Taming the Gods: the Demise of the Epic Age as Constructive Process in Aeschylus’s Oresteia

Abstract

Aeschylus’ Oresteia, following the Trojan War’s aftermath among the Atreids, chronicles the last moments of the age of heroes. In its denouement, Orestes, instead of receiving absolution from his patron-god Apollo – as he did in the mythical tradition, is tried by his fellow mortals in Athens. Throughout the trilogy, a gradual but seismic shift occurs along three related parameters: humanity’s relationship to the divine, conceptions of justice (Δικη), and the structure of the polis. The three plays, which correspond to the three libations, each represent a stage in this progression, ultimately spelling the end of the epic world. Ultimately, the justice of the Olympians, incapable of taming either divine nor mortal enmities, gives way to the institutionalised justice of the republic. The aristocratic oikos, accordingly, is supplanted by the democratic polis. Finally, divinity – embodied in the Erinyes-Eumenides – is tamed by the ascendant polis. At the end of Eumenides, the gods are no longer “Olympian Zeus and the Olympians”, dictating human life as “unignorable potentates” on high, but pragmatic benefactors defined in relation to humanity, i.e. Zeus the Saviour, providing peace and prosperity in return for worship.