Das UberMensch!

...and das UnterMensch...

...who "occupies a certain social position" and cries out for Saviours/ Saving.

Just keep pushing the button, Lois!

Aeschylus, "Seven Against Thebes"

Chorus. I wail over our fearful, mighty woes! the army is let loose, having quitted its camp, a mighty mounted host is streaming hitherward in advance;97 the dust appearing high in the air convinces me, a voiceless, clear, true messenger; the noise of the clatter of their hoofs upon the plain,98 reaching even to our couches, approaches my ears, is wafted on, and is rumbling like a resistless torrent lashing the mountain-side. Alas! alas! oh gods and goddesses, avert the rising horror; the white-bucklered99 well-appointed host is rushing on with a shout on the other side our walls, speeding its way to the city. Who then will rescue us, who then of gods and goddesses will aid us? Shall I then prostrate myself before the statues of the divinities? Oh ye blessed beings, seated on your glorious thrones, 'tis high time for us to cling to your statues—why do we deeply sighing delay? Hear ye, or hear ye not, the clash of bucklers? When, if not now, 59shall we set about the orison of the peplus100 and chaplets? I perceive a din, a crash of no single spear. What wilt thou do? wilt thou, O Mars, ancient guardian of our soil, abandon thine own land? God of the golden helm, look upon, look upon the city which once thou didst hold well-beloved. Tutelary gods of our country, behold,101 behold this train of virgins suppliant to escape from slavery,102 for around our city a surge of men with waving crests is rippling, stirred by the blasts of Mars. But, O Jove, sire all-perfect! avert thoroughly from us capture by the foemen; for Argives are encircling the fortress of Cadmus; and I feel a dread of martial arms, and the bits which are fastened through the jaws of their horses are knelling slaughter. And seven leaders of the host, conspicuous in their spear-proof harness, are taking their stand at our seventh gate,103 assigned their posts by lot. Do thou too, O Jove-born power that delightest in battle, Pallas, become a savior to our city; and thou, equestrian monarch, sovereign of the main, with thy fish-smiting trident, O Neptune, grant a deliverance, a deliverance from our terrors. Do thou too, O Mars, alas! alas! guard the city which is named after Cadmus, and manifestly show thy care60—and thou, Venus, the original mother of our race, avert [these ills]—for from thy blood are we sprung; calling on thee with heavenward orisons do we approach thee. And thou, Lycæan king, be thou fierce as a wolf104 to the hostile army, [moved] by the voice of our sighs.105 Thou too, virgin-daughter of Latona, deftly adorn thyself with thy bow, O beloved Diana. Ah! ah! ah! I hear the rumbling of cars around the city, O revered Juno, the naves of the heavy-laden axles creak, the air is maddened with the whizzing of javelins—what is our city undergoing? What will become of it? To what point is the deity conducting the issue?106 ah! ah! A shower of stones too from their slingers is coming over our battlements. O beloved Apollo! there is the clash of brass-rimmed shields at the gates, and the just issue in battle must be decided by arms according to the disposal of Jove.107 And thou Onca,108 immortal queen, that dwellest in front of our city, rescue thy seven-gated seat. O gods, all-potent to save, O ye gods and goddesses, perfect guardians of the towers of this land, abandon not our war-wasted city to an army of aliens. Listen to these virgins, listen to our all-just prayers, as is most right, to the orisons of virgins which are offered with out-stretched hands. O 61beloved divinities, hovering around our city as its deliverers, show how ye love it; give heed to our public rituals, and when ye give heed to them succor us, and be ye truly mindful, I beseech ye, of the rites of our city which abound in sacrifices.

Translator (Theodore Alois Buckley) Notes:

97 πρόδρομος=so as to be foremost. Cf. Soph. Antig. 108, φυγάδα πρόδρομον ὀξυτέρῳ κινήσασα χαλινῷ.

98 This passage is undoubtedly corrupt, but Dindorf's conjecture ἕλε δ᾽ ἐμὰς φρένας δέος· ὅπλων κτύπος ποτιχρίμπτεται, διὰ πέδον βοὰ ποτᾶται, βρέμει δ᾽—, although ingenious, differs too much from the ductus literarum, to be considered safe. Paley from the interpretation of the Medicean MS. and the reading of Robortelli, εΔΙΔεμνας, has conjectured ΔΙΑ δὲ γᾶς ἐμᾶς πεδί᾽ ὁπλοκτύπου, which seems preferable. Perhaps we might read ἐπὶ δὲ γᾶς πεδιοπλοκτύπου ὠσὶν χρίμπι βοὰ, by tmesis, for ἐπιχρίμπτεται. Æschylus used the compound, ἐγχρίπτεσθαι, Suppl. 790, and nothing is more common than such a tmesis. I doubt whether πεδιοπλοκτύπον is not one of Æschylus' own "high-crested" compounds. Mr. Burges has kindly suggested a parallel passage of an anonymous author, quoted by Suidas, s. v. ὑπαραττομένης · ἵππων χρεμετιζόντων, τῆς γῆς τοῖς ποσὶν αὐτῶν ὑπαραττομένης, οὔλων συγκρουομένων.

59 Stanley compares Pindar, Isth. vii. 33.
——πεπρωμένον ἦν φέρτερον
γόνον [οἱ] ἄνακτα πατρὸς τεκεῖν
And Apoll. Rhod. iv. 201. Also the words of Thetis herself in Nonnus, Dionys. xxxiii. 356.
Ζεύς με πατὴρ ἐδίωκε καὶ ἤθελεν ἐς γάμον ἕλκειν,
εἰ μή μιν ποθέοντα γέρων ἀνέκοπτε Προμηθεύς,
θεσπίζων Κρονίωνος ἀρείονα παῖδα φυτεῦσαι.

100 Cf. Virg. Æn. I. 479;

"Interea ad templum non æquæ Palladis ibant
Crinibus Iliades passis, peplumque ferebant
Suppliciter tristes"—
Statius, Theb. x. 50:
——"et ad patrias fusæ Pelopeides aras
Sceptriferæ Junonis opem, reditumque suorum
Exposcunt, pictasque fores, et frigida vultu
Saxa terunt, parvosque docent procumbere natos
* * * * *
Peplum etiam dono, cujus mirabile textum," etc.

101 Here there is a gap in the metre. See Dindorf.

102 "pro vitanda servitute."—Paley.

103 Not "at the seven gates," as Valckenaer has clearly shown.

60 "These were; 1. Epaphus; 2. Lybia; 3. Belus; 4. Danaus; 5. Hypermnestra; 6. Abas; 7. Prœtus; 8. Acrisius; 9. Danae; 10. Perseus; 11. Electryon; 12. Alcmena; 13. Hercules."—Blomfield.

104 The paronomasia can only be kept up by rendering, "do thou, king of wolves, fall with wolf-like fierceness," etc. Müller, Dorians, vol. i. p. 325, considers that Λύκειος is connected with λύκη, light, not with λύκος, a wolf.

105 I follow Paley's emendation, ἀϋταῖς.

106 See a judicious note of Paley's.

107 I have borrowed Griffiths' translation. It seems impossible that ἁγνὸν τέλος could ever be a personal appeal, while σύ τε evidently shows that the address to Pallas Onca was unconnected with the preceding line. As there is probably a lacuna after Διόθεν, it is impossible to arrive at any certain meaning.

108 See Stanley. Ὄγκα is a Phœnician word, and epithet of Minerva.

61 For two ways of supplying the lacuna in this description of Io's travels, see Dindorf and Paley.