Sir Richard C. Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Electra

---

---

558-609

Clytaemnestra has argued that she was justified in slaying Agamemnon, because he had slain Iphigeneia. The topics of Electra's reply are as follows.

(1) 558—562. The wife who slew her husband would be a criminal, even if the motive had been just retribution; but the real motive was her love for Aegisthus. (2) 563—576. Agamemnon was not a free agent in slaying Iphigeneia; the act was forced upon him by Artemis. (3) 577—583. Suppose, however, that he was a free agent, and wished to please his brother; still she was not justified in taking his life. (4) 584—594. And in any case her plea does not excuse her for living with the man who helped to slay her husband.—The speech then closes in a strain of reproach and defiance (595 —609).

καὶ δὴ λέγω σοι: the same formula as in 892 and Ant. 245,—“καὶ δὴ” expressing prompt compliance. Cp. also 1436, Ant. 1464.The sense of πατέρα is relative to the speaker, and not (as would be more natural) to the subject of φὴς: see on Tr. 1125“τῆς πατροφόντου μητρός”. —For the doubled “ἄν”, cp. 333 f.