Aeschylus
- The first great tragic poet of Greece, the originator of the Greek drama, Hor. A. P. 278; Cic. Tusc. 2, 10.—
- II A rhetorician of Cnidos, a contemporary of Cicero, Cic. Brut. 95.
- 1. tragediedichter in Athene (525—456 v. Chr.); — adj. Aeschylēus, a, um;
- 2. redenaar uit Cnidus ttv. Cicero.
(Αἰσχύλος). The son of Euphorion, born in the Attic deme of Eleusis in the year B.C. 525. The period of his youth and early manhood coincides with the great national struggle which both Asiatic and European Hellas were forced to wage against the barbarians in the first twenty years of the fifth century. In this conflict he played the part of a brave soldier at the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Plataea, and his works abound in traces of the warlike and patriotic feeling of those stirring days. His brother Cynegirus met an heroic death at Marathon, and another distinguished soldier of Salamis, Aminias, is said to have been of the same family, but this is probably an error. We know little of the youth and education of Aeschylus, but it is certain that he began his career as a tragic poet before the age of thirty years, though his first victory was not gained till 485. About the year 470 he went to Sicily at the invitation of King Hieroof Syracuse. Here he composed his Aetnaean Women (Αἰτναῖαι), in honour of the newly founded city of Aetna. His departure from Athens has been ascribed to an indictment by the Athenians for profanation of the mysteries. But it was the policy of Hiero to attract literary men to his brilliant court, and the presence of Aeschylus there needs no more explanation than that of Simonides and Pindar during the same period. Later in his life he visited Sicily a second time, where he met his death in 456. Among the many mythical details with which tradition has surrounded the life of Aeschylus, it is said that he was killed by an eagle letting fall a tortoise upon his bald head, supposing it to be a stone. The high honour in which he was held by the Athenians after his death is shown by the fact that in later times it was made lawful to reproduce his plays in competition for the prize against new tragedies.
Aeschylus is said to have produced seventy-two, or even ninety dramas, and to have gained the first prize thirteen times. As each poet competed with four plays (three tragedies and a satyric drama), it appears that Aeschylus was successful in more than half of all his contests. Only seven of his tragedies have come down to us. They will be described in what seems to have beén their chronological order.
(1) The Suppliants (Ἱκέτιδες) takes its name from the chorus representing the fifty daughters of Danaüs fleeing to Argos for protection from the sons of Aegyptus. The prominence of the chorus, the small number of characters, and the absence of a prologue mark this play as the earliest of those of Aeschylus which we have, and consequently the oldest Greek drama extant. Its undeniable merits are much obscured by the very corrupt state of the text.
(2) The Persians (Πέρσαι) is unique among the Greek tragedies which we possess in drawing its theme from history rather than from myth. The central point of interest is found in a splendid narrative of the battle of Salamis, but by an artifice of the poet the scene of the play is laid in Susa, and the laments of Atossa and the Persian nobles supply the tragic elements. The Persians was produced in B.C. 472, as part of a tetralogy consisting of the Phineus, Persians, Glaucus ποτνιεύς, and Prometheus the Fire-kindler (πυρκαεύς).
(3) The Seven against Thebes (Ἑπτὰ ἐπὶ Θήβας) was produced in B.C. 467, as the third play in a tetralogy of which the remaining pieces were the Laïus, Oedipus, and the satyric drama called The Sphinx. It includes a magnificent description of the seven Argive champions and their Theban opponents, with the final victory of Thebes, and a hint, at the close, of the Antigoné-motive, afterwards so finely worked out by Sophocles. In this play, as in the Persians, the martial spirit of Aeschylus finds ample room for manifestation. Both dramas are “full of war,” to quote the words of Aristophanes (Frogs, 1021).
(4) The Prometheus Bound (Προμηθεὺς δεσμώτης), with its companion pieces the Prometheus Loosed (λυόμενος) and the Prometheus the Fire-bearer (πυρφόρος), treated the history of the rebellious Titan who steadfastly suffered the wrath of Zeus for his benefactions to mankind. The Prometheus Bound, the only play of the trilogy which has come down to us, depicts the hero, fettered to a rock in Scythia, and threatened by Hermes with a penalty still more severe. But he proudly refuses to submit to the will of the new ruler of Olympus, and at the close of the play he is struck by the thunderbolt, and, with the rock to which he is fastened, sinks out of sight. The second play described the final reconciliation and the liberation of Prometheus; while the third (see Westphal's Proleg. to Aeschylus, p. 207 foll.) probably celebrated the establishment of Prometheus in Attica as a benignant deity. No Greek tragedy has been more admired than the Prometheus Bound. In the grandeur of its action and the sublimity of character displayed, as well as in the exquisite pathos of some of its scenes, it stands almost unequalled. The Prometheus trilogy was probably produced either in B.C. 468 or 466 (Christ), or about ten years earlier (Wecklein).
(5) The trilogy composed of the Agamemnon (Ἀγαμέμνων), Choephori (Χοηφόροι), and Eumenides (Εὐμενίδες), comes last in the list, and is of special interest from the fact that it is the only complete trilogy which is extant from any of the Greek tragedians. In the Agamemnon the poet describes the return of the victorious king from Troy, and his murder by Clytaemnestra and her paramour Aegisthus. In the Choephori, Orestes, son of Agamemnon, now grown to manhood, returns, and with the help of his friend Pylades avenges the murder of his father by putting to death the guilty pair, and is himself, in turn, driven frantic by the Erinyes. In the Eumenides he flees to Athens, where he is tried, and by the advocacy of Apollo and the casting vote of Athené he is acquitted, and the family curse comes to an end. This great trilogy shows the genius of Aeschylus in its loftiest form. Each play is complete in itself, and yet each is but a single act in the mighty drama of crime, vengeance, and expiation. The Agamemnon is the most powerful of the three plays, and probably the greatest work of Aeschylus, if indeed it is not the most impressive tragedy in existence. The trilogy is usually known as the Oresteia (Ὀρέστεια), and, with the satyric play Proteus (Πρωτεύς), was produced in B.C. 458.
The extant works of Aeschylus show a constant progress in dramatic art. He is said to have added a second actor to the one employed by his predecessors, and in his later plays he adopts, and uses with full mastery, the third actor first introduced by his younger rival, Sophocles. The choral parts, at first the most prominent feature both in extent and importance, gradually give way before the growth of the dialogue. In the scenic effects, too, Aeschylus made many improvements, using extraordinary means to excite wonder or awe. Like Wagner, he was both poet and musician, and, besides training his own choruses, he is said to have taken part as actor in the performances themselves.
The most characteristic feature of his poetry is its grandeur, both of thought and style, though he is none the less master of lyric beauty and tender pathos. His theology is stern and lofty, and pervaded by the idea of a destiny which controls all things, human and divine. But the hereditary curse that brooded over the families of Labdacus and Pelops was always aided in its destrnctive work by the folly and wickedness of the victims themselves. No poet, in fact, has stated more impressively than Aeschylus the inevitable connection between guilt and punishment. His style, it must be confessed, is sometimes so elevated as to seem almost bombastic, but this apparent fault is the natural result of the poet's mighty current of thought, which could not find vent in the ordinary channels of expression.
All the existing MSS. of Aeschylus are said by W. Dindorf to be derived from the Codex Mediceus (Laurentianus), which dates back to the eleventh century, and contains many valuable scholia taken from the ancient grammarians. It is the chief authority for the Choephori, of which, however, the text is in a bad condition. The Prometheus, Seven against Thebes, and Persians are more fully represented by MSS. than the other plays. Two codices of the fourteenth century (Florentinus and Farnesianus) supply that portion of the Agamemnon (lines 295- 1026) which is missing from the Codex Mediceus.
The Aldine editio princeps (1518) and the edition of Stanley (London, 1663) are worthy of note among the older editions. To these may be added among later works the editions of Hermann (Leipzig, 1852), Kirchhoff (Berlin, 1880), Weil (Leipzig, 1885), and the valuable critical edition of Wecklein-Vitelli (Berlin, 1885). Paley's (London, 1879) is the most convenient English edition of all the plays with notes. Annotated editions of single plays are numerous. Among the more recent are Wecklein's Oresteia (Leipzig, 1888), Schneidewin-Heuse's Agamemnon (Berlin, 1883), Allen's Wecklein's Prometheus (Boston, 1891), Teuffel-Wecklein's Persians (Leipzig, 1886), Tucker's Suppliants (London, 1889), and Flagg's Seven against Thebes (Boston, 1886). Dindorf's Lexicon Aeschyleum (Leipzig, 1873) is an indispensable work to the student. The best complete English translation is that of Plumptre; but for the Agamemnon and the Prometheus we are fortunate in having versions of great excellence by Robert Browning and Mrs. Browning respectively.
- Paus. 4.5.10
- Paus. 6.3.1
- Paus. 6.1.3
Birth of Aeschylus at Eleusis in Attica c. 525/524
Death of Aeschylus at Gela in Sicily c. 456/455
No reliable contemporary source provides us with any detailed information about the life of Aeschylus, but later sources allow us to piece together an outline. The Parian Marbleinforms us that Aeschylus was thirty-five years old at the battle of Marathon. A bit later, the same source asserts that Aeschylus died at the city of Gela in Sicily in 456/55 and informs us that he was sixty-nine years old at the time. This would place his birth at 525/4.
Later sources (the Life of Aeschylusand a scholarly commentary on Aristoph. Frogs 886ff.) identify Aeschylus’ place of birth as Eleusis, the most famous center for the cult of Demeter in Greece. Aristophanes alludes to this birthplace at Aristoph. Frogs 886-7when he has Aeschylus call upon Demeter who nurtured his spirit. Aristotle comments that one can let slip “things which are impious to tell” (ἀπόρρητα) “just as Aeschylus and the mysteries,” by which he surely means the mysteries of Eleusis. Revealing these secrets to the uninitiated was a capital offence, and later ancient scholarship reported elaborate tales of the author's unintentional impiety (he accidentally revealed too much about the mysteries in one of his plays) and its consequences. According to one version, Aeschylus was almost murdered on stage.
CareerAeschylus produces his first play 500/499-497/496
Aeschylus’ first victory 484
The Sudaarticle on another tragic poet, Pratinas, tells us that Pratinas competed with Aeschylus in the first years of the fifth century. The Parian Marble, a chronology of the ancient world preserved on a third century BC inscription, tells us that Aeschylus won his first victory in the same year that Euripides was born, 485/4. Since we know that tragedies were performed in the early spring, we know that Aeschylus’ victory took place in 484 rather than in the second half of 485.
Number of victories by Aeschylus: 13
Number of plays composed by Aeschylus: ??
The Vita (section 13) reports thirteen victories, the Suda's article on Aeschylus twenty eight. Most scholars assume that the Suda's article would include victories outside the City Dionysia, the main festival at which tragedies are performed. The lower figure would account for fifty two plays (since each victory reflects the fate of an entire tetralogy).
contacts with SicilyDuring Aeschylus’ lifetime, Sicily was home to some of the richest and most powerful Greek states. Later tradition records at least two different periods during which Aeschylus visited Sicily.
Aeschylus produces the Women of Aitnain Sicily 476/475
Aeschylus produces a performance of the Persiansat Syracuse: 472/1-456/5
In 476/475, Hieron, the tyrant of Syracuse and the most powerful single man in the Greek world, founded the city of Aitna. According to the Vita, Aeschylus composed the play Women of Aitna, “presenting it as a favorable omen for the fortunate life of those who were founding the city” (Vita Aeschyli 9 : οἰωνιζόμενος βίον ἀγαθὸν τοῖς συνοικίζουσι τὴν πόλιν). The Vita Aeschyli18simply observes that Aeschylus, being highly esteemed by Hieron, put on a successful performance of the Persiansin Sicily. Since the Persianswas performed for the first time in 472, we know that this visit must be separate from the time in which he put on the earlier Women of Aitna.
The Parian Marbleinforms us that Aeschylus died at Gela, but we cannot be certain that he did not die during the same trip in which he staged the Persians. The Vita is especially problematic and contains many problems, but, whatever the chronology, Aeschylus probably had extensive dealings with the great men who held power in Sicily.
importance and Influence of AeschylusThe Vita Aeschylioffers a survey of Aeschylus’ contribution to tragedy. This type of judgment seems to be derived directly from the texts preserved in antiquity and is not as unreliable as the often fanciful reconstructions of Aeschylus’ life. Aeschylus, we are told (Vita Aeschyli 14), was “the first to make tragedy more grand by means of nobler emotions. He decked out the stage and stunned his audience with brilliant visual effects, with paintings and machines, with stage props such as altars and tombs, with trumpets, ghosts, and Furies.” He created for his actors costumes that were both elaborate and exotic, and contributed to the overall impression of grandeur. “Whoever thinks,” the Vita continues a bit later (Vita Aeschyli 16), “that Sophocles was the more effective composer of tragedy, thinks correctly, but let him consider how much more difficult it was in the time of Thespis, Phrynichos, and Choirilos (earlier tragedians whose work is now lost] to bring tragedy up to such a level of greatness than it was for one entering the scene at the time of Aeschylus to bring it to the perfection of a Sophocles.” The Athenians produced something called tragoidiain the generation before Aeschylus, but it was Aeschylus who largely seems to have created “tragedy” in the sense in which we now understand it.
Aeschylean tragedy is, above all, grand, massive and dignified. The language is heavy and, in the Greek, often difficult to understand, full of compound forms and complex metaphors. In the Frogsof Aristophanes (performed in 405), Dionysus, the patron god of tragedy, resolves to enter the Underworld and bring back with him the playwright Euripides, who had died in 407/6. Once Dionysus reaches the Underworld, however, the play turns into a contest between the recently deceased Euripides and Aeschylus, who had been dead for a half century. The elaborate confrontation between the two playwrights remains one of the best analyses of their styles and vividly portrays the way in which fifth-century Athenians viewed them. Aeschylus is parodied as pompous and incomprehensible, but the parody is affectionate and emphasizes as well the power of his language. In the end, Dionysus brings back with him not Euripides (as he had originally intended) but Aeschylus. Aeschylus held a firm grip on his fellow Athenians throughout the fifth century, and Aristophanes, Frogsillustrates the strength of this hold.
Only new tragedies were normally allowed at the tragic festival, but a special exception seems to have been made so that Aeschylus’ work could be revived after his death. According to several late sources, the Athenian people decreed shortly after Aeschylus’ death that his plays could be staged again, and Aeschylus’ work thus continued to win victories even after his death. In the opening of Aristophanes, Acharnians (produced in 425, more than thirty years after Aeschylus had died) the speaker describes how he had breathlessly anticipated a new performance of Aeschylus (Aristoph. Ach. 9-11). In the Clouds (first performed in 423, though our version is a revision from 418/17), an archetypal Athenian man of the older generation asks his son to recite for him poetry of Aeschylus (Aristoph. Cl. 1364). A change of taste against Aeschylus seems to have set in among younger Athenians. The son refuses and ridicules Aeschylus as pompous and old-fashioned. It is clear from Aristoph. Frogsthat Athenians associated the poetic and theatrical magnificence of Aeschylus with the unprecedented wealth and material power which they acquired during the course of the fifth century. When the empire fell and Athens assumed a diminished position, Euripides surpassed Aeschylus in popularity.
Surviving WorksProduction of Persians472
Production of Seven Against Thebesby the young Perikles 468
Production of Suppliant Women463?
Production of Oresteia Trilogy (Agamemnon, Libation Bearers, Eumenides) 458
Production of [Prometheus Bound]450-425
The fragmentary remains of ancient records fortunately link five of Aeschylus’ plays to three separate dates. The Persianswas performed in 472, and we even learn that the Athenian Perikles was the choregos,the wealthy Athenian who underwrote the cost of the production. At that point only in his early twenties, Perikles would a decade later become the most powerful man in Athens and would lead it during its period of greatest material prosperity. Perikles must have seen the production of the highly patriotic Persians, just eight years after the events which it describes, as a powerful device by which to bring his name before the Athenian people. The Seven Against Thebeswas part of the tetralogy which was victorious in 468, while the Oresteia trilogy (Agamemnon, Libation Bearers, Eumenides) was performed ten years later, in 458.
Of the remaining two surviving tragedies traditionally associated with Aeschylus, the date of one is moderately controversial, while the other is extremely problematic. The Suppliant Womenused to be dated very early in the playwright's career, perhaps as early as the 490s. The reasons for this were stylistic: the chorus dominates the play, there is substantial choral lyric and relatively little action. The play had generally impressed readers as stiff and archaic, and this suggested to most scholars that the play derived from a time when tragedy was still at an early stage of development.
In 1952, a scrap of papyrus, preserved in the dry climate of Egypt, was published, and this fragment showed that the trilogy of which Suppliant Womenis a part was performed at the same time as a play by Sophocles. Since Sophocles’ first performance (and victory) both took place in the year 468 and since the Seven Against Thebeswas victorious in 467, the Suppliant Womenmust be dated to one of the years between 467 and 458, when the Oresteia was produced shortly before his death. The fragmentary papyrus contains letters which may designate the name of the man who was archon at Athens in 463, and thus 463 is a good tentative date for the play.
More complex problems surround the Prometheus Bound. Recent scholarship has strongly suggested that Aeschylus did not even compose the Prometheus Bound. The basis for this conclusion is an exhaustive analysis of stylistic features which repeatedly portray the Prometheus as different from the six other plays still assigned to Aeschylus. Once the play is no longer securely associated with Aeschylus, it becomes dislodged from its chronological moorings. Mark Griffith, the scholar who has done the most work on the authorship of this play, believes that it was probably composed well after Aeschylus’ death. The play could conceivably have been produced at any time between 479 and 415, but the third quarter of the fifth century (450-425) seems to be the most likely time for its composition.
On the life of Aeschylus, see [Lefkowitz, 1981] 67-74, [Rosenmeyer, 1982] 369-376, [Lesky, 1966] 241-271, [Easterling, 1985] 281-295, 761-764. [Radt, 1985] 29-108 presents an exhaustive list of sources on the life of Aeschylus, but without translation.
Conacher, D. J. Aeschylus' Oresteia: A Literary Commentary. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1987. ix+229. Conacher, D. J. Aeschylus' Prometheus bound: a Literary Commentary. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1980. xii+198. Gagarin, Michael. Aeschylean Drama. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976. xi+230. Goldhill, Simon. Language, Sexuality, Narrative, the Oresteia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. ix+315. Griffith, Mark. The Authenticity of Prometheus Bound. Cambridge Classical Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977. xii+419. Herington, C. J. Aeschylus. Hermes Books. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986. ix+191. Kossatz-Deissmann, Anneliese. Dramen des Aischylos auf westgriechischen Vasen. Schriften zur antiken Mythologie. Mainz am Rhein: von Zabern, 1978. 4: xv+178. Lebeck, A. The Oresteia: a Study in Language and Structure. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971. xx+222. Lesky, Albin. A History of Greek Literature. New York: Crowell, 1966. xviii+921. Michelini, Ann M. Tradition and Dramatic form in the Persians of Aeschylus. Cincinnati Classical Studies. Leiden: Brill, 1982. 4: x+162. Prag, A. J. N. W. The Oresteia: Iconographic and Narrative Tradition. Chicago: Bolchazy Carducci, 1985. xi+213. Radt, Stefan. Aeschylus. Tragicorum Graecorum Fragmenta. Ed. Bruno Snell. Goettingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1985. Rosenmeyer, Thomas G. The Art of Aeschylus. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1982. 393. Scott, William C. Musical Design in Aeschylean Theater. Hanover, N. H.: University Press of New England, 1984. xxi+228. Smith, Peter M. On the Hymn to Zeus in Aeschylus' Agamemnon. American Classical Studies. Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1980. 5: xiii+91. Spatz, Lois. Aeschylus. Twayne World Authors Series. Boston: Twayne, 1982. 675: 207. Taplin, Oliver. The Stagecraft of Aeschylus. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977. vi+508. Thalman, William G. Dramatic Art in Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes. Yale Classical Monographs. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978. 1: viii+193. Vellacott, Philip. The Logic of Tragedy. Durham, N. C.: Duke University Press, 1984. ix+190. Winnington-Ingram, R. P. Studies in Aeschylus. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. xiii+225. Zeitlin, Froma I. "The Dynamics of Misogyny: Myth and Myth-making in the Oresteia." Arethusa11 (1978): 149-184. Zeitlin, Froma I. Under the Sign of the Shield: Semiotics and Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes. Filologia e Critica. Roma: Edizioni dell' Ateneo, 1982. 44: 227. Gregory Crane- Paus. 2.24.4, Paus. 8.37.6
- bidden by Dionysus to write tragedy: Paus. 1.21.2
- fought at Marathon, Artemisium and Salamis: Paus. 1.14.5
- at court of Hiero: Paus. 1.2.3
- writes satyric dramas: Paus. 2.13.6
- reference to one of his plays: Hdt. 2.156
- his play about Glaucus: Paus. 9.22.7, Paus. 10.4.7
- the Seven against Thebes: Paus. 2.20.5
- the first to represent Furies with snakes in their hair: Paus. 1.28.6
- applies name of Zeus to sea-god: Paus. 2.24.4
- calls Inachus an Argive river: Paus. 8.6.6
- makes Artemis a daughter of Demeter: Paus. 8.37.6
- his statue in theater at Athens: Paus. 1.21.2