At the start of this
tragedy, the oracular priestess praises the gods;
but as she opens the temple, she sees a man
polluting the altar with
blood, and the horrible
Eumenides (Furies). Apollo comes to Orestes and
bids him go to Athens and clutch Athena's statue, saying that he'll be
freed of his suffering thereafter.
About a year later, he does this. But the Furies come there to claim
Orestes' blood, life and soul for Hell. They dance his doom, and that
of all who shed a kinsman's blood. Then the goddess Athena comes in.
She asks who is there, and why she was summoned. Orestes throws himself
on her mercy, and she convokes a court from the men of Athens, and has
them hear the case: Orestes and Apollo versus the Eumenides. The Furies
want vengeance for his blood mother's blood shed in revenge for her
husband's murder. Apollo says it was Father Zeus's will; that women
merely nourish the child that men create, and hence the child's duty to
avenge the father is primary. The Furies say that that makes Zeus a
hypocrite, given what he did to his father, Cronos. But Apollo rejects
their argument, saying that Zeus may give deliverance to whom He will.
The vote is even, so Orestes is acquitted. He leaves, swearing
friendship. The Eumenidies are heartbroken, and want to curse Athens,
but Athena offers them a temple and worship and honour. They eventually
give in, since she says they were not dishonoured, as the vote was
even. So finally they bless the land, and protect the people, and then
go to their homes.
This play and, in a greater sense, this trilogy, marks the transition
from the matriarchy to the patriarchy. The father is triumphant; the
ancient Goddesses relegated to worship and gifts, as women to the house
and men's protection, by the goddess born of her Father only (she
sprang forth fully formed from Zeus's head).