The Oresteia (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
At a glance:
- Author: Aeschylus
- First Published: 458
- Type of Work: Play
- Type of Plot: Tragedy
- Time of Work: After the fall of Troy
- Setting: Argos, Delphi, and Athens
- Genres: Drama, Tragedy
- Subjects: Mythology or myths, Slavery or slaves, Religion, Kings, queens, or royalty, Gods or goddesses, Fratricide, parricide, or filicide, Tragedy, Rites or ceremonies, Greek or Roman times, Priests, Greece or Greek people, Princes or princesses
- Locales: Greece, Athens, ancient, Delphi, ancient, Argos, ancient
Characters Discussed
Agamemnon (a-guh-MEHM-nahn), of the doomed House of Atreus, King of Argos and leader of the Greek expedition against Troy. When the Greeks were de2tained at Aulis, he had been commanded by the gods to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia, so that the fleet might sail. This deed brought him the hatred of his wife, Clytemnestra, who plots his death. On his return to Argos after the fall of Troy, she persuades him to commit the sin of pride by walking on purple carpets to enter his palace. Once within the palace, he is murdered in his bath by Clytemnestra and her...
[The entire page is 885 words long]
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See Also:
Aeschylus (Cyclopedia of World Authors)Aeschylus (Drama)Aeschylus (Encyclopedia of the Ancient World)Aeschylus (Dictionary of World Biography: The Ancient World)
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