ἀχέων is unquestionably the participle, familiar from the Homeric poems ( Il. 2. 724, Il. 5. 399, Il. 18. 446: Od. 11. 195). Orestes is conceived as pining in exile for the moment when he shall return as an avenger. Cp. 171 “ἀεὶ μὲν γὰρ ποθεῖ”: 602 “δυστυχῆ τρίβει βίον”. The mention of his present sorrow prompts the augury of his future triumph (160). Hermann, taking ἀχέων as gen. pl. of “ἄχος”, joined it with κρυπτᾷ: semota a doloribus in iuventa felix. But (a) it seems impossible that “κρυπτᾷ ἀχέων” should mean, ‘secluded from sorrows,’ as if the idea of separation (or exemption) were sufficiently expressed by ‘hidden.’ And (b） in this context, where Electra is reminded that others suffer with her, a reference to the sorrow of the exile is evidently more fitting than an allusion to his immunity from her particular troubles.
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Sophocles: The Plays and Fragments, with critical notes, commentary, and translation in English prose. Part VI: The Electra. Sir Richard C. Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1894.
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