Keble (Præl. 23, p. 451, 462–464) seems to have answered it with a simple affirmative. To him the "Suppliant Maidens" was the first play of a trilogy, answering to the "Agamemnon"—the second, answering to the "Choephoroi," narrated the murder of the bridegrooms—the third, answering to the "Eumenides," described the penalties which, on earth and in hell, were inflicted on Danaus and his daughters. An Æschylean simplicity and solemnity, he considered, pervaded such a dramatic conception.
I doubt, however, if such a theory be tenable. No allusion, I believe, is made by Homer to any penalty befalling the maidens, in the infernal regions, Æschylus' contemporary, Pindar (Pyth. 9, 112; see also Nem. x. 1–10), describes their remarriage. The Tartarean part of the legend, in fact, is of later date. It may well be questioned whether the presentation of an actual Tartarus and its penalties would have been possible to early tragedy—though we know that Æschylus was reckoned daring in such matters, and that to the comedy of Aristophanes such licence was possible. Müller, on the other hand, is positive (Diss. Eum. sect. 100), transl. Camb. 1835) that the "Suppliant Maidens" forms a middle play. With this view Paley concurs, holding that the play was preceded by one of unknown argument, called "Ægyptii," and succeeded by a "Danaides," in which the murder of the bridegrooms, and the acquittal of the brides, must have been narrated.
Lastly, Hermann considers the "Suppliant Maidens" to have been the first play of the trilogy, and to have been followed by an "Ægyptii," or "Ægyptiadæ," or possibly "Thalamopoioi," which described the submission of Danaus in Argos to an Egyptian army, his consent to his daughters' wedlock, and the murder of the bridegrooms: and then by the "Danaides," in which judgment is passed upon the heroines who obeyed their sire and slew their husbands, and on Hypermnestra who, in disobedience, was merciful.
This view he enforces by the reflection that no allusion is found in the "Suppliant Maidens" to any preceding play such as Müller imagines. And undoubtedly it is hard to conceive that the surrender of Danaus to an Egyptian army, his consent to the marriage, the murder, the trial and acquittal, could all have been comprised in one final drama.
The reader will have already perceived that we are moving in a wilderness of guess-work, where ingenuity and vague inferences take the place of learning and demonstration. Such guidance through the twilight as we have, is supplied by the fragments of non-extant dramas.
