SOPHOCLES TRACHINIAE [Women of Trachis] Translated by Ian Johnston Vancouver Island University Nanaimo, British Columbia Canada 2018 TRANSLATOR’S NOTE The following translation may be downloaded and distributed in print or electronic form (in whole or in part) without permission and without charge by students, teachers, artists, and members of the general public. Those who wish to edit or adapt the translation for their own purposes may do so. However, no commercial publication of this text is allowed without the permission of the translator, Ian Johnston (
[email protected]). In the following text, the line number without brackets refer to the English translation; those in square brackets refer to the Greek text. In the English text, short indented lines have been included with short lines above them in computing the appropriate line number. The stage directions and footnotes have been provided by the translator. In this translation, possessives of words ending in -s are usually indicated in the common way (that is, by adding -’s (e.g. Zeus and Zeus’s). This convention adds a syllable to the spoken word (the sound -iz). Sometimes, for metrical reasons, this English text indicates such possession in an alternate manner, with a simple apostrophe. This form of the possessive does not add an extra syllable to the spoken name (e.g., Hercules and Hercules’ are both three-syllable words; whereas, Hercules’s has four syllables). The translator would like to acknowledge the valuable assistance of Richard Jebb’s commentary and translation (available online at Perseus). A NOTE ON THE MYTHOLOGICAL BACKGROUND Like almost all Greek legends, the Herakles (Hercules) story has many versions (especially since Herakles was a very popular figure in Greek drama and poetry).