The Complete Plays

by Aristophanes

  MYRRHINÉ. No, I will not do it; let the War go on.

  LYSISTRATA. And you, my pretty flat-fish, who declared just now they might split you in two?

  CALONICÉ. Anything, anything but that! Bid me go through the fire, if you will; but to rob us of the sweetest thing in all the world, my dear, dear Lysistrata!

  LYSISTRATA. And you?

  MYRRHINÉ. Yes, I agree with the others; I too would sooner go through the fire.

  LYSISTRATA. Oh, wanton, vicious sex! the poets have done well to make tragedies upon us; we are good for nothing then but love and lewdness! But you, my dear, you from hardy Sparta, if you join me, all may yet be well; help me, second me, I conjure you.

  LAMPITO. ’Tis a hard thing, by the two goddesses it is! for a woman to sleep alone without ever a standing weapon in her bed. But there, Peace must come first.

  LYSISTRATA. Oh, my dear, my dearest, best friend, you are the only one deserving the name of woman!

  CALONICÉ. But if — which the gods forbid — we do refrain altogether from what you say, should we get peace any sooner?

  LYSISTRATA. Of course we should, by the goddesses twain! We need only sit indoors with painted cheeks, and meet our mates lightly clad in transparent gowns of Amorgos silk, and with our “mottes” nicely plucked smooth; then their tools will stand like mad and they will be wild to lie with us. That will be the time to refuse, and they will hasten to make peace, I am convinced of that!

  LAMPITO. Yes, just as Menelaus, when he saw Helen’s naked bosom, threw away his sword, they say.

  CALONICÉ. But, poor devils, suppose our husbands go away and leave us.

  LYSISTRATA. Then, as Pherecrates says, we must “flay a skinned dog,” that’s all.

  CALONICÉ. Bah! these proverbs are all idle talk…. But if our husbands drag us by main force into the bedchamber?

  LYSISTRATA. Hold on to the door posts.

  CALONICÉ. But if they beat us?

  LYSISTRATA. Then yield to their wishes, but with a bad grace; there is no pleasure for them, when they do it by force. Besides, there are a thousand ways of tormenting them. Never fear, they’ll soon tire of the game; there’s no satisfaction for a man, unless the woman shares it.

  CALONICÉ. Very well, if you will have it so, we agree.

  LAMPITO. For ourselves, no doubt we shall persuade our husbands to conclude a fair and honest peace; but there is the Athenian populace, how are we to cure these folk of their warlike frenzy?

  LYSISTRATA. Have no fear; we undertake to make our own people hear reason.

  LAMPITO. Nay, impossible, so long as they have their trusty ships and the vast treasures stored in the temple of Athené.

  LYSISTRATA. Ah! but we have seen to that; this very day the Acropolis will be in our hands. That is the task assigned to the older women; while we are here in council, they are going, under pretence of offering sacrifice, to seize the citadel.

  LAMPITO. Well said indeed! so everything is going for the best.

  LYSISTRATA. Come, quick, Lampito, and let us bind ourselves by an inviolable oath.

  LAMPITO. Recite the terms; we will swear to them.

  LYSISTRATA. With pleasure. Where is our Usheress? Now, what are you staring at, pray? Lay this shield on the earth before us, its hollow upwards, and someone bring me the victim’s inwards.

  CALONICÉ. Lysistrata, say, what oath are we to swear?

  LYSISTRATA. What oath? Why, in Aeschylus, they sacrifice a sheep, and swear over a buckler; we will do the same.

  CALONICÉ. No, Lysistrata, one cannot swear peace over a buckler, surely.

  LYSISTRATA. What other oath do you prefer?

  CALONICÉ. Let’s take a white horse, and sacrifice it, and swear on its entrails.

  LYSISTRATA. But where get a white horse from?

  CALONICÉ. Well, what oath shall we take then?

  LYSISTRATA. Listen to me. Let’s set a great black bowl on the ground; let’s sacrifice a skin of Thasian wine into it, and take oath not to add one single drop of water.

  LAMPITO. Ah! that’s an oath pleases me more than I can say.

  LYSISTRATA. Let them bring me a bowl and a skin of wine.

  CALONICÉ. Ah! my dears, what a noble big bowl! what a delight ‘twill be to empty it!

  LYSISTRATA. Set the bowl down on the ground, and lay your hands on the victim…. Almighty goddess, Persuasion, and thou, bowl, boon comrade of joy and merriment, receive this our sacrifice, and be propitious to us poor women!

  CALONICÉ. Oh! the fine red blood! how well it flows!

  LAMPITO. And what a delicious savour, by the goddesses twain!

  LYSISTRATA. Now, my dears, let me swear first, if you please.

  CALONICÉ. No, by the goddess of love, let us decide that by lot.

  LYSISTRATA. Come then, Lampito, and all of you, put your hands to the bowl; and do you, Calonicé, repeat in the name of all the solemn terms I am going to recite. Then you must all swear, and pledge yourselves by the same promises.— “I will have naught to do whether with lover or husband….”

  CALONICÉ. I will have naught to do whether with lover or husband….

  LYSISTRATA. Albeit he come to me with stiff and standing tool….

  CALONICÉ. Albeit he come to me with stiff and standing tool…. Oh!

  Lysistrata, I cannot bear it!

  LYSISTRATA. I will live at home in perfect chastity….

  CALONICÉ. I will live at home in perfect chastity….

  LYSISTRATA. Beautifully dressed and wearing a saffron-coloured gown….

  CALONICÉ. Beautifully dressed and wearing a saffron-coloured gown….

  LYSISTRATA. To the end I may inspire my husband with the most ardent longings.

  CALONICÉ. To the end I may inspire my husband with the most ardent longings.

  LYSISTRATA. Never will I give myself voluntarily….

  CALONICÉ. Never will I give myself voluntarily….

  LYSISTRATA. And if he has me by force….

  CALONICÉ. And if he has me by force….

  LYSISTRATA. I will be cold as ice, and never stir a limb….

  CALONICÉ. I will be cold as ice, and never stir a limb….

  LYSISTRATA. I will not lift my legs in air….

  CALONICÉ. I will not lift my legs in air….

  LYSISTRATA. Nor will I crouch with bottom upraised, like carven lions on a knife-handle.

  CALONICÉ. Nor will I crouch with bottom upraised, like carven lions on a knife-handle.

  LYSISTRATA. An if I keep my oath, may I be suffered to drink of this wine.

  CALONICÉ. An if I keep my oath, may I be suffered to drink of this wine.

  LYSISTRATA. But if I break it, let my bowl be filled with water.

  CALONICÉ. But if I break it, let my bowl be filled with water.

  LYSISTRATA. Will ye all take this oath?

  MYRRHINÉ. Yes, yes!

  LYSISTRATA. Then lo! I immolate the victim. (She drinks.)

  CALONICÉ. Enough, enough, my dear; now let us all drink in turn to cement our friendship.

  LAMPITO. Hark! what do those cries mean?

  LYSISTRATA. ’Tis what I was telling you; the women have just occupied the Acropolis. So now, Lampito, do you return to Sparta to organize the plot, while your comrades here remain as hostages. For ourselves, let us away to join the rest in the citadel, and let us push the bolts well home.

  CALONICÉ. But don’t you think the men will march up against us?

  LYSISTRATA. I laugh at them. Neither threats nor flames shall force our doors; they shall open only on the conditions I have named.

  CALONICÉ. Yes, yes, by the goddess of love! let us keep up our old-time repute for obstinacy and spite.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Go easy, Draces, go easy; why, your shoulder is all chafed by these plaguey heavy olive stocks. But forward still, forward, man, as needs must. What unlooked-for things do happen, to be sure, in a long life! Ah! Strymodorus, who would ever have thought it? Here we have the women, who used, for our misfortune
, to eat our bread and live in our houses, daring nowadays to lay hands on the holy image of the goddess, to seize the Acropolis and draw bars and bolts to keep any from entering! Come, Philurgus man, let’s hurry thither; let’s lay our faggots all about the citadel, and on the blazing pile burn with our hands these vile conspiratresses, one and all — and Lycon’s wife, Lysistrata, first and foremost! Nay, by Demeter, never will I let ‘em laugh at me, whiles I have a breath left in my body. Cleomenes himself, the first who ever seized our citadel, had to quit it to his sore dishonour; spite his Lacedaemonian pride, he had to deliver me up his arms and slink off with a single garment to his back. My word! but he was filthy and ragged! and what an unkempt beard, to be sure! He had not had a bath for six long years! Oh! but that was a mighty siege! Our men were ranged seventeen deep before the gate, and never left their posts, even to sleep. These women, these enemies of Euripides and all the gods, shall I do nothing to hinder their inordinate insolence? else let them tear down my trophies of Marathon. But look ye, to finish our toilsome climb, we have only this last steep bit left to mount. Verily ’tis no easy job without beasts of burden, and how these logs do bruise my shoulder! Still let us on, and blow up our fire and see it does not go out just as we reach our destination. Phew! phew! (blows the fire). Oh! dear! what a dreadful smoke! it bites my eyes like a mad dog. It is Lemnos fire for sure, or it would never devour my eyelids like this. Come on, Laches, let’s hurry, let’s bring succour to the goddess; it’s now or never! Phew! phew! (blows the fire). Oh! dear! what a confounded smoke! — There now, there’s our fire all bright and burning, thank the gods! Now, why not first put down our loads here, then take a vine-branch, light it at the brazier and hurl it at the gate by way of battering-ram? If they don’t answer our summons by pulling back the bolts, then we set fire to the woodwork, and the smoke will choke ‘em. Ye gods! what a smoke! Pfaugh! Is there never a Samos general will help me unload my burden? — Ah! it shall not gall my shoulder any more. (Tosses down his wood.) Come, brazier, do your duty, make the embers flare, that I may kindle a brand; I want to be the first to hurl one. Aid me, heavenly Victory; let us punish for their insolent audacity the women who have seized our citadel, and may we raise a trophy of triumph for success!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Oh! my dears, methinks I see fire and smoke; can it be a conflagration? Let us hurry all we can. Fly, fly, Nicodicé, ere Calycé and Crityllé perish in the fire, or are stifled in the smoke raised by these accursed old men and their pitiless laws. But, great gods, can it be I come too late? Rising at dawn, I had the utmost trouble to fill this vessel at the fountain. Oh! what a crowd there was, and what a din! What a rattling of water-pots! Servants and slave-girls pushed and thronged me! However, here I have it full at last; and I am running to carry the water to my fellow townswomen, whom our foes are plotting to burn alive. News has been brought us that a company of old, doddering greybeards, loaded with enormous faggots, as if they wanted to heat a furnace, have taken the field, vomiting dreadful threats, crying that they must reduce to ashes these horrible women. Suffer them not, oh! goddess, but, of thy grace, may I see Athens and Greece cured of their warlike folly. ’Tis to this end, oh! thou guardian deity of our city, goddess of the golden crest, that they have seized thy sanctuary. Be their friend and ally, Athené, and if any man hurl against them lighted firebrands, aid us to carry water to extinguish them.

  STRATYLLIS. Let me be, I say. Oh! oh! (She calls for help.)

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. What is this I see, ye wretched old men? Honest and pious folk ye cannot be who act so vilely.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Ah, ha! here’s something new! a swarm of women stand posted outside to defend the gates!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Ah! ah! we frighten you, do we; we seem a mighty host, yet you do not see the ten-thousandth part of our sex.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Ho, Phaedrias! shall we stop their cackle? Suppose one of us were to break a stick across their backs, eh?

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Let us set down our water-pots on the ground, to be out of the way, if they should dare to offer us violence.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Let someone knock out two or three teeth for them, as they did to Bupalus; they won’t talk so loud then.

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Come on then; I wait you with unflinching foot, and I will snap off your testicles like a bitch.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Silence! ere my stick has cut short your days.

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Now, just you dare to touch Stratyllis with the tip of your finger!

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. And if I batter you to pieces with my fists, what will you do?

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. I will tear out your lungs and entrails with my teeth.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Oh! what a clever poet is Euripides! how well he says that woman is the most shameless of animals.

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Let’s pick up our water-jars again, Rhodippé.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Ah! accursed harlot, what do you mean to do here with your water?

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. And you, old death-in-life, with your fire? Is it to cremate yourself?

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. I am going to build you a pyre to roast your female friends upon.

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. And I, — I am going to put out your fire.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. You put out my fire — you!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Yes, you shall soon see.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. I don’t know what prevents me from roasting you with this torch.

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. I am getting you a bath ready to clean off the filth.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. A bath for me, you dirty slut, you!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Yes, indeed, a nuptial bath — he, he!

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Do you hear that? What insolence!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. I am a free woman, I tell you.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. I will make you hold your tongue, never fear!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Ah, ha! you shall never sit more amongst the heliasts.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Burn off her hair for her!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Water, do your office! (The women pitch the water in their water-pots over the old men.)

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Oh, dear! oh, dear! oh, dear!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. Was it hot?

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Hot, great gods! Enough, enough!

  CHORUS OF WOMEN. I’m watering you, to make you bloom afresh.

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. Alas! I am too dry! Ah, me! how I am trembling with cold!

  MAGISTRATE. These women, have they made din enough, I wonder, with their tambourines? bewept Adonis enough upon their terraces? I was listening to the speeches last assembly day, and Demostratus, whom heaven confound! was saying we must all go over to Sicily — and lo! his wife was dancing round repeating: Alas! alas! Adonis, woe is me for Adonis!

  Demostratus was saying we must levy hoplites at Zacynthus — and lo! his wife, more than half drunk, was screaming on the house-roof: “Weep, weep for Adonis!” — while that infamous Mad Ox was bellowing away on his side. — Do ye not blush, ye women, for your wild and uproarious doings?

  CHORUS OF OLD MEN. But you don’t know all their effrontery yet! They abused and insulted us; then soused us with the water in their water-pots, and have set us wringing out our clothes, for all the world as if we had bepissed ourselves.

  MAGISTRATE. And ’tis well done too, by Poseidon! We men must share the blame of their ill conduct; it is we who teach them to love riot and dissoluteness and sow the seeds of wickedness in their hearts. You see a husband go into a shop: “Look you, jeweller,” says he, “you remember the necklace you made for my wife. Well, t’other evening, when she was dancing, the catch came open. Now, I am bound to start for Salamis; will you make it convenient to go up to-night to make her fastening secure?” Another will go to a cobbler, a great, strong fellow, with a great, long tool, and tell him: “The strap of one of my wife’s sandals presses her little toe, which is extremely sensitive; come in about midday to supple the thing and stretch it.” Now see the results. Take my own case — as a Magistrate I have enlisted rowers; I want
money to pay ‘em, and lo! the women clap to the door in my face. But why do we stand here with arms crossed? Bring me a crowbar; I’ll chastise their insolence! — Ho! there, my fine fellow! (addressing one of his attendant officers) what are you gaping at the crows about? looking for a tavern, I suppose, eh? Come, crowbars here, and force open the gates. I will put a hand to the work myself.

  LYSISTRATA. No need to force the gates; I am coming out — here I am. And why bolts and bars? What we want here is not bolts and bars and locks, but common sense.

  MAGISTRATE. Really, my fine lady! Where is my officer? I want him to tie that woman’s hands behind her back.

  LYSISTRATA. By Artemis, the virgin goddess! if he touches me with the tip of his finger, officer of the public peace though he be, let him look out for himself!

  MAGISTRATE (to the officer). How now, are you afraid? Seize her, I tell you, round the body. Two of you at her, and have done with it!

  FIRST WOMAN. By Pandrosos! if you lay a hand on her, I’ll trample you underfoot till you shit your guts!

  MAGISTRATE. Oh, there! my guts! Where is my other officer? Bind that minx first, who speaks so prettily!

  SECOND WOMAN. By Phoebé, if you touch her with one finger, you’d better call quick for a surgeon!

  MAGISTRATE. What do you mean? Officer, where are you got to? Lay hold of her. Oh! but I’m going to stop your foolishness for you all!

  THIRD WOMAN. By the Tauric Artemis, if you go near her, I’ll pull out your hair, scream as you like.

  MAGISTRATE. Ah! miserable man that I am! My own officers desert me. What ho! are we to let ourselves be bested by a mob of women? Ho! Scythians mine, close up your ranks, and forward!

  LYSISTRATA. By the holy goddesses! you’ll have to make acquaintance with four companies of women, ready for the fray and well armed to boot.

  MAGISTRATE. Forward, Scythians, and bind them!

  LYSISTRATA. Forward, my gallant companions; march forth, ye vendors of grain and eggs, garlic and vegetables, keepers of taverns and bakeries, wrench and strike and tear; come, a torrent of invective and insult! (They beat the officers.) Enough, enough! now retire, never rob the vanquished!