The Persians

Athens, now commonly regarded as the birthplace of Western democracy, was the host of the Dionysia festival where The Persians won first prize. It’s not surprising then, that Aeschylus’ play questions the governing structure of the Persian Empire—Athens prided itself on the fact that its citizens were free from the rule of a king. Aeschylus really plays up the absolute power of monarchs: The chorus describes Darius as “one who was a god to the / Persians” (Lines 157-58), and they declare that Xerxes may be “a god too, unless our / old protecting power has now changed sides against our army” (Lines 158-59). Atossa, before learning of her son’s defeat, notes that he is not accountable to the people; his defeat would be bad for Persia, but he would remain in power. The ancient world had other unaccountable, deified leaders, such as the Egyptian pharaohs; however, this kind of power dynamic ran contrary to the ethos of Aeschylus’s society. Even Pericles, the powerful Athenian leader who was the chief sponsor of the Dionysia festival during which The Persians was performed, was constrained by democratic limits. While the wars described in The Persians were fought by a coalition of Greek city-states led by Athens and Sparta (a famously totalitarian society), Aeschylus’s audience widely accepted that the ethos of freedom was instrumental in the Greeks’ success against superior Persian numbers.

Within the play, Xerxes is portrayed as a particularly bad king. Unlike his ancestors, whose accomplishments and glories were a seemingly unbroken line of triumph, Xerxes makes foolish mistakes and overreaches. It is particularly significant that the character who most highlights Xerxes’ failures is the ghost of his father Darius. Although Darius was also a former foe of Greece, Aeschylus’s play respects him as a worthy and wise ruler—someone who does not abuse his power to doom his people to destruction and leave his cities vulnerable to attack. Xerxes, on the other hand, is impulsive. His attempt to bridge the ocean, the realm of the god Poseidon, is an act of hubris, or excessive pride; however, because of his role in Persian governance, no one can stop him or argue with his vision. The gods view Xerxes’ ship-bridge as an affront. Echoing their leader’s impiety, Xerxes’ armies “plunder the images of the gods and set fire to temples” (Line 810). In Greek literature and mythology, hubris does not go unpunished; Aeschylus’s audience would have recognized this as the cause of Persian defeat.