Sidequest Episode: Iphigenia at Aulis

For this sidequest episode we bring you Hayley's deep dive research on Euripides' play Iphegenia at Aulis, from our rewatch of Xena Season 3's Forgiven. 

We originally intended to post this to our Patreon, but the themes and questions Hayley brings up regarding duty and integrity in senseless wars were so relevant to today's political climate, we wanted to share with all our listeners. 

We hope you enjoy Hayley's thought-provoking ep. 

Check out our Patreon for Research References

Like what we're doing? Rate, subscribe, and review on your preferred podcast platform!

www.InaTimeofAncientGods.com

For more Xena content, follow us!

For exclusive content check out our Patreon!
Substack: @inatimeofancientgods
Bluesky:@iatoag.bsky.social
YouTube @IATOAGTheXenaPodcast
Need some IATOAG merch? Check out our Teespring shop!

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_00 0:36

Tip-a-tap tap tap tap. Oh, hi. You caught me tapping my way over to InATimeofancient Gods.com, where I can have all sorts of connections with the infinitely scrollable lists of research and merch. I'm Haley here, alone in my lonesome, but with you and Justine in Spirit, and I'm here to bring you an extra In a Time of Ancient Gods Patreon episode on the subject of Gabby's delightful charades of Euripides' famous posthumous play, Iphigenia at Aulis, in season three's episode The Forgiven. So the drama of the play centers around a tragic or heroic, depending on your take, sacrifice of King Agamemnon's daughter Iphigenia. The sacrifice would appease and offended Artemis so that she would release favorable winds to the Greeks to speed their ships to Troy. So today I'm going to walk you through the basic story before centering our focus on the female voices in the play, namely the chorus of Chalcidian women, Agamemnon's wife, Clytemnestra, and Iphigenia herself. I'm interested in the interplay between the young women, nameless in the chorus, who watch Iphigenia a stand-in for themselves, as she faces death, fear, and noble resignation to serve the kind of astronomical movements of the gods and of war. So let's begin with a brief summary. Agamemnon, you may remember, was king of Mycenae, the leader of the Greeks, and the brother of Menelaus, who had lost Helen to Paris, and then kind of invoked the vows of other contenders for this beautiful woman's hand in marriage to go to war to steal her back. This is kind of the follow-through of a longer mythology, but we have Agamemnon here as kind of the central character. Then we get to Clytemnestra, Agamemnon's wife and the mother of Iphigenia. She was a half-sister to Helen, born of the second egg, laid by Lita after her rape by Zeus. While Helen was Zeus's daughter, Clytemnestra was human, fathered by Lita's husband, Tyndarius. In Euripides' account, he evokes Clytemnestra's memories of her first husband, named Prince Tantalos, who, according to this version of the myth, was slain alongside their newborn son by Agamemnon when he captured Clytemnestra and abducted her to his castle. So Euripides already is kind of bringing into the play these different stories of capture of women, and he also brings their voices, particularly Clytemnestra's, into the conversation about the justice of war. The third and most important character in the play, of course, is Iphigenia, their daughter. We're going to hear more about her as we go through the play. But those are the three main characters. And then within the context, we see also Menelaus, again, the brother of Agamemnon, the one who was originally married to Helen, and who's motivating and calling upon all of the Greek forces to go take on Troy. We also get to meet Achilles and Odysseus. Well, Odysseus mainly in reference, but Achilles directly during the play. So in the plot, basically the Greeks had all assembled at the portside town or kind of port area at Aulis. It lay across the Euripus Strait from the city of Chalcis, which is on the island of Euboa. So we're basically thinking kind of across the Grecian peninsula from Athens and on this kind of seaside town. We have this huge assembly of Greek army and naval forces. They're assembled there basically because they're ready to sail for Troy, but they've encountered contrary winds and are unable to embark. Some mythological traditions suggest that the fault lay with Agamemnon, because he had shot a deer in a grove sacred to Artemis, or because he had boasted that he was a better hunter than Artemis. For Euripides, it's enough that basically just the seer Calchus has stated that a young girl, Iphigenia, must be sacrificed to the goddess so that she will release the winds. And this is basically the premise that all of the viewers would have brought to the play upon seeing it in 405 BCE. So, in the kind of bigger context of Greek theater, the chorus had, according to scholars, begun to take a further back seat over this time period around 405 BCE. They kind of started to become less prominent in Greek theater. And this, according to scholars of Euripides, is particularly visible in Eripides' Iphigenia at Aulis. Indeed, scholarship on this play in particular has shown that the final choral song is very likely a much later edition, coming about as late as the 7th century CE, so hundreds of centuries later, or hundreds of years later. So, okay, so we have this kind of retreating chorus in the kind of scholarship. Nevertheless, I'm a relative outsider to this scholarship, or perhaps a recent prodigal daughter coming back to it, to Greek theater. So the chorus captured me in my reading, especially as I noticed the chorus in this play is made up of the women of Chalcis. So women and younger women who would have associated with the trials and circumstances that Clytemnestra and Iphigenia voice in the play. So there's an interesting exchange between them that goes throughout the play, often very supportive voices in reaction to the statements of Clytemnestra and Iphigenia, particularly after they find out about Agamemnon's plot. So the chorus basically captured me in my reading, and I began to look for other researchers who may have written about this particular play and the place of the chorus within it. I found Naomi Weiss, who's a classicist at Harvard, and she argues especially that the paired songs at the close of the play, one by Iphigenia and one by the chorus, show the integral part of the chorus in the dramatic force of the play. And she also comments on the role of the chorus throughout the play to kind of highlight the themes and dramatic challenges the characters are facing. So, as I mentioned, the chorus itself is made up of the women of Chalcis. This is a city across the Strait of Euripus from Aulis, who, in the premise of the play, have come to see this gathering of forces at this neighboring port. And they react and often see themselves within Clytemnestra's and Iphigenia's circumstances. So they come into this play with us, in this kind of female perspective, potentially, on the drama that's about to transpire. The play begins with Agamemnon and his servant setting a scene of kind of torturous regret because Agamemnon has called Iphigenia, sent a letter calling her to her death. He's basically racked with grief after committing the undoable, sending word to his wife and daughter, a story, an outright lie, that she would be marrying the swift-footed Achilles, when really he intended to lure her to Aulis in order to sacrifice her for Artemis in order to gain those favorable winds. So in this starting scene, he's already done all of this, and he's begging his servant, an enslaved man, originally allied with Clytemnestra, originally part of her family. He's begging him to send her a second letter, recanting his original request and advising them to stay in their home. So this sets the background to the play and establishes the real drama that we're going to be going through within the family. But then we expand really far with the chorus to see the entire camp of soldiers arranged at the Port of Aulis. And I want to read this aloud because I think it is really it caught me off guard when I read it. I thought it was really interesting. It gives a sense of the assembled warriors in their splendor, the thrill of youth and the spectacle of young men on the brink of heroism in the war. From the perspective of non-combatants and especially young women on the margins of this activity. So I'm going to read out this passage from the chorus at the beginning of the play. To the sandy beach of sea coast Aulis I came after a voyage through the tides of Euripus, leaving Chalcis in its narrow firth, my city which feedeth the waters of far-famed Arethusa near the sea, that I might behold the army of the Achaeans and the ships rowed by these godlike heroes, for our husbands tell us that fair haired Menelaus and high born Agamemnon are leading them to Troy on a thousand ships in quest of the lady Helen, whom herdsman Paris carried off from the banks of the reedy Eurotus, when that queen of Cyprus entered beauty's lists with Hera and Pallas at the gushing fount. Through the grove of Artemis, rich with sacrifice I sped my course, the red blush mantling on my cheeks from maiden modesty, in my eagerness to see the soldiers' camp, the tents of male clad Dani, and their gathered steeds. Two chieftains there I saw met together in council, one was Aeas, son of Oilis, the other Aeus son of Telamon, crown of glory to the men of Salamis. And I saw Protosilus and Palamedes sprung from the sun of Poseidon, sitting there amusing themselves with intricate figures at draughts, Diomedes, too, at his favourite sport of hurling coits, and Marionus, the war god's son, a marvel to mankind, stood at his side. Likewise I beheld the offspring of Laertes, who came from his island hills, and with him Nirus, handsomest of all Achaeans, Achilles next that nimble runner, swift on his feet as the wind, whom Thetis bore and Chiron trained, I saw him on the beach racing in full armor, along the shingle and straining every nerve to beat a team of four horses, as he sped round the track on foot, and Eumelus, the grandson of Pharis, their driver, was shouting when I saw him, goading on his goodly steeds with their bits of chaste gold work, whereof the center pair that bore the yoke had dappled coats, picked out with white, while the trace horses on the outside, facing the turning post in the course were bays with spotted fetlocks. Close beside them, Pelleus' son leapt on his way, in all his harness keeping abreast the rail by the axle box. Next I saw the countless fleet, a wonder to behold, that I might fill my girlish eyes with gazing a sweet delight. The warlike Myrmidons from Phythia held the right wing with fifty swift cruisers, upon whose sterns right at the end stood narid goddesses in golden effigy, the ensign of Achilles' armament. Near these were more the Argive ships in equal numbers, or which Mestius' son, whom Talus and his grandsire reared, and Thelanus, son of Capanius, were in command. Next in order Theseus' son was stationed at the head of sixty ships from Attica, having the goddess Pallas set in a winged car, drawn by steeds with solid hoof, a lucky sight for mariners. Then I saw Boeotia's fleet of fifty sails decked with ensigns, these had Cadmus at the stern holding a golden dragon at the beaks of the vessels, and earthborne Laetus was their admiral. And my apologies to the son of Oilius, the lords of Ellis, and all the others whose ships were assembled there and mentioned by the chorus, but I think that gives enough of the sense. We're getting the sense of girls and young women who've traveled across the strait to come see this splendid army. We're getting a sense of the glory of the forces in contrast to Agamemnon's deep sorrow. And we're setting up this tension between the energy that's pushing the Greek soldiers out to Troy and also the human cost that's going to roll out over the course of the war. So Agamemnon's deep grief over the potential loss of his daughter is felt in individual severity. And then we see this really bold and energetic display of youthful warriors on the other side. So Naomi Weiss notes this vision also as kind of echoing the chorus themselves. She mentions how the vocabulary that Euripides uses to describe this vision echoes the movement of song. So Achilles racing the chariot in full armor, some of the verbs echo the musical words of movement and rhythm, the circular rounds of the song, and the leaping dances that the choral performers might have been doing on the stage may have reflected also the leaping of the horses they invoke, and also the leaping of tone in musical verse. So from here we cut, in terms of the plot, straight to Menelaus, who has intercepted Agamemnon's servant and stolen the letter. As you can imagine, Menelaus is enraged by this, having put so much energy into the recapture of his bride. Agamemnon confronts Menelaus, argues with him, eventually even convinces him that he cannot possibly sacrifice his own daughter. But in the face of the rising army, Agamemnon then resigns himself to the sacrifice of his daughter, rather than what he sees is not only his own death, but the ruin of his kingship, his family, and his legacy. So with this conclusion to their discussion, the chorus sings in joy for Iphigenia's arrival. Iphigenia and Clytemnestra have just entered as Agamemnon and Menelaus are coming to this conclusion. Kind of tragic intervention. And the love of family just fuels this warm embrace and tender addresses, enthusiastic conversation throughout this scene. Clytemnestra, as they're arriving, asks the little Orestes, What? Sleeping little one, tired out by the ride and the chariot, awake to bless thy sister's wedding. And it's very touching. You can imagine yourself seeing this young face, the young brother of Iphiginia, who's arrived to enjoy this moment of celebration with her. Iphigenia runs to embrace her father, begs him to return soon after the war, and he all but calls her his favorite child as they remember their times of closeness as she was growing up. But shortly after that, the chorus interrupts with a foreboding passage that invokes the violence of the upcoming war, the sacking of quote, stone built towers, dragging men's heads backwards to cut their throats and sacking the citadel of Troy from roof to base, a cause of many tears to Mays and Priam's wife, and Helen, the daughter of Zeus, shall weep in bitter grief because she left her lord. The chorus laments the fates of royal women and the children of Leda especially, singing O neer may there appear to me or my children's children the prospect which the wealthy Lydian dames and Phrygius brides will have, as at their looms they hold converse, say, who will pluck this fair blossom from her ruined country, tightening his grasp on lovely tresses till the tears flow? 'Tis all through thee the offspring of the long necked swan, if indeed it be true report that Leda bore thee to a winged bird when Zeus transformed himself thereto, or whether in the pages of the poets, fables have carried these tales to men's ears idly out of season. This kind of foreboding danger. And also this we get a sense also of the separation of the women of Chalcis who are not noble, who are not subject to these kind of whims of the gods. They're observing this and understanding the tragedy of this particular family's fates. So from here out, Clytemnestra seeks Achilles. She's excited. Her daughter's about to be married, and she wants to know who this man is. But when she finds him in the war camp, he's shocked to hear of his unwitting part in this scheme. And he's drawn to defend Iphigenia. He kind of embraces this mission to stop this particularly deceptive scheme. Clytemnestra, of course, is shocked as well. This is no longer what she had planned. And so she runs back to Agamemnon to confront him. And here we get an even greater sense of the critique of the Trojan War and the challenge to the premise that this is all necessary. So Clytemnestra confronts Agamemnon, and Euripides writes for her the following. And she's learned about the particular plan to sacrifice Iphigenia. So she states, quote, Well, listen, for now I unfold my meaning and no longer employ dark riddles. In the first place, reproach thee first with this it was not of my own free will, but by force that thou didst take me and wed me after slaying Tantalus, my former husband, and dashing my babe on the ground alive, when thou hadst torn him from my breast with brutal violence. Here we have this critique of stealing women from one place to the other, the violence that comes with that. She goes on and writes or speaks out If anyone asks thee thy reason for slaying Iphigenia, tell me, what will you say? Or must I say it for thee, so that Menelaus may recover Helen? Again, if thou go forth with the host, leaving me in the halls, and art long absent at Troy, what will my feelings be at home, dost thou think? When I behold each vacant chair in her chamber now deserted, and then sit down alone in tears, making ceaseless lamentation for her she continues on and returns to this theme. Suppose thou sacrifice the child. What prayer wilt thou utter when it is done? What will the blessing be when thou wilt invoke upon thyself as though thou art slaying our daughter? An ill returning maybe, seeing the disgrace that speeds thy going forth. Is it right that I should pray for any luck to attend thee? Surely we should deem the gods devoid of sense if we harbored a kindly feeling towards murderers. Shalt thou embrace thy children on thy coming back to Argos? Nay, thou hast no right. Will any child of thing ever face thee, if thou hast surrendered one of them to death? Has this ever entered into thy calculations? Or does thy one duty consist in carrying a scepter about and marching at the head of an army? So at the end of this particular passage, we not only hear Clytemnestra's frustration with Agamemnon and anger and rage with him about Iphigenia's potential murder, but we hear that this is layered upon other griefs that he's caused her, severe griefs, being kidnapped and subjected to the To violence, her child murdered by him already. And what struck me about this as well is that, you know, we can sometimes, in the midst of all of the chaos of this particular family, lose track of the injuries that they have inflicted upon each other. If you remember, Clytemnestra later gets blamed and killed for her disloyalty to Agamemnon while he is away. But we can start to see here why that's happening. He's already convicted many, many serious and murderous offenses against her and her own family. And we see this uncovered here in this moment. And the chorus chimes in with her. They say, Hearken to her, Agamemnon, for to join in saving thy children's lives is surely a noble deed. None would gainsay this. And Iphigenia adds on as well. She speaks out after listening for a while to this conversation. Had I the eloquence of Orpheus, my father, to move the rocks by chanted spells to follow me, or charm by speaking whom I would, I had resorted to it. But as it is, I'll bring my tears the only art I know for that I might attempt, and about thy knees in suppliant wise I twine my limbs, these limbs thy wife here bore. Destroy me not before my time, for sweet is to look upon the light, and force me not to visit the scenes below. I was the first to call thee father, thou the first to call me child. I was the first to sit upon thy knee and take the fond caresses. And this is what thou would then say Shall I see thee child, living a happy, prosperous life in my husband's home one day, in a manner worthy of myself? And I in my turn would ask as I hung about thy beard whereto I am now clinging, how shall I see thee? Shall I be giving thee a glad reception in the halls, father, in thy old age, repaying thy anxious care in rearing me? From here she begs her brother, her infant brother, to beg for her life, lifting him up to his father's face. And we hear, full of trouble then, it seems, is the race of mortals, full of trouble verily, and 'tis ever fate's decree that man should find distress. Into this scene arrives Achilles to defend Iphigenia. Agamemnon has left, it's Iphigenia there with her mother, and Achilles arrives. But Odysseus, leading the army, intent on capturing Iphigenia to sacrifice her, is not far behind. Now Achilles tells Iphigenia he's ready to sacrifice himself to fight off the entire army to save her own life. He feels this is so unjust that it's his obligation to do this. And scholar David Sanson suggests that this scene poses Iphigenia and Achilles as a pair matched in nobility and bravery, destined to be held apart by the strength of those virtues, even as they dedicate themselves to the same kind of cause of family in the end of the play. So Iphigenia facing this particular dilemma, the idea that Achilles' death won't secure her own, he can only stand up to so many before he falls and she's captured, and that by dying she might then save many more Greeks, family and loved ones, and in the face of this, she moves her positioning and embraces the somber fate of self-sacrifice. She tells this to Clytemnestra and Achilles, and finally in the ending scenes, it's her and the chorus on the stage. As she invokes or sh tells Clytemnestra not to mourn for her, to go back and not let anyone mourn for her. She then turns to the chorus and tells them, Be it yours, maiden, to him enjoy a strains Artemis, the child of Zeus for my hard lot, and let the order for the solemn hush go forth to the Dani, begin the sacrifice with the baskets, let the fire blaze for the purifying meal of sprinkling, and my father pace from left to right about the altar, for I come to bestow on Hellas safety crowned with victory. Lead me hence me the destroyer of Ilium's town, and the Phrygians, give me wreaths to cast about me, bring them hither, here are my tresses to crown. Bring lustral water too. Dance to Artemis, Queen Artemis the Blessed, around her fan and altar, for by the blood of my sacrifice I will blot out the oracle if it needs must be. O mother, lady revered, for thee shall my tears be shed, and now for at the holy rites I may not weep. Sing with me, maiden, sing the praises of Artemis, whose temple faces Chalcis, where angry spearmen madly chafe, here in the narrow havens of Aulis because of me. O Pelascia, land of my birth, and Mycenae my home. She has a brief exchange with the chorus before she bids farewell to the beloved light of day and exits. The chorus then retakes on a similar song, and this is the pairing that Naomi Weiss is talking about. So they take on this song of praise, and they say, Behold the maiden on her way, the destroyer of Ilium's town and its Phrygians, with garlands twined about her head, and drops of lustral water on her, soon to besprinkle her with gushing blood the altar of a murderous goddess. What time her shapely neck is severed? For thee, fair streams of fathers pouring in lustral waters are in store. For thee Achaea's host is waiting, eager to reach the citadel of Ilium. But let us celebrate Artemis, the daughter of Zeus, queen among the gods, as if upon some happy chance. O lady revered, delighting in human sacrifice, send on its way to Phrygias' land the host of the Hellenes, to Troy's abode of guile, and grant that Agamemnon may wreath his head with deathless fame, a crown of fairest glory for the spearmen of Hellas. As they finish, a messenger arrives. We have the sense that the sacrifice is already underway, Clytemnestra and Agamemnon are awaiting news, and the messenger brings the news that although the sacrifice did go forth and Iphigenia was prepared for her own death, at the moment as the knife fell, Artemis spirited her away and replaced her with a deer to serve as a sacrifice for the day. Iphigenia would then be taken to Taurus by Artemis, where she would serve as priestess, conducting her own human sacrifices, according to this particular tradition of the mythology, until the arrival of her brother Orestes much later. So at the close, these choral songs and Iphigenia's song invite a kind of whirling around at the altar of Artemis, a dance often associated with songs of praise. Iphigenia calls everyone to not mourn, her mother's not to cut her hair or change her clothing. And the chorus praises Iphigenia as a city sacker, as the kind of a military leader. So Naomi Weiss argues that this blending of a tragic moment and some of the elements of a tragic song, a woman singing to a sympathetic female chorus, it blends that with a song of praise, often sung by men to other men in kind of military moments. This pairing also blends If a genia's male normative bravery with her young woman body, kind of blending these gender normative prescriptions in Greek theater to create a different image. And of course, an image that changes a lot of what Chorus had traditionally done, but one that is serving the purpose of the play. And it creates an interesting, I mean, I think uh Naomi Weiss writes that at the close of the play, Ifiginia does something a little bit unusual. She withdraws herself from Greek community by leaving for the sacrifice, but she simultaneously takes a stance as its savior, as the leader of this military action, even as she is no longer going to be present with the army, with her family, or with Greece itself. So it's a fascinating play. The ending scenes, this sacrifice, is controversial even in the scholarship because of its seeming um quick reversal of her reluctance to be killed and then her embrace of this duty. When I read it, I felt like I could see her understand this army's not entirely controllable. She's likely to die anyway, and perhaps she sees what her father sees as well, which is that if she refuses to submit to this godly order, there may be repercussions that affect Orestes and her mother and her sisters as well. Now, as we know, and as the audience would have known at that time, there are many repercussions that affect Agamemnon and Clytemestra and Orestes that fall out over the course of the return after the Trojan War. But the question of duty remains. So rather than trying to answer those questions, I thought I might just leave you with the questions. What is our duty? Questions that I think the play brings up. So what is our duty in a senseless war? Clytemnestra especially brings up the senselessness of an entire war for the theft of a woman, basically, for the abduction of a person. She brings up that this is fairly common in the mythology and also the warfare and history of ancient Greece, the kind of theft of or abduction of women across different powers during that time period. So, to what end is this an important cause for the entire Greek army to unite behind? Okay, so the second question that came up to me was to who or to what do we direct our duty? If not to a war for abduction, which is, I think, what this phrase is the Trojan War uh regarding. What do we owe our duty to? Who do we care about preserving? Is Iphigenia trying to elevate the status of the Greeks? Is she trying to support the Greek effort because simply they are Greeks? She does say in one of her lines that the Greeks are free and the Trojans are slaves. And so for that end, she seems to believe there's some justification in serving the Greek effort. Is it that kind of ideal that we want to get behind? Probably not. Doesn't sound super good to me. So these are two really challenging justifications that Iphigenia and Euripides pose for the Trojan war. Neither seem particularly appealing to us, but it does make us question what do we go to war for? What is this about? And then third question, I think, is there is an integrity separate from duty? Is there a kind of integrity that is not about our duty to a particular people or to a particular idea, but simply an integrity that we serve that is entirely our own? And then the fourth one that I thought about is this entire story simply about the kind of acquiescence to the gods that Xena despised, the kind of willingness to go along with the contemporary order because it feels inevitable, whether that's God given or otherwise. What is Iphigenia's choice in this? What is our choice when faced with potentially or seemingly insurmountable obstacles? What would Xena do? So, in any case, the language in this play is beautiful, the characterizations I found really vivid, and the women in this story get to call out the injustice of the war and provoke really challenging questions for the Greeks at that time, for ourselves today, even if we may not associate with some of the Greek motivations for war, we can still recognize an insensible and unjust war and challenge where we want to take our position through that. I think the appeals to closeness, to interrelationships, this really vivid affection within the family and the mutual care and the bonds that it invokes all call those into question with particular pertinence and uh drama and feeling. So I appreciate you listening today. I hope you'll check out our website. Um, thank you for all your support. It was really fun to get to read this. I recommend you check it out. Um, so before I go, I'm gonna tell you my sources. Scroll, scroll, scroll. Let's see where we are. So um I mentioned Naomi Weiss. The article I looked at was the Antiphonal Ending of Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis, which is from Classical Philology in 2014. I also read David Sansone's Iphigenia Changes Her Mind from Illinois Classical Studies in 1991. I read a few others, but those were the two central ones that came that I think would be most helpful for this particular intervention. And then, of course, I relied heavily on the MIT classics free version of If Vigenia at OLUS. And I'll provide the link to that so that you can access it as well. But it's great. It's a, I think it's an Internet Archive, a classics archive, so you can access the full text there. All right, thank you very much. Wishing you a great day, and hope to see you next time. Thanks.