Prometheus Bound

Prometheus explains to the Chorus how his gift to humanity—the gift of fire—allowed humanity to develop knowledge, technology, and civilization. In fact, Prometheus provided humanity not only with fire but also taught them other valuable skills, including written language, sea navigation, medicine, and prophecy. Yet Prometheus is unable to find a cure for his own troubles: He is fated to suffer “ten thousand pangs and agonies” (512) before he gets his freedom. Even Zeus is not stronger than fate, though Prometheus declines to tell the Chorus the secret of Zeus’s downfall. Only by keeping this secret can Prometheus hope to someday escape his torment.

The Chorus prays that they may never sin or oppose Zeus. They pity Prometheus but criticize him for “regard[ing] mortal beings too high” (544) and thus earning himself his punishment. It is not as though weak humans—“creatures of a day” (547)—can ever requit Prometheus’s kindness!

Prometheus’s next visitor is Inachus’s daughter Io, an Argive princess who has been transformed into a cow. Chanting, Io asks about