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Chorus of Theban Elders

Thou of Many Names, pride and joy 1115

of the Cadmeian bride,⁽¹²⁵⁾

son of loud-thundering Zeus

who haunt renowned

Italy and hold sway

in the folds of Eleusinian1120

Deo⁽¹²⁶⁾ that are open to all, O Bacchus,

dwelling in the mother-city of the Bacchae

beside the liquid

stream of Ismenus and beside

the seeding ground of the savage dragon.⁽¹²⁷⁾1125
 

Thee the light shimmering through smoky flames

has seen about the twin peaks⁽¹²⁸⁾

of rock where Corycian

Nymphs, your Bacchae, wend.

Thee, the stream of Castalia has seen.1130

And thee, the ivied slopes

of Nysean mountains and shores

green with grape clusters escort

amid divine strains of Eu-oi-oi-oi-oi

resounding as you visit1135

the concourses of Thebes.⁽¹²⁹⁾
 

This city thou honorest

as preeminent above all cities

and thy mother taken by lightning.

Now, when the city and its people1140

are held fast under violent sickness,

come with cleansing foot across the slopes

of Parnassus'⁽¹³⁰⁾ or moaning straits.1145
 

Io, io, leader of the chorus

of stars breathing fire, surveyor

of voices in the night,

boy son of Zeus, appear,

O Lord, amidst thy Thyiads⁽¹³¹⁾1150

who accompany you, and in maddened frenzy,

dance the night for you, dispenser of good Iacchos.⁽¹³²⁾
 

[A man enters from the country.]
 

Messenger

Neighbors of the houses of Cadmus and Amphion,⁽¹³³⁾ 1155

no life among men exists that I would

either praise or blame as fixed once for all.

Chance sets upright, and chance dashes down

the lucky and the unlucky, always.

Mortals have no prophet at all for what is established.1160

For Creon was enviable in my opinion, once.

He saved this land of Cadmus from its enemies.

He received sole rule omnipotent over the land

and guided it straight, flourishing in the

seed of children born. And now everything is lost.1165

Whenever men forfeit their pleasures, I do not regard

such a man as alive, but I consider him a living corpse.

Be very wealthy in your household, if you wish, and live

the style of absolute rulers, but should the enjoyment of these

depart, what is left, compared to pleasure,1170

I would not buy from a man for a shadow of smoke.
 

Coryphaeus

What misery this for the kings do you come bringing?
 

Messenger

They are dead. The living are responsible for them dying.
 

Coryphaeus

Who is the murderer? Who is laid forth? Tell us.
 

Messenger

Haemon is dead, his blood drawn by a hand of his own . . .⁽¹³⁴⁾1175
 

Coryphaeus

his father's or the hand of his own?
 

Messenger

He himself by his own hand in anger at his father for the murder.
 

Coryphaeus

O prophet, how truly you fulfilled your word.
 

Messenger

Since this is the situation, it remains to plan for the rest.
 

[A woman enters from the house.]
 

Coryphaeus

Here I see wretched Eurydice close by,1180

wife of Creon.⁽¹³⁵⁾ She comes from the house,

because she has she heard about her son, or by chance.
 

Eurydice

All my townsmen, I heard your words

as I was approaching the door to go

and address the goddess Pallas⁽¹³⁶⁾ with my prayers.1185

I was just loosening the bolts of the door,

when the sound of misfortune for my house

struck my ears. I fell backward

in fear into my servants' arms and fainted.

But say again what the report was, 1190

for I will listen as one not inexperienced in evils.
 

Messenger

I will tell you, philê mistress. I was there.

I will not omit any word of the truth. Why would I

comfort you with words for which later

I will be revealed a liar? The truth is always the right thing.1195

I followed your husband as his guide

to the edge of the plain where was lying, unpitied

and rent by dogs Polyneices' body, still.

We asked the Goddess of the Road and

Plouton to maintain a kindly disposition.⁽¹³⁷⁾1200

We bathed him with purifying bath and burned

what was left on newly plucked branches.

A lofty crowned mound of his own earth,

we heaped upon him, and, afterwards, we left

for the maiden's hollow bridal chamber of Hades 1205

with its bedding of stone. From afar someone hears

high-pitched laments of a voice near the bride's chamber

unhallowed by funeral rites. He came and reported to his master.

Senseless marks of a cry of suffering

came over Creon as he drew nearer.1210

Crying out, he sent forth a mournful word.

"O miserable me, am I a prophet? Am I going

the most unfortunate road of those traveled before?

My son's voice touches⁽¹³⁸⁾ me. But, servants,

go quickly closer, and stand near the tomb,1215

and look, entering at the gap torn in the rocks of the mound

as far as the mouth itself, and see if I am hearing

Haemon's voice, or I am deceived by the gods."

At the command of our despairing master,

we began looking, and in the furthest part of the tomb,1220

we saw her hanging by the neck,

suspended by a noose of fine linen,

and him lying beside her, his arms about her waist,

bewailing the destruction of his nuptial bed departed below,

his father's deeds, and wretched marriage bed.1225

When Creon sees him, crying out dreadfully, he goes

inside toward him, and wailing out loud, he calls out:

"Wretched one, what have you done? What were

you thinking? By what disaster were you destroyed?

Come out, my child, I beg you on my knees."1230

With savage eyes descrying him, the boy,

spitting at his face and offering no reply,

draws his two-edged sword, but he fell short

of his father bolting in flight. Then, doomed

and furious with himself, just as he was, he stretched1235

out and drove his sword half-way into his side. Still

conscious, he enfolds the girl in his faint embrace.

He was panting and streaming a swift flow

of blood upon her white cheek.

He lies, corpse around corpse.1240

The wretched one received marriage rites in Hades' house,
 

[At some point before the Messenger concludes his report, Eurydice withdraws into the house.]
 

having shown among men how much lack of counsel

is the greatest evil that clings to a man.
 

Coryphaeus

What do you suppose about that? The woman is gone again,

before she said a word, good or bad.1245
 

Messenger

I, too, am surprised, but I feed on the hopes

that, on hearing of her child's pains, she does not think

wailing before the city proper, but inside beneath her roof,

she will set forth the grief of her own for her slaves to lament.

She is not inexperienced in discretion so as to make a mistake.1250
 

Coryphaeus

I do not know. To me too much silence seems

as heavy as much vain shouting.
 

Messenger

Well, we will know if, as we fear, she is concealing

something, repressed secretly in her distraught heart,

after I have entered the house. You are right. 1255

There is a heaviness even in too much silence.
 

[Exit Messenger. During his last lines, Creon enters silently, holding onto the body of his son Haemon which is carried by his servants.]
 

Coryphaeus

Here comes the lord himself,

holding in his hands a remarkable memorial,⁽¹³⁹⁾

if it is meet to say, not of another's

ruin but of a mistake that is all his own.1260
 

Creon

Iô, iô,

the mistakes of thoughtless minds,

stubborn, deadly mistakes,

iô, you who look upon kinsmen

slayers and the slain.

Ah me! the unhappy counsels among my counsels.1265

O boy, new to life with a new kind of death,⁽¹⁴⁰⁾

aiai, aiai,

you died, and you have departed

because of my bad counsels, not yours.
 

Coryphaeus

Ah me! how you seem to see justice late.1270
 

Creon

Ah me!

I have learned in misery. Upon my head

a god, at that time holding a heavy weight,

struck me and hurled me in savage ways,

Ah me! overturning and trampling my joy.⁽¹⁴¹⁾1275

pheu, pheu, the painful pains of mortals.
 

[Enter the Messenger from the house.]
 

Messenger

Master, you are holding evils, and you have others

laid in store. Some you carry in your hands. Others inside the house

you are about to come and see over there. 1280
 

Creon

What worse evil is yet to come from evils?
 

Messenger

The woman is dead, the all-mother⁽¹⁴²⁾ of the corpse,

the wretched one, just now by newly cut blows.
 

Creon

Iô,

iô, haven of Hades hard to atone,

why me, why are you destroying me?1285

O you who have escorted to me

the sufferings of ill-tidings, what word are you crying out?

Aiai, you have done away with a dead man.

What are you saying, boy?⁽¹⁴³⁾ What news are telling me?

Aiai, aiai, 1290

slaughter on top of destruction--

a woman's death besetting me on both sides?
 

Messenger

You may see, for she is no longer in the inner recesses of the house.
 

[The central doors of the stage building move inward (1186). The ekkyklêma, a low, wooden platform mounted on wheels, is pushed outward. On it is displayed the corpse of Eurydice lying next to an altar (1301). A sword is visible piercing her side.]
 

Creon

Ah me!

in my misery I am looking at a second evil.1295

What, what fate still awaits me?

I hold my child just now in my hands,

wretched me, and I look further at the corpse before me.

Pheu, pheu, woeful mother, pheu, child.
 

Messenger

†Around the sharply whetted knife at the altar,†⁽¹⁴⁴⁾ 1300

..........................................................

she relaxes her eyebrows into darkness, after lamenting

the empty bed of Megareus who died before⁽¹⁴⁵⁾

and again the bed of this one and lastly, after conjuring

evil doings for you, child-killer.⁽¹⁴⁶⁾1305
 

Creon

Aiai, aiai,

I flutter with fear. Why has someone not

struck me straight in the chest with a two-edged sword?

I am miserable, aiai,1310

and I am soaked in miserable woe.
 

Messenger

Yes, you were denounced⁽¹⁴⁷⁾ by the dead woman with

responsibility for the deaths, that one and this one both.
 

Creon

In what way did she release herself in bloodshed?
 

Messenger

By striking herself with her own hand down to the liver when1315

she heard of the boy's sharply lamented suffering.
 

Creon

Ah me! me, these things will never be fit upon another

of mortals and be free of my responsibility.

Yes, I killed, I killed you, O pitiable me,

I, the report is true. iô, servants,1320

lead me away as quickly as you can, lead me from under foot,

who exists no more than a nonentity.1325
 

Coryphaeus

You give profitable advice, if any profit exists amid evils,

for the evils at one's feet are best when very brief.
 

Creon

Let it come. Let it come.

Let the fairest of destines appear,

the one that brings to me my final day,1330

the supreme destiny. Let it come. Let it come,

that I no longer see another day.
 

Coryphaeus

These things lie in the future. It is necessary to do some of what lies before.

What lies in the future is the care of those who ought to care.1335
 

Creon

No, what I lust for, I have prayed for.
 

Coryphaeus

Then, do not pray for anything. There is no escape

for mortals from misfortune that is fated.
 

Creon

Please, lead a useless man out from under foot,

who killed you, boy, not willingly,1340

and you, too, this woman. O me, wretched me, I do not know

toward which to look or where to lean for support. Everything

in my hands is awry, while upon my head 1345

fate unbearable leaped.
 

[Creon is led into the house. The ekkyklêma is drawn inside, and the messenger and the slaves carrying Haemon's body enter the house.]
 

Chorus of Theban Elders

By far is having sense the first part

of happiness. One must not act impiously toward

what pertains to gods. Big words1350

of boasting men,

paid for by big blows,

teach having sense in old age.
 

Before the festival, the Council had compiled a list of names from each of the ten tribes of citizens. These names were placed in ten urns, sealed and stored on the Acropolis. At the beginning of the festival, the urns were set up in the theater, and the magistrate drew the name of one man from each urn. These ten men, now designated as judges of the contest, were required by law to select a winning poet. With the close of the final satyr play, it was time for them to vote. The judges, weathering the advice shouted down from the slope of the Acropolis and mindful of their oath of impartiality, marked their tablets and deposited them in a jar. The magistrate solemnly drew five and, after reading the names, whispered to the herald. The latter, whose voice speaks for the community, proclaimed the victor.