1. Of the traditional play of 1629 verses I am assuming the genuineness of all but 1578–1629. While some scholars may object that a sound literary critical discussion of the I. A. must be based on a prior (and equally sound) discussion of all the disputed passages and in particular of the two prologues, one might rejoin that in practice eminent scholars are unlikely to agree on what constitutes a sound discussion while in principle literary critical assumptions will contribute at least to the acceptance or rejection of specific passages so that the philological egg may turn out to be posterior to the literary chicken. I prefer therefore to begin by making what literary sense I can of the play that has been handed down to us so that if an overall interpretation can be discovered that includes the disputed passages we have some evidence for their authenticity, while those who reject a passage on philological grounds may disregard whatever of my interpretation depends upon that passage.

2. Aes. Ag. 205 ff.

3. Vellacott, P., Orestes and Other Plays (Harmondsworth 1972) 85Google Scholar, dismisses Artemis as superstition and refers to the possibility of using oars in an emergency. On rowing, see also Siegel, H., ‘Agamemnon in Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis’, Hermes 109 (1981) 257–65Google Scholar, esp. 263. But perhaps it would have been considered impious to avoid the aploia once this had been interpreted in religious terms. Hulton, A.O., ‘Euripides and the Iphigenia Legend’, Mnemosyne 15 (1962) 364–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar, speaks (367) of the optimism of the original epilogue in which Artemis presumably explained the miraculous substitution (and possibly justified the original sacrifice) but Vellacott’s view (100) is more Euripidean. Lesky, A., Greek Tragedy (London 1967) 194Google Scholar, and Wassermann, F.M., ‘Agamemnon in the Iphigenia at Aulis’, TAPA 80 (1949) 174–86Google Scholar, explicitly attribute the aploia to Artemis, but while Lesky plays down the religious aspects of the play in favour of psychology, Wassermann seems to interpret the goddess’s requirement symbolically as the price demanded for success in public life, a force expressing itself through the ‘almost irresistible pressure of the “modern” medium of mass psychology’ (180). Various forms of symbolic interpretation are offered in which Artemis’ demand becomes the objectification of mob pressure which is seen as the real anagke. E.g., Walsh, G., ‘Iphigenia in Aulis, Third Stasimon’, CP 69 (1974) 241–48Google Scholar at 242, sees the goddess as the passive recipient of the sacrifice until the substitution, and the effective cause of the sacrifice as the demand of the mob. Vretska, H., ‘Agamemnon in Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis’, WS 74 (1961) 18–39Google Scholar at 32, cites Agamemnon’s reference to the superiority of the daimon which this critic takes to be Artemis, but Agamemnon surely means the whole complex causation, metaphysical and psychological, that has led to the failure of his attempt to reverse his decision to sacrifice. Vellacott (n. 3 above, 84f.) is probably right in arguing that Artemis and the aploia are deliberately left vague so as to draw our attention from those aspects to the demands of the mutinous mob who constitute the real anagke. Cf. Luschnig, C.A.E., Tragic Aporia A Study of Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis (Berwick Vic. 1988), 122fGoogle Scholar.

4. Agamemnon feels that it is right (for him and his associates?) to sacrifice Iphigenia (Ag. 214–17). That his fellow chiefs share his view is implied (228–30). See also Vretska (n. 3 above) 22f, 31.

5. On Agamemnon’s mendacity see Siegel (n. 3 above) 260 n. 7. Luschnig, C.A.E., ‘Time and Memory in Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis’, Ramus 11 (1983) 99–104Google Scholar, makes some pertinent observations on the unreliability of both Atreidae.

6. See, eg., Lebeck, A., The Oresteia (Cambridge Mass. 1971) 47–51Google Scholar.

7. Ag. 217

8. Conacher, D.J., Euripidean Drama (London 1967) 249CrossRefGoogle Scholar, denies that Agamemnon ceases to be motivated by ambition, seeing him as playing with his emotions to deceive his conscience. See Siegel’s discussion and rebuttal (n. 3 above, 258 ff.) with which I fully concur.

9. O.T.:58–64.

10. See Conacher (n. 8 above) 256; also Grube, G.M.A., The Drama of Euripides (London 1941) 427Google Scholar, and Siegel (n. 3 above) 264: ‘A mostly imaginary, almost paranoid belief rules Agamemnon, and it leads him to bring about what he fears most. In some nightmarish and ironic “self-fulfilling” prophecy, Agamemnon, by believing and fearing that he is enslaved by Odysseus and the army, in fact becomes their slave.’

11. On the role of Tyche see Vretska (n. 3 above) 26–30, Wassermann (n. 3 above) 182, 184. Ferguson, J., ’Iphigeneia at Aulis’, TAPA 99 (1968) 157–63Google Scholar, exaggerates the contribution of Tyche.

12. Mellert-Hoffman, G., Untersuchungen zur ‘Iphigenie in Aulis’ des Euripides (Heidelberg 1969) 97Google Scholar, traces the panhellenic argument back to Menelaus’ earlier attempts at persuasion, but as Siegel, H., ‘Self-Delusion and the Volte-face of Iphigenia in Euripides’ Iphigenia at Aulis’, Hermes 108 (1980), 300–21Google Scholar, argues (302, n. 6), this is mere supposition; we are not told what his arguments were or which one(s) convinced Agamemnon. On the foreshadowing of Agamemnon’s panhellenism by Funke, Menelaus H., ‘Aristoteles zur Euripides’ Iphigenia in Aulis’, Hermes 92 (1964) 284–99Google Scholar, rightly argues (288 f.) that the war was originally conceived as punishment of an adulterer, Greek or foreign, and not as essentially panhellenic. The arguments earlier employed by Menelaus (v. 97) could not, according to Funke, have included a panhellenic appeal because Menelaus’ interest was confined to Helen. However, Menelaus might easily have made a hypocritical appeal, and indeed the phrase panta logon (97) suggests as much. Funke also argues that the deception concerning Iphigenia’s marriage to Achilles would not have been necessary had the panhellenic argument figured prominently in the original purpose of the expedition, but Clytemnestra, one suspects, was too much of a woman and too intelligent to be taken in by such flag-waving imbecility.

13. Wassermann (n. 3 above, 185f.) views Agamemnon’s volte-face as genuine and explains it as ‘one more aspect of the consistent inconsistency so characteristic of contemporary Greece and the sudden transition from individual despair to abandonment to the magic of a great new idea is a not uncommon phenomenon in an age of crisis’. But the change is too sudden and the idea hardly ‘great’. Conacher (n. 8 above, 261 f.) does not see Agamemnon as a passionate adherent of the panhellenic view, but thinks that he is making a virtue of necessity by supplying a respectable motive for the sacrifice. He denies that Agamemnon is hypocritical in this speech — a possible view, but Conacher believes that Agamemnon is speaking out of character in order to allow Euripides to foreshadow for us and Iphigenia the panhellenic argument. But this is awkward and implausible. For a similar view see Vretska (n. 3 above) 36. Grube (n. 10 above, 435) allows Agamemnon a certain dignity while conceding his mixed motives. Funke (n. 12 above) 288, Pohlenz, M., Die Griechische Tragödie (Göttingen 1954) 462Google Scholar, and Vellacott (n. 3 above) 97 argue that Agamemnon’s position is hypocritical, masking his fear of the mob. Blaiklock, E.M., The Male Characters of Euripides (Wellington 1952) 116Google Scholar, and Siegel (n. 3 above) 264, stress self-deception rather than hypocrisy.

14. Siegel (n. 3 above, 263) remarks: ‘Fear and powerlessness are the traits which seem to arise continually in Euripides’ portrayal of Agamemnon’. On fear as the primary motive of the ‘ordinary’ people of Euripides see O’Brien, M. J., ‘Orestes and the Gorgon: Euripides’ Ekctra’, AJP 85 (1964) 13–39Google Scholar.

15. Pohlenz (n. 13 above) 465. Compare Wassermann (n. 3 above) 183, who sees Agamemnon as a introvert in an era of new inwardness seriously struggling with his conscience — and betraying his own phusis.

16. The phrase is Kitto’s, H. D. F., Greek Tragedy (London 1961) 363Google Scholar.

17. Grube (n. 10 above) 425; Vellacott (n. 3 above) 87f.

18. Foley, H. P., Ritual Irony (Ithaca 1985) 96Google Scholar, sees Menelaus’ volte-face more optimistically as a positive ‘willingness to empathize with and adopt another’s point of view and to give up desire’, but this empathy lacks moral and intellectual underpinning. Foley (ibid.) compliments Agamemnon also for giving up ambition, but we should remember that he replaces it with paranoid fear and hypocrisy.

19. E.g. Il 10. 114–25.

20. Tro. 860–1059. For Menelaus’ equivocation see especially 873–79.

21. A romanticized view of the epic Achilles is given by the Chorus (206–30). ‘The Chorus creates an expectation for a heroic Achilles’: Foley (n. 18 above) 80.

22. Il. 1. 153 ff.

23. Notably IL 24.540–42.

24. On Clytemnestra’s former marriage see Walsh (n. 3 above) 241. The evil marriages of Menelaus and Agamemnon and the false marriage of Iphigenia are contrasted with the glorious wedding of Peleus and Thetis (1036–97), but even out of this union ‘come war, strife and the destruction of marriage through uncontrolled eros’: Foley (n. 18 above) 81.

25. E.g. Vellacott (n. 3 above) 95f.

26. See Eur. Hec 342–78, 518–82. For Polyxena’s willed death in the face of necessity see 346f.

27. The term is Snell’s, B. in The Discovery of the Mind (Cambridge, Mass. 1953) 130Google Scholar.

28. See Siegel (n. 12 above) 317–21.

29. See Siegel (n. 12 above) 308–12, esp. 311: ‘The impact and effect of the army on Iphigenia is overwhelming and immediate. We may say that Iphigenia realizes, in a moment, the real cause for what is taking place. She sees before her a force which is irrational, powerful and irresistible and which conforms to the hard facts of life and political reality.’

30. On Iphigenia’s wilful self-deception see Siegel (n. 12 above) 314f. He goes too far in denying her sufficient sanity to make a conscious decision. Contrast Foley (n. 18 above) 75, who describes the recantation speech as ‘masterful in its formal structure and rhetoric’, thereby countering ‘the views of critics … who see Iphigenia here as confused or as hypnotized by her father’s rhetoric’ (ibid. n. 18). I would argue that Iphigenia is neither confused nor hypnotized but is nevertheless mistaken in her views and has a vested interest in being so mistaken. As Foley points out (67, n. 4), the ‘positive readings of the I.A. tend to celebrate Iphigenia’s exercise of free will and acquisition of knowledge’, but, as we have seen, the free will that she exercises is heavily qualified by the situation and by her idealistic self-deception which she acquires in place of knowledge. Foley (ibid.) asks: ‘Is the ending … either ironic or a burst of pure and cleansing heroism, or both?’ I would reply: ‘The ending is ironic and the burst of heroism genuine, but neither pure nor cleansing’.

31. See the remarks of Siegel (n. 12 above, 307f.) on Iphigenia’s initial reaction to her father’s desertion of her.

32. There are frequent references to aristocratic ancestry in this play and although the Greeks not uncommonly employed a patronymic style of address the device is especially remarkable in the I.A. (30, 321, 406, 473f, 504f., 686, 695ff, 827, 836, 855f., 896, 901, 903, 946, 949, 975f., 1030–32, 1106, 1233f., 1344, 1457). In roughly half the instances the reference is reinforced by the idea that one must be worthy of one’s forbears, even if they are Tantalids! The frequency of the references seems to compensate for the emptiness of the idea.

33. E.g. 136f.,388f.,489,876f., 893, 1251f., 1255–58.

34. Compare Odysseus’ situation with that of the man in charge of a large and powerful animal (Plato. Rep. 493B). As Plato indicates here and throughout the Gorgias, such a man lacks moral and intellectual understanding of the entity which he is trying to manipulate in what he supposes to be his own interests, and, we might add, he is unaware of his own humiliating dependence on this entity.

35. Knox, B.M.W., ‘The Medea of Euripides’, YCS 25 (1977) 193–225Google Scholar.

36. M. 767,802, 807–10.

37. M. 403–06.

38. The bow renders Heracles independent of Tyche (H.F. 203). This is the meaning of Amphitryon’s defence of Heracles before Lycus (188–203). See Rohdich, H., Die Euripideische Tragödie (Heidelberg 1968) 80–85Google Scholar.

39. I take the madness to be a stress reaction to the conflict experienced by a civilized and sensitive man who is forced to spend his life in destructive violence. Compare the experiences of some Vietnam war veterans who have run amok on their return to civilian life. See also Amphitryon’s comment (966f.).

40. See, eg., 1347–57.

41. Hipp. 337–43, 394.

42. Hipp. 391 ff.

43. Hipp. 321,329, 403–30.

44. E.g. Hipp. 329–35.

45. Hipp. 509–19.

46. Hipp. 520.

47. Hipp. 616–68

48. Hipp. 728–31

49. Sophocles’ Electra is concerned to confront the murderers continuously with their evil acts so that they cannot relax to enjoy their ill-gotten gains (S. El. 355f.). A superficially similar gesture on the part of Euripides’ Electra (Eur. El. 54–63) is really grounded on self-pity.

50. E.g. Eur. El. 1182–85.