From Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound

lines 200 ff

(lines 430–510)

Prometheus:

You mustn’t think me proud or stubborn if I’m silent. Painful thoughts eat at my heart as I see myself in this hideous predicament. But then who else but I have given to these new gods their rights? Still, I won’t speak of these things because what I’d say wouldn’t be news to you.

Now listen to what I did for the mortals to save them from their many miseries.

In the beginning they were without a working mind so I gave them sense and reason. I’m not saying this to disparage mankind but to show that the gifts I gave them were due to my goodwill for them.

Firstly, in those days their eyes were of no use and the same was true of their ears which though they could hear sounds they made no sense of them. For their whole lives mortals lived as if in a dream, confused about everything and making sense of nothing. They didn’t know if a building was made of brick or wood or about houses that were warmed by the sun but they lived beneath the ground in sunless caves like ants.

They knew nothing of the signs of Winter or of Spring, full of blossoms, or of Summer, full of fruit and upon which they could depend for their survival but they just wandered about and acted aimlessly until I came. I explained to them the risings and settings of stars, a difficult art to explain.

And yes, I invented for them numbers, too, the most important science; and the stringing up of letters, the art of Memory, the mother of the Muses. I also brought the wild beasts into the sway of men, placing them under the yoke, the collar and the saddle so they can carry the heavy burdens of men.

I have harnessed horses to the chariot and made them obey men’s reins as an exhibition of wealth and luxury.

And it was I and no one else who discovered the seafarer’s flax-winged craft that now roam the seas.

I, the poor wretch, I have made all these discoveries for mankind yet I don’t have enough cunning to devise something to rid me of my own suffering.

Chorus:

What you have been made to suffer is indeed terrible. You’ve lost your mind and it’s wandering. You are like a doctor who has fallen ill himself and, in your distress, you cannot find the drug that will cure your ailment.

Prometheus:

And that’s not all the crafts and arts I’ve invented for the race of mortals.

Now listen to the rest of them.

Firstly, and most importantly, I showed them how to mix soothing remedies with which they could stay clear of any malady because beforehand if they fell ill they could do nothing about it.

There was no medicinal food or ointment or any other mixture, so they just wasted away. Then I showed them how to read the future and which of their dreams would come true. I’ve explained to them the meaning of incomprehensible voices and the meanings of cross roads. Then I distinguished clearly for them those of the birds with hooked talons that are sinister from those whose nature is auspicious how they lived, their mutual loves and hatreds and their mateships. I showed them the entrails of these birds and pointed out the smoothness of their entrails and what colour the gall must be to please the gods. The speckled symmetry of the liver-lobe and the limbs enveloped in fat and, having roasted the long back bone. I showed the mortals the way into this difficult art of the occult.

Then I cleared their vision so as to be able to see signs emerging out of flames, an art of which, until then they knew nothing.

So much about these arts and as for the gains mankind received from below the Earth, brass, iron, silver and gold who could say that he had discovered them before me? No one, and he who claims to have done so, babbles on idly. To sum up, let me tell you this, that every art and craft possessed by the mortals comes from me, Prometheus.

Chorus:

Well then, since you’ve helped the mortals beyond measure don’t abandon yourself to your own misery. I am very hopeful that you will be freed from these chains and will have similar power to that of Zeus.