EURIPIDES 



3OO9 



EUROPA POINT 



Euripides, 

 Greek dramatist 



From a bust 



indicated by a single step, longer 

 or shorter notes being shown by a 

 step with one foot and movements 

 with the other. The various exer- 

 cises relate to rates and changes of 

 speed, dynamic expression, synco- 

 pation, phrasing, etc., and are 

 made by both arms and legs. There 

 is a School of Dalcroze Eurhyth- 

 mies in London. See Dalcroze. 



Euripides (480-406 B.C.). Athe- 

 nian tragic dramatist. According 

 to tradition, he was born on the 

 island of Sala- 

 mis on the day 

 of the great 

 naval victory 

 over the Per- 

 sians. A pupil 

 of the famous 

 sophist Prodi - 

 cus, he seems 

 to have been at 

 first intended 

 for a profes- 

 sional athlete, 

 and secondly, 

 for a painter, 

 but soon took 

 to writing for the stage. In 455 B.C. 

 he exhibited his first tragedy, and 

 in 441 gained the first prize for the 

 first time. He was credited with 

 over 90 plays in all, of which 18 

 survive. He gained the first prize 

 only five times, his contemporaries 

 apparently regarding him as in- 

 ferior to both Aeschylus and So- 

 phocles and other dramatists. His 

 vogue increased, however, after 

 his death, and though never the 

 favourite of the critics, he has been 

 the favourite dramatist of many of 

 the world's poets, notably Virgil, 

 Horace, and Milton. 



Euripides is undoubtedly a 

 master in the handling of the tender 

 and the pathetic ; Aristotle truly 

 called him " the most tragic " of 

 the poets. A reputed misogynist, 

 he has yet portrayed women as 

 fine as any to be found in all 

 literature. As a playwright also 

 Euripides ""stands high ; there 

 is an excitement about his plots 

 and a vividness in his situations, 

 although they sometimes verge on 

 the ridiculous, which are lacking in 

 the plays of Aeschylus and Sopho- 

 cles. Euripides is, in fact, the most 

 human of the three dramatists, 

 and this quality of humanity 



accounts for his Drama; Tragedy, 

 greater popularity deez. 

 in subsequent ages. Bibliography. 

 Among the blem- 

 ishes of his art may 

 be mentioned his 

 artificial prologues 

 and his too fre- 

 quent use of the 

 deus ex machina 



' -.' y 



or " . y^^ """"'"^ 



Eurhythmies. Two attitudes in a plastic exercise 

 in the rhythmic method o! training 



(q.v.) or divine intervention in 

 unravelling a plot. 



The extant plays of Euripides 

 are : Alcestis, Medea, Hippolytus, 

 Hecuba, Andromache, Ion, The 

 Suppliants, Heracleidae, The Mad 

 Heracles, Iphigenia among the 

 Tauri, The Trojan Women, Helen, 

 The Phoenician Maidens, Electra, 

 Orestes, Iphigenia at Aulis, Bac- 

 chae,Cyclops, the last being the only 

 extant specimen of a satyric 

 drama. The Rhesus is certainly 

 spurious. Of the plays perhaps the 

 best are Alcestis, notable for its 

 exquisite delineation of woman's 

 devotion ; Hippolytus, the tragic 

 story of the illicit love of Phaedra, 

 a plot used by Racine in his 

 Phedre ; and Bacchae, a brilliant 

 glorification of the worship of 

 Dionysus or Bacchus. The plots of 

 Euripides were all drawn from the 

 old mythology, yet the characters 

 are not cast in heroic mould, but 

 act and talk like Athenian men 

 and women of his time. Euripides 

 was accused by his 

 contemporaries of 

 endeavouring t o 

 undermine faith 

 in the gods and in 

 morality, and for 

 this supposed 

 tendency, as well 

 as for his alleged 

 bad art, he was 

 bitterly attacked 

 by Aristophanes. 

 The last few years 

 of his life were 

 spent at the court 

 of King Archelaus 

 in Macedonia, 

 where he died, 

 406B.C. See Greek Europa. The story of Europa depicted by Paolo Veronese 



Li teratUte, Dogt't Palace. Venice 



X 4 



Pron. U-ripi- 



John McBain 

 The most useful 

 edition of the text, with notes, is 

 that of F. A. Paley, 1857-60. There 

 is an excellent verse translation, 

 with parallel text, by A. S. Way, 

 4 vols., 1912 ; and there are spirited 

 renderings of individual plays by 

 Prof. Gilbert Murray ; consult also 

 Euripides : an account of his Life 

 and Works, J. P. 

 Mahaffy, 1878 ; Eu- 

 ripides the Ration- 

 alist, A. W. Verrall, 

 1895; Euripides 

 and His Age, Gil- 

 bert Murray, 1913. 

 Euripus ( G r . 

 euripos). General 

 name for a narrow 

 channel, specially 

 applied to the strait 

 between the island 

 of Euboea and the 

 mainland. See 

 Chalcis. 



Euroclydon(Gr. 

 Euros, east wind ; 

 klydon, wave). Name given in 

 Acts xxvii. 14, A.V., to the gale 

 which, blowing off Crete, seized the 

 ship in which S. Paul was wrecked 

 on the coast of Malta. The form 

 adopted in the R.V. is Euraquilo, 

 meaning a tempestuous N.E. or 

 E.N.E. wind of the Mediterranean. 

 Europa. In Greek mythology, 

 daughter of Agenor, king of Phoe- 

 nicia. While she was playing one 

 day with her maidens, Zeus ap- 

 peared in the form of a white bull, 

 and Europa was induced to mount 

 on the animal's back. The bull 

 thereupon carried her off over the 

 sea to Crete, where by Zeus she 

 became the mother of Minos, 

 Rhadamanthus, and Sarpedon. 



Europa Point. Headland at the 

 extremity of the peninsula of Gib- 

 raltar, Spain, just S.E. of Europa 

 Bay. To the N.W. is Little Europa 

 Point and to the E. Great Europa 

 Point. Europa Bay is a small cir- 

 cular inlet in the S.W. coast of the 

 peninsula just S. of Shingle Point. 



