The Oresteia | The Oresteia

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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

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 Oresteia | The Oresteia

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