P. 51, 1. 915, A wife and happy.--The last we heard of Electra was
that she lived "unmated and alone" (1. 562, p. 31). But that was
said when Pylades was regarded as practically a dead man. Electra
was apparently betrothed to Pylades, but was not actually his
wife.--There is no mention of the Peasant husband of the Electra.
P. 52, 1. 818.--Anaxibia (?), sister of Agamemnon, was wife to
Strophios. See genealogical table.
P. 53, 11. 930 ff., That frenzy on the shore!--It is only now that
Iphigenia fully realises her brother's madness. His narrative
immediately following makes her feel it the more, and it is
evidently in her mind while she speaks 11. 989 ff.
P. 54 f., 11. 940 ff., Orestes' Trial at Athens.--According to one
legend Orestes was finally purified of his guilt by a trial at the
Areopagus, in which Apollo championed him, and Athena, as
President, gave a casting vote for mercy. (This is the story of
Aeschylus' Eumenides.) By another, he was healed when he had
brought this Image of Artemis to Attica. Euripides combines the
two.--It must often have happened in a blood-feud that some of the
kindred of the slain man would accept the result of a trial and
obey the law, while some cared for no law but clung to their
vengeance. Euripides makes the Furies do the same. Some accept the
judgment and stay as "Eumenides" in Athens; others know no law nor
mercy.
P. 55, 11. 949-960, Mine evil days are made a rite among them.--At
the Feast of the Anthesteria, each family summoned its ghosts from
the grave and after the feast sent them back again. While they
were about, it was very important that each man should keep his
ghosts to himself: there must be no infection of strange or
baleful ghosts. Hence a rite in which each man ate and drank his
own portion, holding no communication with his neighbour. The
story then went that this was done in commemoration of Orestes'
visit to Athens with the stain of blood upon him. (See Miss
Harrison's Prolegomena, chap, ii.) There was a similar feast in
Aegina.
P. 56, 11. 990-1006.--Iphigenia's speech. We must realise that
Iphigenia has been suddenly confronted by a new and complicated
difficulty. She was prepared to make some plot to save her
brother's life. She now realises that he is on the verge of
madness; that he is determined to commit an act of what will be
considered desperate sacrilege by stealing the image of Artemis;
and that he expects her to help him to get the image to his ship.
--She might hope to send him away safe and be forgiven by the King:
if she helps him to steal the image, she cannot possibly be
forgiven. Again, she might very possibly fly with him secretly, if
she went alone; but to steal the statue and fly seems impossible.
Confronted with this problem, she deliberately abandons both her
thoughts of vengeance and her hope of escape, and agrees to give
her life for Orestes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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