26 Ernest Heinrich Klotsche 



TurmoIHng all, that we, foreknowing nought, 

 May worship them." 



Prayers to the dead are of frequent occurrence in Euripides. 

 Achilles' son attempts to propitiate his father's ghost by sacrifice 

 and prayer and all the host joined in that prayer: 



Hec. 534 ff-: 



o) Trat IlrjXecos, irarr^p 6' e/zos, 

 hk^aL xods ixov rdade k. t. X. 



"Son of Peleus, father mine. 

 Accept from me these drops propitiatory, 

 Ghost-raising. Draw thou nigh to drink pure blood 

 Dark-welling from a maid. We give it thee, 

 The host and I. Gracious to us be thou; etc." 



Invocations of the dead presuppose that the departed soul, 

 though beneath the earth, still has the semblance of existence and 

 the power of hearing. In this case the spirit of the dead was not 

 only thought to be propitiated by the sacrifice, but actually to 

 taste it. 



Polymestor having obtained an oracle from the Thracian seer 

 Dionysus foretells to Hecuba that she shall die by a fall from a 

 mast after having been changed into the canine species, and to 

 Agamemnon that he will die by the hand of his wife : 



Hec.- 1261 ff . : 



KpiixpT] fxiv ovv irecrovcrav e/c KafiXV^'i-^v k. t. X. 

 " Nay, but shall whelm thee fallen from the mast. 



Yea — slay him too, upswinging high the axe." 



5. The Andromache 



The " Andromache " was not acted at Athens in the author's 

 life-time. Its plot belongs to the same division of the Trojan 

 affairs as the "Hecuba" and the "Troades," viz., the fortune 

 of the captives after the destruction of their city. The "An- 

 dromache " is by no means one of the best plays of Euripides. It 

 also contributes only a few examples to our discussion, but those 

 few are characteristic of the poet's handling the supernatural 

 element. 



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