CLASSICS 2D03 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Deianira, Trachis, Lichas
13 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
The Women of Trachis
• Play begins with Deianeira, the wife of Heracles, relating the story of her early life to her nurse,
and describing the difficulty she is having in adjusting to married life
▪ Talks about how she used to fear marriage. Her first suitor came to her father three times;
first as a bull, then a snake, and then a man with an ox-like face. His name was the river
Achelous. Before she could start miserable married life, Heracles fought Achelous and won
Deianeira’s hand in marriage.
• She complains that the hero Heracles is always off on some adventure, and shamefully neglects
his family, rarely visiting them
• The Chorus, consisting of a group of women from the town of Trachis (The Women of Trachis
from the title), speak directly to audience and help to explain the context of the plot (according
to the conventions of ancient Greek tragedy), but the also become emotionally involved in the
action and often attempt to advise Deianeira
• On the advice of her nurse and the Chorus, Deianeira sends her son Hyllus off to find Heracles.
▪ She is particularly concerned over a prophecy she has heard about Heracles and the island
of Euboea, where he is reported to be
• However, after Hyllus leaves, a messenger arrives with word that the victorious Heracles is
already headed home
• A herald arrives, bringing in salve girls captured at Heracles’ recent siege of Oechalia, among
them Lole, the beautiful daughter of King Eurytus.
• Herald gives Deianeira a false story of why Heracles had laid siege to the city, claiming that
Heracles had vowed revenge against Eurytus and his people after having been enslaved by him.
• However, Deianeira soon learns the truth that Heracles laid siege to the city expressly to obtain
the girl Lole as his mistress
• Distressed by the thought of her husband falling for this younger woman, Deianeira decides to
use a love charm on him and creates a robe suffused with the blood of a centaur Nessus, who
had once told her as he was dying that his blood would keep Heracles from loving any other
woman more than her.
▪ When she Deianeira was younger, she had been carried across a river by the centaur,
Nessus. Halfway through he made a grab at her, but Heracles came to her rescue and
quickly shot him with an arrow.
• She dispatches the herald Lichas to Heracles with the robe, with the strict instructions that no
one else is to wear it, and that it is to be kept in the dark until he puts it on, as Nessus had
explained.
• However, Deianeira starts to have bad feelings about the charm and then notices that, when
some of the left over material from the robe is exposed to sunlight, it reacts like boiling acid,
revealing that Nessus had tricked her about his blood being a love charm, intending only to
extract revenge on Heracles
• Hyllus arrives soon after to inform Deianeira that Heracles lies dying in agony due to her gift.
Heracles killed Lichas the herald in his pain and fury.
• Deianeira, shamed at her sons harsh words, kills herself. It is only then that Hyllus discovers that
it was not actually his mother’s intention to kill Heracles, and learns the full story.
• Dying Heracles is carried into his home in horrible pain, furious because he thinks his wife tried
to murder him. When Hyllus explains the truth, Heracles realises that the prophesies about his
death have come to pass: he was to be killed by someone who was already dead (namely, the
centaur Nessus)
