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"Not by offerings burned in secret, not by secret libations, not by tears, shall man soften the stubborn wrath of unsanctified sacrifices." (Aeschylus, Agamemnon 69-71)
Part I: Agamemnon as Avenging HeroA) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 22-54: Sent forth from the palace I have come to convey libations to the sound of sharp blows of my hands. My cheek is marked with bloody gashes 25 where my nails have cut fresh furrows. And yet through all my life my heart is fed with lamentation. Rips are torn by my griefs through the linen web of my garment, torn in the cloth that covers my breast, 30 the cloth of robes struck for the sake of my mirthless misfortunes.
For with a hair-raising shriek, the seer [mantis] of dreams for our house, breathing wrath out of sleep, 35 uttered a cry of terror in the untimely [a-(h)ôr-os] part of night from the heart of the palace, a cry that fell heavily on the women's quarter. And those who sort out these dreams, bound under pledge, cried out from the god 40 that those beneath the earth cast furious reproaches and rage against their murderers.
Intending to ward off evil with such a graceless grace [kharis], 45 O mother Earth, she sends me forth, godless woman that she is. But I am afraid to utter the words she charged me to speak. For what atonement is there for blood fallen to earth? Ah, hearth of utter grief! 50 Ah, house laid low in ruin! Sunless darkness, loathed by men, enshrouds our house due to the death of its master.
B) Aeschylus, Agamemnon 1393-1398: Since this is so, old men of Argos, rejoice, if you would rejoice; as for me, I glory in the deed. 1395 And had it been a fitting act to pour libations on the corpse, over him this would have been done with dikê. With dikê and then some! With so many accursed lies has he filled the mixing-bowl in his own house, and now he has come home and himself drained it to the dregs.
C) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 84-97: You handmaidens who set our house in order, since you are here as my attendants in this rite of supplication, give me your counsel on this: what should I say while I pour these offerings of sorrow? How shall I find gracious words, how shall I entreat my father? Shall I say that I bring these offerings to a philos husband from a philê wife - from my own mother? I do not have the assurance for that, nor do I know what I should say as I pour this mixed offering onto my father's tomb. Or shall I speak the words that men are accustomed [nomos] to use: "To those who send these honors may he return benefits" - a gift, indeed, to match their evil? Or, in silence and dishonor, even as my father perished, shall I pour them out for the earth to drink and then retrace my steps, like one who carries refuse away from a rite, hurling the vessel from me with averted eyes?
D) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 118-130
What should I say? Instruct my inexperience, prescribe the form.- Pray that some daimôn or some mortal may come to them -
As judge or as avenger, do you mean?
- Say in plain speech, "One who will take life for life."
And is it right for me to ask this of the gods?
- How could it not be right to repay an enemy with ills?
Supreme herald of the realm above and the realm below, O Hermes of the nether world, come to my aid, summon to me the daimones beneath the earth to hear my prayers, spirits that watch over my father's house, and Earth herself, who gives birth to all things, and having nurtured them receives their increase in turn. And meanwhile, as I pour these lustral offerings to the dead, I invoke my father.
E) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 399-404
(Electra) Hear, O Earth, and you powers below with your timê!
Chorus: And it is the eternal law [nomos] that drops of blood spilled on the ground demand yet more blood. Murder cries out on the Fury [Erinys], which from those killed before brings one atê in the wake of another atê.F) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 466-489
(Chorus) Ah, inbred trouble [ponos] and bloody stroke of ruin [atê] without a tune [mousa]! Ah, lamentable and grievous sorrows! 470 Ah, the unstaunched pain! Our house has a cure to heal these woes, a cure not from outside, from the hands of others, but from itself, by fierce, bloody eris. 475 This hymn is for the gods beneath the earth.O you blessed powers below [khthonioi], hear this supplication of ours, and with favorable phrenes send forth to these children your aid for victory!
Orestes: O father, who perished by a death unbefitting a king [turannos], 480 grant in answer to my prayer the power [kratos] over your halls!
Electra: And I too, father, have a like request of you: to escape when I have wrought great destruction on Aegisthus.
Orestes: Yes, for then the customary funeral feasts of men would be established in your honor. But otherwise, at the rich and savory banquet of burnt offerings made to the earth, 485 you will be without a portion of tîmê.
Electra: And I will likewise at my wedding offer libations to you out of the fullness of my inheritance from my father's house, and before all else I will hold this tomb of yours in the highest honor.
Orestes: O Earth, send up my father to watch my battle!G) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 576-578
I will skewer him with my swift sword and lay him dead. The fury [Erinys] that has no fill of slaughter shall, for her third and crowning drink, drink unmixed blood!Part II: Orestes as Hero and Savior
H) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 235-245
Electra: O most philon object of care in your father's house, its hope of the seed of a savior [sôtêr] longed for with tears, trust in your prowess and you will win back your father's house. O delightful eyes that have four parts of love for me: for I must call you father; 240 and to you falls the love I should bear my mother, she whom I hate with complete dikê; and the love I bore my sister, victim of a pitiless sacrifice; and you were my faithful brother, bringing me your reverence. May Might and Dikê, 245 with Zeus, supreme over all, in the third place, lend you their aid!I) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 306-322
Chorus: You mighty Fates, through the power of Zeus grant fulfillment there where what is just [dikaion] now turns. "For a word of hate 310 let a word of hate be said," Dikê cries out as she exacts the debt, "and for a murderous stroke let a murderous stroke be paid." "Let him suffer [paskhô] what he himself has done," says the mûthos of three generations.
Orestes: 315 O father, unhappy father, by what word or deed of mine can I succeed in sailing from far away to you, where your resting-place holds you, a light to oppose your darkness? 320 Yet a lament that gives kleos to the Atreidae who once possessed our house is none the less a joyous service [kharites].J) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 345-353: Ah, my father, if only beneath Ilium's walls you had been slain, slashed by some Lycian spearman! Then you would have left a good kleos for your children in their halls, and in their maturity you would have made their lives admired by men. 350 And in a land beyond the sea you would have found a tomb heaped high with earth, no heavy burden for your house to bear -
K) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 394-404
Electra: And when will mighty Zeus, blossoming on both his father's and mother's side, bring down his hand on them 395 and split their heads open? Let it be a pledge to the land! After injustice I demand dikê as my right. Hear, O Earth, and you powers below with your tîmê!
Chorus: And it is the eternal law [nomos] that drops of blood spilled on the ground demand yet more blood. Murder cries out on the Fury [Erinys], which from those killed before brings one atê in the wake of another atê.L) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 1014-1017
Now at last I praise [aineô] him. Now at last I am present to lament him, 1015 as I address this web that wrought my father's death. Yet I grieve for the deed and the suffering [pathos] and for my whole lineage [genos]. My victory is an unenviable pollution.M) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 1048-1062
Orestes: Ah, ah! You slave women, look at them there: like Gorgons, wrapped in sable garments, 1050 entwined with swarming snakes! I can stay no longer.
Chorus: What visions disturb you, most philos of sons to your father? Wait, do not be all overcome by fear.
Orestes: To me these are no imagined troubles. For there indeed are the hounds of wrath to avenge my mother… O lord Apollo, look! Now they come in troops, and from their eyes they drip loathsome blood! …You do not see them, but I see them. I am driven out and can stay no longer!N) Aeschylus, Libation Bearers 1065-1076
Look! Now again, for the third time, has the tempest of this clan burst on the royal house and come to fulfillment [telos]. First, at the beginning, came the cruel woes of children slain for food; 1070 next, the suffering [pathos] of a man, a king, when the warlord of the Achaeans perished, murdered in his bath. And now, once again, there has come from somewhere a third, a savior [sôtêr], or shall I say a doom? 1075 Oh when will it bring its work to completion, when will the fury of calamity [atê], lulled to rest, find an end and cease?
Review Relevant facts about ancient Greek hero cults.
A woman pours a wine libation.
