page_title: Aeschylus
section_title: Agamemnon
hierarchical_section_title: Aeschylus / Surviving plays / The Oresteia / Agamemnon
caption_attribution_description: English: Clytemnestra hesitates before killing the sleeping Agamemnon. On the left, Aegisthus urges her on. Español: Clytemnestra vacila antes de matar al durmiente Agamenón. A la izquierda, Egisto la incita. Français&#160;: Clytemnestre hésitant avant de frapper Agamemnon endormi. À gauche, Égisthe en train de la pousser.
context_page_description: Aeschylus was an ancient Greek tragedian. He is often described as the father of tragedy. Academics' knowledge of the genre begins with his work, and understanding of earlier tragedies is largely based on inferences from his surviving plays. According to Aristotle, he expanded the number of characters in the theatre and allowed conflict among them; characters previously had interacted only with the chorus.
  Only seven of his estimated seventy to ninety plays have survived, and there is a long-standing debate regarding his authorship of one of these plays, Prometheus Bound, which some believe his son Euphorion actually wrote. Fragments of some other plays have survived in quotations and more continue to be discovered on Egyptian papyrus, often giving further insights into his work. He was probably the first dramatist to present plays as a trilogy; his Oresteia is the only ancient example of the form to have survived. At least one of his plays was influenced by the Persians' second invasion of Greece.
context_section_description: Aeschylus begins in Greece describing the return of King Agamemnon from his victory in the Trojan War, from the perspective of the towns people (the Chorus) and his wife, Clytemnestra. However, dark foreshadowings build to the death of the king at the hands of his wife, who was angry at his sacrifice of their daughter Iphigenia, who was killed so that the gods would restore the winds and allow the Greek fleet to sail to Troy. She was also unhappy at his keeping of the Trojan prophetess Cassandra as a concubine. Cassandra foretells of the murder of Agamemnon, and of herself, to the assembled townsfolk, who are horrified. She then enters the palace knowing that she cannot avoid her fate. The ending of the play includes a prediction of the return of Orestes, son of Agamemnon, who will seek to avenge his father.
caption: The Murder of Agamemnon by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin (1817)
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