Again, in Sophocles’ Maidens of Trachis, Lichas, Deianira, and a messenger are on the scene when Deianira spies Iole in a throng of captives and questions her (vss. 307 ff.). Iole makes no reply whatsoever. Lichas explains her refusal to answer by stating that from grief and weeping she has not uttered a word since leaving her fatherland (vss. 322 ff.). Since the three actors are already occupied in this scene it is evident that Iole is played by a mute and cannot speak. This illustrates principles (5) and (7).
Still again, up to vs. 1245 of Euripides’ Orestes, when he enters the palace, Pylades speaks freely. At vs. 1554 Menelaus, Orestes, Hermione, and Pylades enter the scene. The last two are now played by mutes, the third actor appearing as Apollo at vs. 1625. Orestes threatens to kill Hermione; and after vainly striving to deter him Menelaus turns to Pylades with the query (vs. 1591): “Do you, also, share in this murder, Pylades?” What is a mute to do under such circumstances? Orestes relieved the situation by saying: “His silence gives consent; my word will suffice.” There can be no doubt that the playwright intended Menelaus’ question to create the illusion that Pylades could have spoken had he so desired, principles (6a) and (7).
Euripides avoided an awkward silence of this sort in the Ion by leaving Xuthus unrepresented in the final scene, where the three actors speak in other rôles. Xuthus takes his final departure at vs. 675, intending to celebrate for his new-found son a public feast from which the host himself is most strangely absent. The poet prepares us in advance for this contingency by means of Xuthus’ words to his son, as reported by a servant at vss. 1130 ff.: “If I tarry in sacrificing to the Birth-gods,” a thin pretext, “place the feast before the friends assembled there,” principles (1), (2), (3), and (10).
Finally, for the presentation of his Phoenician Maids, Euripides must have had a leading actor of great musical attainments. For such a performer the rôles of Jocaste and Antigone were especially adapted, and he seems to have played them both, principle (8). The piece opens with a soliloquy by Jocaste, who withdraws at vs. 87. Immediately a servant appears on the palace roof and tells Antigone to tarry upon the stairs until he can assure himself that there is no one near to see her and to spread scandalous reports of her indiscretion. Thus, Antigone’s appearance is delayed for fifteen verses (vss. 88-102), which is sufficient to enable Jocaste’s actor to shift to the new rôle, principle (4a). The protagonist continues to play both parts without difficulty, except at vss. 1264 ff. Here Jocaste summons her daughter from the palace and both are present during vss. 1270-82, the latter speaking some six verses. Obviously Antigone’s lines in this brief scene must have been delivered by one of the subordinate players, though such splitting of a rôle violates Aeschylean practice, see principle (9). Perhaps the procedure in this case was condoned by the fact that Antigone’s part previously and (for the most part) subsequently was entirely lyric, while her few words here are in plain iambics. The difference between the singing and the speaking voice would help to conceal the temporary substitution of another actor. It is true that by assigning Jocaste’s and Antigone’s rôles to different actors throughout it is possible to distribute the parts in this play among three actors without any difficulty whatever. But this would require us to ignore the peculiar technique of the opening scenes, the true inwardness of which was recognized by ancient commentators.[279]
These examples are by no means exhaustive, but it is high time that we turn to the passages which are of crucial importance to the three-actor theory. In Aeschylus’ Libation-Bearers a servant has just informed Clytemnestra that her paramour is slain, and she cries out: “Let some one quickly give me an ax to slay a man withal” (vs. 889). We are to suppose that the slave at once makes his exit to comply with her command. She speaks two lines more and Orestes enters. They divide seven more lines between them, and Orestes’ purpose is beginning to waver when he catches sight of Pylades entering and asks: “Pylades, what shall I do? Shrink from killing my mother?” Pylades’ electrifying response has already been quoted (vss. 900-902; see [p. 170], above). Here we have four speaking characters between vss. 886 and 900 and consequently four actors, unless the servant can be transformed into Pylades within the space of nine lines, vss. 891-99. This would be a “lightning” change indeed (4a), and it is not surprising that it has been challenged. Yet the ancient scholiast accepts it and I do not believe we are warranted in pronouncing it impossible, especially since the shift is merely from one male character to another.
Another sort of difficulty is presented by Euripides’ Andromache. Menelaus, Andromache, and her son, Molossus, all have speaking (or singing) parts just before the entrance of Peleus at vs. 547. Since none of the earlier speakers has withdrawn and since Peleus at once begins to talk, it would seem at first glance that we had four actors indisputably before us. Not so, answer the defenders of the traditional view, for it is significant that Molossus becomes utterly dumb after Peleus enters. Therefore we are asked to believe that Molossus was played by a mute throughout, and the actor who is presently to appear as Peleus delivered from behind the scenes the words which belong to Molossus, the mute furnishing only the gestures. We have already found support for this kind of thing in a suspected scene of Aeschylus’ Seven against Thebes, principle (11), second alternative ([pp. 175 f.]). But we are asked to go further and believe that this was always the practice when children seemed to sing or speak upon the Greek stage;[280] and in confirmation of this it is pointed out that whenever children have a part, as in Euripides’ Alcestis, vss. 393 ff. and Medea, vss. 1271 ff., one of the actors is always off the scene and available for this purpose. The most difficult example of this problem has recently come to light in the fragments of Euripides’ Hypsipyle, vss. 1579 ff.[281] The heroine and Amphiaraus converse from the beginning of the fragment to vs. 1589, where the latter makes his exit. Two lines of farewell (vss. 1590 f.) are addressed to him and are assigned by the papyrus to “the children of Hypsipyle.” Moreover, they are of such a nature that one line must have been spoken by each of the two youths. Next, one of them converses with his mother until Thoas, who also has a speaking part, appears at vs. 1632. Here, then, if the children’s parts are taken by actors we have four actors required in two successive scenes. The only alternative lies in supposing that mutes impersonated the boys and that Thoas’ actor, already dressed for his introit at vs. 1632, spoke their lines from behind the scenes. This would include twelve lines for one youth and one line, in a different voice, for the other.
Fig. 67.—Distribution of Rôles to Actors in Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus
But the most intractable play of all is Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus. Antigone and Oedipus are on the stage continuously for the first eight hundred and forty-seven verses (the latter until vs. 1555), while the third actor appears successively as a stranger, Ismene, Theseus, and Creon ([Fig. 67]). So far there is no difficulty; but at this point Creon hopes to bring Oedipus to time by announcing that his guards have already seized Ismene (off-scene) and by having them now drag Antigone away. Creon threatens to carry off Oedipus as well, but at vs. 887 Theseus reappears and prevents further outrage. Note, however, that if only three actors were available Theseus must now be impersonated by Antigone’s actor, whereas previously he was represented by the actor who is now playing Creon’s part. Such splitting of a rôle is directly contrary to Aeschylean practice, principle (9), and has not in this instance the justification which Euripides had for splitting Antigone’s part in the Phoenician Maids ([p. 178], above). For Theseus’ second actor participates in the dialogue more extensively than did hers and his lines are prose throughout, while hers were entirely prose for one actor and (almost) entirely lyric for the other. But there are still other obstacles ahead. At vs. 1043 Creon and Theseus withdraw; after a choral ode Antigone, Theseus, and Ismene rejoin Oedipus (vs. 1099). Inasmuch as Ismene now has no speaking part she is evidently played by a mute, principle (6a). Presumably the other two are represented by the same actors as at the beginning, although this second transfer in Theseus’ rôle doubles the chances of the audience noticing the shift. The only alternative, however, is to split also Antigone’s rôle at this point. Theseus retires at vs. 1210 and reappears at vs. 1500, his actor having impersonated Polynices in the interval (vss. 1254-1446). At vs. 1555 all the characters exeunt. In the final act a messenger is on the stage from vs. 1578 to vs. 1669. Since Antigone and Ismene enter immediately thereafter (vs. 1670), it is necessary to suppose that they are played by the same actors as at the beginning and that Oedipus has become the messenger. At vs. 1751 Theseus makes his final entrance, represented this time by Oedipus’ actor, so that this important rôle is played in turn by each of the three actors! This means splitting Theseus’ rôle twice. It is also possible to split his rôle and Ismene’s (or Antigone’s) once each, or to split his rôle once and to have the final actor in this part sing from behind the scenes the few words which fall to Ismene just before Theseus’ last entrance, principle (11). On the other hand, though a fourth actor would obviate all these difficulties we should then have no explanation for the complicated system of entrances and exits and for the strange silence of Ismene during vss. 1099-1555, especially during vss. 1457-99 (see [p. 187], below).
I do not consider it warrantable to draw a categorical conclusion from the data considered in the last fifteen paragraphs. But in my opinion the technique of almost every tragedy is explicable only on the assumption that the regular actors were restricted to three; and, as I stated at the beginning, it is physically possible to stage every play with that number. In the case of a few pieces, however, this limitation imposes practices which so outrage the modern aesthetic sense that we instinctively long for some manner of escape. According to late and unreliable evidence an extra performer was called a parachoregema. This name would indicate that he was an extra expense to the man who financed each poet’s plays (the choregus, see [pp. 186] and [270 f.], below), and consequently that his employment would be determined by the wealth or liberality of the latter. But whether it was in fact possible for the tragic playwrights occasionally to have the services of such an extra, and, if so, under what conditions and how, are questions which in the present state of our knowledge can receive only hypothetical answers. It must be recognized, however, that the paucity of actors in the early days resulted, as we have just seen, in conventions of staging which perhaps were afterward accepted as part of the tradition, however unnecessary they may in the meanwhile have become. The technique of composition also makes it clear in my opinion that extra performers, if such were in fact engaged, were not on a par with the other three nor employed freely throughout the whole play but merely recited or sang a very few lines at those crises in the dramatic economy which were occasioned by the limitation in the number of regular actors.