Euripides Heracles 581

J. M. Bremer

doi:10.1017/S0009838800042038

Euripides Heracles 581

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009

J. M. Bremer

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J. M. Bremer: Affiliation:
University of Amsterdam

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This passage is interpreted by all commentators and translators as follows: ‘Or how shall we call it glorious that I went out to fight the hydra and the lion at the command of Eurystheus—and shall I not labour to shield off death from my own children ?’ The purpose of my note1 is to suggest (i) that we have here a very remarkable use of the verb , and (2) that Euripides used it here with a precise and subtle intention

Type: Research Article
Information: The Classical Quarterly , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , December 1972 , pp. 236 - 240

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800042038 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Classical Association 1972

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^{page 236 note 1} Dr. Colin Austin, of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, read an earlier draft of this paper, and kindly made some suggestions.

^{page 237 note 1} There are some later instances, viz. in Xenophon, in which the verb, occurring within a context of food and digestion, seems to have an eliminative sense; but on closer inspection this view is not correct. In Comm. I. 2. 4 is ‘to digest’, i.e. to assume food into the body by (the labour of) digestion. In Cyrop. I. 2. 16 is intransitive: ‘by physical exercise’ (for then the will disappear in another way, by perspiration). Similarly, in Oecon. n. ia has to be taken in an intransitive sense; ‘provided he takes physical exercise’. In Cyrop. i. 6. 17 it is the context which gives the suggestion of an eliminative sense: A survey of the instances given in Sturz’ Lexicon Xenophonteum makes it clear that the verb normally means either ‘to produce by labour’ (transitive) or ‘to labour’ (intransitive); and this corresponds exactly to the semantic value of the verb in fifth-century drama and earlier. A clear case of the first category in Xenophon is Hippar-chicus 9. I: ‘one must think of the present situation and carry out what is expedient in view of it.’

^{page 238 note 1} In a concluding chapter (253–80) Brunei analyses the relation between the present-aorist-perfect system and the ‘déter-miné-indéterminé’ opposition, and observes that in many cases the effectivity of an action is expressed in three ways: by the meaning of the verb itself, by the preverb, by the aorist. High scores are found for compounds in the aorist (or praesens historicum), and for uncomposed verbs in the present tense.

^{page 238 note 2} He refers to 581 in the context of his note on lines 309–10 . which can, in this context, esp. 311 with Porson's , only mean: ‘whosoever tries to struggle out of the fatalities imposed by the gods is unwisely eager.’ The two verbs are indeed birds of a feather: , too, occurs once in Aesch., not at all in Soph., and ten times in Euripides. It is synonymous with ‘to toil in the process of weaving peploi’ (El. 307), ‘to sustain, to complete’ (Aesch. Prom. 825; Eur. Troad. 646, I.T. 84, 1455, Heracles 22); ‘to win by labour’ (Troad. 64, Heracles 1369, Suppl. 451). Consequently the use of in Heracles 309 is equally remarkable as the use of in 581; but the dramatic importance of 581 is much greater.

^{page 239 note 1} Compare the essay of Conacher, D. J. on the Heracles, pp. 78–90Google Scholar in his Euripidean Drama: Myth, Theme and Structure (Toronto 1967).Google Scholar

^{page 239 note 2} These thematic and verbal links between the ‘separate’ parts of the play have been discussed by Kamerbeek, J. C., ‘Unity ind Meaning of Euripides' Heracles’, Mnemosyne xix (1966), 1 ff.Google Scholar

^{page 239 note 3} Note the four ‘effective’ compounds. It can hardly be called an accident that the nan who composed the hypothesis of the Heracles wrote