Citation with stable link: Philip A. Harland, 'Phrygians: Euripides’ cowardly and inferior easterner via the slave character in Orestes (408 BCE),' Ethnic Relations and Migration in the Ancient World, last modified April 2, 2024, https://philipharland.com/Blog/?p=18774.
Ancient author: Euripides (late fifth century BCE), Orestes 1350-1556 (link; link to Greek).
Comments: As I clarified in the comments on Aeschylus’ Persians (link), Athenian writers of tragedies and comedies used their plays, in part, to portray foreigners or “barbarians,” and easterners (Persians and Trojans / Phrygians) were a principal target. As Edith Hall shows at length, foreigners within older stories and myths (e.g. Trojan war as below) could be recast in new ways as uncivilized “barbarians.” This is illustrated well by the character of the Phrygian / Trojan slave in Euripides’ play Orestes.
You can of course click through above to read the entire play, but here in this post I have presented only the portions involving the Phrygian slave character. While the supposed inferior customs and traits of the Phrygian easterner are somewhat subtle at times, the stereotype begins to build up of Phrygians as fearful, cowardly, effeminate (not men, but not quite women), and servile (including the custom of bowing down to superiors). Overall, the point is that Phrygian barbarians are clearly inferior to Greeks (stated blatantly at one point). Naturally, Phrygians are also depicted as devoted to the Mother goddes of mount Ida. To aid in noticing some of these features, I have underlined key phrases.
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Main characters:
ELECTRA: daughter of Agamemnon and Klytaimnestra, sister of Orestes.
HELEN: wife of Menelaos, sister of Klytaimnestra.
HERMIONE: daughter of Menelaos and Helen.
CHORUS: young women of Argos.
ORESTES: son of Agamemnon and Klytaimnestra, brother of Electra.
MENELAOS: king of Sparta, brother of Agamemnon, uncle of Orestes and Electra.
TYNDAREUS: father of Helen and Klytaimnestra, an old man.
PYLADES: prince of Phokis, a friend of Orestes.
MESSENGER: an old man.
PHRYGIAN: one of Helen’s Trojan slaves, a eunuch.
APOLLO: divine son of Zeus and Leto, god of prophecy.
[The action of the play takes place in Argos just outside the royal palace a few days after Orestes has avenged the murder of his father by killing his mother, Klytaimnestra, and her lover, Aegisthus. At the opening, Orestes is lying ill on a couch near the doors. Electra is sitting close to him.]
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. . . [omitted 1300 lines of the play]. . .
[Phrygian / Trojan slave of Helen enters the narrative]
[Electra enters the house.]
CHORUS: O friends, begin the rhythmic beat,
the noise and shouts, before the house,
so that this murder, once complete,
may not inspire a dreadful fear
among the Argives and they run here
to help the royal house, not before
I see for certain Helen’s dead
and lying in blood there in the house
or hear the news from her attendant.
I know a part of what’s gone on,
but there are things I do not know. [1360]
Justice from the gods has rightly come
with retribution now to Helen —
because she filled all Greece with tears
thanks to that accursed destroyer,
Paris from mount Ida, who led Greeks to Troy.
CHORUS LEADER: The bolts on the palace doors are creaking.
Be quiet. One of the Phrygians
is coming out. We’ll find out from him
how things are going inside.
[A Phrygian enters, quite terrified. He chants or sings his first speeches.]
PHRYGIAN: I’ve fled death from an Argive sword
by scrambling in my Asian slippers [1370]
over bedroom cedar ceiling beams
and the Doric carvings on the frieze
Ruined! Gone! O earth, earth,
in my barbarian flight! Alas for me!
You strange ladies, how can I flee —
by flying up through the shining sky
or out to sea, which bull-headed Ocean,
as he rolls in circles round the earth,
holds in his arms’ embrace?
CHORUS LEADER: What’s going on,
you slave of Helen, creature from mount Ida? [1380]
PHRYGIAN: Ilion [Troy], O Ilion! O woe is me
city of Phrygia, Ida’s sacred hill
with its rich earth, how I lament
with my barbarian cries your ruin,
funereal melodies and dirges,
because the vision of loveliness
born from a swan-feathered bird,
Leda’s lion cub, that hellish Helen,
that evil Helen, avenging fury
for Apollo’s polished citadel.
Alas! Alas, for these laments, [1390]
these dirges for Dardania,
for the horsemanship of Ganymede
Zeus’ sexual partner in his bed.
CHORUS LEADER: Tell us what’s happening inside the house,
clearly and in detail. Your words so far
are difficult for me to understand.
PHRYGIAN: O Linos, Linos — as barbarians say
in their Asian tongue, once death begins,
whenever royal blood spills on the earth
from iron swords of Hades. They came there, [1400]
inside the house – I’m giving you each detail –
twin lions of Greece, one who was called
the commander’s son, the other one
the son of Stophios, with a wicked mind,
just like Odysseus, a silent traitor,
but faithful to his friends, bold in a fight,
clever in war, a deadly serpent. Damn him
for his quiet deviousness, the scoundrel!
They came in, up to where she was sitting,
the woman archer Paris married, faces [1410]
wet with tears, and humbly crouched down there,
one on either side, keeping her hemmed in.
They threw their suppliant arms around her knees –
both laid hands on Helen. Then on the run
her Phrygian servants came rushing up,
each calling to the others in their fear
that it might be a trick. To some of them [1420]
it looked all right, but it seemed to others
that the snake who murdered his own mother
was entangling the child of Tyndareus
in a devious plot to snare her.
CHORUS LEADER: Where were you?
Had you run off in terror long before that?
PHRYGIAN: It so chanced that I, as a Phrygian,
was following Phrygian fashions
and with a circular feathered fan
was wafting breezes, breezes by the curls
of Helen, on Helen’s cheeks – a habit
we barbarians have. She was twisting yarn [1430]
wrapping her fingers round the spindle.
The thread was falling down onto the floor.
With those Phrygian spoils she wished to make
some purple clothes, a gift for Klytaimnestra,
to adorn her tomb. Orestes then spoke up
and called out to the Spartan girl, “Child of Zeus,
leave your chair and stand up over here, [1440]
by the ancient hearth of Pelops, our ancestor,
so you can hear the words I have to say.”
He led her, yes led her, and she followed —
she had no idea what he was planning.
His partner, that evil man from Phokis,
moved off, going about some other business.
“You Phrygian cowards, leave — go somewhere else!”
Then he locked them up in different places
all through the house — some in the stables,
some in the porticoes — some here, some there, [1450]
leaving them in various locations
some distance from their mistress.
CHORUS LEADER: Then what happened?
PHRYGIAN: Mother of Ida! O sacred mother,
holy one! O the murderous suffering,
the lawless evil I saw there, I witnessed
in the royal palace. Their hands pulled swords
out from the darkness of their purple robes,
rolling their eyes back and forth, here and there,
to check that no one else was there. They stood,
like mountain boars, facing the woman there, [1460]
and said, “You’ll die. You’ll die. Your evil mate
is the one who’s killing you — he abandoned
his brother’s family to die in Argos.”
She screamed, she howled, “Alas for me!”
and beat her white forearm against her breast
and struck her fist against her wretched head.
Then she ran off — on golden-sandaled feet
she rushed off, she fled. But then Orestes,
jumping ahead in his Mycenaean boots, [1470]
shoved his fingers in her hair, bent her neck
on his left shoulder, and was quite prepared
to drive his black sword right into her throat.
CHORUS LEADER: Where were you Phrygian household servants
to defend her?
PHRYGIAN: We yelled — then with crowbars
battered the doors and door posts in the rooms
where we’d been held and ran from every spot
to her assistance. One man carried stones,
one had spears, and one held a drawn sword.
But Pylades came at us without fear,
just like Trojan Hector or like Ajax, [1480]
with his triple plumes, whom I saw once —
I saw him at Priam’s gate. So we met
at sword point. And then the Phrygians showed
in their full glory how for warlike spirit
they were born inferior in fighting strength
compared to Greeks. One man ran away,
one man was killed, another wounded,
another pleaded to protect his life.
We ran off, into the shadows, while men
were falling dead. Some would soon collapse,
and some were killed already. At that point,
poor Hermione came in the palace, [1490]
just as her mother, the unlucky one
who’d given birth to her, had fallen down,
sprawling on the ground about to die.
The two men, like followers of Bacchos
chasing a mountain cub without a thyrsos,
ran up and grabbed her. Then they turned again
to slaughter Zeus’s daughter. But Helen
had vanished from the room — and from the house —
O Zeus, and earth, and light, and darkness —
either by poisonings or skills of the Magians (magoi)
or god’s deceit! What happened after that
I’ve no idea. Just like a fugitive,
my legs crept from the house. So Menelaos, [1500]
after going through such painful, painful toil,
got his wife Helen out of Troy in vain.
[Orestes enters from the house.]
CHORUS LEADER: Look how one strange sight succeeds another!
I see Orestes, sword in hand, coming here,
before the palace — his pace is nervous.
ORESTES: Where’s that man who ran out of the house,
to escape my sword?
PHRYGIAN [throwing himself on the ground]:
I bow to you, my lord,
making obeisance, as is the habit
of we barbarians.
ORESTES: We’re not in Troy.
We’re in the land of Argos.
PHRYGIAN: But everywhere
life is more welcome to wise men than death.
ORESTES: Those shouts you made — you weren’t calling out [1510]
for Menelaos to bring up help, were you?
PHRYGIAN: No, no. I was helping you, the worthier man.
ORESTES: So it was just for Tyndareus’ daughter
to be put to death?
PHRYGIAN: It was most just,
even if she had three throats to slit.
ORESTES: Your cowardice makes your tongue delightful —
that’s not what you think inside.
PHRYGIAN: That’s not true.
Was she not the one who wiped out Greece
and Phrygians, too?
ORESTES: Swear you’re not just saying this
to humour me — or else I’ll kill you.
PHRYGIAN: I swear it on my life — an oath I’ll keep.
ORESTES [holding up his sword]: Were all the Phrygians at Troy afraid
of iron, the way you are?
PHRYGIAN: That sword of yours,
put it away. When it’s so close to me
it has a dreadful glint of murder.
ORESTES: Are you afraid you’ll turn to stone, as if [1520]
you’d seen a Gorgon?
PHRYGIAN: No, not to a stone,
but to a corpse. I don’t know anything
about the Gorgon’s head.
ORESTES: You’re just a slave.
Do you fear Hades, which will release you
from your troubles?
PHRYGIAN: Every man, slave or not,
is glad to look upon the light of day.
ORESTES: Well said. Your shrewd mind is your salvation.
Go inside the house.
PHRYGIAN: You won’t kill me?
ORESTES: You’re free to go.
PHRYGIAN: That’s beautiful, what you just said.
ORESTES: But I am about to reconsider.
PHRYGIAN: Now your words are not so nice.
ORESTES: You fool!
Do you think I could stand to stain your neck,
make it bloody? You weren’t born a woman
and don’t belong with men. I left the house
to stop you making such a noise. Argos [1530]
is quick to action once it hears the call.
But still I’m not afraid of matching swords
with Menelaos. Let him come — the man
who’s so proud of that golden hair of his
reaching to his shoulders. If he gathers
Argives up and leads them to the palace,
seeking to avenge the death of Helen,
and will not rescue me and my sister
and Pylades, who worked with me in this,
he’ll see two dead, his daughter and his wife.
[Orestes enters the palace. The Phrygian leaves.]
CHORUS [different parts speak different sections]:
Alas, alas, how things fall out!
Another struggle — once more the house
is plunged into another fearful round
afflicting the family of Atreus!
What do we do? Tell the news in town?
Or stay quiet? That’s the safer course, my friends. [1540]
Look there, in front of the palace.
Look! That smoke rushing up to heaven
is telling its own public story.
They’re lighting torches — they’re going to fire
the house of Tantalus! They won’t stop killing!
God determines how things end for mortal men,
whatever end he wishes.
Those demons of revenge have mighty power.
The house has fallen — fallen through blood,
thanks to Myrtilus tumbling from his chariot.
CHORUS LEADER: But look! I see Menelaos coming —
he’s near the house and moving quickly.
He must have heard what’s happening here. [1550]
You descendants of Atreus in there,
hurry now to close and bolt the doors.
A man who’s had success is dangerous
for those whose situation is not good —
that means men like you, Orestes.
[Menelaos enters with an armed escort.]
. . . [omitted remainder of play].
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Source of translation: Ian Johnston 2010, public domain (link).