Aeschylus II - The Complete Greek Tragedies

I breezed through this second volume on the tragedies of Aeschylus, which covers his Oresteia: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers (known in Greek as the Choēphóroi) and The Eumenides.

As I've written before, these plays provide a window into the ancient Greek world.  

Written in the glorious 5th Century BC, the story follows the changing political scene in Athens.  The history of murder within the house of Atreus (Atreus killing the sons of his brother Thyestes and tricking him into eating his own children, Atreus' son Agamemnon sacrificing his daughter Iphigenia on the eve of the Trojan War, Clytemnestra killing her husband Agamemnon for his murder of Iphigenia, then their son Orestes killing Clytemnestra in revenge) appears to be a never ending cycle.  

There is no real rule of law, just the arbitrary decisions by members of the royal family to kill one another.

But things have changed in 5th century Athens.  Now the people rule in a democratic state, with lawcourts made up of Athenian citizens.  

And so that's how the curse of the family of Atreus is resolved, in an Athenian court, with citizen jurors and under the auspices of Athena.

The play demonstrates how in many ways Athens represented change for the better.  Although not a perfect society it sought new methods of resolving disputes that held one accountable for their actions.

Brilliant stuff!