Euripides Iphigenia in Aulis 900

Old man

calling through the tent door.

Stranger of the race of Aeacus, stay awhile! Ho there! I mean you, O goddess-born, and you, daughter of Leda.

855

Achilles

Who is it calling through the half-opened door? What fear his voice betrays!

Old man

A slave; of that I am not proud, for fortune does not permit it.

Achilles

Whose slave are you? not mine; for mine and Agamemnon’s goods are separate.

Old man

I belong to this lady who stands before the tent, a gift to her from Tyndareus her father.

860

Achilles

I am waiting; tell me, if you are desirous, why you have stopped me.

Old man

Are you really all alone here at the door?

Achilles

To us alone will you address yourself; come forth from the king’s tent.

Old man

coming out.

O Fortune and my own foresight, preserve whom I desire!

Achilles

That speech will save ⁶ them in the future; it has a certain pompous air.

865

Clytemnestra

Delay not for the sake of touching my right hand, if there is anything that you would say to me.

Old man

Well, you know my character and my devotion to you and your children.

Clytemnestra

I know you have grown old in the service of my house.

Old man

Likewise you know it was in your dowry king Agamemnon received me.

Clytemnestra

Yes, you came to Argos with me, and have been mine this long time past.

870

Old man

True; and I bear all goodwill to you, less to your husband.

Clytemnestra

Come, come, unfold whatever you have to say.

Old man

Her father, he that begot her, is on the point of slaying your daughter with his own hand.

Clytemnestra

How? That for your story, old man! you are mad.

Old man

Severing with a sword the hapless girl’s white throat.

875

Clytemnestra

Ah, alas for me! Does my husband happen to have gone mad?

Old man

No; he is sane, except where you and your daughter are concerned; there he is mad.

Clytemnestra

What is his reason? what vengeful fiend impels him?

Old man

Oracles, at least so Calchas says, in order that the army may start—

Clytemnestra

Where? Alas for me, and for the one her father is going to kill!

880

Old man

To the halls of Dardanus, that Menelaus may recover Helen.

Clytemnestra

So Helen’s return then was fated to affect Iphigenia?

Old man

You know all; her father is about to offer your child to Artemis.

Clytemnestra

But that marriage—what pretext had it for bringing me from home?

Old man

An inducement to you to bring your daughter cheerfully, to wed her to Achilles.

885

Clytemnestra

On a deadly errand have you come, my daughter, both you, and I, your mother.

Old man

Piteous the lot of both of you, and dreadful Agamemnon’s venture.

Clytemnestra

Alas, I am undone; my eyes can no longer hold their tears.

Old man

If the loss ⁷ of children is painful, shed your tears.

Clytemnestra

From where, old man, do you say you had this news?

890

Old man

I had started to carry you a letter referring to the former writing.

Clytemnestra

Forbidding or combining to urge my bringing the child to her death?

Old man

No, forbidding it, for your lord was then in his sober senses.

Clytemnestra

How comes it then, if you were really bringing me a letter, that you do not now deliver it into my hands?

Old man

Menelaus snatched it from me, he who caused this trouble.

895

Clytemnestra

Do you hear that, son of Peleus, the Nereid’s child?

Achilles

I have been listening to the tale of your sufferings, and I do not bear my own lightly.

Clytemnestra

They will slay my child; they have tricked her with your marriage.

Achilles

Like you I blame your lord, nor do I view it with mere indifference.

Clytemnestra

No longer will I let shame ⁸ prevent my kneeling to you, a mortal to one goddess-born; why do I affect reserve? whose interests should I consult before my child’s? Throwing herself before Achilles. Oh! help me, goddess-born, in my sore distress, and her that was called your bride, in vain, it is true, yet called she was.

900

For you it was I wreathed her head and led her forth as if to marriage, but now it is to slaughter I am bringing her. On you will come reproach because you did not help her; for though not wedded to her, yet were you the loving husband of my hapless girl in name at any rate. By your beard, your right hand, and mother too I do implore you;

905

for your name it was that worked my ruin, and you are bound to stand by that. Except your knees I have no altar to fly to; and not a friend stands ⁹ at my side. You have heard the cruel abandoned scheme of Agamemnon; and I, a woman, have come, as you see, to a camp of lawless sailor-folk, bold in evil’s cause,

910

though useful when they wish; Now if you boldly stretch forth your arm in my behalf, our safety is assured; but if not, we are lost.

915

Chorus Leader

A strange thing is motherhood, carrying with it a potent spell, in which all share, so that for their children’s sake they will endure affliction.

Achilles

¹⁰ My proud spirit is stirred to range aloft, butI have learned to grieve in misfortune

and rejoice in high prosperity with equal moderation. For these are the men who can count on ordering all their life rightly by wisdom’s rules. True, there are cases where it is pleasant not to be too wise,

920

but there are others, where some store of wisdom helps. Brought up in godly Chiron’s halls myself, I learned to keep a single heart; and provided the Atridae lead well, I will obey them; but when they cease from that, no more will I obey;

925

no, but here and in Troy I will show the freedom of my nature, and, as far as in me lies, do honor to Ares with my spear. You, lady, who have suffered so cruelly from your nearest and dearest, I will, by every effort in a young man’s power, set right, investing you with that amount of pity

930

and never shall your daughter, after being once called my bride, die by her father’s hand; for I will not lend myself to your husband’s subtle tricks; no! for it will be my name that kills your child, although it does not wield the sword. Your own husband

935

is the actual cause, but I shall no longer be guiltless, if, because of me and my marriage, this maiden perishes, she that has suffered past endurance and been the victim of affronts most strangely undeserved.

940

944

So am I made the poorest wretch in Argos ;

I a thing of nothing, and Menelaus counting for a man! No son of Peleus I, but the issue of a vengeful fiend, if my name shall ¹¹ serve your husband for the murder. No! by Nereus, who begot my mother Thetis, in his home amid the flowing waves,

945

never shall king Agamemnon touch your daughter, no! not even to the laying of a finger-tip upon her robe; or Sipylus ¹² , that frontier town of barbarism, the cradle of those chieftains’ line, will be henceforth a city indeed, while Phthia ’s name will nowhere find mention.

950

Calchas, the seer, shall rue beginning the sacrifice with his barley-meal and lustral water. Why, what is a seer? A man who with luck tells the truth sometimes, with frequent falsehoods, but when his luck deserts him, collapses then and there.

955

It is not to secure a bride that I have spoken thus—there are maids unnumbered

eager to have my love ¹³ —no! but king Agamemnon has put an insult on me; he should have asked my leave to use my name as a means to catch the child, for it was I ¹⁴ chiefly who induced Clytemnestra to betroth her daughter to me;

960

I would had yielded this to Hellas , if that was where our going to Ilium broke down; I would never have refused to further my fellow soldiers’ common interest. But as it is, I am as nothing in the eyes of those chieftains, and little they care of treating me well or ill.

965

My sword shall soon know if any one is to snatch your daughter from me, for then will I make it reek with the bloody stains of slaughter, before it reach Phrygia . ¹⁵ Calm yourself then; as a god in his might I appeared to you, without being so, but such will I show myself for all that.

970

Chorus Leader

Son of Peleus, your words are alike worthy of you and that sea-born deity, the holy goddess.

975

Clytemnestra

Ah! would I could find words to utter your praise without excess, and yet not lose the graciousness of it by stinting it; for when the good are praised, they have some sort of feeling

of hatred for those who in their praise exceed the mean. But I am ashamed of intruding a tale of woe, since my affliction touches myself alone and you are not affected by troubles of mine; but still it looks well for the man of worth to assist the unfortunate, even when he is not connected with then.

980

Therefore pity us, for our suffering cries for pity; in the first place, I have harbored an idle hope, in thinking to have you marry my daughter; and next, perhaps, the slaying of my child will be to you an evil omen in your wooing hereafter, against which you must guard yourself.

985

Your words were good, both first and last; for if you will it so, my daughter will be saved.

990

992

Will you have her clasp your knees as a suppliant? it is no maid’s part; yet if it seems good to you, why, come she shall with the modest look of free-born maid;

but if I shall obtain the same end from you without her coming then let her abide within, for there is dignity in her reserve; still reserve must only go as far as the case allows.

995

Achilles

¹⁶ Do not bring your daughter out for me to see, lady, nor let us incur the reproach of the ignorant;

for an army, when gathered together without domestic duties to employ it, loves the evil gossip of malicious tongues. After all, should you both supplicate me, you will attain a like result as if I had never been supplicated; ¹⁷ for I am myself engaged in a mighty struggle to rid you of your troubles.

1000

One thing be sure you have heard; I will not tell a lie; if I do that or idly mock you, may I die, but live if I preserve the girl.

1005

Clytemnestra

Bless you for always helping the distressed!

Achilles

Hearken then to me, that the matter may succeed.

Clytemnestra

What is your proposal? for hear you I must.

1010

Achilles

Let us once more urge ¹⁸ her father to a better frame of mind.

Clytemnestra

He is something of a coward, and fears the army too much.

Achilles

Still argument overthrows argument.

Clytemnestra

Cold hope indeed; but tell me what I must do.

Achilles

Supplicate him first not to slay his children; and if he is stubborn, come to me. For ¹⁹ if he consents to your request, my intervention need go no further, since this consent insures your safety. I too shall show myself in a better light to my friend,

1015

and the army will not blame me, if I arrange the matter by reason rather than force; while, should things turn out well, the result will prove satisfactory both to you and your friends, even without my interference.

1020

Clytemnestra

How sensibly you speak! I must act as seems best to you;

but should I fail of my object, where am I to see you again, where? Must I turn my wretched steps and find you ready to champion my distress?

1025

Achilles

I will keep watch to guard you, where occasion calls, that none may see you passing through the army of Danaids

with that scared look. Do not shame your father’s house; for Tyndareus does not deserve not to be ill spoken of, being a mighty man in Hellas . ²⁰

1030

Clytemnestra

It will be so. ²¹ Command me; I must play the slave to you. If there are gods, you for your righteous dealing

will find them favorable; if there are none, what need to toil? Exeunt Achilles and Clytemnestra.

1035