Page:The Theatre of the Greeks, a Treatise on the History and Exhibition of the Greek Drama, with Various Supplements.djvu/125

 ^SCHYLUS. 107 it, was truly full of warlike spirit ^ but its construction is eminently simple. The dialogue is mainly sustained by Eteocles, the young king of Thebes, who receives intelligence of the seven champions about to attack the seven gates of his city, and appoints a warrior to meet each of them, reserving his brother Polyneices for himself. The play ends with an announcement of the victory of Thebes ; and Antigone and Ismene, in conjunction with the chorus, pour forth a lament over their two brothers who have fallen in the fratricidal strife. Antigone, in particular, declares her resolve to bury Poly- neices in spite of the prohibition of the Theban senate (1017). And while the first play of the Trilogy, probably the (Edipus, must have developed the circumstances leading to the paternal curses, to which Eteocles makes such emphatic reference at the beginning of the Seven against Thebes (v. 70), the fate of Antigone must have been introduced into the last play, no doubt the Eleusinians, the main topic of which was the interference of Theseus to procure the burial at Eleuther^ and Eleusis of the Argives who fell before Thebes'^ The most contradictory opinions have been maintained respect- ing the chronology of the Prometheus. For while one critic contends that it is the oldest of the extant plays of ^schylus, and was exhibited soon after 01. 75, 2, B.C. 478^, another eminent scholar says that it " was in all probability one of the last efforts of the genius of ^schylus, for the third actor is to a certain extent employed in it^." The reason alleged for this late date of the play — namely, the assumed employment of a third actor — falls to the ground when we adopt the probable supposition^ that o yap 8oK€LV dpiaro? dW elvai OeXei, ^adeHav dXoKa 5td (ppeuos Kupwov/xeuos, d(p' •^s TO, Kedvd ^Xaardvei ^ovXev/Mara' Kai Xeyo/x^vwv to^tuv Travres els 'ApLcrTeidrjv diripXexpav. 1 Ran. 1054: dpafxa xoirjaas "Apews fiearov. 2 Plutarch, Thes. c. 29: awi-rrpa^e de (OTjaeis) Kal 'Adpda-TCf rrjv dvalpecriv rdv virh T-§ Kadp-eia ireabvTWv, oix, ws 'E^upnri^-qs eiroliqaev if rpaycpdig., fidxv rwu Qrj^aioiv Kpa- TTjcras, dXXa Trelaas Kai cireL(Tdp.evos...Ta(pal 5^ rCov p.h voWCjv iv 'EXevOepaTs deiKvovrat, tQv 5k Tjyep-Svcjv TrepV'EXevcy^i'a, Kal tovto Qrjaiws' Adpaario x^-pi-f^'^P'-^i'ov. KarafxapTvpovai Sk Twv Evpnridov 'jKeridcov ol kiax^Xov 'EXevalvioL, iv oh Kal ravra X^ycoj' 6 Qrjaeds TreiroirjTaL. 3 G. F. Schoinann, des jEschylos gefesselter Prometheus, pp. 79 sqq. 4 Miiller, Hist. Gr. Lit. i. p. 432 . 5 Welcker, Tril. p. 30; Hermann, Opusc. il. p. 146 ; ad^sch. p. 55. It is curious that Schoinann, who argues for the oldest date of the Prometheits, disallows this sup- position, and imagines that one of the choreutse took the part of the third actor (u. s.