Unit 9 Primary Source Readings

Introduction:

There are two primary source readings for Unit 9: selections from Plutarch’s Life of Theseus and an excerpt from a play of Euripides called Heracles.

Plutarch: Life of Theseus (Trans. Bernadotte Perrin, 1914)

Plutarch was a Greek author from the 2nd century CE.  Among his many works are the ‘Parallel Lives,’ biographies of famous Greeks and Romans that paralleled one another.  His ‘Life of Theseus’ was the counterpart to his ‘Life of Romulus.’  Although Plutarch tended towards the rationalizing or euhemerizing versions of stories, he couldn’t resist slipping in some fantastical tales as well.

Chapter 3

The lineage of Theseus, on the father’s side, goes back to Erechtheus and the first children of the soil; on the mother’s side, to Pelops. For Pelops was the strongest of the kings in Peloponnesus quite as much on account of the number of his children as the amount of his wealth. He gave many daughters in marriage to men of highest rank, and scattered many sons among the cities as their rulers. One of these, named Pittheus, the grandfather of Theseus, founded the little city of Troezen, and had the highest repute as a man versed in the lore of his times and of the greatest wisdom. [2] Now the wisdom of that day had some such form and force as that for which Hesiod was famous, especially in the sententious maxims of his ‘Works and Days.’ One of these maxims is ascribed to Pittheus, namely

“Payment pledged to a man who is dear must be ample and certain.”

At any rate, this is what Aristotle the philosopher says, and Euripides, when he has Hippolytus addressed as ‘nursling of the pure and holy Pittheus,’ shows what the world thought of Pittheus. [3]

Now Aegeus, king of Athens, desiring to have children, is said to have received from the Pythian priestess the celebrated oracle in which she bade him to have intercourse with no woman until he came to Athens. But Aegeus thought the words of the command somewhat obscure, and therefore turned aside to Troezen and communicated to Pittheus the words of the god, which ran as follows:—

“Loose not the wine-skin’s jutting neck, great chief of the people,
Until thou shalt have come once more to the city of Athens.”

[4] This dark saying Pittheus apparently understood, and persuaded him, or beguiled him, to have intercourse with his daughter Aethra. Aegeus did so, and then learning that it was the daughter of Pittheus with whom he had consorted, and suspecting that she was with child by him, he left a sword and a pair of sandals hidden under a great rock, which had a hollow in it just large enough to receive these objects. [5] He told the princess alone about this, and bade her, if a son should be born to her from him, and if, when he came to man’s estate, he should be able to lift up the rock and take away what had been left under it, to send that son to him with the tokens, in all secrecy, and concealing his journey as much as possible from everybody; for he was mightily in fear of the sons of Pallas, who were plotting against him, and who despised him on account of his childlessness; and they were fifty in number, these sons of Pallas. Then he went away.

Chapter 6

During the rest of the time, then, Aethra kept his true birth concealed from Theseus, and a report was spread abroad by Pittheus that he was begotten by Poseidon. For Poseidon is highly honored by the people of Troezen, and he is the patron god of their city; to him they offer first fruits in sacrifice, and they have his trident as an emblem on their coinage. [2] But when, in his young manhood, Theseus displayed, along with his vigor of body, prowess also, and a firm spirit united with intelligence and sagacity, then Aethra brought him to the rock, told him the truth about his birth, and bade him take away his fathers tokens and go by sea to Athens. [3] Theseus put his shoulder to the rock and easily raised it up, but he refused to make his journey by sea, although safety lay in that course, and his grandfather and his mother begged him to take it. For it was difficult to make the journey to Athens by land, since no part of it was clear nor yet without peril from robbers and miscreants. [4]

For verily that age produced men who, in work of hand and speed of foot and vigor of body, were extraordinary and indefatigable, but they applied their powers to nothing that was fitting or useful. Nay rather, they exulted in monstrous insolence, and reaped from their strength a harvest of cruelty and bitterness, mastering and forcing and destroying everything that came in their path. And as for reverence and righteousness, justice and humanity, they thought that most men praised these qualities for lack of courage to do wrong and for fear of being wronged, and considered them no concern of men who were strong enough to get the upper hand. [5] Some of these creatures Heracles cut off and destroyed as he went about, but some escaped his notice as he passed by, crouching down and shrinking back, and were overlooked in their abjectness. And when Heracles met with calamity and, after the slaying of Iphitus, removed into Lydia and for a long time did slave’s service there in the house of Omphale, then Lydia indeed obtained great peace and security; but in the regions of Hellas the old villainies burst forth and broke out anew, there being none to rebuke and none to restrain them. [6]

The journey was therefore a perilous one for travellers by land from Peloponnesus to Athens, and Pittheus, by describing each of the miscreants at length, what sort of a monster he was, and what deeds he wrought upon strangers, tried to persuade Theseus to make his journey by sea. But he, as it would seem, had long since been secretly fired by the glorious valor of Heracles, and made the greatest account of that hero, and was a most eager listener to those who told what manner of man he was, and above all to those who had seen him and been present at some deed or speech of his. [7] And it is altogether plain that he then experienced what Themistocles many generations afterwards experienced, when he said that he could not sleep for the trophy of Miltiades. In like manner Theseus admired the valor of Heracles, until by night his dreams were of the hero’s achievements, and by day his ardor led him along and spurred him on in his purpose to achieve the like.

Chapter 7

And besides, they were kinsmen, being sons of cousins-german. For Aethra was daughter of Pittheus, as Alcmene was of Lysidice, and Lysidice and Pittheus were brother and sister, children of Hippodameia and Pelops. Accordingly, he thought it a dreadful and unendurable thing that his famous cousin should go out against the wicked everywhere and purge land and sea of them, while he himself ran away from the struggles which lay in his path, [2] disgracing his reputed father by journeying like a fugitive over the sea, and bringing to his real father as proofs of his birth only sandals and a sword unstained with blood, instead of at once offering noble deeds and achievements as the manifest mark of his noble birth. In such a spirit and with such thoughts he set out, determined to do no man any wrong, but to punish those who offered him violence.

Chapter 10

He also slew Sciron on the borders of Megara, by hurling him down the cliffs. Sciron robbed the passers by, according to the prevalent tradition; but as some say, he would insolently and wantonly thrust out his feet to strangers and bid them wash them, and then, while they were washing them, kick them off into the sea. [2] Megarian writers, however, taking issue with current report, and, as Simonides1 expresses it, ‘waging war with antiquity,’ say that Sciron was neither a violent man nor a robber, but a chastiser of robbers, and a kinsman and friend of good and just men. For Aeacus, they say, is regarded as the most righteous of Hellenes, and Cychreus the Salaminian has divine honors at Athens, and the virtues of Peleus and Telamon are known to all men. [3] Well, then, Sciron was a son-in-law of Cychreus, father-in-law of Aeacus, and grandfather of Peleus and Telamon, who were the sons of Endeis, daughter of Sciron and Chariclo. It is not likely, then, they say, that the best of men made family alliances with the basest, receiving and giving the greatest and most valuable pledges. It was not, they say, when Theseus first journeyed to Athens, but afterwards, that he captured Eleusis from the Megarians, having circumvented Diocles its ruler, and slew Sciron. Such, then, are the contradictions in which these matters are involved.

Chapter 15

Not long afterwards there came from Crete for the third time the collectors of the tribute. Now as to this tribute, most writers agree that because Androgeos was thought to have been treacherously killed within the confines of Attica, not only did Minos harass the inhabitants of that country greatly in war,1 but Heaven also laid it waste, for barrenness and pestilence smote it sorely, and its rivers dried up; also that when their god assured them in his commands that if they appeased Minos and became reconciled to him, the wrath of Heaven would abate and there would be an end of their miseries, they sent heralds and made their supplication and entered into an agreement to send him every nine years a tribute of seven youths and as many maidens. [2] And the most dramatic version of the story declares that these young men and women, on being brought to Crete, were destroyed by the Minotaur in the Labyrinth, or else wandered about at their own will and, being unable to find an exit, perished there; and that the Minotaur, as Euripides says, was

“A mingled form and hybrid birth of monstrous shape,”

and that

“Two different natures, man and bull, were joined in him.”

Chapter 16

Philochorus, however, says that the Cretans do not admit this, but declare that the Labyrinth was a dungeon, with no other inconvenience than that its prisoners could not escape; and that Minos instituted funeral games in honor of Androgeos, and as prizes for the victors, gave these Athenian youth, who were in the meantime imprisoned in the Labyrinth and that the victor in the first games was the man who had the greatest power at that time under Minos, and was his general, Taurus by name, who was not reasonable and gentle in his disposition, but treated the Athenian youth with arrogance and cruelty. [2] And Aristotle himself also, in his Constitution of Bottiaea, clearly does not think that these youths were put to death by Minos, but that they spent the rest of their lives as slaves in Crete. And he says that the Cretans once, in fulfillment of an ancient vow, sent an offering of their first-born to Delphi, and that some descendants of those Athenians were among the victims, and went forth with them; and that when they were unable to support themselves there, they first crossed over into Italy and dwelt in that country round about Iapygia, and from there journeyed again into Thrace and were called Bottiaeans; and that this was the reason why the maidens of Bottiaea, in performing a certain sacrifice, sing as an accompaniment ‘To Athens let us go!’

And verily it seems to be a grievous thing for a man to be at enmity with a city which has a language and a literature. [3] For Minos was always abused and reviled in the Attic theaters, and it did not avail him either that Hesiod2 called him ‘most royal,’ or that Homer3 styled him ‘a confidant of Zeus,’ but the tragic poets prevailed, and from platform and stage showered obloquy down upon him, as a man of cruelty and violence. And yet they say that Minos was a king and lawgiver, and that Rhadamanthus was a judge under him, and a guardian of the principles of justice defined by him.

Chapter 23

The ship on which Theseus sailed with the youths and returned in safety, the thirty-oared galley, was preserved by the Athenians down to the time of Demetrius Phalereus.1 They took away the old timbers from time to time, and put new and sound ones in their places, so that the vessel became a standing illustration for the philosophers in the mooted question of growth, some declaring that it remained the same, others that it was not the same vessel. [2]

It was Theseus who instituted also the Athenian festival of the Oschophoria. For it is said that he did not take away with him all the maidens on whom the lot fell at that time, but picked out two young men of his acquaintance who had fresh and girlish faces, but eager and manly spirits, and changed their outward appearance almost entirely by giving them warn baths and keeping them out of the sun, by arranging their hair, and by smoothing their skin and beautifying their complexions with unguents; he also taught them to imitate maidens as closely as possible in their speech, their dress, and their gait, and to leave no difference that could be observed, and then enrolled them among the maidens who were going to Crete, and was undiscovered by any. [3] And when he was come back, he himself and these two young men headed a procession, arrayed as those are now arrayed who carry the vine-branches. They carry these in honor of Dionysus and Ariadne, and because of their part in the story; or rather, because they came back home at the time of the vintage. And the women called Deipnophoroi, or supper-carriers, take part in the procession and share in the sacrifice, in imitation of the mothers of the young men and maidens on whom the lot fell, for these kept coming with bread and meat for their children. And tales are told at this festival, because these mothers, for the sake of comforting and encouraging their children, spun out tales for them. At any rate, these details are to be found in the history of Demon. Furthermore, a sacred precinct was also set apart for Theseus, and he ordered the members of the families which had furnished the tribute to the Minotaur to make contributions towards a sacrifice to himself. This sacrifice was superintended by the Phytalidae, and Theseus thus repaid them for their hospitality.

Chapter 24

After the death of Aegeus, Theseus conceived a wonderful design, and settled all the residents of Attica in one city, thus making one people of one city out of those who up to that time had been scattered about and were not easily called together for the common interests of all, nay, they sometimes actually quarrelled and fought with each other. [2] He visited them, then, and tried to win them over to his project township by township and clan by clan. The common folk and the poor quickly answered to his summons; to the powerful he promised government without a king and a democracy, in which he should only be commander in war and guardian of the laws, while in all else everyone should be on an equal footing. [3] Some he readily persuaded to this course, and others, fearing his power, which was already great, and his boldness, chose to be persuaded rather than forced to agree to it. Accordingly, after doing away with the townhalls and council-chambers and magistracies in the several communities, and after building a common town-hall and council-chamber for all on the ground where the upper town of the present day stands, he named the city Athens, and instituted a Panathenaic festival. [4] He instituted also the Metoecia, or Festival of Settlement, on the sixteenth day of the month Hecatombaeon, and this is still celebrated. Then, laying aside the royal power, as he had agreed, he proceeded to arrange the government, and that too with the sanction of the gods. For an oracle came to him from Delphi, in answer to his enquiries about the city, as follows:— [5]

“Theseus, offspring of Aegeus, son of the daughter of Pittheus,
Many indeed the cities to which my father has given
Bounds and future fates within your citadel’s confines.
Therefore be not dismayed, but with firm and confident spirit
Counsel only; the bladder will traverse the sea and its surges.”

And this oracle they say the Sibyl afterwards repeated to the city, when she cried:—”‘Bladder may be submerged; but its sinking will not be permitted.’”

Chapter 25

Desiring still further to enlarge the city, he invited all men thither on equal terms, and the phrase ‘Come hither all ye people,’ they say was a proclamation of Theseus when he established a people, as it were, of all sorts and conditions. However, he did not suffer his democracy to become disordered or confused from an indiscriminate multitude streaming into it, but was the first to separate the people into noblemen and husbandmen and handicraftsmen. [2] To the noblemen he committed the care of religious rites, the supply of magistrates, the teaching of the laws, and the interpretation of the will of Heaven, and for the rest of the citizens he established a balance of privilege, the noblemen being thought to excel in dignity, the husbandmen in usefulness, and the handicraftsmen in numbers. And that he was the first to show a leaning towards the multitude, as Aristotle says, and gave up his absolute rule, seems to be the testimony of Homer also, in the Catalogue of Ships,1 where he speaks of the Athenians alone as a ‘people.’ [3]…

Chapter 26

He also made a voyage into the Euxine Sea, as Philochorus and sundry others say, on a campaign with Heracles against the Amazons, and received Antiope as a reward of his valor; but the majority of writers, including Pherecydes, Hellanicus, and Herodorus, say that Theseus made this voyage on his own account, after the time of Heracles, and took the Amazon captive; and this is the more probable story. For it is not recorded that any one else among those who shared his expedition took an Amazon captive. [2] And Bion says that even this Amazon he took and carried off by means of a stratagem. The Amazons, he says, were naturally friendly to men, and did not fly from Theseus when he touched upon their coasts, but actually sent him presents, and he invited the one who brought them to come on board his ship; she came on board, and he put out to sea…

Chapter 27

Well, then, such were the grounds for the war of the Amazons, which seems to have been no trivial nor womanish enterprise for Theseus. For they would not have pitched their camp within the city, nor fought hand to hand battles in the neighborhood of the Pnyx and the Museum, had they not mastered the surrounding country and approached the city with impunity. [2] Whether, now, as Hellanicus writes, they came round by the Cimmerian Bosporus, which they crossed on the ice, may be doubted; but the fact that they encamped almost in the heart of the city is attested both by the names of the localities there and by the graves of those who fell in battle.

Chapter 29

There are, however, other stories also about marriages of Theseus which were neither honorable in their beginnings nor fortunate in their endings, but these have not been dramatized. For instance, he is said to have carried off Anaxo, a maiden of Troezen, and after slaying Sinis and Cercyon to have ravished their daughters; also to have married Periboea, the mother of Aias, and Phereboea afterwards, and Iope, the daughter of Iphicles; [2] and because of his passion for Aegle, the daughter of Panopeus, as I have already said,1 he is accused of the desertion of Ariadne, which was not honorable nor even decent; and finally, his rape of Helen is said to have filled Attica with war, and to have brought about at last his banishment and death, of which things I shall speak a little later. [3]

Of the many exploits performed in those days by the bravest men, Herodorus thinks that Theseus took part in none, except that he aided the Lapithae in their war with the Centaurs; but others say that he was not only with Jason at Colchis,2 but helped Meleager to slay the Calydonian boar, and that hence arose the proverb ‘Not without Theseus’; that he himself, however, without asking for any ally, performed many glorious exploits, and that the phrase ‘Lo! another Heracles’ became current with reference to him.

Chapter 30

The friendship of Peirithous and Theseus is said to have come about in the following manner. Theseus had a very great reputation for strength and bravery, and Peirithous was desirous of making test and proof of it. Accordingly, he drove Theseus’s cattle away from Marathon, and when he learned that their owner was pursuing him in arms, he did not fly, but turned back and met him. [2] When, however, each beheld the other with astonishment at his beauty and admiration of his daring, they refrained from battle, and Peirithous, stretching out his hand the first, bade Theseus himself be judge of his robbery, for he would willingly submit to any penalty which the other might assign. Then Theseus not only remitted his penalty, but invited him to be a friend and brother in arms; whereupon they ratified their friendship with oaths. [3]

After this, when Peirithous was about to marry Deidameia, he asked Theseus to come to the wedding, and see the country, and become acquainted with the Lapithae. Now he had invited the Centaurs also to the wedding feast. And when these were flown with insolence and wine, and laid hands upon the women, the Lapithae took vengeance upon them. Some of them they slew upon the spot, the rest they afterwards overcame in war and expelled from the country, Theseus fighting with them at the banquet and in the war.

Chapter 35

But when he desired to rule again as before, and to direct the state, he became involved in factions and disturbances; he found that those who hated him when he went away, had now added to their hatred contempt, and he saw that a large part of the people were corrupted, and wished to be cajoled into service instead of doing silently what they were told to do. [3] Attempting, then, to force his wishes upon them, he was overpowered by demagogues and factions, and finally, despairing of his cause, he sent his children away privately into Euboea, to Elephenor, the son of Chalcodon, while he himself, after invoking curses upon the Athenians at Gargettus, where there is to this day the place called Araterion,1 sailed away to the island of Scyros, where the people were friendly to him, as he thought, and where he had ancestral estates.

Euripides’ Heracles (1160-1339) (Trans. George Theodoridis, 2012)

In this play, which was first performed in 416 BCE, Heracles has returned to Thebes after completing his famous twelve labours to find his wife, father, and children under attack from King Creon of Thebes.  After Heracles defeats Creon, Hera sends her servants Iris and Lyssa (Madness) to drive him insane.  In his insanity, Heracles proceeds to kill his wife and children.  He then regains his sanity and is horrified to see what he has done.  It is then that Theseus arrives in Thebes:

Theseus
I have come, and others with me, young warriors from the land of Athens, encamped by the streams of Asopus, [1165] to bring an allied army to your son, old friend. For a rumour reached the city of the Erechtheidae, that Lycus had usurped the scepter of this land and had become your enemy even to battle. Wherefore I came making recompense for the former kindness of Heracles [1170] in saving me from the world below, if you have any need of such aid as I or my allies can give, old man.

Ha! why this heap of dead upon the floor? Surely I have not delayed too long and come too late to check new ills? Who slew these children? [1175] whose wife is this I see? Boys do not go to battle; no, it must be some other strange mischance I here discover.

In the following lines, Amphitryon makes sung responses to Theseus’ spoken questions.

Amphitryon
O king, whose home is that olive-clad hill!

Theseus
Why this piteous prelude in addressing me?

Amphitryon
[1180] The gods have afflicted us with grievous suffering.

Theseus
Whose are these children, over whom you weep?

Amphitryon
My own son’s children, woe to him! he was their father and butcher both, hardening his heart to the bloody deed.

Theseus
Hush! good words only!

Amphitryon
[1185] I would I could obey!

Theseus
What dreadful words!

Amphitryon
Fortune has spread her wings, and we are ruined, ruined.

Theseus
What do you mean? what has he done?

Amphitryon
Slain them in a wild fit of frenzy [1190] with arrows dipped in the venom of the hundred-headed hydra.

Theseus
This is Hera’s work; but who lies there among the dead, old man?

Amphitryon
My son, my own enduring son, that marched with gods to Phlegra’s plain, there to battle with giants and slay them, warrior that he was.

Theseus
[1195] Ah, ah! whose fortune was ever so cursed as his?

Amphitryon
Never will you find another mortal that has suffered more or been driven harder.

Theseus
Why does he veil his head, poor wretch, in his robe?

Amphitryon
He is ashamed to meet your eye; [1200] his kinsman’s kind intent and his children’s blood make him abashed.

Theseus
But I come to sympathize; uncover him.

Amphitryon
My son, remove that mantle [1205] from your eyes, throw it from you, show your face to the sun. As a counterweight, fighting along with my tears, I entreat you as a suppliant, as I grasp your beard, your knees, your hands, and let fall [1210] the tear from my old eyes. O my child! restrain your savage lion-like temper, for you are rushing forth on an unholy course of bloodshed, eager to join woe to woe, child.

Theseus
Enough! To you I call who are huddled there in your misery, [1215] show to your friends your face; for no darkness is black enough to hide your sad mischance. Why do you wave your hand at me, signifying murder? is it that I may not be polluted by speaking with you? [1220] If I share your misfortune, what is that to me? For once I had good fortune with you. I must refer to the time when you brought me safe from the dead to the light of life. I hate a friend whose gratitude grows old; one who is ready to enjoy his friends’ prosperity [1225] but unwilling to sail in the same ship with them when they are unfortunate. Arise, unveil your head, poor wretch! and look on me. The gallant soul endures such blows as heaven deals and does not refuse them.

Heracles
O Theseus, did you see this struggle with my children?

Theseus
[1230] I heard of it, and now I see the horrors you mean.

Heracles
Why then have you unveiled my head to the sun?

Theseus
Why have I? you, a mortal, can not pollute what is of the gods.

Heracles
Try to escape, luckless wretch, from my unholy taint.

Theseus
The avenging fiend does not go forth from friend to friend.

Heracles
[1235] For this I thank you; I do not regret the service I did you.

Theseus
While I, for kindness then received, now show my pity for you.

Heracles
Ah yes! I am piteous, a murderer of my sons.

Theseus
I weep for you in your changed fortunes.

Heracles
Did you ever find another more afflicted?

Theseus
[1240] Your misfortunes reach from earth to heaven.

Heracles
Therefore I am resolved on death.

Theseus
Do you suppose the gods attend to your threats?

Heracles
The god has been remorseless to me; so I will be the same to the gods.

Theseus
Hush! lest your presumption add to your sufferings.

Heracles
[1245] My ship is freighted full with sorrow; there is no room to stow anything further.

Theseus
What will you do? Where is your fury drifting you?

Heracles
I will die and return to that world below from which I have just come.

Theseus
Such language is fit for any common fellow.

Heracles
Ah! yours is the advice of one outside sorrow.

Theseus
[1250] Are these indeed the words of Heracles, the much-enduring?

Heracles
Though never so much as this. Endurance must have a limit.

Theseus
Is this the benefactor and great friend to mortals?

Heracles
Mortals bring no help to me; no! Hera has her way.

Theseus
Never would Hellas allow you to die through sheer perversity.

Heracles
[1255] Hear me a moment, that I may enter the contest with words in answer to your admonitions; and I will unfold to you why life now as well as formerly has been unbearable to me. First I am the son of a man who incurred the guilt of blood, before he married my mother Alcmena, [1260] by slaying her aged father. Now when the foundation is badly laid at birth, it is necessary for the race to be cursed with woe; and Zeus, whoever this Zeus may be, begot me as an enemy to Hera; yet do not be vexed, old man; [1265] for you rather than Zeus I regard as my father. Then while I was being suckled, that bedfellow of Zeus foisted into my cradle fearsome snakes to cause my death. After I took on a cloak of youthful flesh, [1270] of all the toils I then endured what need to tell? what did I not destroy, whether lions, or triple-bodied Typhons, or giants or the battle against the hosts of four-legged Centaurs? or how when I had killed the hydra, [1275] that monster with a ring of heads with power to grow again, I passed through a herd of countless other toils besides and came to the dead to fetch to the light at the bidding of Eurystheus the three-headed hound, hell’s porter. Last, ah, woe is me! I have dared this labor, [1280] to crown the sorrows of my house with my children’s murder. I have come to this point of necessity; no longer may I dwell in Thebes, the city that I love; for suppose I stay, to what temple or gathering of friends shall I go? For mine is no curse that invites greetings. [1285] Shall I go to Argos? how can I, when I am an exile from my country? Well, is there a single other city I can rush to? Am I then to be looked at askance as a marked man, held by cruel stabbing tongues: “Is not this the son of Zeus that once murdered children [1290] and wife? Plague take him from the land!” Now to one who was once called happy, such changes are a grievous thing; though he who is always unfortunate feels no such pain, for sorrow is his birthright.

This, I think, is the piteous pass I shall one day come to; [1295] for earth will cry out forbidding me to touch her, the sea and the river-springs will refuse me a crossing, and I shall become like Ixion who revolves in chains upon that wheel. And so this is best, that I should be seen by no one of the Hellenes, [1300] among whom in happier days I lived in bliss. What right have I to live? what profit can I have in the possession of a useless, impious life? So let that noble wife of Zeus dance, beating her foot in its shoe; [1305] for now has she worked her heart’s desire in utterly confounding the first of Hellas‘ sons. Who would pray to such a goddess? Her jealousy of Zeus for his love of a woman has destroyed [1310] the benefactors of Hellas, guiltless though they were.

Chorus Leader
This is the work of none other of the gods than the wife of Zeus; you are right in that surmise.

Theseus
I cannot counsel you . . . rather than to go on suffering. There is not a man alive that has wholly escaped misfortune’s taint, [1315] nor any god either, if what poets sing is true. Have they not intermarried in ways that law forbids? Have they not thrown fathers into ignominious chains to gain the sovereign power? Still they inhabit Olympus and brave the issue of their crimes. [1320] And yet what shall you say in your defence, if you, a child of man, take your fate excessively hard, while they, as gods, do not? No, then, leave Thebes in compliance with the law, and come with me to the city of Pallas. There, when I have purified you of your pollution, [1325] I will give you homes and the half of all I have. Yes, I will give you all those presents I received from the citizens for saving their fourteen children, when I slew the bull of Crete; for I have plots of land assigned me throughout the country; these shall henceforth [1330] be called after you by men, while you live; and at your death, when you have gone to Hades’ halls, the whole city of Athens shall exalt your honor with sacrifices and a monument of stone. For it is a noble crown of a good reputation [1335] for citizens to win from Hellas (Greece), by helping a man of worth. This is the return that I will make you for saving me, for now you are in need of friends. But when the gods honor a man, he has no need of friends; for the god’s aid, when he chooses to give it, is enough.