Helen, whose death thou hast essayed, to sting
The heart of Menelaus, yet hast missed,
Is here,—whom wrapped in folds of air ye see (ἐv αἰθέρος πτυχαῖς),—
From death delivered, and not slain of thee, etc.
[Way’s translation]
The italicized words show that Apollo and Helen stand above all the other actors in the drama, who are themselves standing on two different levels; and it is evident that the machine was utilized for this purpose.
The last example is typical of a large class of instances in which a divinity appears as a splendid climax to the events of the play. It is plain that in all or practically all of these the god is raised above the other performers, as would be only appropriate for an effective close; but whether the deity merely came forward upon the logium or was brought into view by means of a machine is not always an easy matter to determine. By a natural extension of meaning, however, such an apparition at the close of a play came to be called a “god from the machine” (θεὸς ἀπὸ μηχανῆς; deus ex machina) regardless of the method used for his appearance. By a further extension of meaning μηχανή was used to designate any mechanical artifice, such as the “long arm of coincidence,” for example. Thus Aristotle criticized the μηχανή in Euripides’ Medea, but from another passage it becomes clear that he was referring, not to the use of an actual machine at the dénouement, but only to the improbability involved in the appearance of King Aegeus in the course of the play.[361]
There are several ancient notices which refer to the use that inexpert playwrights made of the deus ex machina in order to extricate their characters when the plot had become complicated beyond the possibility of disentanglement by purely natural means. It would seem that in the hands of second-rate poets the deus was frequently so employed. In particular it has often been charged that Euripides was guilty of this practice, but in my opinion without due warrant. It is true that he concluded fully half of his eighteen extant plays in this manner, besides several other instances in the plays now lost; but with only one exception his principal motive was never to relieve himself of the embarrassment into which the confusion of his plot had involved him. The truth of this statement appears most clearly in the Iphigenia among the Taurians (see [pp. 201 f.], above). At vs. 1392 all the immediate requirements of the drama have been met: Orestes, Iphigenia, and Pylades have made good their escape, bearing the image of Artemis. The poet could have stopped here without requiring the aid of a divinity. Instead he preferred to plunge himself into such a plight as only a deity could rescue him from, for in the succeeding verses a messenger reports that contrary wind and wave are driving the refugees back to land. King Thoas just has time to issue quick commands when Athena appears (vs. 1435) and bids him cease his efforts. Surely the playwright’s difficulties here are self-imposed and must be regarded as having furnished the excuse rather than the reason for the use of the deus ex machina. What other objects might he have had in mind? It has already been suggested ([p. 202], above) that this device enabled him to bring the melodramatic course of the action to a more dignified and truly tragic close. Also he thus found it possible to rescue the chorus, who had been promised a safe return to Greece but had been left behind. But the fact that the chorus in the same poet’s Helen is irremediably left in the lurch after the same fashion (see [pp. 160 f.], above) implies that this was a lesser consideration. Again, toward the close of Euripides’ Suppliants, Adrastus has vowed the eternal gratitude of Argos to Athens for having secured the return of her slain. But the appearance of Athena at vs. 1183 makes her a witness to this, and her demand that Adrastus’ promise be ratified by an oath converts it into a sacred obligation.
But after all these are only occasional motives, while a more important result is obtained again and again. In the Iphigenia, Euripides took advantage of Athena’s presence to have her foretell the heroine’s later career and final decease in Attica. It is unnecessary to point out that the presence of a divinity was highly serviceable and appropriate for such a purpose. We have already seen ([p. 259], above) that exactly the same situation obtains in the Andromache. In this way the poet was enabled to burst through the restricting influences which caused the normal observance of the unities of time and place and to include other days and other places within the purview of his play. Frequently there is included in this an aetiological explanation of rites which were observed in the dramatist’s own day. Thus in Euripides’ Hippolytus (vss. 1423 ff.), Artemis promises that the maidens of Troezen will perform certain ceremonies in honor of the hero’s sufferings, and in the Iphigenia among the Taurians (vss. 1446 ff.), Athena enjoins upon Orestes to establish the temple and worship of Artemis Tauropolos at Brauron in Attica.