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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
There are two difficult passages in the Eumenides of Aeschylus to which it may be well to invite the attention of Greek students in general and of archaeologists in particular. It seems probable that the solution in each case is to be sought from archaeology as much as from linguistic and textual criticism.
It will be remembered that in the Eumenides, Athena, having undertaken the consideration of the suit between Orestes and his pursuers, the divine Avengeresses, pronounces the case to be improper for decision either by herself or by a single mortal arbitrator, and accordingly assembles and constitutes a court, the first court on the hill of Ares, for the purpose of the trial (Eum. 470–489). The court assembles accordingly, and Athena opens the proceedings by causing solemn silence to be proclaimed. There can be no doubt that the formalities and accompaniments of this legendary institution are imitated from those actually used in the historical tribunal. It is with this proclamation that the present question is concerned.
page 162 note 1 The references in Aeschylus are to the numbering of Dindorf's Poetæ Scenici.
page 163 note 1 The doubt as to the correctness of this word need not be here considered.
page 170 note 1 Compare the magical prescription from the Δεισιδαίμων of Menander (Clem. Alex. Strom, vii. p. 303, 7), where the patient is to be sprinkled ἀπὸ κρουνῶν τριῶν.