thumb|Artistic rendition of Deianeira being captured by the centaur, Nessus.
Women of Trachis or The Trachiniae (, ) c. 450–425 BC, is an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles.
Women of Trachis is generally considered to be less developed than Sophocles' other works, and its dating has been a subject of disagreement among critics and scholars.
Synopsis
The story begins with Deianeira, the wife of Heracles, relating the story of her early life and her great difficulties in adjusting to her years of married life. Heracles was not her first suitor; the river god Achelous was first to woo her, but, with Zeus's intervention, Heracles defeated Achelous and took her as a wife. Now she is distraught over her husband's neglect of their family. Often off somewhere involved in some adventure, he rarely sees her or their children. It has been fifteen months since she last heard from him, so she does not know his whereabouts. She sends their son Hyllus to find him, for she is concerned about prophecies foretelling that Heracles will die if he stays where he is. After Hyllus sets off, a messenger arrives with word that Heracles, victorious in recent battle, is making offerings on Cape Cenaeum before coming home soon to Trachis. The messenger adds that Heracles's homecoming has been delayed by the popular demand wherever he goes to hear tales of his victories.
Lichas, a herald of Heracles, arrives with a procession of captives. He lies to Deianeira about why Heracles had laid siege to the city of Oechalia (in Euboea). He claims Eurytus, the city's king, had ordered Heracles enslaved, causing Heracles to vow revenge against him and his people. As part of his revenge, Heracles enslaved the women of Eurytus and ordered Lichas to take them to Trachis. Among the captured is Iole, daughter of Eurytus. Deianeira soon learns from another messenger the truth: Heracles laid siege to the city just to obtain Iole after the king refused to allow Heracles to take Iole as a secret lover. Extremely disappointed and upset, Deianeira uses the information to question Lichas more pointedly, and he soon confirms the truth of the messenger's story.
Unable to cope with her husband falling for a young woman, she decides to use a love charm on him, a magic potion that will win him back. When she was younger, she had been carried across the River Evenus by the centaur Nessus. Halfway through the crossing, he tried to sexually assault her, but Heracles heard her cries and came to her rescue, quickly shooting Nessus with an arrow. As he was dying, he told her his blood, now mixed with the poison of the Lernaean Hydra in which Heracles' arrow had been dipped, would keep Heracles from loving any other woman more than her as long as she followed his hastily given directions. So now, years later, Deianeira dyes a robe with the blood and has Lichas carry it to Heracles with strict instructions that no one else must wear it and it must be kept in darkness until he puts it on.
After Deianeira sends her gift securely off, a bad feeling comes over her. She throws some of the leftover material into sunlight and it reacts like boiling acid. Shocked, she realizes Nessus had lied about the love charm: it was a poison that would bring death to his killer. Hyllus returns and tells his mother that his father, poisoned by the robe, lies dying. In Heracles's horrific pain and fury, he brutally killed Lichas for having brought him the robe: "he made the white brain to ooze from the hair, as the skull was dashed to splinters, and blood scattered therewith" (as translated by Sir Richard C. Jebb).
Deianeira feels enormous shame for what she has done, amplified by her son's harsh words, and kills herself. Hyllus discovers soon after that his mother did not intend to kill her husband. The dying Heracles is carried to his home in agony and furious over what he believes was his wife's murder attempt. Hyllus explains the truth, and Heracles realizes that the prophecies he heard about his death have come true: he was to be killed by someone already dead, and it turned out to be Nessus.
Heracles's pain becomes so unbearable he begs and begs for someone to finish him off, bemoaning that his weakened state makes him like a woman. He makes Hyllus promise him two things under protest: first, while shedding no tears, to take Heracles to the highest point of Zeus's peak and burn him alive on a pillar, and second, to marry Iole. Heracles is then carried offstage to the unseen mountain, where he will be killed as requested.
Date
The date of the first performance of Women of Trachis is unknown, and scholars have speculated a wide range of dates for its initial performance. Scholars such as T.F. Hoey believe the play was written relatively early in Sophocles' career, around 450 BC. Often cited as evidence for an early date is the fact that the dramatic form of Women of Trachis is not as developed as those of Sophocles' other surviving works, advancing the belief that the play comes from a younger and less skilled Sophocles. Evidence for a date near Oedipus Rex include a thematic similarity between the two plays. One reason Webster gives for this dating is that there are a number of similarities between Women of Trachis and plays by Euripides that were known to be written between 438 and 417, and so may help narrow the range of dates, although it is unknown which poet borrowed from the other. Arguments in favor of such a date include the fact that events of the play seem to reflect events that occurred during the Peloponnesian War around that time.