The Trojan Women

1First Semi-Chorus O Hecuba! why these cries, these piercing shrieks? What do your words mean? For I heard your piteous wail echo through the building, and a pang of terror shoots through each captive Trojan’s breast, as within these walls they mourn their slavish lot. Hecuba My child, even now at the ships of the Argives— First Semi-Chorus†The rower’s hand is busy? Ah, woe is me! what is their intent? Will they really carry me away from my country in their fleet? Hecuba I do not know, though I guess our doom. First Semi-Chorus O misery! woe to us Trojan women, soon to hear of our troubles: Come out of the house, the Argives are preparing to return. Hecuba Oh! please do not bid the wild Cassandra leave her chamber, the frantic prophetess, for Argives to insult, nor to my griefs add yet another. Woe to you, ill-fated Troy, Troy, your sun is set; and woe to your unhappy children, living and dead alike, who are leaving you behind!

1Second Semi-Chorus With trembling step, alas! I leave this tent of Agamemnon to learn of you, my royal mistress, whether the Argives have resolved to take my wretched life, or whether the sailors at the prow are making ready to ply their oars. Hecuba My child, your wakeful heart! Second Semi-Chorus I have come, stricken with terror. Has a herald from the Danaids already arrived? To whom am I, poor captive, given as a slave? Hecuba You are not far from being allotted now. Second Semi-Chorus Alas! What man of Argos or Phthia will bear me in sorrow far from Troy, to his home, or to some island fastness? Hecuba Ah! ah! Whose slave shall I become in my old age? in what land? a poor old drone, the wretched copy of a corpse, alas! set to keep the gate or tend their children, I who once held royal rank in Troy.

2Chorus Alas, alas! What piteous dirge will you devise to mourn the outrage done you? No more through Ida’s looms shall I ply the shuttle to and fro. I look my last on my children’s bodies, my last; I shall endure surpassing misery, it may be as the unwilling bride of some Hellene (perish the night and fortune that brings me to this!); it may be as a wretched slave from Peirene’s sacred fount I shall draw their store of water. Oh! may it be ours to come to Theseus’ famous realm, a land of joy. Never, never let me see Eurotas’ swirling tide, hateful home of Helen, there to meet and be the slave of Menelaus, whose hand laid Troy waste!

2Chorus That holy land by Peneus fed, nestling in all its beauty at Olympus’ foot, is said, so have I heard, to be a very granary of wealth and teeming fruitfulness; next to the sacred soil of Theseus, I could wish to reach that land. They tell me too Hephaestus’ home, beneath the shadow of Aetna, fronting Phoenicia, the mother of Sicilian hills, is famous for the crowns it gives to valor. Or may I find a home on that shore which lies very near Ionia’s sea, a land watered by Crathis, lovely stream, that dyes the hair an auburn tint, feeding with its holy waves and making glad the home of heroes.

1Chorus Sing me, Muse, a tale of Troy, a funeral dirge in strains unheard as yet, with tears; for now I will uplift for Troy a piteous chant, telling how I met my doom and fell a wretched captive to the Argives by reason of a four-footed beast that moved on wheels, when Achaea’s sons left at our.gates that horse, loud rumbling to the sky, with its trappings of gold and its freight of warriors; and our people cried out as they stood upon the rocky citadel, Up now, you whose toil is over, and drag this sacred image to the shrine of the Zeus-born maiden, goddess of our Ilium! Forth from his house came every youth and every grey-head too; and with songs of joy they took the fatal snare within.

1Chorus Then hastened all the race of Phrygia to the gates, to make the goddess a present of an Argive band ambushed in the polished mountain-pine, Dardania’s ruin, a welcome gift to be to her, the virgin queen of deathless steeds; and with nooses of cord they dragged it, as it had been a ship’s dark hull, to the stone-built temple of the goddess Pallas, and set it on that floor so soon to drink our country’s blood. But, as they labored and made merry, came on the pitchy night; loud the Libyan flute was sounding, and Phrygian songs awoke, while maidens beat the ground with airy foot, uplifting their glad song; and in the halls a blaze of torchlight shed its flickering shadows on sleeping eyes.

1Andromache My Achaean masters are leading me away. Hecuba Ah me! Andromache Why do you in note of woe utter the dirge that is mine? Hecuba Alas— Andromache For these sorrows— Hecuba O Zeus— Andromache And for this calamity. Hecuba O my children! Andromache Our day is past.

1Hecuba Joy is gone, Troy is gone. Andromache Unhappy! Hecuba For my gallant sons Andromache Alas! Hecuba Alas indeed, for my Andromache Misery! Hecuba Piteous the fate Andromache Of our city, Hecuba Smouldering in the smoke.

2Andromache Come to me, my husband, come to me! Hecuba Ah, hapless wife! you call on my son who lies in the tomb. Andromache Your wife’s defender!

2Hecuba Oh, you, who before made the Achaeans grieve, eldest of the sons I bore to Priam, take me to your rest in Hades’ halls!

3Andromache These great griefs— Hecuba Unhappy one, bitter these woes to bear. Andromache Our city ruined— Hecuba And sorrow to sorrow added. Andromache Through the will of angry heaven, since the day that son†of yours escaped death, he that for a hated bride brought destruction on the Trojan citadel. There lie the gory corpses of the slain by the shrine of Pallas for vultures to carry off; and Troy has come to slavery’s yoke.

3Hecuba O my country, O unhappy land— Andromache I weep for you now left behind. Hecuba Now do you behold your piteous end. Andromache And you, my house, where I gave birth. Hecuba O my children! bereft of her city as your mother is, she now is losing you. Oh, what mourning and what sorrow!... oh, what endless streams of tears in our houses! The dead alone forget their griefs and never shed a tear. Chorus Leader What sweet relief to sufferers it is to weep, to mourn, lament, and chant the dirge that tells of grief! Andromache Do you see this, mother of that man, Hector, who once laid low in battle many a son of Argos? Hecuba I see that it is heaven’s way to exalt what men accounted nothing, and ruin what they most esteemed. Andromache Hence with my child as booty am I borne; the noble are brought to slavery—a bitter change. Hecuba This is necessity’s grim law; it was just now that Cassandra was torn with brutal violence from my arms. Andromache Alas, alas! it seems a second Aias has appeared to wrong your daughter; but there are other ills for you. Hecuba Yes, beyond all count or measure are my sorrows; evil vies with evil in the struggle to be first. Andromache Your daughter Polyxena is dead, slain at Achilles’ tomb, an offering to his lifeless corpse. Hecuba O woe is me! This is that riddle Talthybius long ago told me, a truth obscurely uttered. Andromache I saw her myself; so I alighted from the chariot, and covered her corpse with a mantle, and struck upon my breast. Hecuba Alas! my child, for your unhallowed sacrifice! and yet again, alas! for your shameful death! Andromache Her death was even as it was, and yet that death of hers was after all a happier fate than my life. Hecuba Death and life are not the same, my child; the one is annihilation, the other keeps a place for hope. Andromache Hear, O mother of children! give ear to what I urge so well, that I may cheer my drooping spirit. It is all one, I say, never to have been born and to be dead, and better far is death than life with misery. For the dead feel no sorrow any more and know no grief; but he who has known prosperity and has fallen on evil days feels his spirit straying from the scene of former joys. Now that child of yours is dead as though she never had seen the light, and little she knows of her calamity; whereas I, who aimed at a fair repute, though I won a higher lot than most, yet missed my luck in life. For all that stamps the wife a woman chaste, I strove to do in Hector’s home. In the first place, whether there is a slur upon a woman, or whether there is not, the very fact of her not staying at home brings in its train an evil name; therefore I gave up any longing to do so, and stayed within my house; nor would I admit indoors the clever gossip women love, but conscious of a heart that told an honest tale I was content. And ever would I keep a silent tongue and modest eye before my husband; and well I knew where I might rule him, and where it was best to yield. Report of this has reached the Achaean army, and proved my ruin; for when I was taken captive, Achilles’ son would have me as his wife, and I must serve in the house of murderers. And if I set aside my love for Hector, and open my heart to this new lord, I shall appear a traitress to the dead, while, if I hate him, I shall incur my master’s displeasure. And yet they say a single night removes a woman’s dislike for her husband; I despise the woman who, when she has lost her former husband, transfers her love by marrying another. Not even the horse, if parted from her stablemate, will cheerfully draw the yoke; and animals have neither speech nor sense to help them, and are by nature man’s inferiors. O my dear Hector, in you I found a husband amply dowered with wisdom, noble birth and fortune, a brave man and a mighty; while you took from my father’s house a spotless bride, yourself the first to make this maiden wife. But now death has claimed you, and I am soon to sail to Hellas, a captive doomed to wear the yoke of slavery. Has not then the dead Polyxena, for whom you wail, less evil to bear than I? I have not so much as hope, the last resource of every human heart, nor do I beguile myself with dreams of future bliss, the very thought of which is sweet. Chorus Leader You are in the same plight as I; your lamentations for yourself remind me of my own sad case. Hecuba I never yet have set foot on a ship’s deck, though I have seen such things in pictures and know of them from hearsay. Now sailors, if there comes a storm of moderate force, are all eagerness to save themselves by toil; one stands at the tiller, another sets himself to work the sheets, a third meanwhile is baling out the ship; but if tempestuous waves arise to overwhelm them, they yield to fortune and commit themselves to the driving billows. Even so I, by reason of my countless troubles, am speechless and forbear to say a word; for this surge of misery from the gods is too strong for me. Cease, my darling child, to speak of Hector’s fate; no tears of yours can save him; honor your present master, offering your sweet nature as the bait to win him. If you do this, you will cheer your friends as well as yourself and you shalt rear my Hector’s child to lend stout aid to Ilium, that so your children in the aftertime may build her up again, and our city yet be established. But our talk must take a different turn; who is this Achaean servant I see coming here again, sent to tell us of some new design? Talthybius You that once were the wife of Hector, bravest of the Phrygians, do not hate me, for I am not a willing messenger. The Danaids and sons of Pelops both command— Andromache What is it? your prelude bodes evil news. Talthybius It is decreed your son is—how can I tell my news? Andromache Surely not to have a different master from me? Talthybius None of all Achaea’s chiefs shall ever lord it over him. Andromache Is it their will to leave him here, a remnant of Phrygia’s race? Talthybius I know no words to break the sorrow lightly to you. Andromache I thank you for your consideration, unless indeed you have good news to tell. Talthybius They mean to slay your son; there is my hateful message to you. Andromache Oh me! this is worse tidings than my forced marriage. Talthybius So spoke Odysseus to the assembled Hellenes, and his word prevails. Andromache Oh, once again alas! there is no measure in the woes I bear. Talthybius He said they should not rear so brave a father’s son. Andromache May such counsels prevail about children of his! Talthybius He must be thrown from Troy’s battlements. Let it be so, and you will show more wisdom; do not cling to him, but bear your sorrows with heroic heart, nor in your weakness think that you are strong. For nowhere do you have any help; consider this you must; your husband and your city are no more, so you are in our power, and I alone am match enough for one woman; therefore I would not see you bent on strife, or any course to bring you shame or hate, nor would I hear you rashly curse the Achaeans. For if you say anything to anger the army, this child will find no burial nor pity either. But if you hold your peace and with composure take your fate, you will not leave his corpse unburied, and you yourself will find more favor with the Achaeans. Andromache My dearest! my own sweet child and priceless treasure! your death the foe demands, and you must leave your wretched mother. That which saves the lives of others, proves your destruction—your father’s nobility; to you your father’s valiancy has proved no gift. O my unlucky bed and marriage, that brought me once to Hector’s home, hoping to be the mother of a son that should rule over Asia’s fruitful fields instead of serving as a victim to the Danaids! Do you weep, my child? do you know your hapless fate? Why clutch me with your hands and to my garment cling, nestling like a tender chick beneath my wing? Hector will not rise from the earth and come gripping his famous spear to bring you salvation; no kinsman of your father appears, nor might of Phrygian hosts; one dreadful headlong leap from the dizzy height and you will dash out your life with none to pity you! Oh to clasp your tender limbs, a mother’s fondest joy! Oh to breathe your fragrant breath! In vain it seems these breasts did suckle you, wrapped in your swaddling-clothes; all for nothing I used to toil and wear myself away! Kiss your mother now for the last time, nestle to her that bore you, twine your arms about my neck and join your lips to mine! O you Hellenes, cunning to devise new forms of cruelty, why slay this child who never wronged any? You daughter of Tyndareus, you are no child of Zeus, but I say you were born of many a father, first of some evil demon, next of Envy, then of Murder and of Death, and every horror that the earth breeds. That Zeus was never father of yours I boldly do assert, bane as you have been to many a Hellene and barbarian too. Destruction catch you! Those fair eyes of yours have brought a shameful ruin on the fields of glorious Troy. Take the child and bear him hence, hurl him down if you wish, then feast upon his flesh! It is the gods’ will we perish, and I cannot ward the deadly stroke from my child. Hide me and my misery; cast me into the ship’s hold; for it is to a fair wedding I am going, now that I have lost my child! Chorus Leader Unhappy Troy! you have lost countless men for the sake of one woman and her hateful bed.

1Chorus O Telamon, King of Salamis, the feeding-ground of bees, who have your home in a seagirt isle that lies near the holy hills where first Athena made the grey olive branch to appear, a crown for heavenly heads and a glory to happy Athens, you came, you came in knightly brotherhood with that great archer, Alcmena’s son, to sack our city Ilium, in days gone by, on your advent from Hellas;

1Chorus When he led the chosen flower of Hellas, vexed for the steeds,†and at the fair stream of Simois he stayed his sea-borne ship and fastened cables to the stern, and forth from the ship he took the bow his hand could deftly shoot, to be the doom of Laomedon; and with the ruddy breath of fire he wasted the masonry squared by Phoebus’ line and chisel, and sacked the land of Troy; so twice in two attacks has the blood-stained spear destroyed Dardania’s walls.

2Chorus In vain, it seems, you Phrygian boy†pacing with dainty step among your golden chalices, do you fill high the cup of Zeus, a lovely service; the land of your birth is being consumed by fire. The shore re-echoes to our cries; and, as a bird bewails its young, so we bewail our husbands or our children, or our old mothers. The dew-fed springs where you bathed, the course where you trained, are now no more; but you beside the throne of Zeus are sitting with a calm, sweet smile upon your fair young face, while the spear of Hellas has destroyed the land of Priam.

2Chorus Ah! Love, Love, who once sought these Dardanian halls, deep-seated in the hearts of heavenly gods, how high you made Troy to tower in those days, allying her with deities! But I will cease to urge reproaches against Zeus; for white-winged dawn, whose light is dear to man, turned a baleful eye upon our land and watched the ruin of our citadel, though she had within her bridal bower a husband to give her children,†from this land, whom once a chariot of gold spangled stars caught up and carried there, great source of hope to his native country; but all the love the gods once had for Troy is passed away.

1Chorus So then you have delivered into Achaea’s hand, O Zeus, your shrine in Ilium and your fragrant altar, the offerings of burnt sacrifice with smoke of myrrh to heaven uprising, and holy Pergamos, and glens of Ida tangled with the ivy’s growth, where rills of melting snow pour down their flood, a holy sun-lit land that bounds the world and takes the god’s first rays!

1Chorus Gone are your sacrifices! gone the dancer’s cheerful shout! gone the vigils of the gods as night closed in! your images of carven gold are now no more; and Phrygia’s holy festivals, twelve times a year, at each full moon, are ended now. It is this, it is this that fills me with anxious thought whether you, lord, seated on the sky, your heavenly throne, care at all that my city is destroyed, a prey to the furious fiery blast.

2Chorus Ah! my loved husband, you are a wandering spectre; unwashed, unburied lies your corpse, while over the sea the ship sped by wings will carry me to Argos, land of steeds, where stand Cyclopian walls of stone reaching to heaven. There in the gate the children gather, and weep their piteous lamentation; they cry, they cry: Mother, alas! torn from your sight, the Achaeans bear me away from you to their dark ship to row me over the deep to sacred Salamis or to the hill on the Isthmus, that overlooks two seas, the seat that holds the gates of Pelops.

2Chorus Oh may the sacred blazing thunderbolt of the Aegean, hurled in might, smite the ship of Menelaus full in the middle, on its way in mid-sea, since he is carrying me away in bitter sorrow from the shores of Ilium to be a slave in Hellas, while the daughter of Zeus still keeps her golden mirrors, delight of maidens’ hearts. Never may he reach his home in Laconia or his father’s hearth and home, nor come to the town of Pitane†or the temple of the goddess†with the gates of bronze, having taken as his captive the one whose marriage brought disgrace on Hellas through its length and breadth and woful anguish on the streams of Simois!

1Hecuba Oh, earth, nourisher of my children! Chorus Ah, ah! Hecuba Hearken, my children, hear your mother’s voice. Chorus You are calling on the dead with voice of lamentation. Hecuba Yes, as I stretch my aged limbs upon the ground, and beat upon the earth with both my hands. Chorus I follow you and kneel, invoking from the nether world my hapless husband. Hecuba I am being dragged and hurried away— Chorus The sorrow, the sorrow of that cry! Hecuba To dwell beneath a master’s roof! Chorus From my own country!†Hecuba Woe is me! O Priam, Priam, slain, unburied, left without a friend, nothing do you know of my cruel fate. Chorus No, for over his eyes black death has drawn his pall, a pure man slain by the impure.

1Hecuba Woe for the temples of the gods and for our dear city! Chorus Ah, ah! Hecuba Murderous flame and enemy spear are now your lot. Chorus Soon will you tumble to your own loved soil, and be forgotten. Hecuba And the dust, mounting to heaven on wings like smoke, will rob me of the sight of my home. Chorus The name of my country wiII pass into obscurity; all is scattered far and wide, and hapless Troy has ceased to be. Hecuba Did you know, did you hear? Chorus Yes, it was the crash of the citadel. Hecuba The shock, the shock— Chorus Will overwhelm our city utterly. Hecuba O woe is me! trembling, quaking limbs, support my footsteps! away! to face the day that begins your slavery. Chorus Woe for our unhappy town! And yet let us advance to the Achaean fleet.