its massive bulk,

  its forked tongue darting to and fro; it looks for victims

  whom it may kill. But hearing her voice, it stops,

  plaits its swollen body into a heap of knots,

  and piles them up in coils. Now she says: ‘From the earth

  690

  come only minor evils, weaker weapons.

  I shall search the sky for poison. Now, now the time has come

  to start something grander than ordinary deceit.

  Let the Dragon descend, which lies like a rushing stream,

  here let him come, whose massive coils touch the Bears,*

  those two wild beasts, the Great Bear and the Small,

  (Greek sailors use the Great Bear, Tyrians use the Small)

  and let the Serpent Holder at last release his grip,

  and pour out venom. Let Python* come at my call,

  who dared provoke Diana and Apollo, the twin gods.

  700

  And let the Hydra come; let every snake, mown down

  by Hercules, return, and heal its own death wound.

  And you, abandon Colchis, my always-wakeful Dragon,

  come to me; you were the first serpent I charmed to sleep.’

  After she had summoned every kind of snake,

  she heaped together all her poison plants.

  Whatever grows on trackless Eryx’s rocks,*

  and the mountain ridges clothed with eternal snow

  of Caucasus, which is drenched in Prometheus’ blood,*

  and the herbs which the wealthy Arabs use to anoint their

  arrows,

  710

  and the Medes, those fearsome archers, or the light-armed

  Parthians,

  or the juices which the high-born German women gather

  under a frozen sky, in their barbarian groves.

  * * *

  medea

  93

  Whatever the earth produces while birds are building nests,

  or when the frozen winter has already thrown aside

  the beauty of the woodland, heaping up the freezing snow,

  every plant whose blooming flowers bring death,

  and
deadly sap which lurks in twisted roots,

  to bring us harm — she took them in her hands.

  Some of the poisons came from Thessalian Athos;*

  720

  Others from great Mount Pindus; on Pangaeus’ ridges,*

  this plant’s delicate leaves were lopped with a bloody sickle.

  Some the Tigris fed, restraining his deep current;

  others the Danube; some, bejewelled Hydaspes,*

  running with warm waters through the desert lands,

  and these by the river Baetis, which gave its own name to its

  country,*

  which hits the Western Sea with a quiet plash.

  Some of the plants were cut by iron, while Apollo got

  ready the day,

  the stem of others is cut at the dead of night,

  others cropped with a fingernail, while a charm is said.

  730

  She gathers the poisonous plants and squeezes the venom

  of the snakes, and mixes it with birds of ill omen,

  the heart of a melancholy eagle-owl, and the innards

  cut from a living screech-owl. These, the great criminal

  mastermind

  laid out separately. Some contain the devouring power

  of fire; others hold the icy cold of bitter frost.

  She added to the poisons certain words — themselves

  equally dangerous. Listen! You can hear her crazy feet.

  She is chanting and the world is shaking at her spell.

  medea I pray you, silent hordes, and ghostly gods,

  740

  Chaos obscure, dark home of shady Dis,*

  caverns of ugly Death, bound by Tartarus,*

  Spirits, be free from your torments, hurry to this new wedding.

  Let stop the wheel which wrenches his body, may Ixion touch

  the ground,

  may Tantalus* freely drink the waters of Pirene.

  Only for his in-laws should punishment increase:

  let the slippery stone send Sisyphus* tumbling down the rocks.

  You too, who vainly work to fill the leaky urns,

  * * *

  94

  medea

  Danaids,* gather here: this day requires your hands.

  Now, summoned by my rituals, come to me, moon of the night, 750

  put on your fiercest faces, scowling with all three.*

  For you I have loosened my hair and bared my foot

  to sway as my people do through the secret parts of the wood.

  I have called down gushing water from dry clouds,

  driven the ocean to its bed; the swelling tides,

  defeated, have withdrawn inside the sea.

  I have confounded the law of the sky: the world has seen

  both sun and stars together, and you, Bears, have touched

  the forbidden sea. I have bent the course of the seasons,

  the summery earth has shuddered at my spell,

  760

  Ceres has been compelled to see harvest in winter.

  Phasis’ wild waters turn to their source again,

  and Hister, with its many mouths, restrains

  its waters, sullen in all their separate banks.

  The waves have roared, the frenzied sea rose high

  without the sound of wind. The home of the ancient wood

  has lost its shadows when it heard my voice.

  Phoebus, abandoning day, has stopped in the middle sky,

  the Hyades* are shaken by my spells and totter.

  Now, Diana,* is the time to come to your own rites.

  770

  For you I weave these wreaths with bloody hand,

  wreaths bound up with serpents nine,

  To you I give these limbs which rebel Typhon* bore,

  who shook the realms of Jove.

  Here is the blood of that treacherous ferryman,

  which dying Nessus* gave.

  Here is the ash from the fading pyre of Oeta,*

  which drank the poison of Hercules.

  Here you see the torch of a good sister, a wicked mother,

  Althaea* the avenger.

  780

  These are the feathers left in a far remote cave

  by the Harpy, fleeing Zetes.*

  Add to these the wings of a wounded Stymphalian bird,*

  struck by Lernaean arrows.

  Altars, you crackle: I see my tripods tremble

  as the goddess gives consent.

  I can see Hecate’s swift chariot in the sky,

  * * *

  medea

  95

  not that which she drives when her face shines full,

  all through the night,

  but the one that she rides with a mournful expression,

  790

  troubled by threats from Thessalian witches,*

  picking her way through the sky with a tighter rein.

  With just that pallid face, pour grim light out through the air,

  frighten the people with a new source of terror,

  and let the precious cymbals of bronze* ring out,

  to help you, Diana.

  For you we offer the holy rite

  on the bloody turf,*

  for you the torch is seized from the midst of a pyre,

  to burn for you with fires in the night-time,

  800

  for you I toss my head and twist my neck

  and chant my spells,

  for you I have tied up my flowing hair

  in a headband like corpses wear,*

  for you I shake the gloomy branch from the waters of Styx.

  For you, bare-breasted, like a Maenad,*

  I slash my arms with a holy knife.

  My own blood drips on the altar:

  hands, get used to unsheathing the blade,

  and submit to shed your own dear blood.

  810

  I have struck myself ! The sacred fluid flows.

  But if you do not like the frequent summons

  of my prayers, please forgive me.

  Hecate, I call so many times

  for your arrows

  for just one reason, always the same. Jason.

  Now anoint Creusa’s clothes,

  and as soon as she puts them on, let a snaky flame

  burn up very marrow of her bones.

  Let the fire lie hid in yellow gold,

  820

  in darkness. He who robbed heaven for fire,

  and paid with ever-growing liver for his theft,

  gave me this flame, and taught me how to hide

  power by art: Prometheus.* Mulciber* gave

  flames hidden in delicate sulphur,

  and I got from my cousin Phaethon*

  * * *

  96

  medea

  the thunder of living flame.

  I have the gifts of the middle of Chimaera,*

  I have the flames stolen from the scorched throats

  of the bulls,*

  830

  which mixed with the gall of Medusa,*

  I have ordered to create a secret venom.

  Hecate, whip up my poisons,

  and keep secret the seeds of flame in my gifts:

  may they deceive the eyes, submit to touch,

  but may the heat swim to the heart and veins,

  make melt the limbs and smoke the bones

  and may that newly wedded bride outdo her marriage torch

  with her own smoking hair.

  My prayers succeed: she barks three times,

  840

  bold Hecate, and shoots

  sacred flames from her melancholy torch.

  The whole power of my rites has been achieved.

  Call here the children,

  who will take my precious gift to the newly wed bride.

  Go, go my children! Though the mother who bore you

  is unlucky,

  make peace with your mistress, your stepmother: give her

  th
ese presents

  and pray to her all you can. Go, and come quickly back

  to your home, and let me enjoy a last embrace with you.

  chorus Where is this blood-stained Maenad rushing,

  headlong, seized by barbarian lust?

  850

  What crime does she plot

  in her violent fury?

  Her face roused up in anger

  is glazed, she shakes her head

  proudly, wildly;

  she sets out to threaten the king.

  Who would believe her an exile?

  Her cheeks flame red,

  her pallor puts her blush to flight.

  She keeps no colour long,

  860

  her shape is ever-changing.

  Here and there she moves her feet

  * * *

  medea

  97

  as a tigress, her cubs lost,

  scans the groves of the Ganges

  on thunderous paws.

  Medea cannot understand restraint

  for anger, or for love.

  Now anger and love have joined

  to give her a cause: what will happen?

  When will this Colchian monster

  870

  leave the lands of Greece

  and release from fear

  the kingdom and royal family?

  Now, Phoebus, speed your chariot,

  let your reins lie loose,

  may gentle night bury the light,

  may Hesperus, night’s leader,

  drown this fearful day.

  ACT FIVE

  messenger Now all is lost, the whole state of the kingdom is

  fallen:

  daughter and father together lie mixed with ash.

  880

  chorus What trickery deceived them?

  messenger

  The usual one for kings:

  gifts.

  chorus What fraud could there be in those?

  messenger I am astounded too, and though I know it happened,

  I find I can scarcely believe it.

  chorus

  What was the cause of death?

  messenger Devouring flame is raging through the palace,

  obeying some command. Now the whole house has fallen,

  people fear for the city.

  chorus

  Get water, put out the flames!

  messenger In this disaster, something magical:

  water feeds the flames, the more they fight the fire,

  the higher still it burns. It robs our defences.

  890

  nurse Carry yourself away, fast as you can, from the land

  of Pelops,

  * * *

  98

  medea

  Medea, run away: find anywhere else to live.

  medea I? Would I run? Would I yield? If I had fled before