Theseus, on entering, immediately demands of the Chorus an explanation of the in the house and of the lack of proper welcome for the returning master. His first thought is that something may have happened to the aged Pittheus. No, say the Chorus, the has nothing to do with the old: it is the young whose death causes pain . Naturally, Theseus now leaps to the conclusion that it is his children whose ‘life is pillaged’ : no, he is told, (...) it is his wife. (shrink)

emended in with the note ‘hanc formam doricam defendere studet G. Fraenkel Glotta ii. 33’.Fraenkel argues that this form is the product of a conscious effort to avoidconfusion and not ‘ein bloss‘.

emended in with the note ‘hanc formam doricam defendere studet G. Fraenkel Glotta ii. 33’.Fraenkel argues that this form is the product of a conscious effort to avoidconfusion and not ‘ein bloss‘.

In this scene Oedipus receives the delegation of suppliants who have come, under the leadership of the priest of Zeus, to entreat Oedipus to deliver them from the blight and the plague. The issue with which I propose to deal concerns the composition of this delegation.