Department of the Classics, Harvard University

The Oracles of Sophocles' "Trachiniae": Convergence or Confusion?

Author(s): Charles Segal
Source: Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, Vol. 100 (2000), pp. 151-171
Published by: Department of the Classics, Harvard University
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THE ORACLES OF SOPHOCLES' TRACHINIAE:
CONVERGENCE OR CONFUSION? *
CHARLES SEGAL
1. THE ORACLES
O
VER
eighty years ago
Tycho
von Wilamowitz
incisively
laid out
the
problems surrounding
the oracles in what is often
regarded
as
Sophocles'
most
puzzling
extant
play.'
From
beginning
to end the
play
is dominated
by
oracles,
but we are never told
precisely
how
they
fit
together.
The
problem begins
in the
prologue.
Deianeira is anxious
about Heracles's absence for fifteen
months,
"no small time"
(Xp6vo;),
and then
immediately
refers to a tablet in close
proximity
to some "ter-
rible woe"
(43-48):
oaS'bv
5'
v
io
a8i9ai
tg t
nfii
' FXovt6
vtv
Xp6vov y7p
oi
I30at6v, 1&XX' ijrl
eca
7t
,
va
"XxPi )g a,ot; ncv't' ni Kpu:'OS ,tV1t. 45
Ka(ot~tv "t
8Etvo)v
cijt'a"
"ota'Ut7lV 69tot
8AXov xtn(uv
,o(TtXs"
tlv
syo
Oag
t
Osoi; &pji(at
inrltovfi
L
aftp Xap v.2
*
I have
profited from the comments of the Boston
University Group
in
Religion
and
Mythology,
where I
presented
a version of this
paper
on
Sept.
24, 1999,
especially Jeffrey
Henderson,
Stephen Scully,
and Steven
Esposito.
1
Tycho
von
Wilamowitz,
Die dramatische Technik des
Sophokles, Philologische
Untersuchungen
22
(Berlin 1917)
116-133
(henceforth
cited as
Tycho).
For Trach. as
"the most
puzzling
of our seven
plays"
see F. J. H.
Letters,
The
Life
and Work
of Sopho-
cles (London
and New York
1953)
176. For a
survey
of other views of the
play
see
C.
Segal, Sophocles' Tragic
World
(Cambridge,
Mass.
1995)
27
(henceforth
cited as
Segal, Tragic World).
For a careful examination of the
supposed
discontinuities of the
oracles in the course of the action see Albert
Machin,
Cohdrence
et
continuitd
dans la
tragddie
de
Sophocle (Paris 1980)
151-162.
2 The
apparent inconsistency
of these lines with the oracles elsewhere
(pointed
out in
detail
by Tycho 122-125)
has led to
attempts
at
deletion,
most
recently by
M. D.
Reeve,
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152 Charles
Segal
Acting
on the Nurse's
suggestion,
she summons
Hyllus,
who adds
two
pieces
of information:
first,
Heracles's enslavement to
Omphale
for
the
past year, literally
the
"past plowing
season"
(rbv
rnapEX06vr'
aporov, 69); then,
in
response
to Deianeira's
question
whether Hera-
cles
is "alive or
dead,"
the rumor that he has
pillaged
the "Euboean
land,
Eurytus' city,
or is about to"
(74-75).
At this
point
Deianeira
makes the first
explicit
mention of oracles in the
play. Picking up Hyl-
lus'
allusion to
Euboea,
she recalls the
"trustworthy
oracles about this
place"
that Heracles had left her
(jtavrta
Intat
tijocE tif X( 4pa;
nept,
77)-an anticipation,
in a much less dramatic
mood,
of
Oedipus'
recognition
of a critical
place
in OT 726-745. She does not
specify
the
form in which Heracles "left" this oracle
(h7ltns,
76),
but
presumably
it was in the form of the tablet of line 47 that he "left"
(86kxov
Xtnuv).
Line 77 introduces the first serious
problem
of the oracles. The
manuscripts
all read
Xcdpa;;
but editors often
print
Hense's
conjecture,
Xpdag;
(a favorite word of Sophocles), on the grounds that "we
hardly
expect
mention of the oracle about Euboea."3 But the name of this
"place,"
Euboea
(74),
soon becomes all too
familiar,
for it returns at
significant
moments
throughout
the
play
(237, 301, 752, 788).
Particu-
larly significant
are the two
messages
from Cenaeum announced on the
stage,
first Lichas' announcement of Heracles'
victory-offerings
at
Cenaeum on the "Euboean shore" and then
Hyllus'
horrific account of
Heracles' sacrifice there later:
ooojio
EXrl 9' yicapna Krlvatq At( (237-238)
acurj rt;
ag(cpickXXo;o
E'AU"o(c apov
Kijvat6v FoTtv,
9Iv0a xnap(co
Ati
ipoiont;o
6pi5st
..
(752-754).
The verbal echoes make clear that all the
joy
of that first
message
from
"Some
Interpolations
in
Sophocles,"
GRBS 11
(1970)
283-286. For a
good
defense see
Malcolm Davies
ed.,
Sophocles,
Trachiniae
(Oxford 1991)
ad
loc.
I cite the
play
from the
Oxford text of
Hugh Lloyd-Jones
and
Nigel
Wilson, Sophocles,
Fabulae
(Oxford 1990),
with a few minor
departures.
3 So
Hugh Lloyd-Jones
and
Nigel
Wilson, Sophoclea (Oxford 1990) 151;
similarly
Davies
(above,
n.
2)
ad
loc.
P. E.
Easterling
ed., Sophocles,
Trachiniae
(Cambridge 1982)
ad
loc.
retains the mss.
reading, rightly
in
my opinion.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 153
Cenaeum is now reversed. The use of the demonstrative in
77,
further-
more,
helps
confirm the
validity
of the
manuscript reading,
for "trust-
worthy
oracles about this
place"
in 77 makes
perfect
sense if it refers
back to the "Euboean
place"
that
Hyllus
had first mentioned four lines
earlier
(Ei'poi8a xOpav, 74).
The
"place"
of
77,
to be
sure,
is still
obscure at this
point;
but the
unanticipated
mention of such a detail in a
prophecy,
as we shall
see,
is
fully
in
keeping
with
Sophocles'
dramatic
use of oracular information.
Deianeira,
in the
prologue, goes
on to describe this Euboean venture
as the critical labor or trial
(&OXov)
for either "the end of
(Heracles')
life"
or "a
happy
lifetime"
(79-83):
xhEfxliv
to?I Pioi
giLxEt
tEhEv, /
x
...
toyV Xotn6V ir Piotov
E*ioV)' F~Etv. Tycho
observed
the
difficulty
of
reconciling
this oracle with
Deianeira's
full statement
of the oracle from Dodona that she tells to the
chorus,
soon after the
parodos (155-174).4
Here too she mentions a tablet from Heracles
("an
old tablet inscribed with
signs,"
naxat&v
&8Xrov
'yyeypaIvivrl
/
Sv-
0ijCaa,
157-158)
in which he recorded the
prophecy
from the
talking
oak at Dodona
(164-168):
...
Xp6vov
npozdaq,
4;
tpinrlvo; ivirxa
Bt
pan
th&iei
t
cavtaio to;
pte hr, 165
TOT' 1 0avetv Xpe&r7
apE
to6e "t
xp6v ,
i
toi0'
nenK68pat6vxta
xoI Xp6vol teXo;
This oracle foretold either his death or a
painless
life after a
period
of
fifteen months of absence from home but it
says nothing
about the
place.5 Despite
Tycho's
doubts, the combination of the tablet and the
fifteen months links this oracle
unmistakably
to the
prologue (44-47).
Between the two allusions to this oracle, however, a dramatic
progres-
sion has
occurred,
for the issue of
"time,"
mentioned
by
Deianeira in 44
("no
small
time")
has become more critical. Heracles had
"appointed
the time"
(Xp6vov cnpotdga;,
164)
of fifteen months for his death or
happy
life,
and "this time" has now arrived
(t(6e
x(
Xp6vM,
166).6
4
Tycho
122.
5
The reference to the
place
in
165,
Xcbpaq &drcll K&dvtwaito; I
P
qeO,
perhaps
estab-
lishes a
vague
link with the
"place"
that
Deianeira
mentioned in the
prologue (77),
but the
"place"
here is her home in
Trachis,
not Euboea.
6
Xp6vo;
is a recurrent and
important
theme in the
play;
the word occurs 18 times: see
Segal, Tragic
World 30-32.
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154 Charles
Segal
This
oracle,
in its two
divergent
forms,
comes from Heracles. From
him too will come
another,
different oracle. Near the end of the
play
he
recalls an "old" oracle from his father Zeus that no
living thing
could
kill him. Now he understands the
meaning
of this
oracle,
his death from
the dead
Centaur, Nessus;
and he
goes
on to combine this
prophecy
with the "new" oracle that he "wrote down" from the Selloi that
stipu-
lated "the
living
and now
present
time" as the moment of his "release
from the toils that had been set
upon
him"
(1164-1171):
(Pavo) 5' y&,
0rorotat
ot$lpavovT'
'i'a
jiave(ta icatva,
Tol
t;
lXat ovrijyopa,
1165
&
t(iv O6p&iv
1aci XaCgat1otT(Ov Sy&)
EXXX
v
9axovxo;
Fv yooS
(opaVOtCwlv
7pE;
-Onj;

azp(,;
cnai
ioXiyXdoaaoT
5pi6;,
ii got
Xp6vO
ro
(~ivnt
Icai
niap6vrt
viv
cpaoncT
ioxOO&w 'r
t&
o
PTAT(orcov
goit
1170
Xi(atv t
Twoeat
...
In these "new
oracles,"
as in Deianeira's oracle about the fifteen
months,
time rather than
place
or
agent
is the decisive factor. Not
only
does Heracles here add to the oracular information
circulating
about his
life,
but he
completes
the dramatic
progression
involved in the "time"
of its
fulfillment,
for he
recognizes
this moment as "the
present
and liv-
ing
time" of its realization.7
All
previous reports
of this oracle have
been second-hand. Now for the first time we hear it in the first
person,
from the mouth of the man who received it and who will suffer what it
has foretold.8
7
The combination of "old" and "new" in 1165 also underlines the
importance
of
time;
and
"old," naikat,
cnaxat6g,
is another recurrent theme in the
play.
J. C.
Kamerbeek,
The
Plays of Sophocles,
Part
2,
The Trachiniae
(Leiden 1959)
76
f.,
also notes the
parallels
between
Hyllus' mentioning
the name of the
place
to
Deianeira
in the
prologue
and the
name of Nessus to Heracles in the exodos
(1141).
E.-R.
Schwinge,
Die
Stellung
der
Trachinierinnen im Werk des
Sophokles, Hypomnemata
1
(G6ttingen
1962) 103,
on the
other
hand,
finds Heracles' new oracle at the end undramatic and
unintegrated
with the
rest of the
play
and therefore an indication of
early
date. Karl
Reinhardt, Sophocles3
(1947),
trans. H. and D.
Harvey (Oxford 1979)
61-62
suggests
that this
recognition
of an
oracle is in the vein of
story-telling
rather than in a
fully
dramatic
mode,
citing
a
parallel
with the
story
of
Cambyses
in Hdt. 3.64.
P.
E.
Easterling,
"The End of the
Trachiniae,"
ICS 6
(1981) 57-58,
rightly points
out that Heracles' oracle at the end
brings completion
in what is
essentially
a
play
about the nostos of this hero.
8 See Segal, Tragic World 50.
Comparable too,
though
on a different scale and with a
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 155
To add to the
complications,
the
play
has one other oracle. In the
third
stasimon,
just
after
Hyllus reports
the horrible effects of the
poi-
soned robe at
Cenaeum,
the chorus refers to an oracle that
spoke
of the
"twelfth
plowing
season" as the time for Heracles to find relief from his
toils,
an oracle which
they
now
interpret
to mean his death
(821-840).
Tycho brought
some order into this embarassment of oracular riches
by pointing
out that
Hyllus'
two
pieces
of information in the
prologue
are
chronologically congruent:
Heracles'
year
of service to
Omphale
plus
three months
attacking Eurytus' city
of Oechalia make
up
the fif-
teen months of his ominous absence.9 That
figure
of a
year,
however,
will recur later in the
play,
when the
chorus,
in the second
stasimon,
joyful
at the
prospect
of Heracles'
return,
recounts their twelve-month
wait for the hero
(8oKat8id1crlvov
&aggivoimat
Xpvov, 647-649),
whom
they
now
regard
as "released," thanks to
Ares,
from his
"days
of
toil"
(viv 8'
"Apri;
oiaprl0i
15~o'
Yintnc6vo)v
FiEp6v,
653-654).10
This
hope approximates
an
interpretation
of
oracles,
particularly
in the
reference to the twelve months and the "release from toils"
(cf. 825,
1170, 1173). But,
as we shall
see,
the third stasimon soon dashes these
hopes
to the
ground.11
Noting
the inconsistencies
among
these
oracles,
Tycho
concluded
that
Sophocles' principal
aim in the
prologue
is to motivate
Deianeira's
anxiety
and to set
up
the
present
mood of crisis.
Sophocles,
he
argues,
withholds mention of Dodona in the
prologue
so that Deianeira can
save that crucial
part
of the oracular material for her
dialogue
with the
chorus in 153-177.12 At that
point
the oracle enters into the
shifting
movements between
hope
and disaster that are characteristic of
Sopho-
cles' use of oracles in
general. Tycho
is
right
as far as he
goes,
but we
need not
accept
his view that
Sophocles
is
willing
to
purchase
an
different dramatic
effect,
is the contrast in OT between Jocasta's
report
of the oracle to
Laius (711-712),
received at second
hand,
and
Oedipus' first-person
account of
going
to
Delphi
and
receiving
his
oracle
directly
from the
god (787-793).
9
Tycho
130;
see also
Walther Kranz,
"Aufbau und Gehalt der Trachinierinnen des
Sophokles" (1921),
in his Studien
zur
antiken Literatur und ihrem Nachwirken: Kleine
Schriften,
ed. Ernst
Vogt (Heidelberg 1967)
288.
10
On the ironies of the "release" here see
Segal, Tragic
World
38;
also
50-51.
11
The second stasimon exhibits the
Sophoclean
device of a
hopeful interpretation
of
events
by
the chorus
just
as the disaster is about to break:
cf. Ajax
693-718 and OT
1086-1109.
12
Tycho 131-133.
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156 Charles
Segal
immediate dramatic effect in an individual scene at the
price
of incon-
sistencies and contradictions in the details of his
plot.
Even within the limits of
Tycho's analysis
Deianeira's first mention
of the oracle reveals its
importance
for the overall
design
of the
play,
for it
energizes Hyllus
to his role as the bearer of
messages
and narra-
tives between Deianeira and Heracles
(86-91)--a
role that defines his
tragic
situation in the
play.
In that role he soon
joins
the chorus in their
parallel attempt
to soothe Deianeia's fears
(88-89;
cf.
136-140,
178-179, 723-728).
Both his and the
chorus'
optimism,
of
course,
proves
to be
misplaced.
Sophocles
often introduces new oracles late in a
play (as
in
Ajax
748-761)
or allows different versions of oracles to interact until
they
add
up
to a coherent whole. But the aim of this device is
not,
as
Tycho
thought,
to
gain
the maximum immediate
impact
from the individual
scene,
but rather to
depict
a
gradually unfolding meaning
and concur-
rently
to show the mortal
characters'
dawning recognition
of a
tragic
pattern
that is
becoming
clear in their lives. To this
end,
as is now
widely recognized, Sophocles gradually
reveals different
aspects
of
critical oracles or lets them
appear
in different
perspectives.13
In the
case of the
Ajax,
for
example,
as has often been
observed,
the
report
of
Calchas'
oracle about the fateful
single day
not
only
creates dramatic
tension but also shows the interconnection between a
divinely
foreseen
outcome and a life
pattern
that character has
stamped
with a recurrent
mode of behavior
(see Ajax 763-780): i~Oo
d;&v0pc'no 6ao
ov.
In other
words,
the
converging
oracles reveal the
shape
that a human life will
eventually
have and in fact has had all
along
in the
all-seeing
vision of
the
gods.
The obverse of this idea
appears
in Deianeira's
opening
state-
ment,
but from the
point
of view of the limited vision of mortals
(1-3):
"There is an ancient
saying,
revealed
among
humankind,
that
you
13
See, e.g., Kranz
(above,
n.
9) 285-288; Schwinge (above,
n.
7) 93-103;
Hugh
Lloyd-Jones, "Tycho
von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff on the Dramatic
Technique
of
Sophocles," CQ
22
(1972) 222;
Davies
(above,
n.
2)
ad 43
ff.,
on
Sophocles' "masterly
revelation of details as and when
appropriate";
and,
following Schwinge (above,
n.
7)
103-104,
he notes the
similarity
of this
"progressive
revelation of the truth" to Homer's
use of the
prophecies
around Achilles' death in the Iliad.
Schwinge
104, however,
also
points
out the
important
difference between the relative
clarity, objectivity,
and directness
of the Iliadic
prophecies
and the relative
obscurity
and
complexity
of those in Trach. See
also G. M.
Kirkwood,
A
Study of Sophoclean
Drama,
Cornell Studies in Class. Philol. 21
(Ithaca, N.Y. 1958) 72-82;
T. B. L.
Webster,
An Introduction to
Sophocles (Oxford 1936)
21-23;
R. B.
Rutherford,
"Tragic
Form and
Feeling
in the
Iliad,"
JHS 102
(1982)
148.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 157
would not
fully
understand the
quality
of life
(aithv)
of
mortals,
whether
good
or
bad,
until one has met his death."
In
Oedipus Tyrannus, Sophocles'
most
carefully
constructed oracu-
lar
play,
the initial oracle that Thebes must "drive out the
land's
pollu-
tion,"
the oracle to Laius and Jocasta that their child will kill its
father,
and the oracle
given
to
Oedipus
at
Delphi,
that he will
marry
his mother
and kill his father
(in
that
order),
all add
up
to a coherent
pattern
that
the two main
protagonists finally grasp
with the horrendous
recognition
that
gives
the
play
its
incomparable power.
In the
Philoctetes,
another
play
of
highly
controversial
oracles,
there is an
apparent
contradiction
between whether the
prophecy
means that the man or the
bow,
or
both,
must
go
to
Troy;
but as the
play goes
on we see that the different inter-
pretations
of the oracle reflect fundamental differences in
outlook,
particularly
between
Odysseus
and
Neoptolemus.
In a tense dramatic
progression, Neoptolemus'
nobler and more
generous
view is ulti-
mately proven
correct.
In the Coloneus
Oedipus'
initial
knowledge
of an oracle that the
Eumenides'
grove
is to be his ultimate
place
of rest
(46, 84-110)
com-
bines with various oracles that his
presence,
whether he is alive or
dead,
will be a source of
blessings
or curses
(390-409, 1331-1332).
These
contrasting
oracles then come
together
at the end when
Oedipus
curses
his sons on the one hand
(1370-1396)
and instructs Theseus in the
future
blessings
that his tomb will
bring
to Athens on the other hand
(1518-1534;
cf.
603-628).
At this
point Oedipus
himself
possesses
oracular
authority,
for he
speaks
like a
prophet
(sO~tenrovTa,
1516)
and
is shown in fact to have
predicted
the numinous
signs
of the
gods'
call
to him
(cf.
94 f. and
1605-1612).
The Trachiniae resembles both the
Tyrannus
and the Coloneus in the
way
in which the different oracles
converge
to reveal the final
shape
of
a mortal life in the divine
plan;
but Trachiniae is closer to the
Philoctetes in that the oracles are unclear and
ambiguous
and are
revealed in their true
meaning only
at the end.14 The
vagueness
and
obscurity
of these different oracles are calculated to set off the effect of
14
On the other
hand,
as Machin
(above,
n.
1)
151
points
out,
the essential
unity
of the
oracles of OT and Phil. contrasts with the
ambiguous plurality
of the oracles of Trach. On
the oracles of Phil.
see,
for
example,
C. H.
Whitman, Sophocles:
A
Study of
Heroic
Humanism
(Cambridge,
Mass.
1951) 183-185;
Kirkwood
(above,
n.
13) 79-81;
D. B.
Robinson,
"Topics
in
Sophocles'
Philoctetes," CQ
19
(1969) 45-51;
further
bibliography
in
Segal, Tragic
World 241 n. 22.
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158 Charles
Segal
an ultimate
convergence
in Heracles' flash of
tragic understanding
that
brings together
the "old" and the "new"
prophecies.
In order to
gain
this effect of
convergence, Sophocles deliberately
blurs the relation
among
the various oracles.
To sum
up
thus
far,
there are five oracular statements in the
Trachiniae;
and
Sophocles
leaves it
vague exactly
how
they
relate to
one another:
1. a
prophecy,
written on a tablet
(47),
mentioned
by
Deianeira in
the
prologue
that involves "some terrible woe"
(46)
after Hera-
cles' absence for fifteen months.
2. An oracle
(the
same as
1)
that
specifies
the
"place" (77),
i.e.
Euboea,
as the critical element in Heracles' future
(death
or a
happy life).
3. Deianeira's full
statement,
made to the Trachinian Maidens in
154-174,
of what seems to be the same
prophecy.
Here she harks
back to the tablet and the "fifteen months" of the
prologue
(164-165
and
44-45),
but adds its
provenience
from Dodona and
specifically
mentions "death"
(167)
and not
just
the "end of life"
(cf.
79-81 and
167-168).
4. The
chorus,
in the third
stasimon,
to which we shall
presently
turn,
refers to a similar
disjunctive
oracle,
but
places
it twelve
years
in the
past.
5. Heracles near the end combines the oracle from Dodona
(3)
with
an
"ancient"
oracle from Zeus that
nothing living
can kill him.
Some
interpreters
have tried to reduce all of these to two.
Tycho pro-
duced an elaborate
argument
for
identifying
the chorus' oracle
(4)
with
the one
given
to Heracles twelve
years ago
at Dodona. On
leaving
Deianeira Heracles
merely
"subtracted" the fifteen months from the
twelve
years during
which he
has,
presumably,
known this
oracle.'5
Jebb,
followed
by Schwinge, similarly
views items
1
through
4 as
merely
different
aspects
of the same
oracle.16
As we have
noted,
the
15
Tycho
127-128.
16
R. C. Jebb ed., Sophocles,
Part
5,
The Trachiniae
(Cambridge 1892), Introduction,
xli-xlii;
also on 44
f.
and 824
f;
Schwinge (above,
n.
7) 97;
H. D. F
Kitto, Poiesis,
Struc-
ture and
Thought,
Sather Classical Lectures 36
(Berkeley
and Los
Angeles 1966)
189.
Christina S.
Kraus,
"'Aryo
pv
eat'
a&pxa'o;':
Stories and
Story-telling
in
Sophocles'
Trachiniae,"
TAPA 121
(1991)
96
suggests
that the oracle
from
Zeus is the oldest
thing
in
the
play-a point
which would
perhaps
confirm the
Zeus-given pattern operating
in Hera-
cles'
life from its
beginning.
See also Kranz
(above,
n.
9)
288 and below,
n. 28.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae
159
play
invites us to
identify
1
through
3,
despite
their different
emphasis;
but the relation of 4 to the other oracles is never clarified.
Sophocles
has left its exact relation to the other oracles
vague,
and it is
probably
wrong
to
try
to reduce this to
chronological precision.
To a modem
audience,
and
particularly
to a rationalistic critic accus-
tomed to scrutinize the details of a written
text,
these differences
may
seem
confusing.
Yet their
very vagueness
has an
important
dramatic
effect: while not
eliminating
the
agent's
choice and
responsibility, they
show the lives of these
characters,
and
especially
Heracles,
surrounded
by
divine forces that are elusive and obscure to mortal
understanding.17
The
important thing
is that the oracles all do come
together
(auC1-
paivovra, 1164) or,
in
Sophocles'
other
metaphor, "speak together,"
4wuviyopa,
1165)
in that terrible
clarity
of the
ending
which Ezra
Pound tried to
express
in his
famous,
"It all
coheres."'8
Several features of the dramatic
progression
in these oracles are
sig-
nificant. Deianeira's fear that the Dodonan oracle
may
mean Heracles'
death
(166)
is so vivid that she often
leaps
out of her
sleep
terrified at
the
prospect
of
losing
her husband
(Kictrin6&v
igTh
/
p63py, c(ptat,
rap-
poikuav,
175-176).
This fear seems to be
dispelled by
the
Messenger's
news of Heracles'
arrival,
as the
Messenger eagerly
indicates
(Inpaoro;
a&yyXv
/
'icvou
a Xiaco,
180-181).
The
Messenger's
entrance seems
to endorse the
hopeful
answer to the alternative
meanings
of the
oracle,
much as the Corinthian
Messenger's
at OT 924 seems to
bring
a
posi-
tive answer to Jocasta's
anguished prayer.
The
Oedipus'
use of this
device is more
dramatic,
but the effect is
analogous.
In both cases a
messenger's apparent good
news
proves
to be the
catalyst
of disaster. In
17 For the oracles as the site of the revelation of a divine
plan
see C. M.
Bowra, Sopho-
clean
Tragedy (Oxford 1944) 148-154;
see also Kitto
(above,
n.
16) 190-191;
Machin
(above,
n.
1) 155-157,
who views the oracles in terms of
"stages
of an evolution that it is
possible
... to
distinguish
in the
presentation
of the fate of Heracles"
(155).
On the
importance
of oracles in the
religious thinking
of the Greeks in
general
see A. D.
Nock,
"Religious
Attitudes of the
Greeks,"
in his
Essays
on
Religion
in the Ancient
World,
ed.
Zeph
Stewart
(Cambridge,
Mass.
1972)
2.534-542.
18 The end of Ezra Pound's
Sophokles,
The Women
of
Trachis
(1954);
on
convergence
and coherence in
Trach.,
with
good
remarks on the
oracles,
see Adrian
Poole, Tragedy:
Shakespeare
and the Greek
Example (Oxford 1987) 54-56,
80-86. Note the
repetition
of
oapavovra
in 1164 ten lines later in
1174,
,aCmp'x
oCtpaip
vet.
Heracles'
4uvi(yopa
in 1165
may
also reflect back on the chorus'
dismay
when
Deianeira, by
her
silence,
"agrees
with" the
accusatory speech
of
Hyllus, just
before her exit
(814),
4jlvVlyOpEb;
oatyioa o icarloy6po,
with the remarkable
play
here on
"speaking
with" and
"speaking
against."
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160 Charles
Segal
Deianeira's
case,
his revelation of the truth about
Iole
not
only brings
the first of the
play's reinterpretations
of narratives about the
past
but
also
impels
Deianeira to the fatal use of Nessus'
gift (536-587).
Deianeira's account of her use of that
gift
in her next
speech gives
a
new
significance
to the tablets on which Heracles had written down his
oracle. The
play's
first two accounts of the oracle are linked
by
this
motif of the tablet. The
writing
down of the oracle is in itself a
striking
detail,
particularly given
the anachronism of a literate Heracles.19 The
importance
of
writing
is in fact
emphasized by
the contrast between the
somewhat
mysterious "signs"
or "tokens" that Heracles has inscribed
on his tablet
(157)
and the oral instructions that he
gave
Deianeira
about the
property (edne igv
...
eine
8c, 161-162).20
Heracles also
mentions
"writing
down" his Dodonan oracles at the end
(1167).
In the
middle of the
play,
however, Deianeira,
alarmed
by
the
unguent's
effects on her tuft of
wool,
recalls how how she
preserved
Nessus'
"teaching"
as if it were the indelible
writing
of a bronze tablet
(680-683):
~Y~O
y&p
jOv
6
00ip
t1
e
Kvtrapo;
novov
IXrt1p
Ov
IrClCPa
yXq)XLVi)vt
tpo1~)6lt&aao
napi^:Ca
EYO
OeWv o)&v, &XX'
8
aY6mtrlV,
aX"cL;i;
itc;o
&6ovtirtov
ec
&X-ro)
ypapijv.
The
play obviously exploits
the contrast between the domestic concerns
that
accompany
Deianeira's
inscription
from Heracles and the lust and
murderousness
lurking
behind the
mentally
"inscribed" instructions of
the Centaur. The one comes from
Zeus,
the other from a violent beast-
man;
the one
speaks
truth;
the other is
deceptive;
the one has to do with
safeguarding
the
household,
the other with
destroying
it.21
19
Sophocles may
have in mind
something
like the
aiijgata kueypd
scratched on the
folded tablets that Proitos
gives Bellerophon,
II.
6.167-170.
20
On this
point
see
Tycho
126.
21
On the significance of the tablets see
Easterling (above,
n.
7) 59;
C.
Segal, Tragedy
and Civilization: An
Interpretation of Sophocles (Cambridge, Mass., 1981)
93-94
(hence-
forth cited as
Segal, Civilization);
most
recently
Kirk
Ormand, Exchange
and the
Maiden:
Marriage
in
Sophoclean Tragedy (Austin 1999) 50-55,
who
relies, however,
on
a dubious connection between the letter delta
(to
be associated with the female
genitalia)
and
deltos,
tablet. A similar connection is
attempted by
Laurel
Bowman,
"Prophecy
and
Authority
in the
Trachiniai,"
AJP 120
(1999) 344-346,
with n.
14,
which
appeared
after
the
completion
of
my essay.
She also discusses the
writing
down of the oracle from Zeus
in terms of the authoritative voice behind
prophecy (339-340). Nevertheless,
the
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 161
Both the literal and the
metaphorical
tablets are
parallel
to the ora-
cles in
producing
the sense that we are
gradually working
our
way
back
to the remoter
past
in the lives of both of the
protagonists.
Heracles'
tablet takes us back fifteen months. The oracle of the third stasimon
takes us back twelve
years, presumably
to the
beginning
of Heracles'
labors. Deianeira's
metaphor
of the tablet in 683 takes us back to the
beginning
of the
marriage, perhaps
some
eighteen
to
twenty years
in
the
past (given
the
probable age
of
Hyllus).
Her narrative in the
pro-
logue (like
the first
stasimon)
takes us back to the contest between Her-
acles and Achelous that
immediately precedes
the
marriage.
Thus
we
follow both of these lives back to their remote
past;
and,
as we do
so,
we see a
pattern emerging
on the basis of new
information,
in
part
orac-
ular
information,
that
requires
us to reevaluate our
interpretation
of the
past-a
device characteristic of a
play
that is so much about narrative
and about
understanding
or
misunderstanding
narrative.22
Closely
related both to this
uncovering
of stories about the
past
and
to the oracles is the
interweaving
of
ignorance
and
truth,
illusion and
reality.
From the
prologue
on,
the oracles contribute to the
atmosphere
of illusion and
ignorance
in which these lives are embedded. Deianeira
initially
refers to the tablet and the crucial fifteen months' absence in
the context of "not
knowing"
where Heracles is
(ixevog
8'
6nov
/
t3irl-
iKEv
OIEi
oF6E, 40-41). Hyllus' report
of the oracle about Euboea
emerges
from a
dialogue
about
knowing,
"tales," "belief,"
and "hear-
say";
and the
repeated
indications of
uncertainty
here hammers in the
interlocutors' remoteness from "truth"
(67-78):
YA. &X' ot6a,
~v60ot0;
y' Ei't Uoreietvy
XpE'v.
AH.
iai tnoi3
c
tg
vtv, tinCvov, iSplao0at x0ov6;;
YA.
vr6r
v
inapeX06vr' aiporov
v
CifiEt
Xp6vov
metaphorical "writing"
of Nessus'
instructions,
precisely
because it is a
metaphor,
seems
to me to
belong
on a different level from the
writing
on Zeus'
tablets,
and the contrasts
between the two tablets seem to me more
important
than the
parallelism
that Bowman
alleges.
22 On this
gradual
revision of the
past
narratives see Kraus
(above,
n.
16) 75-98, pas-
sim,
especially
96. On the issue of misunderstood narrative see Ursula Parlavantza-
Friedrich,
Tdiuschungsszenen
in den
Tragbdien
des
Sophokles, Untersuchungen
zur
antiken Literatur und Geschichte 2
(Berlin 1969)
26-29 and
(with
considerable
exaggera-
tion)
Bruce
Heiden, Tragic
Rhetoric: An
Interpretation of Sophocles'
Trachiniae (New
York
1989) 44-79,
both on Lichas' narrative about the
past
events at
Oechalia.
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162 Charles
Segal
Av,~6 yVvatc'
qeaoi
vtv
Xdtptv Iovetv.
70
AH.
Crt`vov",o'
%zrl,
Ea
Iqot
Tt 9V.
YA.
hXX' p4
itai'rat oii y', UE
"
799
(9
.
AH.
itoi3 '8ra v6v &v ii
Oav, v
dryy(
brXat;
YA.
E439o~ta
X
pav paciv,
Eipurov
u
nt6tv,
IntoepaTeIetv aI)bv 1i
t,h)tV
1tt. 75
AH.
&p'
otoTa
Ifr',
T
riCVov,
)g XEhtn
~
got
gavzta
ytora IGio8ErI^J;
X(
zpa;
nt'pt;
YA. r
icnoia, ptIrEp; brov
6yov yyp
&yvow.
78
Deianeira's
verb,
&yyEDzXrat
in
73,
followed
by Hyllus' "they say"
and
his
uncertainty
about whether Heracles has
already
attacked Oechalia
or "is about to"
(74-75),
adds to the
atmosphere
of
uncertainty
and
ignorance. Hyllus
exits with the
promise
to "make
inquiry
about
the whole truth"
(90-91):
v6v
6'
;
Svvirltu',
ovi6i
v
XhXi
m
w
rtb Tgil
/
tav
nto0oIEto t
r
&v8'
&68,OEtav
rnpt.
Lichas' lies are
only gradu-
ally disentangled (cf. 449-454, 474),
and the truth
proves
disastrous as
Deianeira
reacts in a
way
that makes her the victim of the
deception
of
Nessus.
Everyone
in the
play
will remain
entangled
in lies and
decep-
tions,
until Heracles'
chilling cry brings
forth the
recognition
of "the
misfortune in which we stand"
(1143-1146).
The oracles
early
in the
play,
nevertheless,
offer clues to the truth
that will recur
throughout
the
play:
the definition of a limited
period
of
time
(xpdvog,
44, 69) conveyed through
the seasonal
metaphor
of the
agricultural year (diporo;, 69),
and the
disjunctive
formula,
"alive or
dead,"
"end of life or
happiness" (73, 79-81).
These
terms,
along
with
the numerals twelve and
fifteen,
recur
throughout
the
play
to
suggest
a
coherent
pattern underlying
all the discrete bits of information. When
Deianeira
explains
the oracle in its full form to the chorus in
154-174,
she
repeats
the
disjunctive
formula of the
prologue,
but also
anticipates
the darker outcome when she
reports
how Heracles in the
past
set off on
his tasks "as if to
accomplish something,
but not to
die"
(&)X' i6
nt
8pdico
EtpnE
oi'o Oavo6*Evog,
160).
That word
"die,"
Oavo'gEvog,
harks back to Deianeira's
question
of 73
(ntob
8fira
v6v
Uv i
Oav&v
dyy
kXrxat;)
and will color the oracle's
Oaveiy
a few lines later with
the hint of the actual outcome
(9 Oavetv
XPcirl aYpE
t&E
T
X
p6ovm,
166).23
There is
perhaps
a touch of
Sophocles'
celebrated
tragic irony
23
We may wonder whether
Sophocles'
audience
may
have heard a more somber and
ominous note in 73: not
just,
"Where then is he announced to
be, (whether) living
or
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 163
in the fact that her
simple request
for Heracles' whereabouts in 73
anticipates
the
disjunctive
"alive or dead" of the
oracle,
which does not
become
explicit
until the full statement of the oracle in the next scene
(r6r'
i~
Oaveiv
XpEil
...
/
i ...
o
9
otrtbv
...
fiv
..., 165-168).
The
third
stasimon,
as we shall
see,
moves us farther
along
on the
path
to
the fatal
meaning.
When
Heracles,
finally,
describes his oracles near the
end,
he will confirm the
meaning
"death"
(0avdiv,
1160, 1172).
What
Tycho
saw as
Sophocles' opportunistic
concern to
exploit
a local dra-
matic effect
proves
in fact to be
part
of a
carefully wrought sequence
of
individual facts and stories whose
progression
from
incongruity
to
order is an essential
component
of the
play's design.
2. THE THIRD STASIMON
The most notorious
among
the
problems
of the oracles is the
period
of twelve
years
mentioned in the third stasimon and nowhere else in the
play.
Jebb tried to reconcile the twelve
years
with the other
oracles,
but
even he had to
acknowledge
an
"inconsistency
of detail ... overlooked
by
the
poet" (ad
824
f.).
For S. M.
Adams,
this
inconsistency
was one
of the reasons for
thinking
the
play
not
by Sophocles.24
In this anoma-
lous
detail, however,
apparent
incoherence is revealed as
part
of a
larger
meaning. Interpreters
have not
fully perceived
the dramatic function of
this oracle because
they
have
insufficiently appreciated
the little word
dcpap,
"all of a
sudden,"
"all at once"-one of the
play's
favorite
words-at the ode's
opening (821-822):9'18'
oov, naai^t8,
rtpo(ylt-
ev
id(pap
/
to~9itog
6r
OeoIrp6rtov
il7V
..., "Behold,
girls,
how sud-
denly
the oracular word has come to
mingle
with us."
This word of "sudden" arrival has associations with both
protago-
nists in their
respective
forms of
tragic suffering,
for it harks back to the
dead?" but
also,
"Where then is he announced as
living
or
dead?",
particularly
as the verb
nyy'*xErat
is often used of the report of an oracle: see Gregory Nagy,
Pindar's Homer
(Baltimore 1990) 168,
with n. 95.
Furthermore,
in the context of "life or
death,"
&dy,lE-
rat
may
also have resonances of the
"message"
that
passes
between the world of the liv-
ing
and the
dead,
as in
epinician poetry
and elsewhere:
e.g.,
Pi. 01.
8.81-82, 14.21;
also
Plato, Rep. 10.614d;
see in
general my "Messages
to the Underworld"
(1985)
in
my
Aglaia (Baltimore 1998) 133-148;
on the Pindaric
usage
see also D. E.
Gerber, "Pindar,
Nemean Six: A
Commentary,"
HSCP 99
(1999)
82-83.
24
S. M.
Adams,
Sophocles
the
Playwright, Phoenix,
Supplement
3
(Toronto 1957)
125-126.
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164 Charles
Segal
"sudden"
disappearance
of human
happiness
in the
parodos
(134),
to
Deianeira's fearful isolation when Heracles wins her in
marriage (529),
and to the chorus' death-wish in their terror at
seeing
the
approach
of
the stricken Heracles
(958).25
The "suddenness" with which the chorus
recalls this oracle contributes to the effect of
dawning recognition
that
is a
particular
feature of this
play
of "late
learning."26
The
metaphor
of
"mingling"
here
(nIpoo~Lett
v, 821)
adds an ominous tone to the cho-
rus'
statement.27
Coming immediately
after
Hyllus'
account of the
poisoned
robe at
Cenaeum,
the chorus'
unique
oracle indicates their
sudden
recognition
of the
meaning
of these
events,
and this
prepares
for
Heracles' flash of
recognition
at the end. This is the first time that an
oracle from the
past
has been understood for what it
is,
a
prediction
of
doom rather than a
promise
of
hope.
Hitherto the
major
statements of
the
oracles,
as we have
noted,
have the
disjunctive
form,
either
happi-
ness or death.
Now,
for the first
time,
an
interpreter
resolves the dis-
junction
into a
single meaning:
not two
alternatives,
but
only
one,
death.28
This device of a
preliminary recognition
of the
meaning
of a
myste-
rious oracle with
multiple
versions has a close
parallel
in the
Philoctetes. In a
striking epirrhematic dialogue
with the chorus in
dactylic
hexameters-the
language
of
oracles-Neoptolemus
realizes
that the oracles about Philoctetes mean not
just
the Greek
victory
at
Troy
but the benefit to the exiled sufferer as well
(Phil. 839-842).29
That
recognition
in the Philoctetes also comes at a
place
in the action
comparable
to the third stasimon of the Trachiniae
(821-830):
25
Davies
(above,
n.
2)
ad 134 ff. notes that
q`pap
occurs four times in this
play
and
only
twice
again
in the rest of extant
tragedy (A.
Pers.
469;
Eur. IT
1274).
On the
repeated
verb
P3iPvice
associated with the adverb
q`pap
in 133-134 and 529
(and
cf.
874)
see
Segal, Tragic
World 82.
26
Late
learning
is central to the
play:
see Whitman
(above,
n.
14) 103-121,
whose
view of this theme remains influential:
e.g.,
H.
E
Johansen, "Heracles in
Sophocles'
Tra-
chiniae,"
C&M 37
(1986)
48-49.
27
For the sinister of connotations of
"mingling"
see 519 and
838;
also Poole
(above,
n.
18)
72.
28
On this
point
see R. W. B.
Burton,
The Chorus in
Sophocles' Tragedies (Oxford
1980) 66;
also D. A.
Hester,
"'Either ... or' versus 'both ... and': A Dramatic Device in
Sophocles,"
Antichthon 13
(1979) 12-18,
especially
13.
29
On this
passage
see B. M. W.
Knox,
The Heroic
Temper,
Sather Classical Lectures
35
(Berkeley
and Los
Angeles 1964) 131; Segal, Tragic
World 106.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 165
XO. i''
otov,
&
n
RaitS,
1poo4lEt4Ev
aap
ro
no;
tr
Oeonp6nov
i
tv
&rlE naXatcpdou npovoia;,
0
T'
Xaicsv, 6E6tS
sE,6,trLvo;
EKicqpot
80&Kicaao;
poto,
avaIoXOCv
sXtV n6v(ov
825
o
At';
a 9r
6"ratit
icKai 6' 6p809 ioCSo
8 Ca
icaoupi`&t.
co;
yap
av o
Ri
6
Eiaooaov
it
nor' er' ntinovov
i'xot
Oavciv
Xhapeiav;
830
Sophocles
does not tell us where this oracle comes
from,
or how the
chorus knows
it,
or what its relation is to the other oracles that we have
heard. He is
probably drawing
on a
tradition,
preserved
in
Apollodorus
(2.4.12),
in which
Heracles,
at the
beginning
of his
labors,
receives
from the
Pythia
an oracle that "he will become immortal" after his
twelve
years
of service to
Eurystheus.30
In its concentration on the
pre-
sent crisis the
play
leaves all this
vague;
but it does link this oracle to
the others
by
the
repetition
of the same or similar words in those
previ-
ous oracles:
aiporo;
and
rt6vot,
the numeral
twelve,
the word for
months,
and a sense of
approaching finality implied
in both
rOXe6wOLvo;
and
reLiv.31
In several other
ways
too this ode
prepares
for the
progression
toward Heracles' final
understanding
of the oracles. Like the
previous
oracles,
this one
depends
on the characteristic oracular
ambiguity
of
"release from toil" in the
phrase
ava5oXa'v
sriv
n6voMv,
which can
mean both
"accomplish
a relief from toils" and "fulfill the succession
of toils"
(or
"fulfill the continuation of
toils");
and in both of these
senses the
phrase
can also
imply
death.32 In a
departure
from the under-
30
On this point see
Tycho
128. The
problem
of how the chorus knows this oracle has
often
puzzled interpreters: e.g.
Kirkwood
(above,
n.
13) 78;
Kamerbeek
(above,
n.
7)
ad
824-825; Machin (above,
n.
1)
153. Kranz
(above,
n.
9)
288 mentions
speculation
about
an
original
model of a "Zeus-oracle"
(death
from no
living being)
and an
"Apollinian
ora-
cle" about the twelve
years
that
points
to "death and
transfiguration,"
but
acknowledges
that
any
such distinction is
arbitrary
in this Zeus-dominated
play.
31
See,
e.g.,
79-81,
164
(the compound
rpi-trlvo;),
167-168, 824-825,
1170-1171.
32 Davies
(above,
n.
2)
ad 825 notes that this
meaning
"series,"
or "succession"
(Jebb
[above,
n.
16]
ad 824
f.,
followed
by LSJ)
occurs
only
here. The scholiast
(ad 826)
takes
the word to mean "rest" or
"release,"
&vxao-tv,
avaico)Xaiv, Easterling
ad 825
prefers
the
meaning "undertaking," connecting
it
closely
with
relxv,
in the sense
"carry through
to the end." Yet
rexiv
has a sinister sense
throughout
the
play,
associated as it is with the
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166 Charles
Segal
standing
of the earlier
oracles, however,
the chorus now
recognizes
the
ambiguity
and solves the
riddle,
as it
were,
of the
ambiguous
words,
as
if it were
answering
a
question (828-830):
tG0;
y
&p
&v
6
pg~l
LEuoowv
/
ei t
rnor'
et'
irnrtovov
/
eXot
0aviv
harpeiav;
This
interpretation
is
confirmed
by
the
parallelism
between
Wt;
y&p
av 6
gil
Eaooaov
here
in the
strophe (829-830)
and 835-837 of the
antistrophe:
i;j i8' &v
xiktov
repov
9
tav6v i'ot,
/
8etvoradsr
ogev i6pa;
/
rpoore'arido
/
oagaxrt.
Both
passages
not
only
are
parallel
in their
interrogative
form but also
they repeat
the
metaphor
of
sight
for
life,
and its absence
for death. This
metaphor
of "not
seeing
the
light"
for Heracles' death
(here
for the first time in the
play) anticipates
Heracles'
cry
at his
recognition
of his oracles'
meaning:
"I
am
destroyed, destroyed;
I have
the
light
no
longer"
(0,oX' ,o,
a,
qeyyo; obicet'
,~aot
got, 1144).
The
significance
of the third stasimon's oracle
emerges retrospec-
tively
in
yet
another
way
at Heracles' final
recognition
of the truth.
When he adds to the
original
oracles about the fifteen months the oracle
hitherto not
mentioned,
but revealed to him
"long ago" by
Zeus,
that he
could be killed from
nothing (or
no
one)
breathing,
he sees that this lat-
ter oracle meant "the beast Centaur"
(6"6'
o
v
6
Ol'p Kv-racpo;,
1162).
The
congruence,
however,
is not
just
with the first
group
of ora-
cles mentioned
early
in the
play,
but also with the chorus' oracle in the
third
stasimon,
where both the name and the
bestiality
of the Centaur
are
prominent.
As has often been
noted,
the
"seething spurs,"
KdEzvpa,
that are the
metaphorical
instrument of his death
(840)
constitute a
figura etymologica
for the name of Heracles' killer in
Hades, Kivrabu-
po; (831-840,
especially
835-840):
Ei yidp
ape
Kevrau~pot
povia vep~P&
Xpiet
oIonootb;O &v6y(cx
txpi,
tEpooYraiC~Xvro;
io0,
Ov
'tKEVo
06varoq,
'rpe(pe
6'
ai6,o;
6pd~aov,
dark "fulfillment" of the oracles.
Kamerbeek,
ad
loc.
argues
for the sense "the toils he
had to submit to."
Lloyd-Jones,
in the Loeb
edition, Sophocles
2
(Cambridge,
Mass.
1994) translates,
"It should
bring
relief from his labours."
Drawing
on the
scholiast,
I
would
argue
that the
phrase
is
deliberately ambiguous,
as is
appropriate
to the oracular
discourse of the
play.
Even
Easterling's "carry through
to the end the
undertaking
of
toils" and Jebb's "it should end the series of toils" are
ambiguous,
for both can
imply
death as well as final achievement.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 167
rco d6'
& v
d~tov 'repov
i'
ravuv
i'8ot,
835
8&tvotdic
ptv
Supa;
npooaetaicco;
(Pdoaagat,
gc~ayYXa`za r'
ajtptya
vtv
aiv rt
rn6(0pova 8oX60
u-
Oa
icevyp' intr~iavra;
840
For if the
guile-producing necessity
of the Centaur anoints
(Hera-
cles')
ribs with its
[and/or his]
murderous cloud as the
poison
melts
into him-the
poison
that death sired and that the
shimmering
snake
nurtured,
how would he
(Heracles)
see the
(day of) sunlight
other than the
present
one,
melted to the most terrible
phantom
of
the
Hydra;
and the
murderous,
guile-speaking spurs
of the black-
haired
one,
seething upon
him,
disfigure
him,
mingling (with
his
flesh).33
The first
part
of this
passage (831-838)
also foreshadows Heracles'
oracle about his doom
only
from one who is
dead,
for it
strongly
emphasizes
death: the
poison appears metaphorically
as the child of
Death in those
"deadly" Centaur-spurs,
and Heracles will die "melted
to the most terrible
ghost
of the
Hydra" (Kevtraupo
t
oviat
ve(qpi,
ioi
/
5v
rcicEco
0Ovatog,
&8tvo-r&,rp..
q.iaati,
n6cpova
...
Kicvrpa).
The Centaur is himself the
"ghost"
or
"apparition"
of the
Hydra
(836-837),
the form of the
Hydra
that now lives
again
in
him,
thanks to
its
poison
that he has handed on to Deianeira. The Centaur is also the
"ghost"
of the
Hydra
in the sense that he is both the victim of the
Hydra
and also its current
incarnation,
a kind of alastor who
returns,
like a
ghost,
to take
revenge
from the dead
against
his killer. Such ideas are
deeply
rooted in
Sophocles,
as
Winnington-Ingram
has
pointed
out,
and
are
explicit
at the end of the Electra
(1416-1423;
cf.
1495-1500).34
33 On this
passage
and its
significance
in the
play
see
Segal,
Civilization 87 and
Tragic
World
33;
on the beast-man conflict
generally,
see Civilization 70-73,
87
ff.; Tragic
World 52-54.
34 See R. P.
Winnington-Ingram, Sophocles:
An
Interpretation (Cambridge 1980)
205-216,
especially
213-215 on
Trach.;
also
Segal, Tragic
World 64. See also Letters
(above,
n.
1)
78: "The Centaur's cloud is in effect the Centaur's
ghost," calling
attention
too to the
myth
of the
origins
of the Centaur from Zeus's
deceptive
"cloud"
(vEqpa)
in
Pi.
Pyth.
2.26-48,
on which see also Davies
(above,
n.
2)
ad 838 ff. At Trach. 839
-m6'nova
...
.So6uOa
is Hermann's
widely accepted
emendation of the unmetrical
{icno
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168 Charles
Segal
These associations are also in
keeping
with this
play's
use of
"primi-
tive" themes of
magic
and incantations.35 In
fact,
at the end of the
play
the
language
of
magic
and
philtres
leads
directly
into Heracles'
recog-
nition of the coincidence of the different oracles
(1140-1145):
HP.
iKai
rfg
roaooro;
qpappjaluei q
Tpaxtviov;
YA.
N"coog
na'iat
Kevraupo;g
eeta
vtv
8otoE pirzpto
Gv
obv
C~ivcgat a60Oov.
HP.
ioi )iot
86orivog,
oi'ogjat
rdXa;g
X WoX' oXoXa,
(kyyO;
o t'S9' EoJt got.
Oitgot, (PPOVo
6i
;A(Popa;
i'v'
orasgev.
Hyllus' phrase
Niooog i6tXat
Kevravpo;
here
triggers
Heracles' sud-
den
cry
of the
recognition
of his doom in 1143:
jot
iout
84oulnvo;.
The
coupling
of "Centaur" and "inhabitant of Hades" at Heracles'
explana-
tion a few lines later
confirms
the
certainty
of his death
(1160-1163):
npbo;
vov
vEsvrov
gtievbo; Oavsiv {Jno,
&XX' ortg; "At8oL )peOitgvo; olci-op niRot.
68' o v 6
Oi'p
Kvrtavpo;,
c0
ti
Os8iov
jv
p7p6(pavTov,
oSto rvtd
ji' iK'sretvev
OavIv.
As we have
noted,
the associations of Nessus with both death and
Hades here also
point
back to the third stasimon. In that
passage,
fur-
thermore,
the
parallelism
and
progression
from the first to the second
no);
in the
questions
about death
(828
and
835)
shift the
emphasis
from
the
"dying
one" as victim
(Heracles),
to the
death-dealing agent,
the
Centaur with his "murderous cloud" and
"deadly spurs"
who is the
transmitter of the
death-begotten poison
of the
Hydra
and is also a kind
of
"ghost"
((pdo6La),
a dead creature
seeking revenge
on the
living
(831-840).
In both its statements of
recognizing
the oracle's
meaning
in the
third
stasimon,
the chorus'
question,
"How could
not... ,"
emphasizes
?poivia
...
SottAi6nOa
of the mss.: see
Lloyd-Jones
and
Wilson, Sophoclea (above,
n.
3)
168.
Easterling (above,
n.
3) prefers
p6vita
...
8oot6'giOa.
In
any
case,
some
adjective
from p6vo; is
fairly
certain.
35 For this much discussed theme
see,
e.g., Hugh Parry, Thelxis
(Lanham,
Md.
1992)
290-294;
Christopher
A.
Faraone, "Deianira's
Mistake and the Demise of Heracles:
Erotic
Magic
in
Sophocles' Trachiniae,"
Helios 21
(1994)
115-135.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 169
the intellectual
process
of
solving
a
problem
or riddle. That sense of
intellectual
discovery, though phrased
somewhat
differently,
also domi-
nates Heracles' movement from
"seeming"
to truth in 1171-1173:
Kc86Kouv
4evpd IEtV KaCxx
6 68'
Av
Lip' oi~ v
i,
o
v
i
ilv
OavXev
jCi
roit
ydp
0avoiat
6pxOo
o0
1)poY~yyvezat.
I
thought
that I would fare
well;
but this then
(6pa)
was
nothing
other than
my dying;
for no toil comes to those who are dead.
Heracles'
repeated ,6xOo;
in this
passage (1170, 1173) corresponds
to
the
repetition
of its
synonym
in6vo;
in 825-830
(nivoov
...
~ninovov),
just
as the inferential
apa
with the
imperfect
of "sudden
enlighten-
ment" in 1172
corresponds
to the rhetorical form of the
question,
"How
could not
...
," in both the
strophe
and
antistrophe
of the third
stasimon.36 We
may
note too the alternation of
metaphors
for death
with the literal
Oavsev
in both
passages (not seeing
the
light
of the sun
in
830-835,
having
no toil in
1172-1173).
Like Deianeira and the
chorus,
Heracles too comes to reevaluate the
meaning
of
past
narrative. His correct
recognition
now of the cause or
ai'nov
behind his death contrasts
markedly
with his
misrecognition
in
the
murky
flames of the sacrifice at Cenaeum
(772-785). There,
when
he "heard"
(0; iricovce, 777)
the
hapless
and
ignorant
Lichas' answer
about the
gift
of the robe
(6 &' ou?i~8v
ei86;),
he hurled him to his
death,
though
Lichas was "in no
way guilty
of
(his)
woe"
(Aixav,
t6v
oI?5Cv
ai'-nov
tou oI
icaico~
, 773). Now,
at the
end,
he
immediately
understands the truth behind
Hyllus' report.
Heracles'
clinching
oracle about doom that can come
only
from the
dead
is,
as he
says,
from his
"father,"
Zeus and is "old"
(np6qpavtov
CK
ncap~~g
iiat, 1159).
In the third stasimon the oracle about his death
after twelve
years
is
"spoken
of old"
(&r
i
nakat(pa&rov
7povota;, 823)
and is directed to "the
very
son of Zeus"
(t(o
At';
a6ronat&t,
826).
Given the
importance
both of Zeus and of father-son relations in the
play,37
these oracular statements cast an ironic
light
on Heracles' confi-
36
For the inferential
liopa
see H. Weir
Smyth,
Greek Grammar
(1920),
rev. G. M.
Messing (Cambridge,
Mass.
1956) pp.
635-636,
sections 2790-2791.
37 On father-son relations see
139-140, 1104-1106, 1268-1269;
Segal, Tragic
World
51;
Kitto
(above,
n.
16)
163-164.
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170 Charles
Segal
dence in his descent from Zeus
(cf. Hyllus' closing speech,
1266-1269
and
1278),
for it
suggests
that the will of Zeus has
"long ago"
estab-
lished a
shape
for Heracles' life
very
different from his
assumptions
about
"faring
well"
(rpaetyv
KaX'&;, 1171;
cf.
57).
In the other direc-
tion,
still hidden from Heracles and the other mortal
characters,
is the
further extension of Zeus's will
beyond
the death of
Heracles,
to his
future
apotheosis.38
To one
interpreter
the chorus'
interpretation
of the oracle in the third
stasimon
(particularly 828-830)
must "ruin Heracles'
subsequent
real-
ization that the oracle meant his death."39 If
so,
why
does
Sophocles
thus allow the chorus to
anticipate
the oracle's final
meaning
at this rel-
atively early point
in the
play?
The answer
lies,
I
think,
in the ode's
place
at the
juncture
of events and
especially
at the
juncture
of accumu-
lated information about the
past
lives of both
protagonists. By
this
point
we have heard the three
long
narratives about this
past:
Lichas' account
of the events at
Oechalia,
Deianeira's of her encounter with
Nessus,
and
Hyllus'
of the horrors of the
perverted
sacrifice at
Cenaeum,
where the
consequences
of both the remoter and recent events
converge.
This
moment is also the
juncture
between the
present agony
of Heracles and
the imminent suicide of Deianeira
(813-820;
cf.
720-722).
At this
point
the
chorus,
like all the other
characters,
is forced to
reinterpret
radically
the
meaning
of
previous
narratives,
including
oracular narra-
tives. So
far,
it has maintained an
optimistic
and
hopeful
mood as it
attempted
to reassure Deianeira in her worries
(119-120,
205-224,
655-662).
It even tried to offer
"hope"
amid her fears of "terrible
deeds" after
Deianeira
herself has
recognized
the fearful truth of what
she has done
(723-730).
The chorus now draws the
logical
conclusion
and
simultaneously
adds its recollection of a
twelve-year-old
oracle
whose
import
it
"suddenly" grasps.
Thus another
piece
of Heracles'
past
falls into
place.
The chorus' mention of this oracle also continues the
play's pattern
38
Heracles' apotheosis
remains
controversial;
I continue to believe that it is a relevant
part
of the action of the
play.
See
Segal,
Civilization 99-101 and
Tragic
World
53-55;
with the references there
cited;
also
Easterling (above,
n.
3) 9-12, 17-19;
Philip
Holt,
"The End of the Trakhiniai and the Fate of Heracles,"
JHS 109
(1989) 69-80,
especially
78
f.;
Winnington-Ingram (above,
n.
33)
215 n.
33;
Davies
(above,
n.
2) Introduction,
xix-xxii.
39 Adams
(above,
n.
24) 126, who,
I
think,
exaggerates
the
problem
and misses the fact
that
foreshadowing,
not
suspense,
is the
poet's
aim.
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The Oracles
of Sophocles'
Trachiniae 171
of
introducing
new information about the
past along
with an
interpreta-
tion of the
past.
The
pattern
is
complete
with Heracles' account of his
oracle from Zeus at
1159-1174,
where new information and definitive
interpretation again
coincide. At that
point
his reference to a "revela-
tion"
stamped by
the
authority
of the
gods
(b' )r6
Oeiov
~v
lnp6opavTov,
1162-1163)
harks back
explicitly
to the chorus' "revelation" of a "vast
and treacherous disaster" that is about to "come" as the
"portion"
or
"doom" of the house
(849-850):
&(
' pXop~ova
tgotpa
sipopa(vet
XOki~v
/
ical(
Xsyakav
aa.40
Heracles' reference to
to6
Osov in 1162
now marks his
privileged,
definitive
understanding
of what the oracles
have been
telling
him for so
long.
In all of these cases the oracles reveal the
present
as dominated
destructively by
the
past. Only
at the end does new information refer to
the future as Heracles commands the
preparation
of his
pyre
and orders
the
marriage
of
Hyllus
and
Iole.
To sum
up, through
the oracles the mortal
protagonists
discover the
hidden truth of the divine
pattern
that underlies the
struggles
and suffer-
ings
of their lives
(nt6vot
or
g6xOot),
both in the
present
and in the
past.
The oracles are the medium
through
which the characters come to see
the
shape
of their lives in the
gods' design. Sophoclean tragedy
allows
that
meaning
to
emerge only gradually
from the
illusions, errors,
and
self-deceptions
amid which these
characters,
like all
mortals,
live.
Although Sophocles
leaves
vague
the exact interrelation of the three
forms of the
prophecy
of Heracles'
death,
the
language
of the third
stasimon is
carefully
calculated to
suggest
a
gradual progression
in the
unfolding meaning
of the oracles.
Specifically,
it
points
ahead to the
final
recognition
of that
meaning,
which will
pass
from the chorus to
Heracles. For the first and last time that
meaning
will be enunciated
by
Heracles
himself;
and that
recognition
will be followed
by
his knowl-
edge
of a still more
mysterious,
undeclared oracle
having
to do with the
pyre
and his afterlife. In this
case, however,
Heracles does not know
precisely
what that oracle
says,
and so he meets his end almost as unen-
lightened
about his afterlife as he was about the death that he is now
undergoing.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
40
The reference is
probably
to the doom of both Heracles and
Deianeira:
see Easter-
ling
ad
loc.
On the
importance
of notions of
revealing
and the root
paxv-
in the
play
see
Segal, Tragic
World
57-58,
with n. 128.
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