ἔμβαλλε “κ.τ.λ.” Here Philoctetes receives this pledge in place of an oath. In Tr. 1181 ff. the intense anxiety of Heracles is marked by the fact that he exacts from Hyllus, first the “δεξιά”, and then the “ὅρκος”:—“ἔμβαλλε χεῖρα δεξιὰν πρώτιστά μοι”:—“ὄμνυ Διὸς νῦν τοῦ με φύσαντος κάρα”. When belligerents had taken oaths to a treaty, the hand-pledge followed, as the seal of mutual confidence: it was the moral sanction added to the religious. Xen. Anab. 2. 3. 28“ὤμοσαν καὶ δεξιὰς ἔδοσαν”.
This text is part of:
Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part IV: The Philoctetes. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1932.
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