Hipp. 108-122 Segal

Euripides, Hippolytus 108-112: Tragic Irony and Tragic JusticeAuthor(s): Charles SegalSource: Hermes, 97. Bd., H. 3 (1969), pp. 297-305Published by: Franz Steiner VerlagStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4475597 .Accessed: 18/11/2013 10:52

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EURIPIDES, HIPPOLYTUS Io8 -ii2: TRAGIC IRONY AND TRAGIC JUSTICE

Hippolytus IO8-I2 are spoken by the protagonist in reply to the servant who has just criticized his neglect of Aphrodite:

IO8 Zco)peZr, O'nah't, zot' napeX00'vT? aO' [OUq aLt'ov pLx?c?O -TepiVV eX xuv0CyLaXq

IIO TpOT?O 7p'n XO XaOTMYnZLV pewv

&T7ot0uq, 07rOW aV appaXL 4eVaq U750

II2 ,opaq ZOpeaOe'q yutv(acl0 Ta 7-Cp6a(popoc.

Editors and interpreters generally pass over these lines in silence. Yet they come as something of a surprise. Why, for instance, should the poet so strongly emphasize eating at this point? As we shall see, the lines are important for two reasons: they shed light on the ethos of the chief character, and they help advance the dramatic movement of the first part of the play. Incidentally, they also show us how attentive and skilful Euripides is in the handling of small details in this carefully structured work.

I.

The lines are of interest, first of all, for the light they shed on Hippolytus' character. To command dinner after a reproach about religious observances leaves little doubt about the abrupt, haughty tone 1. The lines thus add another dimension to the self-confident brusqueness of Hippolytus conveyed by the entire scene. This point, however, does not exhaust their significance.

The language of II2 is especially important for the tone and the dramatic function of the speech. The phrase ,opiq xopeOeL4 is a striking expression for Hippolytus to apply to himself. The noun ropoc can be used of ordinary human food2. When so used in Euripides, however, it often has associations with gluttony on the one hand (cf. Suppl. 865 -6) or bare survival on the other (cf. Cycl. 88, 98, I22; I. T. 973). The speaker in such cases tends be one of Euripides' less noble characters (the farmer in Electra 429 -30, the old servant in Ion II69) or else a hero reduced to dire straits (Odysseus in Cycl. 98; Orestes in I. T. 973; Menelaus in Helen 502). The noun occurs most frequently, as one might expect from the foregoing, in the Cyclops. Here it refers once to the Cyclops' rustic diet (I22). More often it is applied to his grisly cannibalistic

1 For the brusque tone in the preceding lines (IO5 ff.) see W. S. BARRETT, Euripides, Hippolytos (Oxford I964) ad loc., especially page i8o. See also BARRETT'S notes on vss. 9I-2, 99, II4-20.

2 E.g. Aeschyl. Pers. 490; Soph. 0. T. I463, Philoct. 274, 308; Hdt. I, II9, 5; 2, 65, 4; 3, i6, 3; Eurip. Orest. I89. Other Euripidean examples are cited in the text.


298 CHARLES SEGAL

meals (I27, 249, 289, 367, 409). This cannibalistic meaning of Popa occurs elsewhere in Euripides (I. T. 388) and in Aeschylus (Ag. I220 and I597).

Bopa can also mean the food of animals (cf. German 'fressen'): I. A. 423 and cf. Aristoph. Equ. 4I6. But in this sense it most commonly refers to the carrion, human carrion, left for beasts or birds of prey: Eurip., SuppI. 46-7, Phoen. I603, frag. I22 = Aristoph., Thesm. I033; also Aeschyl., P. V. 583; Soph., Antig. 30, IOI7, I040.

The verb zop?aOeLs is also interesting. It occurs only here in the extant Euripides. In other authors the verb, like ropa, can have associations of gluttonous eating (e.g. Homer, Od. 0 28; Hdt. I, 2I2, 3). More broadly, it can refer to 'glut' generally (cf. xopoq), often in a pejorative sense: Homer, I1. N 635, X 427; Hdt. 3, 8o, 4; Aristoph., Pax I283-5. Like P3op', it too is used of animals (Homer, Od. x 41I, hymn. Cer. I75) and of beasts of prey devouring human corpses (Homer, I1. E) 379, N 83I-2, P 24I; Soph., Philoct. II56). There are metaphorical and more neutral usages too, of course', but generally the verb seems capable of a pejorative connotation. Such a connotation is all the more likely in combination with ropa.

Expressions which are analogous to opaq xopsaOes in Hipp. II2 also suggest that this line has a negative tone. The closest analogies in Euripides describe respectively the brutalizing, coarse poverty of the unheroic farmer in Electra 424-5,

C6'TLV Or On o?aocx y' zv 30LoLq ZTt, (Ot)' ZV y' ehZ 'iPjp T9ouGa TC)Wp GOCL 3opaq.

and the gruesome cannibalism of the Cyclops at Cycl. 409-IO:

eT1 a' aocLpOv -cov 4LCOv TCX?0Oe 3opaq av ernsa, cp&puyoq aO&p' e ,lS r3osqv ....

The phrase -nX?3aOetq Pop&q in the latter passage seems modelled after the

Thyestean banquet of Aeschylus:

yeZpaq xpe7v tX Oov-c, oLZxLoc, ,op&x (Ag. I220); eaOsLt Pop3V O&atwroV, (t) 6pR, Y, (Ag. I597).

It is fairly likely, therefore, that line II2 has connotations of violence and coarseness. Such connotations in the context are surprising and yet, as will appear, appropriate. Both the phrase and its context stand in harsh contrast to the purity of Hippolytus' way of life described in his famous speech of 73-87. That contrast takes on a deeper, more tragic irony when Theseus later taunts Hippolytus with his 'pure' diet of &4'Xou POpFx; (952). (We are not,

1 E.g. of human eating, neutrally: Homer, I1. rI 747, T I67; metaphorically, of grief or war: Homer, IL. N 635, X 427; Od. 8 54I, X 499, etc.


Euripides, Hippolytus io8-i12: Tragic Irony and Tragic Justice 299

of course, to take Theseus' insult as conveying literal truth and thus imagine Hippolytus as a vegetarian: io8 -I2 clearly show the reverse).

The speech of I08-I2 thus hints at an ambiguity in Hippolytus' major pursuit, the hunt. For Hippolytus hunting is a means of coming into touch with the purity of nature (cf. 74 -8I) and of approaching his chaste goddess. The very first speech in the play states this association between the hunt and the hero's 4ULoLc with Artemis. Aphrodite says (I7-I8),

zxwp, v 8' o&v' U`?v rapOevo iUveVw a&l xua6v rozsLg Onpoc iatp xoovo6 ....

The language of line i8 here already hints that the hunt has a cruel and callous side. And opax copscOe'L in II2 underlines this savage aspect of the hunt. Is not the hunter's food, the ropoc of II2, after all, the spoils of the chase1? Bop5cq zopcOelg could suggest a creature of prey battening on his kill (cf. the passages cited above). Naturally the point should not be pressed too far. But the lines imply a negative quality in Hippolytus' kinship with the wild and its goddess, an element of cruelty and savagery which Phaedra later recognizes when she describes him as opy~ auvrnyplvoq cpp'vocq (689), a phrase which suggests a wild boar 2. It is interesting that Phaedra, even in the grip of her strange longing for the hunt, i. e. for Hippolytus and his way of life, describes his hounds with the bloody epithet Opo(pvosL (2I6). Whether she realizes it or not, the adjective contains an insight into Hippolytus' nature and hence, indirectly, points to the tragic hopelessness of her love.

In the very midst of the pure tranquillity to which Hippolytus aspires, the phrase Popxq xopea0eL intimates something savage. It thus forewarns us of that latent, animal-like violence which will be his undoing. The speech which most fully betrays this violence dwells on wild beasts (645-8) and develops further the ambiguity of Hippolytus' connection with the wild:

xpnv a' e' yU'VOxoc 7rp6a7r0o0V e OU ?rspAv, &cpoyyoc 8' -zZTa CUyXoTOLxLZLV &axYj

Op%&V, LV SLXOV pLTC lpOac)VSLV '6LVO

P . x76 vcvt cpOVy@V o 8KCa00CL 760?v.

In these lines Hippolytus reveals, unwittingly, the inhuman, unresponsive quality of the wild, the realm with which, here in our passage of the prologue, he happily associates himself.

1 See BARRETT ad vss. 952 -5. He remarks, in the course of refuting the idea that these lines refer to any Orphic vegetarianism, ))Are we seriously to believe that when the passion- ate hunter sits down after his hunting to a rpmbrz4oc rnXpiq (iio), that table is laden not with venison but with bread and cheese ? e (p. 343).

2 Cf. Eurip. Phoen. I380; Homer, Il. A 4I6, N 474-5. See C. P. SEGAL, The Tragedy of the Hippolytus: the Waters of Ocean and the Untouched Meadow, HSCP 70, I965, I32, with note 33, P. I64.


300 CHARLES SEGAL

This sinister side of Hippolytus' association with the wild has many reverberations throughout the play. Hippolytus' death, for example, comes from the realm of wild nature which he has both espoused and hunted: he is killed by an &cypLOV tkpoq which fills the land with a terrifying, inhuman roar (I2I4-I6)1. Like all of Hippolytus' relation with the wild, however, the bull is more complex. Its roar recalls Phaedra's description of Hippolytus himself, shouting angry denunciations of women:

692 7CX~GCL Te 76EUoV yoaxv av7-rWv ?o0cv.

Cf. I2I5-I6 oi WTX6OC p?V xOcWV ?0eypto10o 7pOUtwV 9 &vp'tXs ( yOkyy?T (o)....

The hunter and the wild in which he hunts are drawn ominously together. The ambiguity of Hippolytus' hunting is developed in still another direction

when Theseus, just after his 'Orphic' insult of 952 (see above), gives an unex- pected twist to 'hunting'. He uses the verb to impute an evil, impure meaning to Hippolytus' way of life (956 -7):

Opru, ouGt ydp 6pVozq XO6yoLaLv, ML Px tyXaVcqevot.

We may note another reference here to the scene with the servant (88-II3) in the pejorative use of ae[,v6q in 957: cf. 99 and I03.

II.

We may now examine another function of lines I08-II2. They form a striking contrast with what we are told of Phaedra only some twenty lines later in the parode (I35 -8):

CpLTOCTaV 8? VLV X?UWt -r&v8' &ocpcLoc

I 1 c N ,

A o poc, axta& a6 ocaq MyV0v Laxzv ....

#I hear that for the third day she keeps her body pure of Demeter's grain in the non-eating of her mouth ((2.

The lines bring the two characters together in several ways. First, Phaedra's

34acq &yv6ov alludes not only to the ))ritual purity

Euripides, Hippolytus io8-iI2: Tragic Irony and Tragic Justice 30I

(I02; cf. II) 1. Second, and more to our present purpose, the lines contrast Phaedra's abstention from food with that exuberant, almost coarse appetite of Hippolytus described in I08-I2.

This latter contrast, in turn, is part of a larger motif. Disease and health are controlling metaphors in this epeisodion. Disease, v06ao4, is frequently mentioned2, and there is even an explicit mention of its opposite, uyLea, in 263. A good appetite is a mark of health. Phaedra's fasting, however, is the most disturbing symptom of her 'disease'. It is this abstention, in fact, which makes the Nurse fear for her life. Hence the chorus returns to the subject in a passage closely related to I35 f. (274-77):

Xo. J aOcvez e xOl xoct-ravtroL ae,uLaO. Tp. 7cC a' otu, trpoacav y' o5a' &aLroq ,uIepav; XO. 7OT6pOV U'7r' 0"C&T q Oacv zv 7pCtOPIV; Tp. (oux ol'*> akrZi a' Csq &IaM0alcv f3ou.

TpLraL'ocv in 275 shows that Euripides still has the parode in mind (cf. rpLr0&T(V, I35). We are twice told that Phaedra is &ar.Tqo (275, 277); and we may be reminded of Hippolytus' a6trov [Le6?Xa0 (io9).

What is the dramatic significance of these contrasts? There are several possibilities. The contrast increases the distance between the two protagonists and thus strengthens the impossibility of communication and hence the likeli- hood of disaster. Hippolytus' lines (Io8-I2) portray a smug, self-contained satisfaction with his mode of life. The bursting 'health' of such a huntsman is not likely to be able to comprehend, let alone deal with, the 'sickness' of a Phaedra.

On the other hand, the image of Hippolytus' 'health' conveyed in io8-I2 is to be undercut by subsequent events, especially the vehement speech of 6i6-68. Indeed, his health-or, in its spiritual aspect, his aocppoat'vI (cf. 8o, IIOO, I365) -has already been partly undercut by the scornful last line of this very speech (II3; see below). Thus Hippolytus' apparent affirmation of life may appear initially to compare favorably with Phaedra's rejection of life (M706a-actv ,LoU, 277; cf. 39, 47, 400-30); but it is later revealed to rest upon a narrow exclusion of reality (cf. 6I6-24). Hence the 'disease'-metaphor so pervasively used of Phaedra will eventually be applied to Hippolytus too (730 -I, 933) 3. And in his final scene, he, like Phaedra after the parode, will appear as a helpless invalid on the point of death (I348 ff.) 4.

1 For the meaning of Phaedra's 'purity' in I38 see BARRETT ad loc. The word &yv6q is central to the play, and I hope to develop its significance elsewhere.

2 Cf. HSCP 70, I38 with note 39. Note also the pharmakon-theme of 389 and 478-524. 8 HSCP 70, 138. 4 HSCP 70, I52.


302 CHARLES SEGAL

III.

In the preceding section I have argued that lines I08-I2 prepare a contrast between Hippolytus and Phaedra in terms of eager appetite versus fasting, health versus disease, energetic affirmation of life versus suicide. This contrast, however, as I have suggested, has an underlying irony which is in turn part of the tragic situation. It is, however, possible to take this argument a bit further.

There are many links between the two scenes on either side of the parode. Phaedra desires to drink from a )>dewy spring'< and lie in a meadow (208-II; cf. also 226). Her language is obviously meant to recall Hippolytus' >pure meadow

Euripides, Hippolytus io8-I12: Tragic Irony and Tragic Justice 303

To return to II2, one may wonder, in the light of the double function of I08-I2, whether yuVvo o -a irp6acpopoc may not contain an irony of another kind. WECKLEIN long ago noted that the line was a preparation for the manner of Hippolytus' death at the end'. His doom is latent in his most characteristic pursuit. The ironic foreshadowing of the end, however, goes even further than WECKLEIN saw. The concern which the hero shows for his horses in III I2 iS to prove fruitless as they drag him to death. The messenger's long account of the grim event begins with details of Hippolytus' care for the horses (II74): 4rYXTpoMLGv 1rctMOv ZTrCsvL'opzv ptPZa. It is most interesting that the first word of this line is from the same root as the verb xaroci'4-v in iio. Later, just before the horses break completely out of control, Hippolytus appeals to that very care which lines III-I2 have described (I240-I):

bT' (p&'XvLaL6 -Tog ?pt IOpOXLJVcLL,

And finally, after his entrance, the shattered youth apostrophizes the horses and mentions his special care of them (I355-6):

cT) auyvo VO/V OYfZ LLtS=LOV, Sl1Y4

Line II2 also points to a deeper, inner failing which these pursuits imply and hence marks the deeper reasons for Hippolytus' destruction. T& 7tpO6YOpX can mean merely what is 'useful' or 'needful' in a simple, physical sense2. In tragedy, however, the word can also refer to what is 'fitting' or 'appropriate' with an attendant idea of moral obligation, religious propriety, or responsibility to human ties 3. Euripides here plays upon the two meanings, as Aeschylus had done before him4. It is exactly ro& -rcpoyopo in the latter, moral sense which Hippolytus does not practise, at least toward the goddess whom he scornfully dismisses in his next line: >)Your Kypris I bid a long farewell

304 CHARLES SEGAL

7Cp6acpOPO ~' oOUPST, TU'VTOVOC 0' F-A%eTP tOV xoc06xotc40o XO~L XoTpoTOV

The link is made even stronger by Hippolytus' references to his piety and wor- ship in the ensuing lines (I364-5):

68 0 asptv6L [cf. 99] Z XOOL 00Ga7rWp%, 68' o aypo VV [cf. 8o] 7avm 'repaX V a . -

His tone here stands at the opposite pole from the animal energy and assured, commanding presence of III-I2. It is rather the pathetically feeble entreaty of a suffering man near death who wants to spare himself what further pain he can. Hippolytus' condition, as I have pointed out elsewhere 1, also recalls the weakened state of Aphrodite's other victim (I98): OcpPT' [cf. I36I] tou a' 6pOoi05' [cf. I445] xapoc; cf. also 243 and I458.

The connection between the two characters begun in the contrast between io8 -I2 and I35-8 is now fulfilled. Once more the two fates are linked; and the chorus, just before Hippolytus appears, prepares us for the connection in lamenting the ))double griefa (8L8u[Lov . .. .c vOo) of the house (I345-6; cf. also I403-4). The linking of the two characters has been essential to Aphrodite's scheme (cf. 47-50), and the outcome is a fearful vindication of her power. Hippolytus is destroyed for denying her (II3). Yet the connotations of I08-I2 which we have explored suggest that the goddess also makes use of his own nature in this destruction.

IV.

This internal dimension of Hippolytus' tragedy complements and deepens the religious dimension. There is still an element of justice on Hippolytus' side in his complaint of I36I -6: I, a pious and reverent man, am cruelly killed; my piety counts for nothing. Hence there is still an element of raw, unresolved suffering left in the outcome. It would be an oversimplified moralism to regard Hippolytus' death simply as a completely just recompense for his neglect of Aphrodite and as a consequence of anthropomorphic jealousy. This neglect of Aphrodite, however, as lines io8-i2 help show, has a broader meaning. It is bound up with an attitude which may anger a goddess who is not merely a jealous female, but presides over the joyful procreation of life (cf. 447-50, I268 -8I).

Aphrodite's wrath, in other words, may be more integrally related to Hippolytus' hunting and hence to his basic character than most critics have

1 HSCP 70, I38.


Euripides, Hippolytus io8-iI2: Tragic Irony and Tragic Justice 305

seen. The hunting itself is more than just a superficial characteristic given by the myth. It contains a potential for delineating a fundamental stance toward life, nature, creativity, which Euripides has profoundly exploited. Lines Io8 -I2 help set that hunting into a perspective, a consistent framework of ideas, to which belong the language of line i8 (see above), the adjective 0IpOyopVOL in 2I6, Hippolytus' lines on childbirth (6I6-24) and on wild beasts as women's proper companions (645-8).

On the one hand Hippolytus would share in the peace and serenity of nature's clear streams and remote groves to escape the disturbing passions of the city and the burdens of the human world and human relationships generally. On the other hand his hunting contains not an ideal harmony, but a harsh opposition between man and nature. As hunter, man invades and destroys nature s tranquillity. Hippolytus' hunting, the connotations of the language of II2 (above, section I), and the other traits of violence in his character stand in irreconcilable opposition to the positive functions of Aphro- dite (see especially I268 -8i) and even of Hippolytus' own Artemis'. They stand in opposition also to his ideal relation to the natural world sketched out in his speech of 73-87.

We could put these antitheses in terms of nomos and physis, as the poet himself hints (see 79, 448, 46I). Or, if we wish to look beyond the play, we could see these antitheses perhaps as foreshadowing those tensions between man and nature, city and country, tranquil disengagement and social involve- ment which, lightly touched upon by Plato in the next century2, are to become vitally important in the groves of Theocritus and the garden of Epicurus. In any case the significance of Hippolytus' tragedy extends far beyond its theo- logical frame, as does also the significance of the goddess who causes that tragedy: )>Kypris is then no god, but something else greater than a god, whatever that may be(( (359-60).

Brown University CHARLES SEGAL Providence, R. I.

1 For a hint at some limitations in Hippolytus' idea of Artemis cf. I65-9 and see HSCP 70, I58ff.

2 Phaedrus 229 B-D.

Hermes 97,3 20


Article Contentsp. [297]p. 298p. 299p. 300p. 301p. 302p. 303p. 304p. 305

Issue Table of ContentsHermes, 97. Bd., H. 3 (1969), pp. 257-384Die Inschrift vom Nestor-Becher aus Ischia [pp. 257-261]Some Notes on the Athenian Entry, Iliad B 546-56 [pp. 262-266]Saffo Fr. 31,13 L.-P. [pp. 267-272]Pindars Dritte Nemeische ode [pp. 272-291]Ein Buchtitel des Protagoras [pp. 292-296]Euripides, Hippolytus 108-112: Tragic Irony and Tragic Justice [pp. 297-305]Why Are the Frogs in the Frogs? [pp. 306-317]De Exemplo meo Ipse Aedificato: An Organizing Idea in the Mostellaria [pp. 318-332]Ein Pferdegleichnis bei Ennius [pp. 333-345]'Verteidigung' des I. Buches der Aeneis [pp. 346-361]Zu Ammianus Marcellinus [pp. 362-371]MiszellenThe Bond of the Cosmos: A Significant Metaphor (Tim. 31 c ff.) [pp. 372-373]Zu Anth. Pal. 5, 162 (Asklepiades) [pp. 373-374]Anth. Pal. 12, 91 [pp. 375-377]Horace, Carmina I, II, 5-6: quae nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare Tyrrhenum [pp. 377-378]Three Notes on Tibullus I, I [pp. 378-380]A Correction [p. 380]'Eating People Is Right': Petronius 141 and a [pp. 381-384]

Hipp. 108-122 Segal

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