Springs from no god except the wife of Jove....
Hence he says to Hercules[214]:
From Thebes retire
Since thus the laws ordain: and follow me
To Pallas’ city: when thy hands are there
Cleansed from pollution, I to thee will give
A palace, and with thee divide my wealth.
What, we may ask, is the law to which Theseus here refers? Wilamowitz[215] rightly says that the law is that which prohibits his continuance at Thebes. We believe, however, that this was not a specifically Theban law. If it had been, the fact would have been more clearly indicated. The law in question is, we believe, an international law, which declared that when an alien slew an alien, even without intent, he must be debarred for ever from the State in which the deed occurred. This law we have already quoted from Plato.[216] Hercules therefore left Thebes and went to Athens,[217] and we are told that when, in course of time, he dies in Athens he will receive the worship of a Hero![218] The similarity of this dénouement to that of the Oedipus Coloneus of Sophocles needs no comment. Both these consummations are based, perhaps, on the existence of Hero-shrines in Attic soil. But the legend-makers were careful not to give us legal impossibilities. Hercules had shrines everywhere in Greece. Yet Hercules could not go to Argos, for the simple reason that he had been exiled from that city. He could not return to Thebes because of ‘the law.’ It was fortunate then for Hercules that he found a king such as Theseus who admitted without question the element of extenuation in his act. In historical Greece a wilful kin-slayer could not have been accepted as an exile in any State. The law which is referred to by Theseus cannot therefore have reference to wilful slaying, for it permitted him to leave Thebes. If he had slain his children wilfully, it would not have allowed him the option of exile. If he is allowed this option, it is because his deed was viewed, either by the dramatist or by the legend-maker, or by both, as extenuated or quasi-involuntary kin-slaying. Such slaying in Greek law prescribed a period of exile, temporary or perpetual, pending the appeasement of the kinsmen.
Owing to the important differences which exist between the Euripidean conception of the native state of Hercules and Homer’s conception, we must assume that Euripides has abandoned Homer and is following an Argive legend concerning Hercules. This conclusion is strengthened by the account which Euripides gives, in this play, of Amphitryon, the father of Hercules. Euripides makes Amphitryon say[219] that he is an exile from Argos living at Thebes, because he had slain Electryon. Now, if Euripides conceived Amphitryon as a Theban by birth, he could not legally have presented him, since he was a man-slayer, as a resident in Thebes. We have seen[220] that homicide-exiles were debarred from three possible places of residence, namely (1) the State of the slayer, (2) the State of the victim, and (3) the State in which the deed of blood took place.
Pausanias also refers[221] to this legend of Amphitryon. The Thebans of his time pointed out a ruined house in Thebes, ‘where they say Amphitryon dwelt when he fled from Tiryns owing to the death of Electryon.’ As Tiryns was a city within the boundary of the historical Argive State it is frequently confused with Argos in the legends. Electryon was the father-in-law and the uncle of Amphitryon. That the slaying of Electryon was not wilful is suggested by certain facts. Thus, the return of Amphitryon to Argos is said to depend on the will of Eurystheus and the labours of Hercules are regarded as the necessary ‘appeasement.’[222] We need not suppose that there is any reference to the Pelasgian wergeld system in the story of the ‘recompense’ which was demanded by Eurystheus. This ‘recompense’ is more akin to the ‘appeasement’ of relatives in the pollution system. It was the father of Eurystheus, Sthenelus, the brother of Electryon, who had driven Amphitryon into banishment. Euripides concedes this much to the claim of Thebes to be regarded as the home of Amphitryon, in so far as he makes Amphitryon say[223] that he has settled there as an exile. But legally he could not have lived there as a homicide-exile if he had been a citizen of Thebes. Hence Euripides calls him ‘the Argive Amphitryon.’ His hopes of an ultimate return to Argos and of the ‘appeasement’ of Eurystheus suggest that his act was involuntary, or quasi-involuntary. The very fact of his exile points to the same conclusion.