Complete Works of Euripides

by Euripides

  Hector (steadied and courteous again).

  Good allies I have had since first the Greek

  Set foot in Troy, and never heard them speak

  Complaint of Hector. Thou wilt be the first.

  I have not, by God’s mercy, such a thirst

  For horses as to murder for their sake.

  [He turns to his own men.

  Odysseus! Yet again Odysseus! Take

  All the Greek armies, is there one but he

  Could have devised, or dared, this devilry?

  I fear him; yea, fear in mine own despite,

  Lest Dolon may have crossed him in the night

  And perished; ’tis so long he cometh not.

  Thracian.

  I know not who Odysseus is, nor what.

  I know it was no Greek that wounded us.

  Hector.

  To think thus pleasures thee? Well, have it thus.

  Thracian.

  Home, home! To die at home and rest my head!

  Hector.

  Nay, die not, friend. We have enough of dead.

  Thracian.

  How can I live? Lost, and my master slain.

  Hector.

  My house will shelter thee and heal thy pain.

  Thracian.

  Thy house? Will murderers’ nursing give me peace?

  Hector.

  Still the same tale! This man will never cease.

  Thracian.

  My curse rest — not on Hector, but on those

  Who stabbed us, as thou say’st. — Ah, Justice knows!

  Hector.

  There, lift him. — Bear him to my house. Take pains,

  If care can do it, that the man complains

  No more of Troy. — Ye others, bear withal

  To Priam and the Elders of the Wall

  My charge, that, where the cart-road from the plain

  Branches, they make due burial for our slain.

  [One party of Guards lifts carefully the wounded Thracian and goes off bearing him: another departs with the message to Troy.

  Chorus.

  Back from the heights of happiness,

  Back, back, to labour and distress

  Some god that is not ours doth lead

  Troy and her sons; He sows the seed,

  Who knows the reaping?

  [In the air at the back there appears a Vision of the Muse holding the body of her dead son Rhesus.

  Ah! Ah!

  My king, what cometh? There appears

  Some Spirit, like a mist of tears;

  And in her arms a man lieth,

  So young, so wearied unto death;

  To see such vision presageth

  Wrath and great weeping.

  [The Guards hide their heads in their mantles.

  Muse.

  Nay, look your fill, ye Trojans. It is I,

  The many-sistered Muse, of worship high

  In wise men’s hearts, who come to mourn mine own

  Most pitifully loved, most injured, son,

  For whose shed blood Odysseus yet shall pay

  Vengeance, who crawled and stabbed him where he lay.

  With a dirge of the Thracian mountains,

  I mourn for thee, O my son.

  For a mother’s weeping, for a galley’s launching, for

  the way to Troy;

  A sad going, and watched by spirits of evil.

  His mother chid him to stay, but he rose and went.

  His father besought him to stay, but he went in

  anger.

  Ah, woe is me for thee, thou dear face,

  My belovèd and my son!

  Leader.

  Goddess, if tears for such as thee may run

  In our low eyes, I weep for thy dead son.

  Muse.

  I say to thee: Curse Odysseus,

  And cursèd be Diomede!

  For they made me childless, and forlorn for ever, of

  the flower of sons.

  Yea, curse Helen, who left the houses of Hellas.

  She knew her lover, she feared not the ships and sea.

  She called thee, called thee, to die for the sake of Paris,

  Belovèd, and a thousand cities

  She made empty of good men.

  O conquered Thamyris, is this thy bane

  Returned from death to pierce my heart again?

  Thy pride it was, and bitter challenge cast

  ‘Gainst all the Muses, did my flesh abase

  To bearing of this Child, what time I passed

  Through the deep stream and looked on Strymon’s face,

  And felt his great arms clasp me, when to old

  Pangaion and the earth of hoarded gold

  We Sisters came with lutes and psalteries,

  Provoked to meet in bitter strife of song

  That mountain wizard, and made dark the eyes

  Of Thamyris, who wrought sweet music wrong.

  I bore thee, Child; and then, in shame before

  My sisterhood, my dear virginity,

  I stood again upon thy Father’s shore

  And cast thee to the deeps of him; and he

  Received and to no mortal nursing gave

  His child, but to the Maidens of the Wave.

  And well they nursed thee, and a king thou wast

  And first of Thrace in war; yea, far and near

  Through thine own hills thy bloody chariot passed,

  Thy battered helm flashed, and I had no fear;

  Only to Troy I charged thee not to go:

  I knew the fated end: but Hector’s cry,

  Borne overseas by embassies of woe,

  Called thee to battle for thy friends and die.

  And thou, Athena — nothing was the deed

  Odysseus wrought this night nor Diomede —

  ’Tis thine, all thine; dream not thy cruel hand

  Is hid from me! Yet ever on thy land

  The Muse hath smiled; we gave it praise above

  All cities, yea, fulfilled it with our love.

  The light of thy great Mysteries was shed

  By Orpheus, very cousin of this dead

  Whom thou hast slain; and thine high citizen

  Musaeus, wisest of the tribes of men,

  We and Apollo guided all his way:

  For which long love behold the gift ye pay!

  I wreathe him in my arms; I wail his wrong

  Alone, and ask no other mourner’s song.

  [She weeps over Rhesus.

  Leader.

  Hector, thou hearest. We were guiltless here,

  And falsely spake that Thracian charioteer.

  Hector.

  Always I knew it. Had we any need

  Of seers to tell this was Odysseus’ deed?

  For me, what could I else, when I beheld

  The hosts of Argos camped upon this field,

  What but with prayers and heralds bid my friend

  Come forth and fight for Ilion ere the end?

  He owed me that. — Yet, now my friend is slain,

  His sorrow is my sorrow. On this plain

  I will uplift a wondrous sepulchre,

  And burn about it gifts beyond compare

  Of robes and frankincense. To Troy’s relief

  He came in love and parteth in great grief.

  Muse.

  My son shall not be laid in any grave

  Of darkness; thus much guerdon will I crave

  Of Death’s eternal bride, the heavenly-born

  Maid of Demeter, Life of fruits and corn,

  To set this one soul free. She owes me yet,

  For Orpheus widowed, an abiding debt.

  To me he still must be — that know I well —

  As one in death, who sees not. Where I dwell

  He must not come, nor see his mother’s face.

  Alone for ever, in a caverned place

  Of silver-veinèd earth, hid from men’s sight,

  A Man yet Spirit, he shall live in light:

>   As under far Pangaion Orpheus lies,

  Priest of great light and worshipped of the wise.

  Howbeit an easier anguish even to me

  Falls than to Thetis in her azure sea;

  For her son too shall die; and sorrowing,

  First on the hills our band for thee shall sing,

  Then for Achilles by the weeping wave.

  Pallas could murder thee, but shall not save

  Thy foe; too swift Apollo’s bolt shall fly.

  O fleshly loves of sad mortality,

  O bitter motherhood of these that die,

  She that hath wisdom will endure her doom,

  The days of emptiness, the fruitless womb;

  Not love, not bear love’s children to the tomb.

  [The Vision rises through the air and vanishes.

  Leader.

  The dead man sleepeth in his mother’s care;

  But we who battle still — behold, the glare

  Of dawn that rises. Doth thy purpose hold,

  Hector, our arms are ready as of old.

  Hector.

  March on; and bid the allies with all speed

  Be armed, bind fast the yoke upon the steed,

  Then wait with torches burning, till we sound

  The Tuscan trump. — This day we shall confound,

  God tells me, their Greek phalanx, break their high

  Rampart and fire the galleys where they lie.

  [Pointing to the dawn.

  Yon first red arrow of the Sun, that brings

  The dawn to Troy, hath freedom on his wings.

  During the following lines Hector goes to his tent to get his shield, and as he enters sees Dolon’s bloody wolf-skin hanging. He takes it, looks at it, and throws it down without a word. Then he puts on his helmet, takes his shield and spear, and follows the Guards as they march off.

  Chorus.

  The Chief hath spoken: let his will

  Be law, ye Trojans. — Raise the cry

  To Arms! To Arms! and down the line

  Of allies pass the battle-sign.

  The God of Ilion liveth still;

  And men may conquer ere they die.

  [Exeunt.

  CYCLOPS

  Translated by Edward P. Coleridge

  A comical burlesque on the Polyphemus and Odysseus story narrated in Book Nine of Homer’s Odyssey, Cyclops is the only complete satyr play that has survived from antiquity. Satyr plays were a form of tragicomedy, featuring choruses of satyrs and events of mock drunkenness, brazen sexuality, pranks and general merriment. Satyric drama was one of the three varieties of Athenian drama, the other two being tragedy and comedy. In the Athenian Dionysia, each playwright customarily entered four plays into the competition: three tragedies and one satyr play to be performed either at the end of the festival or between the second and third tragedies of a trilogy, as comic relief to break the oppression of hours of gloomy tragedy. Satyr plays were usually very short, being half the duration of a tragedy.

  In Cyclops Euripides portrays Odysseus as having lost his way on the voyage home from the Trojan War. He and his weary crew land their boats in Sicily at Mount Aetna, which is inhabited by the fabled one-eyed monsters, the Cyclopes. On the island, the men come upon the Satyrs and their father Silenus, who have been separated from their god Dionysus and enslaved by a Cyclops. These characters are not contained in Homer’s version of the myth, providing much of the play’s humour due to their cowardly and drunken behaviour.

  When Odysseus arrives he meets Silenus and offers to trade wine for food. Being a servant of Dionysus, Silenus cannot resist obtaining the wine despite the fact that the food is not his to trade. The Cyclops soon arrives and Silenus is quick to accuse Odysseus of stealing the food, swearing to many gods. After a heated argument, the Cyclops brings Odysseus and his crew inside his cave and eats some of them. Odysseus manages to slip out and is stunned by what he has witnessed. He then devises his now legendary scheme to make the Cyclops drunk and burn out his eye with a giant spear, winning their freedom.

  An actor playing the role of Papposilenus in a satyr play, c. 100 AD

  Odysseus and his men blinding the Cyclops Polyphemus, as depicted on a proto-attic amphora, c. 650 BC

  CONTENTS

  CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY

  CYCLOPS

  ‘Odysseus in the cave of Polyphemus’ by Jacob Jordaens, c. 1625

  ‘Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus’ by J. M. W. Turner, 1829

  CHARACTERS IN THE PLAY

  SILENUS, old servant of the CYCLOPS

  CHORUS OF SATYRS

  ODYSSEUS

  THE CYCLOPS

  Companions of ODYSSEUS

  CYCLOPS

  (SCENE:-Before the great cave of the CYCLOPS at the foot of Mount Aetna. SILENUS enters. He has a rake with him, with which he cleans up the ground in front of the cave as he soliloquizes.)

  Silenus O BROMIUS, unnumbered are the toils I bear because of thee, no less now than when I was young and hale; first, when thou wert driven mad by Hera and didst leave the mountain nymphs, thy nurses; next, when in battle with earth-born spearmen I stood beside thee on the right as squire, and slew Enceladus, smiting him full in the middle of his targe with my spear. Come, though, let me see; must I confess ’twas all a dream? No, by Zeus! since I really showed his spoils to the Bacchic god. And now am I enduring to the full a toil still worse than those. For when Hera sent forth a race of Tyrrhene pirates against thee, that thou mightest be smuggled far away, I, as soon as the news reached me, sailed in quest of thee with my children; and, taking the helm myself, I stood on the end of the stern and steered our trim craft; and my sons, sitting at the oars, made the grey billows froth and foam as they sought thee, my liege. But just as we had come nigh Malea in our course, an east wind blew upon the ship and drove us hither to the rock of Aetna, where in lonely caverns dwell the one-eyed children of ocean’s god, the murdering Cyclopes. Captured by one of them we are slaves in his house; Polyphemus they call him whom we serve; and instead of Bacchic revelry we are herding a godless Cyclops’s flocks; and so it is my children, striplings as they are, tend the young thereof on the edge of the downs; while my appointed task is to stay here and fill the troughs and sweep out the cave, or wait upon the ungodly Cyclops at his impious feasts. His orders now compel obedience; I have to scrape out his house with the rake you see, so as to receive the Cyclops, my absent master, and his sheep in clean caverns.

  But already I see my children driving their browsing flocks towards me.

  What means this? is the beat of feet in the Sicinnis dance the same to you now as when ye attended the Bacchic god in his revelries and made your way with dainty steps to the music of lyres to the halls of Althaea?

  (The CHORUS OF SATYRS enters, driving a flock of goats and sheep. Servants follow them.)

  Chorus (singing) Offspring of well-bred sires and dams, pray whither wilt thou be gone from me to the rocks? Hast thou not here a gentle breeze, and grass to browse, and water from the eddying stream set near the cave in troughs? and are not thy young ones bleating for thee? Pst! pst! wilt thou not browse here, here on the dewy slope? Ho! ho ere long will I cast a stone at thee. Away, away! O horned one, to the fold-keeper of the Cyclops, the country-ranging shepherd.

  Loosen thy bursting udder; welcome to thy teats the kids, whom thou leavest in the lambkins’ pens. Those little bleating kids, asleep the livelong day, miss thee; wilt then leave at last the rich grass pastures on the peaks of Aetna and enter the fold? . . .

  Here we have no Bromian god; no dances here, or Bacchantes thyrsus-bearing; no roll of drums, or drops of sparkling wine by gurgling founts; nor is it now with Nymphs in Nysa I sing a song of Bacchus, Bacchus! to the queen of love, in quest of whom I once sped on with Bacchantes, white of foot. Dear friend, dear Bacchic god, whither art roaming alone, waving thy auburn locks, while I, thy minister, do service to the one-eyed Cyclops, a slave and wanderer I, clad in this wretched goat-skin dress, severed from thy love?

/>   Silenus Hush, children! and bid our servants fold the flocks in the rock-roofed cavern.

  Leader of the chorus (to Servants) Away! (To SILENUS) But prithee, why such haste, father?

  Silenus I see the hull of a ship from Hellas at the shore, and men, that wield the oar, on their way to this cave with some chieftain. About their necks they carry empty vessels and pitchers for water; they are in want of food. Luckless strangers! who can they be? They know not what manner of man our master Polyphemus is, to have set foot here in his cheerless abode and come to the jaws of the cannibal Cyclops in an evil hour. But hold ye your peace, that we may inquire whence they come to the peak of Sicilian Aetna.

  (ODYSSEUS and his companions enter. They carry baskets for provisions and water jars.)

  Odysseus Pray tell us, sirs, of some river-spring whence we might draw a draught to slake our thirst, or of someone willing to sell victuals to mariners in need.

  Why, what is this? We seem to have chanced upon a city of the Bromian god; here by the caves I see a group of Satyrs. To the eldest first I bid “All hail!”

  Silenus All hail, sir! tell me who thou art, and name thy country.

  Odysseus Odysseus of Ithaca, king of the Cephallenians’ land.

  Silenus I know him for a prating knave, one of Sisyphus’ shrewd offspring.

  Odysseus I am the man; abuse me not.

  Silenus Whence hast thou sailed hither to Sicily?

  Odysseus From Ilium and the toils of Troy.

  Silenus How was that? didst thou not know the passage to thy native land?

  Odysseus Tempestuous winds drove me hither against my will.

  Silenus God wot! thou art in the same plight as I am.

  Odysseus Why, wert thou too drifted hither against thy will?

  Silenus I was, as I pursued the pirates who carried Bromius off.

  Odysseus What land is this and who are its inhabitants?

  Silenus This is mount Aetna, the highest point in Sicily.

  Odysseus But where are the city-walls and ramparts?

  Silenus There are none; the headlands, sir, are void of men.

  Odysseus Who then possess the land? the race of wild creatures?

  Silenus The Cyclopes, who have caves, not roofed houses.

  Odysseus Obedient unto whom? or is the power in the people’s hands?

  Silenus They are rovers; no man obeys another in anything.