P. 4, 1. 23, Whatever birth most fair.—Artemis Kalliste ("Most Fair") was apparently so called because, after a competition for beauty, that which won the prize ([Greek Text]) was selected and given to her. This rite is made by the story to lead to a sacrifice of the fairest maiden, and may very possibly have sometimes done so.
P. 4, 1. 42.—She tells her dream to the sky to get it off her mind, much as the Nurse does in the Medea (p. 5,1.57).
P. 5, 1. 50, One … pillar.—It is worth remembering that a pillar was among the earliest objects of worship in Crete and elsewhere. Cf. "the pillared sanctities" (1. 128, p. 9) and the "blood on the pillars" (1. 405, p. 20).
P. 8, 1. 113, A hollow one might creep through.—The metopes, or gaps between the beams. The Temple was therefore of a primitive Dorian type.
P. 8, 11. 124-125.—The land of Tauris is conceived as being beyond the Symplegades, or, as here, as being the country of the Symplegades.
As these semi-mythical names settled down in history, Tauris became the Crimea, the Symplegades, or "Clashing Rocks," or "Dark- Blue Rocks," became two rocks at the upper end of the Bosphorus, and the Friendless or Strangerless Sea became the Euxine. The word Axeinos, "Friendless," has often been altered in the MSS. of this play to Euxeinos, "Hospitable," which was the ordinary prose name of the Black Sea in historical times.
P. 9, l. 133, The horses and the towers.—The steppes of the
Taurians would have no gardens or city walls, but it is curious
that Hellas should seem specially a land of horses by comparison.
Cf. p. 86, l. 1423, where Thoas has horses.
P. 10, l. 168, The golden goblet, &c.—She evidently takes jars of libation from the Attendants and pours them during the next few lines into some Eschara, or Altar for the Dead. Most of the rite would probably be performed kneeling.
P. 11, ll. 192 ff., The dark and wheeling coursers.—i.e. those of Pelops. The cry of one betrayed: Myrtilus, when he was thrown into the sea. (See on l. 1.) For the Golden Lamb and the Sun turning in Heaven, see my translation of Electra, p. 47, l. 699 and note.
P. 12, l. 217, The Nereid's Son.—Achilles, son of Peleus and the
Nereid Thetis.