Suppliants

play by Aeschylus
Feedback
Corrections? Updates? Omissions? Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login).
Thank you for your feedback

Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.

Greek:
Hiketides
Latin:
Supplices

Suppliants, the first and only surviving play of a trilogy by Aeschylus, believed to have been performed in 468. As the play opens, the Danaïds (born in Egypt though of Greek descent) have fled with their father to Argos in Greece in order to avoid forced marriage with their cousins, the sons of Aegyptus. Pelasgus, the king of Argos, is torn between charity to the Danaïds and anxiety to appease Aegyptus but nobly agrees in the end to grant them asylum. The trilogy as a whole seems to have favourably stressed the saving power of domestic love as contrasted with ...(100 of 114 words)