Greek Drama · Part 5 · Aeschylus · B2
Prometheus Bound
Part 5 of Greek Drama: Prometheus, the god who stole fire for humans and taught them every art, is chained to a rock at the edge of the world by order of Zeus. He knows a secret that could destroy Zeus, and he refuses to tell it. Verbs with two objects (gave humans fire, taught them to count), hedging about authorship (is thought to have been written by, may not be by), and the language of defiance, with Philo, Sophia, Marcos and Demetria.
In the Theogony you met Prometheus the trickster, who cheated Zeus at the sacrifice at Mekone. Tonight’s play shows him very differently: as the great friend of humanity, chained to a mountain because he loved us too much.
A god who suffers for humans. That is an unusual idea for the Greeks.
It is, Philo. And there is a mystery about the play itself: for two thousand years everyone said Aeschylus wrote it, and now many scholars doubt it. Tonight we learn how to talk carefully about who wrote what, and the grammar of giving and teaching.
If he gave us fire, he deserves a statue, not a rock.
Prometheus Bound has always been listed among the seven surviving plays of Aeschylus. But many modern scholars think it may not be by him: its style, its metre and its view of Zeus are different from his other plays. Some suggest it was written by his son Euphorion, or by another poet after his death. Others still defend Aeschylus as the author. It was probably part of a trilogy; the other plays, including Prometheus Unbound, are lost.
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