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Bridal Cloths, Cover-UPS, and Kharis: The ‘Carpet Scene’ in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 April 2006

Lynda McNeil
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Extract

Past readings of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon (458 BC) have spawned numerous theories about the nature and significance of the cloth stage prop central to the ‘Carpet Scene’ (783-974). Kenneth Morrell has pointed out that ‘recent critics at best emphasize the ambiguous nature of the “fabric” ’, which the critics refer to variously as something carpet-like, as rugs or blankets, as garment-like tapestries or loosely-fitting garments, as draperies, and more generally as the household's treasure. But what fabric, if any, would have been versatile enough to function as a tapestry, a robe, and a blanket, and would have inspired outrage when used as a rug?

More symbolically significant than the most luxurious carpet, the fabric strewn on the ground before Agamemnon strongly suggests a bridal cloth, an object replete with symbolism, which would have served as both a nuptial robe and a coverlet for the marriage bed. Scholars who discuss Athenian weddings in the context of the Oresteia have overlooked the nuptial nuances of the ‘carpet’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 52 , Issue 1 , April 2005 , pp. 1 - 17
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2005

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References

1 I would like to acknowledge my appreciation of those individuals without whom I could not have completed this project: Benjamin Gracy (Classics Department, University of Colorado, Boulder), Judith Sebesta (History Department, University of South Dakota), and Alexandra Villing (Research Department of Classical Antiquities, the British Museum). I am indebted to all the authors cited in the paper for their contributions to this project. References to Aeschylus’ Agamemnon in Greek or English translation are from Fraenkel, E., Aeschylus, Agamemnon (Oxford, 1950)Google Scholar, unless stated in the notes; references to the Choephoroi and to the Eumenides are from D. I.. Page, Aeschyli Septem Quae Supersunt Tragoediae (Oxford, 1972).

2 Morrell, K., ‘The Fabric of Persuasion: Clytemnestra, Agamemnon, and the Sea of Garments’, CF 92 (1997), 155 ffGoogle Scholar., refers to D. Denniston and D. Page's survey (Aeschylus, Agamemnon [London, 1957], 148 ff.) of heitna in other contexts as an ‘outer garment’ not a ‘rug’ or ‘carpet’. Conversely, according to Woodhouse, S. C., English-Greek Dictionary: A Vocabulary of the Attic Language (London, 1936), 68-9Google Scholar, 138-9, 180, 719, heima refers to bedclothes and a bed coverlet. See Morrell's review of interpretations of the cloth, op. cit. 155-6, (nn. 20 and 21), especially arguments that it is clothing, not a carpet. On the former, see K. J. Dover, ‘I tessuti rossi dell'Agamemnone’, Dioniso 48 (1977), 58, as ‘tessuti’ and ‘non sono tappeti’, who agrees with E. Vermeule, ‘The Boston Oresteia Rrater’, AFA 70 (1966), 21, asserting that, ‘It is not, of course, a red carpet. It is clothing.’ Whallon, W., Problem and Spectacle: Studies in the ‘Oresteia’ (Heidelberg, 1980), 64 ffGoogle Scholar., also argues that the cloths resemble pharea or peploi, ‘loosely fitting garments that may serve other purposes as well’. Furthermore, he suggests that instead of spreading many garments on Agamemnon's path, the servants lay one large pharos or peplos out. Some scholars also refer to the cloth's association with household wealth (948-9): G. Crane, ‘Politics of Consumption and Generosity in the Carpet Scene of the Agamemnon’, CP 88 (1993), 117 ff.; or with gender power-play between husband and wife, polis and oikos: Goldhill, S., Aeschylus: The Oresteia (Cambridge, 1992)Google Scholar; Taplin, O., The Stagecraft of Aeschylus: The Dramatic Use of Exits and Entrances in Greek Tragedy (Oxford, 1977), 299–300 Google Scholar on ‘Clytemnestra's control of the threshold’.

3 Few scholars have discussed wedding rites in the context of the Oresteia. Rehm, R., Marriage to Death (Princeton, 1994)Google Scholar, the most thorough to date, overlooks the nuptial nuances of the ‘cloth’; Seaford, R., ‘The Last Bath of Agamemnon’, CQ 34 (1984), 250 ffGoogle Scholar. refers in passing to similarities between funereal and wedding rites, with regard to Agamemnon's bath cloak (kostnos); Meridor, R., ‘Aeschylus Agamemnon 944–57: Why Does Agamemnon Give In?’, CP 88 (1987), 38 ffGoogle Scholar. refers only to love-triangles in the ‘carpet scene.’ And, while numerous scholars have interpreted the ‘carpet’ to be garments of some kinds (n. 2 above), none explores the possible connection to wedding robes, even though earlier (232–3) the Chorus in the Agamemnon describe Iphigenia sacrificed in her wedding robes.

4 MacLachlan, B., The Age of Grace: Charis in Early Greek Poetry (Princeton, 1993), 124 ffGoogle Scholar. on kharis in the Oresteia; Wagner-Hasel, B., ‘The Graces and Colour Weaving’, in Women's Dress in the Ancient Greek World (London, 2002), 20 ffGoogle Scholar. on kharis and the textile arts; Seaford, R., Reciprocity and Ritual (Oxford, 1994)Google Scholar.

5 Hague, R., ‘Marriage Athenian Style’, Archaeology 41 (1988), 32 ffGoogle Scholar.; R. Rehm (n. 3), 154; Scheid, J. and Svenbro, J., The Craft of Zeus: Myths of Weaving and Funeral Rituals in Greek Tragedy (New Haven, 1996), 60 ff.Google Scholar; B. Wagner-Hasel (n. 4), 20 ff.

6 Oakley, J. H. and Sinos, R. H., The Wedding in Ancient Athens (Madison, 1993)Google Scholar, discuss and provide numerous photos of Attic vases and epinetra depicting pre-nuptial rites, wedding processions with the bride and groom in chariot or cart, and the couple entering the wedding chamber. Among these, a popular mythological subject for fifth-century Attic vases was the wedding procession of Peleus and Thetis (or the procession of guests on the following day, the epaulia). See also Taplin (n. 2), 304.

7 R. Seaford (n. 3), 247 ff.; Hague (n. 5), 33; and Oakley and Sinos (n. 6), 15 ff. on pre-nuptial ablutions. The Dokimasia vase (460 BC) depicts Agamemnon, covered with a fine net (veil-like), being slain; see E. Vermeule (n. 2), 1-22. Vermeule, and Prag, , The Oresteia: Iconographic and Narrative Tradition (London, 1985)Google Scholar, suggest that both the krater and Aeschylus’ references to Agamemnon caught in a net or web may draw upon Stesichorus’ Oresteia (c. 560-40 BC).

8 Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 66 ff. While the authors discuss the Roman wedding practice whereby the bride and groom are covered with their nuptial cloth, it is unclear if this was common for ancient Athenian weddings as well. The Attic red-figure vase fragment (Figure 3) suggests that this too may be an ancient Greek wedding practice. Regarding the purple colour of the cloth, see Morrell (n. 2), 162, (n. 31), on Aeschylus’ audience's association of this colour with wedding rites, not only with bloodshed.

9 Barber, E., ‘The Peplos of Athena’, in Neils, J. (ed.), Goddess and Polis: The Panathenaic Festival in Ancient Athens (Princeton, 1992), 111-12Google Scholar. Fragments of ancient Greek woven picture cloths, used as robes (heima, peplos, pharos) in ritual contexts have been found throughout the ancient world. See Barber, op. cit, 111-14 and her Women's Work, The First 20,000 Years (New York, 1994), 229-31; Vickers, M., Images on Textiles: The Weave of Fifth-Century Athenian Art and Society (Konstanz, 1999)Google Scholar; B. Wagner-Hasel (n. 4), 22 ff.; Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, Winter 1995/96: Textiles in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 90.5.873; 10.130.1076; 1977.232. In Hellenistic times, they were also used as wall-hangings (pastoi) in bedrooms or temples. See Oakley and Sinos (n. 6) 138, (n. 98); Sebesta, J., ‘Mantles of the Gods and Catullus 64’, Syllecta Classica 5 (1994), 39 Google Scholar.

10 Fraenkel (n. 1), 147, 149, translates ta poikila (926, 936) as ‘embroideries’, which denotes hand stitching on linen or another fine fabric, rather than decorated woven cloths or tapestries, and he translates huphos (949) as ‘textures’ rather than textiles. Compare this with Lattimore, R., Aeschylus I: Oresteia (Chicago, 1953), 62-3Google Scholar: ‘tapestries’ (909, 936).

11 According to Barber (n. 9: 1994), 231, if, in fact, these royal story cloths depicted the mythohistory of the clan, such weaving would be ‘a task so important that it could be entrusted only to the queens and princesses, with their gold and silver spindles and royal purple wool’.

12 On the Charites in early Greek poetry, see MacLachlan (n. 4), 41 ff.

13 As both Vickers (n. 9), and Wagner-Hasel (n. 4), maintain, the pleasure and power of a woven cloth derived from its beauty, which could be heightened in special cases by the incorporation of Tyrian purple dye and even golden threads.

14 On kharis communities, see Wagner-Hasel (n. 4), 27-8. See MacLachan (n. 4), 26, 136, 140, on Clytemnestra's un-kharis speech, peithō used for seduction and deceit, rather than for pleasure and truthful persuasion (Ag. 606–7: ), referring to hypocrites who greet the hero home from the war (793-4: ); alluding to the kharis of truthful speech: Cassandra to the Chorus (1183: ) and the Chorus to Cassandra (1243-4: ).

15 According to Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 66, typically, since the bride would be a stranger entering her husband's house, this meant that the groom would provide the nuptial blanket and the house. However, the reverse may have been true when a foreign man is integrated into a woman's home, as was the case for Agamemnon, Jason, Menelaus, Odysseus, and Theseus. In such cases, the bride provided the nuptial cloth, as well as the house, and her spouse ‘ends up beneath the khlaina of his bride’.

16 Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 85 ff.

17 The metaphorical connection between house, bed, and sexual consummation is also implied in Clytemnestra's prayer to Zeus Teleios (966-74) just before entering the house where she mentions ‘consummation’ (telos) four times: (972-4). Notably, the trilogy ends with Apollo's tribute to the goddess Hera as ‘the lady of consummation and married love’ (Eum. 214-15).

18 The Homeric word for pattern-weaving, passein or empassein, alludes to the technique of ‘scattering’ coloured supplementary wefts in the foundation weft to produce these woven images. Homer refers to women weaving colourful picture cloths: Helen's purple diplax: Il. 3. 125-8, Od. 4.121-37; Andromache's purple diplax: Il. 22.440-41; Nausicaa: Od. 6.25-40, 57-65; Arete: Od. 6. 305-7; Circe: Od. 10.221-3; Calypso: Od. 5.61. Some scholars suggest that Penelope too (Od. 1.228-50) may be weaving either a picture cloth (Barber [n. 9: 1994]) or a nuptial robe (Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 68 (n. 79). Furthermore, in the Iliad (5.338), Aphrodite makes a veil woven with many pictures, or daidala (14.178-9: ), and a girdle for Hera to seduce her husband, Zeus (14.219—20: ). Moreover, Homer refers to Aphrodite's peplos ambrosios with brightly coloured flowers woven into it (Scheid and Svenbro [n. 5], 65). Ovid (Met. 6) refers to Athena's picture weaving skills in her competition with Arachne; Athena's cloth depicts the Gigantomachy.

19 Murray, A. T., Homer: The Odyssey (New Haven, 1995), 403 ffGoogle Scholar. The English translation of The Odyssey used here is that by R. Fitzgerald (Garden City, 1963). Scholars focus on Clytemnestra as Penelope's foil for the faithful wife: see S. Goldhill (n. 2), 46 ff. However, critics overlook the fact that in these two stories, we find wives who pass the time purposefully weaving during their husbands’ absences. While Penelope is the prototypical wife against whom Clytemnestra is judged, both appear to have been weaving a nuptial and/or funeral pharos or heima. In Cho. 989, 1010-11, Orestes speaks of the fatal robe as his ‘mother's sacrilegious handiwork’.

20 Several post-Homeric writers refer to married couples being reconciled under their nuptial cloths or bed coverlets, some of which depict pictures or stories. See Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 65, on Zas and Chthonie's pharos in Pherekydes of Syros (sixth-century BC), Helen's khlaina woven for Menelaus in Theocritus’ ‘Epithalamium of Helen’ (Idylls 18, 16-19), and Peleus and Thetis’ purpura khlaina, which depicts Ariadne abandoned by Theseus after their wedding night under her peplos, in Catullus 64. Regarding the latter, an Attic red-figure lekythos depicts Ariadne and Theseus on their nuptial bed, perhaps sharing her peplos (Pan Painter, 470 BC, Taranto, Museo Nazionale IG 4545: J. D. Beazley ARV2 (Oxford, 1963), 560.5 and 1659; Para 388 (Oxford, 1971); Addenda 259 (Oxford, 1982)).

21 Notably, the trilogy ends with the incorporation of the Erinyes, renamed the Eumenides (the Kind Ones), in the social fabric of the new order, with Athena proclaiming (Eum. 834-6): ‘you shall win the fruits in offerings for children and the marriage rites for always’: .

22 A. J. N. W. Prag (n. 7), 73 (n. 23), 122, discusses how in his Oresteia, Stesichorus used Hesiod as the source for Agamemon's ‘ruse whereby (Iphigenia) was decoyed to Aulis on the pretext of marrying Achilles’. Aeschylus would most likely have been familiar with both versions.

23 Tapestry cloths used ‘to create a sacral enclosure separated from the profane world originated in the East’: Sebesta (n. 9), 39; Broneer, O., ‘The Tent of Xerxes and the Greek Theatre’, University of California Publications in Classical Archaeology 1 (1944), 305 Google Scholar. As Herodotus 9. 82 reports, the Greeks’ first experience of such a curtained enclosure could well have been Xerxes’ field tent that was captured after the battle of Plataea, in which Aeschylus is believed to have fought.

24 Scheid and Svenbro (n. 5), 66, in discussing Plato's Statesman, maintain that throughout ancient Greek literature and thought, there is a symbolic connection between stegasma (roof as house and home, oikos) and skepasma (fabric). They maintain that it follows logically: nuptial robe is to bed, as roof is to house.

25 Because Greco-Roman nuptial cloths are reputed to have depicted mythohistorical scenes (Barber [n. 9: 1994], 229-31), often as cautionary tales (Oakley and Sinos [n. 6], 11), it is plausible that Agamemnon offers scattered clues (as in mock tapestry technique: empassein) about the iconography (actual or meant for the audience to imagine it) on Clytemnestra's nuptial cloth.

26 Prag (n. 7), 80 (nn. 98, 111), 123-4; Taplin (n. 2), 308 ff.

27 OCD (Oxford 1970), 18, on Aeschylus’ fascination with foreign lands and art, as well as his fondness for spectacular stage props and effects. Taplin (n. 2), 308, 313, 314, refutes the claim that the cloth's sole purpose is for spectacular effect, arguing that it is both a strongly symbolic (albeit enigmatic) ‘tapestry-coverlet’ and a ‘rich tapestry-garment’, so ‘delicate’ and ‘finely woven’ that ‘even to tread on it with bare feet will spoil it’.

28 R. Meridor (n. 3), 39.

29 Taplin (n. 2), 309, asserts that ‘the maids took up the cloth behind Agamemnon’ after he walked across it; however, there is no evidence to support this reading. Conversely, the fact that the Chorus and Cassandra continue to allude to the myth of Philomela as Cassandra steps out of the chariot (around 1072; see Taplin, op. cit., 318) and walks into the house (1072-1330) suggests that she may be walking across the cloth while she and the Chorus refer to its iconography.