The Eumenides

 
 
 

The Plot

The plot of the third play, the Eumenides, the word means “the Kindly Ones” (a euphemistic name of the Furies), is as follows. Outside the shrine at Delphi, the Pythian priestess utters a prayer to all of the deities connected with the spot, after which she enters the sanctuary. Almost instantly she returns in horror, and tells how she has seen a blood-stained man seated upon the Omphalos and round him a band of sleeping females, horrible to look upon. She departs. Apollo brings forth Orestes. The god encourages the young hero, and then sends him forth (led by the god Hermes) on his wanderings. When the two have disappeared, the ghost of Clytemnestra rises and awakens the sleeping Furies. They burst forth from the temple in a frenzy to pursue their victim.  ApolIo, with words of contemptuous hatred, bids them begone. The Furies reply by indicting Apollo himself for his complicity in the murder of Cyltemnestra. Apollo asks why they torture Orestes for matricide, but did not punish Clytemnestra similarly. They reply that the latter is not a crime against one’s flesh and blood.

APOLLO:  What about a wife who kills her husband?

LEADER:  That's not blood murder in the family.

APOLLO: What?
      What about Zeus and his queen Hera—
      your actions bring disgrace on them.
      You ignore the strongest bonds between them.
      Your claim dishonors Aphrodite, too,
      goddess of love, from whom all men derive

      their greatest joys. With man and woman
      a marriage sealed by fate is stronger
      than any oath, and justice guards it.
      Now, if one partner kills the other one,
      and you're not interested in punishment,
      if you feel no urge to act, then I say
      the way you chase Orestes is unjust.
      I don't see why in one case you're so harsh
      when you don't really care about the other.


The scene now changes, quite abruptly, to Athens, where Orestes throws himself upon the protection of the goddess Athena, whose statue he clasps. The chorus of Furies enter in pursuit; they discover Orestes and describe the horrible doom that he must suffer. He defies them and calls upon the absent Athena. But they circle about him chanting their fearful “binding-song “ — the statement of their duty and their rights as the unforgiving avengers of bloodshed and every other sin. Athena enters the temple and listens to a summary of the dispute. The Furies insist that for matricide there can be no pardon. Orestes declares that he has been purified by Apollo who had urged him to action in the first place. The goddess determines that the suit should be tried by a court of Athenians. The Furies sing of the danger to righteousness and order that must result without their punishment: “terror has a rightful place and must sit for ever watching over the soul.”

Athena assembles the Court of the Areopagus to hear the case. She, herself will preside as judge. Athenian citizens (generally thought to be twelve in number) will act as jury. Before the court are Orestes, the Furies and Apollo. Behind them are a great number of Athenian citizens. The trial opens with a cross examination of Orestes by the Furies. Apollo next takes the stand and gives three reasons in order to justify the matricide.

  1. 1.It was commanded by Zeus.

  2. 2.Agamemnon was a great king.

  3. 3.The real parent of a child is the father, the mother being only the bearer and nurse.

  1. I'll speak to that, as well. Make sure you note
    how right my answer is. That word mother—
    we give it to the one who bears the child.
    However, she's no parent, just a nurse
    to that new life embedded in her.

  2. The parent is the one who plants the seed,
    the father. Like a stranger for a stranger,
    she preserves the growing life, unless
    god injures it. And I can offer proof
    for what I say—a man can have a child
    without a mother. Here's our witness,
    here—Athena, child of Olympian Zeus.

  3. [Apollo points to Athena]

  4. No dark womb nursed her—no goddess bears
    a child with ancestry like hers. Athena,
    since I know so many other things,
    I'll make your city and your people great.
    That's why I sent this man a suppliant
    to your own shrine, so he might prove himself,
    then place eternal trust in you, dear goddess,
    and you could win a new ally in him,
    in his descendants, too, and thus create
    an everlasting bond with his posterity.


Apollo ends his deposition by stating that, if acquitted, Orestes will be a true and useful ally to Athens. Athena declares the pleading at an end, but before the jury votes, she delivers a speech to the jury. Athena announces that she has founded the Court of the Areopagus to be a permanent institution, its function to protect the city of Athens by prosecuting crimes. Athena further declares that should the jury be tied, Orestes will be acquitted since she will cast her vote in his favor. The votes are counted to a tie, and Athena declares that Orestes is free. Orestes is free, but the Furies, angry and indignant turn their rage upon Athens. They threaten to blight the soil, the flocks, and the people. Athena seeks to placate them by offering a habitation and worship in Attica. For a time they refuse to listen, but finally they relent. Athena promises that they are to become kindly earth-deities living in Attica, blessing Athenian crops, herds, and families. The citizens, with torches in their hands, form a procession led by Athena, and conduct the new divinities to their dwelling in a cave beneath the Acropolis.

What do we make of all this?

Discussion of The Eumenides  can be approached from numerous angles, but since we are looking at that tension in Greek thought between the individual, the oikos, and the polis, that will be our angle of attack. The final play in the Oresteia ends the individual/family revenge cycle by transferring the responsibility from the hero, the oikos, and supernatural agencies like the Furies or the gods, to the polis. It marks, in mythical terms, the rise of state justice over the lex talionis.