While still in the parodus, albeit near its upper end, he pauses for a moment's rest and speaking to himself as he gazes in the direction of the cottage, where lives Electra, says:

Where is my honored mistress, my loved child,
Daughter of Agamemnon, once my charge?
Steep to her house and difficult the ascent.

Again he moves forward, saying to himself the while:

With pain my age-enfeebled feet advance,

Yet lab'ring onwards with bent knees I move

To seek my friends.

Nearing the house he sees Electra before the door and presents his gifts:

O daughter, for mine eyes

Before the house behold thee, I am come,

Bringing this tender youngling from my fold, etc."

Creusa and

A similar scene occurs in the Ion (vss. 725 ff.). an aged servant are on their way to the Temple of Apollo, Creusa slightly in advance of the old man who is toiling up the slope. As she reaches the orchestra Creusa turns and says:

Thou reverend child-ward of my sometime sire
Erechtheus, while he walked yet in the light,
Bear up, and press to yon God's oracle,
That thou mayst share my joy, if Loxias King
A boding-pledge of sons hath uttered forth.
'Tis sweet with friends to share prosperity:
And if - which God forbid - if ill befall,
'Tis sweet to gaze in eyes of sympathy.

Returning to the old man's side and graciously supporting his tottering steps she continues:

Now thine old loving tendance of my sire

I, though thy lady, render back to thee.

As the two again move forward they engage in the following dialogue:

76 Translation of R. Potter; the interpretation of the action is my own.

OLD SERVANT

My daughter, spirit worthy of noble sires

Thou keepest, and thou hast not put to shame

Thine old forefathers, children of the soil.

Draw, draw me toward the shrines, and bring me on.
Steep is the god-ward path; be thou physician
Unto mine age, and help my toiling limbs.

CREUSA

Follow; take heed where thou dost plant thy feet.

OLD SERVANT

Lo there!

Slow is the foot, still by the mind outstripped.

CREUSA

Try with thy staff the ground; lean hard thereon.

OLD SERVANT

Blind guide is this when mine eyes serve so ill.

CREUSA

Sooth said; yet yield not thou to weariness.

OLD SERVANT

I would not, but my lost strength I command not.

They are now before the temple and Creusa, turning, says to the chorus:

Women, which do leal service at my loom

And shuttle, show what fortune hath my lord
Found touching issue, for which cause we came."

Of course the steepness of the parodi was not so great as these scenes suggest; the poet exaggerates for the sake of dramatic effect. But the assumption that in these scenes the actors were silent until after they had attained the orchestra renders their

77 Translation of A. S. Way (Loeb Classical Library, 1912); as before, however, the dramatic interpretation is my own.

interpretation more difficult. In any case they afford no justification for supposing that the scene-building stood on a higher level than the orchestra.78 Before pursuing this matter further, however, let us inquire what evidence the dramatic literature of the fifth century affords for the reconstruction of this building. To this inquiry the passages which have just been quoted form a fitting introduction.

78 Nor for the assumption of a "Chorbühne" (Weissmann, Die scenische Aufführung der griechischen Dramen des V. Jahrhunderts, 1893, p. 53).

Two other passages in which an ascent is mentioned are The Madness of Heracles of Euripides, vss. 119 ff. and Aristophanes' Lysistrata, vs. 286. Both are lyrical, and the steepness is perhaps wholly feigned.

IV

THE EVIDENCE OF THE DRAMAS 79

Our chief source of information regarding the types of background in use in the fifth century and the various settings employed are the texts of the plays themselves. These abound. in hints of inestimable value, and yet owing to the almost complete lack of stage directions such evidence as may be gathered from a study of the texts must be used with caution. In some cases a reference is too fleeting to be of substantial service, or too vague to place a decision beyond the pale of uncertainty. Thus in the Persians of Aeschylus the mention of "this an

79 Selected Bibliography: Müller, Lehrbuch der griechischen Bühnenalterthümer (1886), pp. 107 ff., 136 ff. Although antiquated, this book is still a useful collection of material. As all subsequent treatises have been influenced by Dörpfeld's discoveries, the Bühnenalterthümer may be said to close the pre-Dörpfeldian period. An announcement of the discovery of the fifth-century theater is given in the Nachträge, pp. 415, 416.

von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, “Die Bühne des Aischylos," Hermes, XXI (1886), 597 ff. See note 40.

Harzmann, Quaestiones Scaenicae (1889). This dissertation is noteworthy as being the earliest attempt to classify the evidence of the dramas with reference to the stage question; its conclusions are wrong.

White, "The Stage in Aristophanes," Harv. Stud. Class. Phil., II (1891), 159 ff. Excellent.

Capps, "The Greek Stage According to the Extant Dramas," Trans. Am. Phil. Assoc. XXII (1891), 1 ff. A most useful treatise.

Weissmann, Die scenische Aufführung der Dramen des V. Jahrhunderts (1893). Prickard, "The Relative Position of Actors and Chorus in the Theatre in the Fifth Century B.C.," Am. Jour. Phil. XIV (1893), 68 ff., 198 ff., 273 ff. Reisch, Das griechische Theater (1896), pp. 176 ff.

Robert, Die Szenerie des Aias, der Eirene und des Prometheus," Hermes, XXXI (1896), 530 ff.

Bolle, Die Bühne des Sophokles (1902); Die Bühne des Aeschylus (1906).

Haigh, The Attic Theatre (see note 11).

Fensterbusch, Die Bühne des Aristophanes (1912).

Noack, Σκηνή Τραγική (see note 40).

Flickinger, The Greek Theater and its Drama (see note 11).

For other titles see the following footnotes.

cient house" (Tóde σTéyos ȧpxaîov, vs. 141) is so indefinite and isolated that one may not be certain which building is intended, whether senate-house or palace, or even whether any building whatever was actually represented.80 Later in the same play the ghost of Darius rises from the tomb, but what the appearance of the tomb was and where it was placed cannot be determined.81 So in the Peace of Aristophanes, although it is clear that two buildings are represented, one the house of Trygaeus, the other the palace of Zeus, yet so vague are the hints afforded by the text that a minute consideration of the entire action of the play is necessary to show that the house of Zeus (τὴν οἰκίαν τὴν τοῦ Διός, vs. 178) stands above that of Trygaeus, and even this conclusion is contested.82

Or again a suspicious fullness of detail may characterize a description. An instance of this sort occurs in the Ion of Euripides. The background represents the temple of Apollo at Delphi (vs. 66), and the scene in which Ion singing the while honors the prophet-shrine with his matutinal service (kadóv ye tòv nóvov, å| Φοῖβε, σοὶ πρὸ δόμων λατρεύω | τιμῶν μαντείον ἕδραν vss. 128-130) is one of the most beautiful creations of this gifted poet :

And I in the toil that is mine- mine now
And from childhood up,

with the bay's young bough,

And with wreathed garlands holy, will cleanse

The portals of Phoebus; with dews from the spring

80 The chorus propose to seat themselves in "this ancient house" and to deliberate upon the possible fortunes of the war, but they are prevented from doing so by the entrance of the queen, and the proposal comes to naught. Scholars have long been divided over the question of the setting, many denying that a house was represented (so, most recently, Flickinger, op. cit., p. 226), others dissenting. Among the latter are von Wilamowitz (Aischylos, Interpretationen, 1914, p. 43); cf. Hermes, XXXII (1897), 283, and Petersen (Die attische Tragödie, 1915, p. 554).

81 An Altarbau, Reisch, Das griech. Theater (1896), p. 196; a Tempelchen in form, von Wilamowitz, Hermes XXXII (1897), 393; a xŵua yês in the orchestra, Harrison, Essays and Studies Presented to William Ridgeway (1913), pp. 136 ff.

82 The divergent views regarding the scenic arrangements of this unique play are presented and discussed by Sharpley in his edition of the Peace (1905), pp.