Sophocles, Antigone (ed. Sir Richard Jebb)

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You, you with your face bent to the ground, do you admit, or deny that you did this?

I declare it and make no denial.

You can take yourself wherever you please, [445] free and clear of a heavy charge. Exit Guard.

You, however, tell me--not at length, but briefly--did you know that an edict had forbidden this?

I knew it. How could I not? It was public.

And even so you dared overstep that law?

[450] Yes, since it was not Zeus that published me that edict, and since not of that kind are the laws which Justice who dwells with the gods below established among men. Nor did I think that your decrees were of such force, that a mortal could override the unwritten [455] and unfailing statutes given us by the gods. For their life is not of today or yesterday, but for all time, and no man knows when they were first put forth. Not for fear of any man's pride was I about to owe a penalty to the gods for breaking these. [460] Die I must, that I knew well (how could I not?). That is true even without your edicts. But if I am to die before my time, I count that a gain. When anyone lives as I do, surrounded by evils, how can he not carry off gain by dying? [465] So for me to meet this doom is a grief of no account. But if I had endured that my mother's son should in death lie an unburied corpse, that would have grieved me. Yet for this, I am not grieved. And if my present actions are foolish in your sight, [470] it may be that it is a fool who accuses me of folly.

Further comments from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Antigone:
line 441: se dê,
line 450: Zeus
line 460: dôsein
line 460: thanoumenê gar
line 460: ti d' ou
line 465 (general note)
line 465: toisde d' ouk algunomai
line 470: schedon ti
line 470: môrôi môrian
line 470: ophliskanô

Cross references from Herbert Weir Smyth, A Greek Grammar for Colleges:
2044 [THE PARTICIPLE]

Cross references from Sir Richard C. Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Oedipus Tyrannus:
1119: se dê, se tên neuousan eis pedon kara, i phês ê katarnei k.t.l
706: exô bareias aitias eleutheron

Cross references from Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache (ed. Ildar Ibraguimov):
412 [Besondere Eigentümlichkeiten im Gebrauche des Akkusativs. (Elliptischer Akkusativ. Akkusativ bei Ausrufungen. Absoluter Akkusativ.)]

Cross references from Raphael Kühner, Bernhard Gerth, Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache (ed. Ildar Ibraguimov):
588 [Von den Wort- oder Nominalfragen.]

Cross references from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Antigone:
* [988-1114]

Cross references from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Ajax:
*
* [1223-1420]
* [201-595]
* [974-1184]

Cross references from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Electra:
* [1398-1510]
* [251-471]
* [516-1057]

Cross references from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Philoctetes:
* [1-134]
* [1-134]
* [219-675]

Cross references from Sir Richard Jebb, Commentary on Sophocles: Trachiniae:
* [141-496]

Cross references from William Watson Goodwin, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb:
827 [Attributive Participle.]

This text is based on the following book(s):
Sophocles. The Antigone of Sophocles. Edited with introduction and notes by Sir Richard Jebb. Sir Richard Jebb. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1891.
OCLC: 39793726