Enter Io. Io is one of those mysterious characters on the borderland between history and fable, concerning which it is difficult to say whether they are to be looked on as personal realities, or as impersonated ideas. According to the historical view of ancient legends, Io is the daughter of Inachus, a primeval king of Argos; and, from this fact as a root, the extravagant legends about her, sprouting from the ever active inoculation of human fancy, branched out. Interpreted by the principles of early theological allegory, however, she is, according to the witness of Suidas, the Moon, and her wanderings the revolutions of that satellite. In either view, the immense extent of these wanderings is well explained by mythological writers (1) from the influence of Argive colonies at Byzantium and elsewhere; and (2) from the vain desire of the Greeks to connect their horned virgin Io, with the horned Isis of the Egyptians. It need scarcely be remarked that, if Io means the moon, her horns are as naturally explained as her wanderings. But, in reading Æschylus, all these considerations are most wisely left out of view, the Athenians, no doubt, who introduced this play, believing in the historical reality of the Inachian maid, as firmly as we believe in that of Adam or Methuselah. As little can I agree with Both. that we are called upon to rationalize away the reality of the persecuting insect, whether under the name of ᾽(ο)ιστρος or μύωψ. In popular legends the sublime is ever apt to be associated with circumstances that either are, or, to the cultivated imagination, necessarily appear to be ridiculous.
“. . . save me, O Earth!”
I have here given the received traditionary rendering of Αλεῦ ὦ δᾶ; but I must confess the appeal to Earth here in this passage always appeared to me something unexpected; and it is, accordingly, with pleasure that I submit the following observations of Schoe. to the consideration of the scholar—“Δᾶ is generally looked on as a dialectic variation of γᾶ; and, in conformity with this opinion, Theocritus has used the accusation Δᾶν. I consider this erroneous, and am of opinion that in Δημητηρ we are rather to understand Δεαμητηρ than Γημητηρ; and δᾶ is to be taken only as an interjection. This is not the place to discuss this matter fully; but, in the meantime, I may mention that Ahrens de dialecta Doricâ, p. 80, has refuted the traditionary notion with regard to δᾶ.
Chorus. With Well., and Schoe., and the MSS., I give this verse to the Chorus, though certainly it is not to be denied that the continuation of the lyrical metre of the Strophe pleads strongly in favour of giving it to Io. It is also certain that, for the sake of symmetry, the last line of the Antistrophe must also be given to the Chorus, as Schoe. has done.
“. . . the sisters of thy father, Io.”
Inachus, the Argive river, was, like all other rivers, the son of Ocean, and, of course, the brother of the Ocean-maids, the Chorus of the present play. Afterwards, according to the historical method of conception, characteristic of the early legends, the elementary god became a human person—the river was metamorphosed into a king.