Prometheus Bound

Prometheus Bound has come down to us under the name of Aeschylus, and it is one of the most spectacular tragedies of the Greek stage. Soon after giving fire to humankind in defiance of Zeus, the Titan Prometheus is chained to a rock in the Scythian wilderness by Zeus’ agents, Power and Force, and the reluctant god of fire, Hephaestus (lines 1–87). A chorus of Oceanids overhears him and arrives to sympathize with him. In the discussions between the nymphs and the Titan we learn that Prometheus is punished because he helped mortals (lines 228–254). Pursued by a gadfly, the mortal Io, half-maiden and half-cow, rushes in (lines 561–608); Prometheus tells her of her wanderings and promises that, from her descendants, a bold archer will in time free him (lines 700–876). Prometheus is not shaken by his torment, because he knows a secret: Zeus is destined to make a marriage that will cast him out of his rule (lines 764–768, 907–912). Zeus sends Hermes to extract the secret, but the Titan remains defiant, and as the storm of Zeus breaks around him, the Oceanids refuse to leave him (lines 944–1093).

Date and Historical Background

No ancient source we have tells us when Prometheus Bound was first produced, at which festival, or with which plays. The play has come down in the manuscripts of Aeschylus, and the ancient tradition ascribes it to him. Modern readers have questioned this, because of the play’s style and staging and because its Zeus is so unlike the Zeus of the other plays, but the question remains open.

The story itself is older than the play. Hesiod tells of Prometheus, son of Iapetus, who deceived Zeus at the division of the sacrifice, stole fire in a hollow fennel stalk, and was bound by Zeus, with an eagle set to eat his liver until Heracles shot it and freed him (Hesiod, Theogony 507–616; Works and Days 42–105). Apollodorus, who tells the same story in prose, adds that Prometheus was nailed to Mount Caucasus (Library 1.7.1). Prometheus Bound differs from Hesiod in important points: here Prometheus is the son of Themis, who is also called Earth: “one form with many names,” he says (lines 18, 211–212, 873–874), he is the helper of Zeus in the war against the Titans (lines 199–225), and he refuses to speak his secret to the new ruler of the gods.

Characters and Setting

Characters

• Prometheus, a Titan and the giver of fire and the arts to mortals
• Power (Kratos) and Force (Bia), Zeus’ enforcers
• Hephaestus, the god of fire and metalworking
• Chorus of Oceanids, daughters of Oceanus and Tethys
• Oceanus, the Titan of the river that encircles the world
• Io, daughter of Inachus and one of Zeus’s loves, in the shape of a horned maiden
• Hermes, the messenger of Zeus

Setting

The play is set at the far ends of the earth, in an uninhabited wilderness of Scythia (lines 1–2), at a rock overlooking the sea, where Prometheus is fastened (lines 117–118, 140–143).

Summary of Prometheus Bound

Prologue

(Lines 1–127.) Power and Force bring the Titan to the farthest part of the earth, “the Scythian road, a desert where no one goes,” with Hephaestus, whom Power tells to fasten the “offender” to the high crags with unbreakable adamantine bonds (lines 1–6). Power explains the reason: Prometheus stole Hephaestus’ “flower, the gleam of all-skilled fire,” and gave it to mortals, and for such a wrong he must pay the penalty to the gods, so that he learns to accept Zeus’ rule and to stop being a friend of men (lines 7–11).

Hephaestus is reluctant: he calls Prometheus a god of his own kin and the son of Themis, but he must obey Zeus (lines 12–35). Power presses him on, and Hephaestus nails the Titan’s hands and legs and drives an adamantine wedge through his chest (lines 52–65). Power’s parting taunt is a pun on the Titan’s name: “The gods call you Prometheus (Forethinker) wrongly, for you yourself need forethought to find how you will escape this contrivance” (lines 82–87).

Alone, Prometheus calls on the bright upper air, the swift winds, the springs of the rivers, the countless laughter of the waves of the sea, all-mother earth and the all-seeing circle of the sun to witness what he, a god, suffers at the hands of gods (lines 88–92). He says that he knows everything that will come, and that he stole the fire in a fennel stalk, the teacher of every craft to mortals (lines 101–113). Then he hears the sound of wings and a rustle in the air (lines 114–127).

Parodos (Entrance Song)

(Lines 128–192.) The Oceanids, daughters of Oceanus and Tethys, arrive on a winged chariot, having left their cave when the noise of iron struck their modesty; they have come barefoot (lines 128–135). They tell him not to fear, for they are friends. Prometheus asks them to look at him (lines 136–143). The chorus laments that new helmsmen now rule Olympus, and that Zeus governs by new laws and brings the old powers to nothing (lines 144–151). Prometheus says that he wished Zeus had hurled him under the earth to Tartarus, so that neither god nor any other could rejoice at his sufferings (lines 152–159). He is certain that Zeus will need him one day, to learn from him by whom he will be deprived of his scepter and honors, and that neither sweet persuasion nor threats will make him speak until Zeus releases him from his bonds and is willing to pay for the outrage (lines 168–179). The chorus finds him bold and outspoken and fears for him (lines 180–188), but Prometheus declares that Zeus, harsh as he is, will one day become mild and, when his anger is calmed, will come to him in friendship (lines 189–195).

First Episode

(Lines 196–396.) The Oceanids, who live far from the councils of the gods, ask him to explain the offence for which Zeus treats him so dishonorably. Prometheus tells of the quarrel among the gods when Zeus and Cronus were rivals (lines 201–205). He tried to persuade his fellow Titans, the children of Earth and Heaven, to win by cunning rather than by strength, but they ignored him, and so, advised by his mother Themis (Earth), he went over to Zeus: by his counsel the dark depths of Tartarus now hold Cronus and his allies (lines 206–223). That is what the tyrant of the gods paid him back with, for it is the disease of tyranny not to trust one’s friends (lines 224–227).

The reason for the punishment is the following (lines 228–243). When Zeus took his father’s throne, he distributed privileges among the gods, but took no account of the wretched mortals and wished to destroy the whole race and plant a new one. No one opposed this except Prometheus, who dared to rescue mortals so that they would not go to Hades destroyed, and for that he is now bent in agony. In answer to the chorus, he adds that he stopped mortals from foreseeing their death by planting “blind hopes” in them, and that he gave them fire, from which they will learn many arts (lines 248–256). He admits that he erred “willingly, willingly,” but did not expect such a punishment (lines 266–270).

Oceanus himself now arrives, riding a swift, bridleless winged creature (lines 284–299). He offers to go to Zeus and try to obtain his release, and advises Prometheus to change his ways, since the ruler is new and harsh (lines 309–331). Prometheus thanks him but tells him to stay out of it, for his help will not succeed: he points to the example of his brother Atlas, who holds up the pillar of earth and sky in the west, and of Typhon, the hundred-headed giant who rose against all the gods and now lies under Etna (lines 343–378). Oceanus argues that words are the healers of a sick temper, but Prometheus warns him that his sympathy would make Zeus his enemy, and Oceanus, taking the hint, rides home on his four-legged bird (lines 379–398). The chorus sings of the grief of the whole earth for the Titan and his brother Atlas (lines 397–435).

Second Episode

(Lines 436–560.) Prometheus now tells the Oceanids what he has done for mortals (lines 436–506). In the beginning men saw without seeing and heard without hearing; like the shapes of dreams they mixed everything up for a long time, living in sunless caves like ants (lines 447–453). He taught them the risings and settings of the stars (lines 457–458); number, the chief of inventions, and the combination of letters, the memory of all things (lines 459–461); how to yoke animals to the plough and chariot and to build the linen-winged ships of sailors (lines 462–468); medicines and mixtures against disease (lines 478–483); the many methods of divination, from dreams and omens to the flight of birds and the entrails of sacrifices (lines 484–499); and the hidden benefits under the earth, bronze, iron, silver and gold (lines 500–503). “In one short word, learn it all,” he concludes: “every art of mortals comes from Prometheus” (lines 505–506).

The chorus advises him not to help mortals beyond measure while neglecting his own plight, and Prometheus answers that Fate has not yet decreed that his release will be so: “craft is far weaker than necessity” (lines 507–514). Asked who steers necessity, he answers: the three Fates and the mindful Furies, and even Zeus cannot escape what is destined (lines 515–518). Asked what is destined for Zeus, he refuses to say: it is a secret that must be kept covered, for by keeping it he escapes his degrading bonds (lines 519–525). The Oceanids then pray never to anger Zeus and sing of Prometheus’ fate (lines 526–560).

Third Episode

(Lines 561–906.) Io, a horned maiden driven by a gadfly, bursts onto the scene (lines 561–588). Prometheus knows her at once, as the daughter of Inachus, loved by Zeus and hated by Hera, who is forced to run these long courses (lines 589–592). When she asks who he is, he answers: “You see Prometheus, the giver of fire to mortals” (lines 593–612). The Oceanids ask Io to tell them how her wanderings began (lines 631–639), and she does: night after night dreams visited her chamber and urged her to go to Lerna, since Zeus desired her; her father Inachus sent to Pytho and Dodona and received dark oracles, until a clear one told him to drive her from home and country, or the fiery thunderbolt of Zeus would destroy his whole family (lines 640–672). At once her form and mind were altered, and she was a horned maiden stung by a gadfly; the earth-born cowherd Argus with his many eyes followed her until sudden death took him, and she is driven by the divine whip from land to land (lines 673–682). The play does not say who killed Argus.

Prometheus tells her what lies ahead (lines 700–741): she must go east through the Scythians, who live on wheeled carts and are armed with bows, and keep clear of the iron-working Chalybes; follow the river Hybristes up to Caucasus, then south to the Amazons at Themiscyra, and cross the Cimmerian isthmus and the Maeotic strait, which will be called the Bosporus (“the Ox Ford”) after her, to Asia (lines 707–735). He asks the chorus whether the tyrant of the gods is not violent in all things, for he wished to be with this mortal maiden and set these wanderings upon her (lines 736–738). Io cries out that she would prefer to throw herself from a rock (lines 747–751). Prometheus says that her sufferings are as nothing to his, for Zeus will fall from his throne by a marriage of his own planning, from which will be born a son stronger than his father; only Prometheus can show him how to avoid it (lines 755–770).

When Io asks who will release him against Zeus’ will, he says that it will be one of her descendants, “the third in birth after ten other generations” (lines 771–774), but he refuses to say more. At the chorus’s request, he tells her the rest of her course: across the Gorgon plains of Cisthene, where the three gray Phorcides share one eye and the winged, snake-haired Gorgons live (lines 790–800); past the griffins and the one-eyed Arimaspians (lines 803–806); through the land of the dark-skinned people to the river Nile (lines 807–815). He reminds her of the oracle of the talking oaks of Dodona, which hailed her as the future wife of Zeus (lines 829–835), and of the gulf that will be called the Ionian after her wanderings (lines 836–841). At Canopus, at the mouth of the Nile, Zeus will restore her to her senses by his touch, and she will bear a dark son, Epaphus, who will rule the land watered by the Nile (lines 846–852). In the fifth generation fifty daughters will come back to Argos, fleeing marriage to their cousins, who will chase them like hawks after doves; the women will kill their husbands in the night, except one, who will spare her husband and bear a royal line in Argos (lines 853–869). From this line will be born a man famed for his bow, who will release Prometheus from his labors, as his mother, Themis, told him long ago (lines 871–874). The gadfly returns, and Io rushes away in a frenzy (lines 877–886).

The chorus sings that wise was the man who said that marriage is best with one’s equal, and prays never to be the bride of a god (lines 887–906).

Exodos (Exit Song)

(Lines 907–1093.) Prometheus then proclaims that Zeus, for all his pride, will be humbled by the marriage he is preparing, which will cast him out of his tyranny and throne; then the curse that his father Cronus uttered as he fell will be fulfilled (lines 907–912). No one of the gods but himself can show Zeus how to avoid it, and he knows how; Zeus may sit in confidence with his thunder and fiery bolt, but they will not save him from falling (lines 913–919). He is raising up a wrestler against himself, with a flame stronger than the lightning and a crash greater than thunder, who will break Poseidon’s trident (lines 920–925). The chorus warns him against such words (lines 928–943).

Hermes arrives (lines 944–952) and addresses him as “sophist” and thief of fire: the father orders him to tell what marriage he boasts of, plainly and without riddles. Prometheus answers that Hermes’ speech is pompous and full of pride, as befits a servant of the gods, and that the new rulers think they live in towers that grief cannot reach (lines 953–963). “Simply,” he says, “I hate all the gods who, having received good from me, repay it unjustly” (lines 975–976). No torture or device will make him speak until his bonds are loosed (lines 987–996). Hermes then spells out the threat of Zeus (lines 1014–1029): Zeus will split the rocky ravine with thunder and lightning and bury the Titan; after a long time he will return to the light, and Zeus’ winged hound, a bloody eagle, will tear his body and feast, uninvited, on his liver all day long. There will be no end to this torment until a god appears who will take on his suffering and be willing to go down to Hades and the dark depths of Tartarus. Prometheus answers that he is ready: let the lightning, thunder, wind and sea come, and hurl his body into Tartarus; he will not be killed (lines 1043–1053).

Hermes tells the Oceanids to leave before the thunder stuns their senses (lines 1054–1062). They refuse: “With him I am willing to suffer whatever must be suffered; I have learned to hate traitors, and there is no sickness I spit on more” (lines 1063–1070). Hermes warns them that they will not be able to blame Zeus for a sudden disaster, but only themselves, since they enter the net of ruin knowingly (lines 1071–1079). The play ends with the beginning of the storm: the earth is shaken, thunder bellows underground, lightning flashes, whirlwinds raise the dust, and the sky and sea are mingled. Prometheus calls on Themis and on the bright upper air to witness how unjustly he suffers (lines 1080–1093).

A Brief Analysis

The play is very hard to read as a whole, because it stands at the beginning of a story that it does not finish.

The Trilogy

Prometheus is still chained at the end, and Hermes has just announced what Zeus will do next. In the play itself, Prometheus says that Fate has not yet decreed his release (lines 511–514) and that a descendant of Io will free him (lines 871–874). An ancient commentator’s note (scholion) on line 511 says that Prometheus is released in the following play. Another play, Prometheus Unbound, is known by this title and by fragments, and a Latin translation of a passage of it, in which the chained Titan speaks, is preserved in Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations (2.23). Hesiod already tells that the eagle was shot by Heracles (Hesiod, Theogony 526–534), and Apollodorus says the same (Library 2.5.11). A third play, Prometheus the Fire-Bearer, is also known by its title; the ancient sources we have do not tell us the order in which the plays stood, or whether they were produced together.

The Peculiarities and Authenticity

The play is unusual in several respects that can be seen in the text. First, Zeus is called a tyrant over and over again (lines 10, 35, 149–151, 224–227, 736–738), and the whole play is told from the point of view of his victim. Second, the staging seems to need devices to bring characters in the air: the Oceanids come on a winged chariot (line 135), Oceanus on a winged creature (lines 286–289, 395–398), and in the end the earth shakes and the rock is swept up in a storm (lines 1080–1093). Third, its characters are not the usual ones: Prometheus is the son of Themis, who tells him the future (lines 18, 211–215), and he declares a prophecy that even Zeus does not know (lines 907–914).

The play has come down as Aeschylus’ work. Some modern readers have thought that these differences, together with its style, show that the play was changed or completed after his death, or even written by someone else. No ancient source gives such a hint, and the question cannot be settled from the text.

Themes and Symbolism

The play is about what Prometheus did for mortals and what he suffered for it. The Titan lists his gifts: fire (lines 109–111, 254–256), the knowledge of the stars, number and letters, the yoking of animals, ships, medicine, divination and the metals under the earth, and sums it up in the words “every art of mortals comes from Prometheus” (lines 436–506). He also saved them from the plan of Zeus to destroy them (lines 232–238), and gave them “blind hopes” so that they should not foresee their deaths (lines 248–252). The word “philanthropic” (“loving mankind”) is used by Power and Hephaestus of the Titan’s fault (lines 11, 28).

It is also a play about power. Zeus is a new ruler, harsh as new rulers are (lines 35, 149–151, 310–312), who does not trust his friends (lines 224–227), and even he is subject to Necessity, which the three Fates and the Furies steer (lines 515–518). His rule can be ended by a marriage (lines 764–768, 907–912), and the only one who knows how to avoid it is the prisoner. The chorus, who begin by advising Prometheus to yield, end by sharing his fate (lines 1063–1070).

In the nineteenth century, poets of the Romantic age took the figure of the chained Titan as the type of a lone benefactor who suffers for humanity against the will of a tyrant.

Prometheus Bound Sources

Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound, lines 1–1093, for all scenes, speakers and quotations in this article; Hesiod, Theogony 507–616 and Works and Days 42–105; Apollodorus, Library 1.7.1 and 2.5.11; Cicero, Tusculan Disputations 2.23, for the Latin version of a passage of Prometheus Unbound; the ancient scholion on line 511 for the release in the following play. The Greek text can be read on Perseus.

See Also: Prometheus, Zeus, Typhoeus, Aeschylus