Gallery: Electra at the Tomb of Agamemnon, Frederic Leighton
AESCHYLUS
LIBATION BEARERS, TRANSLATED BY H. W. SMYTH
Now when she had slain Agamemnon, Queen Clytaemestra with her lover Aegisthus ruled in the land of Argos. But the spirit of her murdered lord was worth and sent a baleful vision to distress her soul in sleep. She dreamed that she gave birth to a serpent and that she suckled it, as if it had been a babe; but together with the mother’s milk the noxious thing drew clotted blood from out her breast. With a scream of horror she awoke, and when the seers of the house had interpreted the portent as a sign of the anger of the nether powers, she bade Electra, her daughter, and her serving-women bear libations to the tomb of Agamemnon, if haply she might placate his spirit.
Now Princess Electra dwelt in the palace, but was treated no better than a slave; but, before that Agamemnon was slain, her brother, Prince Orestes, had been sent to abide with his uncle Strophius in a far country, even in Phocis. There he had grown to youthful manhood, and on the selfsame day that his mother sought to avert the evil omen of her dream, accompanied by his cousin Pylades, he came to Argos seeking vengeance for his father’s murder.
On the tomb of Agamemnon he places a lock of his hair, and when Electra discovers it, she is confident that it must be an offering to the dead made by none other than her brother. She has been recognized by him by reason of her mourning garb; but not until she has had further proof, by signs and tokens, will she be convinced that it is he in very truth.
Orestes makes known that he has been divinely commissioned to his purpose of vengeance. Lord Apollo himself has commanded him thereto with threats that, if he disobey, he shall be visited with assaults of the Erinyes of his father—banned from the habitations of men and the altars of the gods, he shall perish blasted in mind and body.
Grouped about the grave of their father, brother and sister, aided by the friendly Chorus, implore his ghostly assistance to their just cause. Orestes and Pylades, disguised as Phocian travellers, are given hospitable welcome by Clytaemestra, to whom it is reported that her son is dead. The Queen sends as messenger Orestes’ old nurse to summon Aegisthus from outside accompanied by his bodyguard. The Chorus persuades her to alter the message and bid him come unattended. His death is quickly followed by that of Clytaemestra, whose appeals for mercy are rejected by her son. Orestes, displaying the bloody robe in which his father had been entangled when struck down, proclaims the justice of his deed. But his wits begin to wander; the Erinyes of his mother, unseen by the others, appear before his disordered vision; he rushes from the scene.
[Scene: The tomb of Agamemnon. Enter Orestes and Pylades.]
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