A) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 246-263
Orestes: O Zeus, O Zeus, become a sacred observer of our cause! Behold the orphaned brood of a father eagle that perished in the meshes, in the coils of a fierce viper. They are utterly orphaned, 250 gripped by the famine of hunger: for they are not grown to full strength [telos] to bring their father's quarry to the nest. So you see both me and poor Electra here, children bereft of their father, both outcasts alike from our home. 255 If you destroy these nestlings of a father who made sacrifice and gave you great tîmê, from what like hand will you receive the homage of rich feasts? Destroy the brood of the eagle and you cannot again send signals [sêmata] that mortals will trust; 260 nor, if this royal stock should wither utterly away, will it serve your altars on days when oxen are sacrificed. Oh foster it, and you may raise our house from low estate to great, though now it seems utterly overthrown.

B) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 500-507
Electra: So listen, father, to this last appeal of mine as you behold these fledglings crouching at your tomb. Have compassion on a song of lament performed by a woman and by a man as well, and let not this seed of Pelops' line be blotted out: for then, in spite of death, you are not dead. 505 For children are voices of salvation [sôtêriâ] to a man, though he is dead; like corks, they buoy up the net, saving [sôzô] the flaxen cord from out of the deep. Hear! For your own sake we make this lament. By honoring this plea of ours you save [sôzô] yourself.

C) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 526-550
Orestes And have you learned the nature of the dream so as to tell it properly?

Chorus She dreamed she gave birth to a serpent: that is her own account.

Orestes And where does the tale come full circle [telos], where is it completed?

Chorus She laid it to rest as if it were a child, in swaddling clothes.

Orestes What food did it crave, the newborn viper?

Chorus In her dream she offered it her own breast.

Orestes Surely her nipple was not unwounded by the loathsome beast?

Chorus No: it drew in clotted blood with the milk.

Orestes Truly this vision is not without meaning! …I pray to this earth and to my father's grave that this dream may come to its fulfillment [telos] in me. As I sort it out, it fits at every point. For if the snake left the same place as I; if it was furnished with my swaddling clothes; 545 if it sought to open its mouth to take the breast that nourished me and mixed the philon milk with clotted blood while she shrieked for terror at this pathos, then surely, as she has nourished an ominous thing of horror, she must die by biâ. 550 For I, turned serpent, am her killer, as this dream declares.

D) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 924-928: Take care: beware the hounds of wrath that avenge a mother… Oh no! I myself bore and nourished this serpent!

E) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 935-938: As to Priam and his sons dikê came at last in crushing retribution, so to Agamemnon's house came a twofold lion, twofold slaughter [Ares].

F) Aeschylus Libation Bearers 1053-1054:To me these are no imagined troubles. For there indeed are the hounds of wrath to avenge my mother.

	Read the Perseus Project description of the Oresteia Krater.
	Visit the Nashville Parthenon, a half scale replica of Athens' most impressive temple. Go on their virtual tour, which includes a reconstructed replica of the 38 foot statue of Athena.
	Next, view a 3-d rendering of the Parthenon (as produced by an architectural team at the University of Iowa). This site gives you an idea of the colorful decorations that would have adorned the parthenon in antiquity.
	Finally, visit Metis for a Quicktime QTVR tour of the Athenian Acropolis or the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi.