The Grove (Prologue and Entry of the Chorus)

An old blind man, in rags, with a staff, came along the road with a girl leading him.

"Child of a blind old man, Antigone, to what place have we come, to the city of what men? Who will receive the wandering Oedipus today with scanty gifts? I ask little, and receive still less than that little, and it is enough for me; for my sufferings, and the long time that has been my companion, and my noble blood, teach me to be content."

Antigone told him what she saw: the towers of a city far off; and nearby, a place that seemed holy, full of laurel, olive and vine, where nightingales sang thickly. She sat him on a rock.

A man of the place came by, and was horrified: they must get up at once; the old man was sitting on holy ground, which no one may touch or live on. Whose ground? The grove of the dread goddesses, the daughters of Earth and Darkness — the Eumenides, the All-seeing Kindly Ones, as the people here called them. And Oedipus heard it with strange joy: "May they receive their suppliant graciously! For I will never leave this seat." It was the sign of his fate.

Long ago, when Apollo prophesied to Oedipus his terrible future, he had told him also that at the end of his life he would come to rest at a sanctuary of the dread goddesses, and there would find his release — a blessing to those who received him, and a curse to those who had driven him out.

The man told them that this place was Colonus, the land of the horseman, under the protection of Poseidon and of the Titan Prometheus; its king was Theseus, king of Athens. Oedipus asked him to send for Theseus: "For a small service he will gain a great reward." What could a blind beggar give a king? "My words will have eyes." The man went to tell the people of the village.

Alone, Oedipus prayed to the goddesses: "Dread queens, you whose faces are terrible, since yours is the first seat in this land at which I have bent my knees, do not be harsh to Phoebus and to me. For when he proclaimed all those many evils for me, he spoke of this as my rest after long years: when I came to a final land, where I would find a seat of the dread goddesses and a shelter for strangers, there I would end my wretched life, bringing gain to those who received me and ruin to those who sent me away . . . Pity this wretched ghost of the man Oedipus; for this is not his old body."

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The Chorus of old men of Colonus came in, searching for the stranger who had dared to enter the holy grove: "Look! Who was he? Where is he lodged? Where has he rushed off to, the most insolent of all men?" Antigone led Oedipus out from the grove to a place where he could speak lawfully. They asked who he was. He begged them not to ask. They pressed him; and at last he told them: "Do you know of a son of Laius? . . . Of the race of the Labdacids? . . . Oedipus, wretched Oedipus . . ." And they cried out in horror, and told him to leave their land at once, before he brought pollution on them.

Antigone pleaded for her father: "Strangers, kind of heart . . . pity me, wretched one, who begs you for my father's sake alone; I beg you with eyes that are not blind, looking into your eyes, as if I were one born of your own blood, that this unhappy man may find mercy."

And Oedipus defended himself. Was this the famous piety of Athens, the refuge of the stranger? They were afraid of a name. "For my deeds were suffered rather than done — if I must tell you of my mother and father, for whose sake you fear me." He had struck the man who struck him; and even if he had acted knowing, he would not have been guilty; but in fact he had come to that place knowing nothing; and those who tried to destroy him knew everything. He was a holy man, a suppliant under the protection of the gods, bringing a gift for their city; let them wait until their king came. The elders, awed, agreed to wait for Theseus.