Enter Kreon, with attendants bearing the body of Menoikeus.
Kreon.
What shall I do? Weeping shall I bemoan1310
Myself, or Thebes whom such a cloud o'erpalls
That she through Acheron's night is passing now?
Dead is my son! He died for fatherland,
Winning a glorious name, but woe for me.
Him from the Dragon's crags but now I caught1315
Self-slain, and woefully bare him in mine arms.
My whole house wails. I for my sister come,
Jocasta,—come, the old to seek the old,—
To bathe and lay out this no more my son.
For he who hath not died must reverence1320
The Nether-gods by honouring the dead.
Chorus.
Gone is thy sister, Kreon, forth the house;
And with her went her child Antigonê.
Kreon.
Whither?—for what mischance?[1] Declare to me.
Chorus.
The purpose of her sons she heard, to fight1325
In single combat for the royal halls.
Kreon.
How sayest thou? Lo, tending my son's corse,
I came not to the knowledge of this deed.
- ↑ Kreon's mental attitude, through which he forebodes evil everywhere (cf. 1311–12), countenances this rendering, though συμφορὰ does not necessarily mean more than "occurrence."
