Asterisk denotes entries on real places.
*Argos
Appropriate to the function of Greek drama as both religious instruction and ritual, the play concerns the spiritual cleansing of Argos. Despite Paidagogos’s acute awareness of the city’s beauty and venerable tradition, his speech presents the kingdom as desecrated and thus in need of the purification Orestes and Electra will bring by avenging their royal father’s death. According to a notion common among many ancient religions, only more blood can cleanse the earth from the impurity generated by the shedding of a king’s blood, in this case that of Agamemnon, murdered by his wife. Consequently, through a divinely ordained execution of the murderers, Orestes expects to make the land flourish again.