298 H. B. Wright, 



suspiciously like the ly.y.vy.'kmia of tragedy. Surely this excessive 

 lamentation and the problematic wagon adapt themselves much 

 better to actors on the stage whom the conventionalities of the 

 drama allow to express in words and by mechanical devices those 

 feelings and actions which in actual life are for the most part 

 suppressed — than to blood-stained warriors on the field of battle. 



The first question which presents itself is whether there is evi- 

 dence of any lost tragedy by Aeschylus which could have com- 

 memorated the cavalry-battle. We naturally turn at once to the 

 tetralogy of which the Persians is the central drama. According 

 to the hypothesis this tetralogy consisted of three tragedies, the 

 Phincus, Persians and Glaucus,'^ with the Prometheus as satyr-play. 

 Of these the Persians is preserved entire. Only scattered fragments 

 of the other three remain. 



Is there a unity of theme running through this tetralogy, as is 

 the case in the Oresteia, and if so how is the Glanciis to Idc related 

 to the whole? Over this point probably as much controversy has 

 been waged as on any problem relating to Aeschylus, for its 

 solution carries with it the solution of another most fundamental 

 problem — whether all of Aeschylus' plays were grouped in unified 

 tetralogies 2. After nearly a century of heated discussion there now 

 seems to be fair unanimity of opinion among those who would see 

 some connection among the dramas — (a) that the Phineus, a sort 

 of prophetic prelude to the Persian wars, dealing with the first of 

 the clashes between the Greek and the Barbarian — the rescue of 

 King Phineus from the Harpies by the Greeks of the Argonautic 

 expedition— contained the prophecy of the overthrow of the Persians 

 in the campaign of Xerxes, and that it is this prophecy which is 

 alluded to but not further amplified (because it had been discussed 

 in the Phineus^ by Darius in the Persians ^ ; (b) that the Persians, 

 which is concerned with the victory of Salamis and the retreat ol 

 Xerxes himself, the great Athenian accomplishment of the war, 

 fulfils only part of this prophecy ; (c) and that the Prometheus 

 Purcaeus, the closing satyr-drama, must have referred in some wa}' 



^ It was Professor Hermann of Leipzig who first rescued the Glannis 

 Potiiicns^ now by common consent recognized as the third play of tliis 

 tetralogy, from the oblivion into -which Casaubon had cast it. The 

 position ■which he maintained regarding the drama against overwhelming- 

 opposition seems to have fully justified itself (Opus, ii, 59). 



- The Persians is probably the oldest of the extant plays. Unity of 

 theme proved here would go far to establish unity of theme throughout. 



» vv. 739-741. 800 ff. 



