Theatres of the Classical World

Theatre at Syracusa in Sicily (designed in the 5th century by the Greek architect Damacopos, and enlarged in 3rd and 2nd centuries; this is the largest theatre in Sicily). Aeschylus is said to have produced some of his works for the first time here. There are caves just barely visible on the top ridge of this photo, above the theatroi; these cave held shrines to heroes and gods.

To the left is the inside of one of these hero shrines at the theatre at Syracusa, now known as the Grotta del Museion (shrine of the muses) pictured here complete with modern-day hero-cult worshippers (scoff!).

In the top left of the picture to the right you can just make out the similar shrines at the back of the Theatre of Dionysus in Athens. These seem to be under repair at the moment.

This is the theatre at Taormina in Sicily (second largest in Sicily). Originally built in the 3rd century BC, it was rebuilt in the 2nd by the Romans. Taorminans boast that the skene is the best preserved in the world but it is clearly mostly Roman reconstruction.

To the right is the Roman theatre in Athens. You can see the similarity in the two skenes. The columns in the one at Taormina perhaps suggest the older Greek theatre.


Left is the theatre at Segesta (3rd Century BC), in the northwest of Sicily. Like many ancient theatres the theatroi [triangular segments of seating] have been refurbished and the theatre is used as an outdoor venue during summer evenings. Though in many ways unfortunate in terms of authenticity, the refurbishments do at least give a practical definition to the orchestra [semicircular performance surface] and to the paradoi [entrance / exit corridors to the side of the stage].

The same is again true of this theatre in Morgantina, central Sicily (4th century BC). Unfortunately what this does not show (my camera battery died) is the proximity to other religious shrines. Not at the back of the theatre as in Athens and Syracusa, but to the left of this picture in the greater city complex. The nearest building is the shrine comlex to Demeter and Persephone. What also becomes really clear in a small city like the one here at Morgantina is that the divide between business, politics, religion, and theatre barely exists in spatial terms with the three colonnades (housing shops and businesses) opening onto the agora (political forum) with the market building at its centre and the shrine to Demeter and Persephone and the Theatre building taking up the majority of the fourth side of the square. You really get a feel for how this blend of spheres was not just spatial.

An arial view of the Theatre of Dionysus, in Athens. The triangular theatroi are particularly apparent in this view.

The pictures above are of the theatre on the island of Delos (3rd century BC). The island was the birthplace of Apollo and Artemis and is like Delphi in that the site is largely dedicated to temples and there are few practical buildings. On the part of the island that the theatre is in there is a fairly large network of later Roman buildings many of which have mosaics that are in one way or another evocative of drama (e.g. Dionysus riding a leopard). As you can see this theatre has not been recently renovated to house performances (the island is in the middle of nowhere) and offers some glimpse of how the other ruins might have looked before reconstruction.

These pictures above are of the Roman Theatre in Fiesole in Tuscany.

In the Old Theatre, Fiesole (April, 1887)
by Thomas Hardy
I traced the Circus whose gray stones incline

Where Rome and dim Etruria interjoin,

Till came a child who showed an ancient coin

That bore the image of a Constantine.

She lightly passed; nor did she once opine

How, better than all books, she had raised for me

In swift perspective Europe's history

Through the vast years of Caesar's sceptred line.

For in my distant plot of English loam

'Twas but to delve, and straightway there to find

Coins of like impress. As with one half blind

Whom common simples cure, her act flashed home

In that mute moment to my opened mind

The power, the pride, the reach of perished Rome.

This is the an aerial view of the theatre at Delphi (originally built in the 4th century BC and enlarged in the 2nd, potentially in 159 BC). At the back left of the picture you can make out the remaining columns of the Temple of Apollo, where the Pythia breathed her criptic noises for the priests of Apollo to turn into hexameter, with the treasury building on the level below on the right hand side.

This is the Roman theatre (there may have been an earlier Greek theatre on the site but there is no real evidence to suggest it). What is interesting about this building is the way that the city has just ignored it as it built up all around it. It is not visible from the street.

Thucydides’ The Peloponnesian War. Book III, chapters 82-3

Chapter 82
[1] So bloody was the march of the revolution, and the impression which it made was the greater as it was one of the first to occur. Later on, one may say, the whole Hellenic world was convulsed; struggles being everywhere made by the popular chiefs to bring in the Athenians, and by the oligarchs to introduce the Lacedaemonians. In peace there would have been neither the pretext nor the wish to make such an invitation; but in war, with an alliance always at the command of either faction for the hurt of their adversaries and their own corresponding advantage, opportunities for bringing in the foreigner were never wanting to the revolutionary parties.[2] The sufferings which revolution entailed upon the cities were many and terrible, such as have occurred and always will occur, as long as the nature of mankind remains the same; though in a severer or milder form, and varying in their symptoms, according to the variety of the particular cases. In peace and prosperity states and individuals have better sentiments, because they do not find themselves suddenly confronted with imperious necessities; but war takes away the easy supply of daily wants, and so proves a rough master, that brings most men's characters to a level with their fortunes.[3] Revolution thus ran its course from city to city, and the places which it arrived at last, from having heard what had been done before carried to a still greater excess the refinement of their inventions, as manifested in the cunning of their enterprises and the atrocity of their reprisals.[4] Words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take that which was now given them. Reckless audacity came to be considered the courage of a loyal ally; prudent hesitation, specious cowardice; moderation was held to be a cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question inaptness to act on any. Frantic violence, became the attribute of manliness; cautious plotting, a justifiable means of self-defence.[5] The advocate of extreme measures was always trustworthy; his opponent a man to be suspected. To succeed in a plot was to have a shrewd head, to divine a plot a still shrewder; but to try to provide against having to do either was to break up your party and to be afraid of your adversaries. In fine, to forestall an intending criminal, or to suggest the idea of a crime where it was wanting, was equally commended,[6] until even blood became a weaker tie than party, from the superior readiness of those united by the latter to dare everything without reserve; for such associations had not in view the blessings derivable from established institutions but were formed by ambition for their overthrow; and the confidence of their members in each other rested less on any religious sanction than upon complicity in crime.[7] The fair proposals of an adversary were met with jealous precautions by the stronger of the two, and not with a generous confidence. Revenge also was held of more account than self-preservation. Oaths of reconciliation, being only proffered on either side to meet an immediate difficulty, only held good so long as no other weapon was at hand; but when opportunity offered, he who first ventured to seize it and to take his enemy off his guard, thought this perfidious vengeance sweeter than an open one, since, considerations of safety apart, success by treachery won him the palm of superior intelligence. Indeed it is generally the case that men are readier to call rogues clever than simpletons honest, and are as ashamed of being the second as they are proud of being the first.[8] The cause of all these evils was the lust for power arising from greed and ambition; and from these passions proceeded the violence of parties once engaged in contention. The leaders in the cities, each provided with the fairest professions, on the one side with the cry of political equality of the people, on the other of a moderate aristocracy, sought prizes for themselves in those public interests which they pretended to cherish, and, recoiling from no means in their struggles for ascendancy, engaged in the direct excesses; in their acts of vengeance they went to even greater lengths, not stopping at what justice or the good of the state demanded, but making the party caprice of the moment their only standard, and invoking with equal readiness the condemnation of an unjust verdict or the authority of the strong arm to glut the animosities of the hour. Thus religion was in honor with neither party; but the use of fair phrases to arrive at guilty ends was in high reputation. Meanwhile the moderate part of the citizens perished between the two, either for not joining in the quarrel, or because envy would not suffer them to escape.
Chapter 83
[1] Thus every form of iniquity took root in the Hellenic countries by reason of the troubles. The ancient simplicity into which honor so largely entered was laughed down and disappeared; and society became divided into camps in which no man trusted his fellow.[2] To put an end to this, there was neither promise to be depended upon, nor oath that could command respect; but all parties dwelling rather in their calculation upon the hopelessness of a permanent state of things, were more intent upon self-defence than capable of confidence.[3] In this contest the blunter wits were most successful. Apprehensive of their own deficiencies and of the cleverness of their antagonists, they feared to be worsted in debate and to be surprised by the combinations of their more versatile opponents, and so at once boldly had recourse to action:[4] while their adversaries, arrogantly thinking that they should know in time, and that it was unnecessary to secure by action what policy afforded, often fell victims to their want of precaution.

Translation is from http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/GreekScience/Thuc.+3.69-85.html

Euripides - Orestes

W. Geoffrey Arnott, ‘Double the Vision: A Reading of Euripides’ Electra,’ Greece & Rome, 2nd Ser., Vol. 28, No. 2 (Oct. 1981) 179-192.

W. Geoffrey Arnott, 'Euripides and the Unexpected,' Greece & Rome, 2nd Series, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Apr. 1973) 49-64.

Helen H. Bacon, Barbarians in Greek Tragedy. (New Haven: Yale UP, 1961).

A. Bierl, 'Apollo in Greek Tragedy: Orestes and the God of Initiation.' in J. Solomon, ed. Apollo: Origins and Influences (Tucson, U of Arizona P, 1994) 81-96.

Francis M. Dunn, ‘Orestes and Tragicomedy,’ in Tragedy’s End: Closure and Innovation in Euripidean Drama. (Oxford: OUP, 1996).

Barbara E. Goff, 'The Sign of the Fall: The Scars of Orestes and Odysseus.' Classical Antiquity 10 Vol. 10, No. 2 (Oct. 1991) 259-67.

Karelisa Hartigan, 'Euripidean Madness: Herakles and Orestes,' Greece & Rome, 2nd Ser., Vol. 34, No. 2 (Oct. 1987) 126-135.

Masaaki Kubo, ‘The Norm of Myth: Euripides’ Electra,’ Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, Vol. 71 (1967) 15-31.

J. R. Porter, Studies in Euripides’ Orestes. Mnemosyne Supplements 128 (Leiden: Brill, 1994).

Freidrich Solmsen, Electra and Orestes: Three Recognitions in Greek Tragedy. Amsterdam: Noord-Hollandsche U.M., 1967.

John R. Wilson, ‘Eris in Euripides,’ Greece & Rome, 2nd Ser., Vol. 26, No. 1 (Apr. 1979) 7-20.

Apollodorus on Medea

from Argonautica 1.9.16-28
[16] Aeson, son of Cretheus, had a son Jason by Polymede, daughter of Autolycus. Now Jason dwelt in Iolcus, of which Pelias was king after Cretheus. But when Pelias consulted the oracle concerning the kingdom, the god warned him to beware of the man with a single sandal. At first the king understood not the oracle, but afterwards he apprehended it. For when he was offering a sacrifice at the sea to Poseidon, he sent for Jason, among many others, to participate in it. Now Jason loved husbandry and therefore abode in the country, but he hastened to the sacrifice, and in crossing the river Anaurus he lost a sandal in the stream and landed with only one. When Pelias saw him, he bethought him of the oracle, and going up to Jason asked him what, supposing he had the power, he would do if he had received an oracle that he should be murdered by one of the citizens. Jason answered, whether at haphazard or instigated by the angry Hera in order that Medea should prove a curse to Pelias, who did not honor Hera, “ I would command him,” said he, “ to bring the Golden Fleece. ” No sooner did Pelias hear that than he bade him go in quest of the fleece. Now it was at Colchis in a grove of Ares, hanging on an oak and guarded by a sleepless dragon…
[23] …When the ship was brought into port, Jason repaired to Aeetes, and setting forth the charge laid on him by Pelias invited him to give him the fleece. The other promised to give it if single-handed he would yoke the brazen-footed bulls. These were two wild bulls that he had, of enormous size, a gift of Hephaestus; they had brazen feet and puffed fire from their mouths. These creatures Aeetes ordered him to yoke and to sow dragon's teeth; for he had got from Athena half of the dragon's teeth which Cadmus sowed in Thebes. While Jason puzzled how he could yoke the bulls, Medea conceived a passion for him; now she was a witch, daughter of Aeetes and Idyia, daughter of Ocean. And fearing lest he might be destroyed by the bulls, she, keeping the thing from her father, promised to help him to yoke the bulls and to deliver to him the fleece, if he would swear to have her to wife and would take her with him on the voyage to Greece. When Jason swore to do so, she gave him a drug with which she bade him anoint his shield, spear, and body when he was about to yoke the bulls; for she said that, anointed with it, he could for a single day be harmed neither by fire nor by iron. And she signified to him that, when the teeth were sown, armed men would spring up from the ground against him; and when he saw a knot of them he was to throw stones into their midst from a distance, and when they fought each other about that, he was taken to kill them. On hearing that, Jason anointed himself with the drug, and being come to the grove of the temple he sought the bulls, and though they charged him with a flame of fire, he yoked them. And when he had sowed the teeth, there rose armed men from the ground; and where he saw several together, he pelted them unseen with stones, and when they fought each other he drew near and slew them. But though the bulls were yoked, Aeetes did not give the fleece; for he wished to burn down the Argo and kill the crew. But before he could do so, Medea brought Jason by night to the fleece, and having lulled to sleep by her drugs the dragon that guarded it, she possessed herself of the fleece and in Jason's company came to the Argo. She was attended, too, by her brother Apsyrtus. And with them the Argonauts put to sea by night.
[24] When Aeetes discovered the daring deeds done by Medea, he started off in pursuit of the ship; but when she saw him near, Medea murdered her brother and cutting him limb from limb threw the pieces into the deep. Gathering the child's limbs, Aeetes fell behind in the pursuit; wherefore he turned back, and, having buried the rescued limbs of his child, he called the place Tomi…
[27] Now Pelias, despairing of the return of the Argonauts, would have killed Aeson; but he requested to be allowed to take his own life, and in offering a sacrifice drank freely of the bull's blood and died.1 And Jason's mother cursed Pelias and hanged herself, leaving behind an infant son Promachus; but Pelias slew even the son whom she had left behind. On his return Jason surrendered the fleece, but though he longed to avenge his wrongs he bided his time. At that time he sailed with the chiefs to the Isthmus and dedicated the ship to Poseidon, but afterwards he exhorted Medea to devise how he could punish Pelias. So she repaired to the palace of Pelias and persuaded his daughters to make mince meat of their father and boil him, promising to make him young again by her drugs; and to win their confidence she cut up a ram and made it into a lamb by boiling it. So they believed her, made mince meat of their father and boiled him. But Acastus buried his father with the help of the inhabitants of Iolcus, and he expelled Jason and Medea from Iolcus.
[28] They went to Corinth, and lived there happily for ten years, till Creon, king of Corinth, betrothed his daughter Glauce to Jason, who married her and divorced Medea. But she invoked the gods by whom Jason had sworn, and after often upbraiding him with his ingratitude she sent the bride a robe steeped in poison, which when Glauce had put on, she was consumed with fierce fire along with her father, who went to her rescue.1 But Mermerus and Pheres, the children whom Medea had by Jason, she killed, and having got from the Sun a car drawn by winged dragons she fled on it to Athens.2 Another tradition is that on her flight she left behind her children, who were still infants, setting them as suppliants on the altar of Hera of the Height; but the Corinthians removed them and wounded them to death.
Medea came to Athens, and being there married to Aegeus bore him a son Medus. Afterwards, however, plotting against Theseus, she was driven a fugitive from Athens with her son. But he conquered many barbarians and called the whole country under him Media, and marching against the Indians he met his death. And Medea came unknown to Colchis, and finding that Aeetes had been deposed by his brother Perses, she killed Perses and restored the kingdom to her father.

Euripides - Medea

Philoi (Friends) & Ekthoi (Enemies) in Euripides’ Medea

Nurse. “Now all is hatred: love [‘philtata’: beloved things] is sickness-stricken.” (16)

Pedagogus. “Old bonds of love are aye outrun by feet / Of new: – no friend [philos] is he unto this house.” (76-7)

Nurse. “…to his friends [philous] he stands convicted of baseness.” (84)

Pedagogus. “…no man loves [philei] his neighbour as himself…” (86)

Nurse. “To foes [‘ekthrous’: enemies] may she work ill, and not to friends [‘philous’: beloved ones]!” (95)

Medea to Chorus. “Thine is this city, thine a father’s home, / Thine bliss of life and fellowship of friends [philos]; / But I, lone, cityless, and outraged thus / Of him who kidnapped me from foreign shores, / Mother nor brother have I, kinsman none, / For port of refuge from calamity.” (252-8)

Upon Creon’s pronouncement of her banishment – “Nay, – by thy knees, and by the bride, thy child!” (324)

Medea to Jason. “Out on this right hand, which thou oft wouldst clasp, – / These knees! – I was polluted by the touch / Of a base man, thus frustrate of mine hopes! Come, as a friend [philos] will I commune with thee – …/…/…thus it is – a foe [ekthra] am I become / To mine own house [‘oikothen philois’ my friends at home]: no quarrel I had with those / With whom I have now a death-feud for thy sake.” (496-9 & 506-8)

Jason’s to Medea. “ - for I know full well / How all friends [‘philos’] from the poor man stand aloof, - ” (560-1)

Medea. “No profit is there in a villain’s gifts.” (618)

Medea to Aegeus, “But I beseech thee, lo, thy beard I touch, – / I clasp thy knees, thy suppliant am I now –” (710-11) This becomes a kind of contract in friendship. She promises him children in return for protection from enemies ‘ekthrois’ (750) and then enforces it as a bond, “were oath-pledge given for this / To me, then had I all I would of thee.” (731-2)

Medea to Chorus. “…unendurable are mocks of foes [‘ekthros’]” (795)

Medea to Chorus. “Let none account me impotent, nor weak, / Nor spiritless! – O nay, in other sort, / Grim to my foes [ekthrois], and kindly to my friends [philoisis].” (807-10)

Medea to Chorus. “Over my foes triumphant now, my friends [philai], / Shall we become: our feet are on the path / Now is there hope of vengeance [dike] on my foes [ekthrous].” (1116-7)

Jason to Glauke [Messenger reporting] “Nay, be not hostile to thy friends: / Cease from thine anger, turn thine head again, / Accounting friends whomso thy spouse accounts.” (1151-3)

Select Bibliography:

Shirley A. Barlow, 'Stereotype and Reversal in Euripides' Medea,' Greece & Rome 2nd Ser., Vol. 36, No. 2 (1989) 158-171.

Deborah Boedeker, 'Euripides' Medea and the Vanity of Logoi,' Classical Philology Vol. 86, No. 2 (1991) 95-112.

Elizabeth Bongie, 'Heroic Elements in the Medea of Euripides,' Transactions of the American Philological Association, Vol. 107 (1977) 27-56.

Anne Burnett, 'Medea and the Tragedy of Revenge,' Classical Philology Vol. 68, No. 1 (May 1973) 1-24.

Malcolm Davies, 'Deianeira and Medea: a Foot-note to the Pre-history of Two Myths,' Mnemosyne 4th Ser., Vol. 42 (1989) 469-472.

Helene Foley, 'Medea's Divided Self,' Classical Antiquity Vol. 8, No. 1 (1989) 61-85.

Helene Foley, Female Acts in Greek Tragedy, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2001.

Ingrid E. Holmberg, "Mhtis and Gender in Apollonius Rhodius' Argonautica," Transactions of the American Philological Association 128 (1998) 135.

David Kovacs, 'On Medea's Great Monologue (E. Med. 1021-80),' Classical Quarterly Vol. 36, No. 2 (1986) 343-352.

David Kovacs, 'Zeus in Euripides' Medea,' American Journal of Philology, Vol. 114, No. 1 (Spring 1993) 45-70.

C. A. E. Luschnig, 'Interiors: Imaginary Spaces in Alcestis and Medea,' Mnemosyne, 4th Ser., Vol. 45 (1992) 19-44.

Emily A. McDermott, Euripides' Medea: the Incarnation of Disorder, London, PA: Penn State University Press, 1989.

Jennifer March, 'Euripides the Misogynist?' in Anton Powell, ed., Euripides, Women, and Sexuality, London: Routledge, 1990, 32-75.

S. P. Mills, 'The Sorrows of Medea,' Classical Philology, Vol. 75, No. 4 (1980) 289-296.

Robert B. Palmer, 'An Apology for Jason: A Study of Euripides' Medea,' Classical Journal, Vol. 53, No. 2 (Nov. 1957) 49-55.

M. D. Reeve, 'Euripides' Medea 1021-1080,' Classical Quarterly, New Ser. Vol. 22, No. 1 (May 1972) 51-61.

Margaret Visser, 'Medea: Daughter, Sister, Wife, and Mother. Natal Family versus Conjugal Family in Greek and Roman Myths About Women,' in Cropp, Fantham, & Scully, eds. Greek Tragedy and its Legacy: Essays Presented to D. J. Conacher, Calgari, Alberta: University of Calgari Press, 1986, 149-165.

Margaret Williamson, 'A Woman's Place in Euripides' Medea,' in Anton Powell, Euripides, Women, and Sexuality, London: Routledge, 1990, 16-31.

Ian Worthington, 'The Ending of Euripides' Medea,' Hermes, Vol. 118, No. 4 (1990) 502-505.

Euripides’ Medea - David Adamson

The Grandadaughter of the sun

The Background
Jason goes to Colchis in search of the Golden Fleece to regain his family’s throne. Aeete, the king of Colchis and guardian of the fleece won’t give it over unless Jason completes three tasks. Fortunately for Jason, Medea (Aeete’s daughter) has fallen in love with him. Being both the granddaughter of the sun and educated in magic, Medea assists Jason. Together the two overcome the three tasks and escape from Colchis, with Medea chopping up her younger brother to slow down their father.

Back at Iolcus, Medea rejuvenates Jason’s father and at the same time tricks Pelius’ daughters into killing him. The couple are forced into exile by law and settle in Corith where they have two children.

The Play
Medea is heard in the house grieving, wailing and swearing revenge because Jason has just declared that he plans to leave Medea and marry Glauke, the princess of Corinth.
Medea leaves the house and is calm and collect and laments the plight of woment:
*Women pay a high price for a husband (dowery)
*Women are expected to give their husbands full rule of their lives and bodies.
*Only later will they discover if the husband is ‘good’ or ‘bad’
*They are expected to obey, run the home and bear their husband children.
*The husband can have affairs or leave his wife if he is bored, this is unacceptable for a woman. Divorce is unacceptable.
Creon enters and demands Medea and her two sons leaves Corinth. Medea persuades him to let her stay for one more day. After he leaves, she reveals her plan to kill ‘them’.
Jason enters and debates with Medea. She is able to counter his argument (showing advanced skills of oratory, high intelligence and creativity). Jason claims:
* Aphrodite made Medea help him. It’s not his fault.
* She has benefitted from living in Greece. She is now amongst ‘civilised’ people.
* He is marrying Glauke for political and social reasons of advancement.
Jason leaves angry with Medea, claiming she is only being exiled because she threatened revenge on the royal family.
· Aegeus (King of Athens) enters and he and Medea greet one another as old friends. Medea gains Aegeus’ pity and support and makes him swear to house her safely in Athens after she has left Corinth. With a safe relocation confirmed, she reveals her plan to the audience. Kill not just Glauke and Creon, but use her children to do it and when they return, kill them.
· Jason returns, Medea mocks humility and persuades him to take the children to supplicate Glauke (and persuade her with gifts). She then will go to her father and speak on their behalf. Jason takes the children with the gifts to the palace.
· The tutor and children return, and the tutor announces the children are free from exile. Medea is silent to the news and appears torn and unhappy. Medea addresses the children alone for the first time and she tells them about all the things she will never get to do for them (e.g. prepare marriage beds). She has an internal struggle about if she’s going to kill them or not, and concludes that it is too late to back out now (the children will be blamed for Glauke’s death anyway – so by her killing them she is also saving them great tournament.
· Medea has an internal struggle about what to do, but concludes the children are to be blamed for Glauke’s death anyway. She is the one who should kill them, not the mob.
· A messenger enters and says Glauke’s face has been eaten off. Medea enters the house and the audience/chorus hear the children crying for help.
· Jason enters demanding to see Medea, who appears above the house in a golden chariot drawn by dragons. She claims boasts that she has destroyed him.

Themes

Women & Social expectation
“No woman can be a criminal. To be a criminal one must be a man” – Nawal El Saddawi, ‘Women at point Zero’
As we know, women had certain roles in Greek society and certain expectations. Mothers/ Wives/ Submissive to husband/ ’preening’ the Oikos/ no involvement in the Polis. Medea has little resemblance to a classic Greek woman. She seems to have been ‘playing the role’:
Mother: Children were regarded as the possessions of their fathers. Medea regards the children as an extension of Jason. She is only able to possess them fully when she has killed them.
Wife: She played at the roll of being a wife. A self imposed prison. We are presented with Medea’s opposite in Glauke. Naivety, youth, easily pleased.
Submissive: As she demonstrates in her debates with various men, Jason was only successful in his quest because of her assistance. Similarly, her ability to engage in active debate (considered to be a polis activity reserved for men) and that she is able to win in debate and verbally extract what she wants from various men demonstrates her intelligence, courage, creativity and her lack of modesty or restraint when it comes to using her femininity.
Oikos: She steps out of the Oikos, which she now regards as empty. The home is just a building without Jason, who has similarly abandoned or sacrificed his children to the potential for other royal children. She was always to big for the oikos, she didn’t fit. So when she realises that her efforts have been futile, she destroys the it (an oikos destroyer)

Familiar bonds
Jason [Political/Social]
· Marriage, the incentive being the political advancement. This cannot be found with Medea and thus he turns to the royal family of Corinth.
Medea [Alien Concept/Self Imposed]
· Betrayed her father/ killed her brother/ tricked Pelius’ daughters into murder their father
· Self imposed à Marriage customs and expectations (e.g. Children) – Jason incentive
· Assisted by her grandfather Helios (The Sun God) – True family bond (for her)
· By the end of the play she is no longer a daughter, sister, wife or mother.
Creon [Traditional/loving]
· He banishes Medea as a father trying to protect his daughter - “I fear you”
· He throws himself down over Glauce when she is dying

Slaves
Most Euripidean tragedies begin with a monologue by a famous character from myth or legend. The Medea does not. Both the Nurse and the Tutor, pity Medea’s situation. Significant because slaves could be seen as figures who see everything. To be mocked by your slaves was a significant social comment. To be respected by them, a social comment.