# The Libation Bearers — Character guide

> Key figures in The Libation Bearers by Aeschylus.

- [Orestes](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/orestes.md): Raised in the hills of Phôkis by Strophius after being plundered and cast out in childhood, Orestes comes home a stranger to the very house he must save. He has sworn to divide his hair between the river Inachos and his 
- [Electra](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/electra.md): Electra moves alone among the black-robed libation bearers, her cheek ploughed red and her tresses torn, the visible wound of a house broken in two. When she finds a shorn tress on the tomb, she half-dares to believe her
- [Clytemnestra](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/clytemnestra.md): Clytemnestra rules beside Aigisthos, holding a usurper's power by fear while the loyal old retainers of the House hate her in silence. Terrified by a dangerous dream, she made the fatal mistake of sending offerings to Ag
- [Agamemnon](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/agamemnon.md): Agamemnon lies under a mound of earth in a desolate expanse, a lord slain whose reverence has gone from the land and whose hearthstone is wet with tears. He is absent and yet everywhere: the tress laid on his grave, the 
- [Aigisthos](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/aigisthos.md): Aigisthos rules Argos beside Clytemnestra, and the Chorus of loyal slave women regard him as a usurper who keeps his grip through intimidation. He is the man Orestes could have bought off with a large blood-price and liv
- [Pylades](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/pylades.md): Pylades grew up alongside Orestes in Phôkis, the companion named in the same breath as the oath sworn to remember what enemies tried to make him forget. He enters in travel-stained garb, grim and armed, and withdraws wit
- [Zeus](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/zeus.md): Zeus presides over a world where every act of vengeance calls upon his name, yet the play quietly asks whether divine justice can sanction the very violence it condemns. The chorus and the avengers appeal to him as guara
- [Apollo](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/apollo.md): Apollo speaks through his oracle at Delphi, and his command to avenge Agamemnon carries the full weight of divine law. Yet the play links his name to a strange incoherence in Orestes' speech, as if the god's demand fract
- [Loxias](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/loxias.md): Epithet of Apollo as the prophetic god guiding Orestes.
- [Hermês](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/hermes.md): Messenger god and guide of souls, invoked in prayers.
- [Cassandra](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/cassandra.md): Prophetess and captive of Agamemnon, murdered with him.
- [Strophius](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/strophius.md): King of Phocis and father of Pylades, who sheltered Orestes.
- [Skylla](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/skylla.md): Mythological figure referenced as a parallel to treacherous women.
- [Althaea](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/althaea.md): Mother of Meleager, cited as an example of maternal vengeance.
- [Meleâger](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters/meleager.md): Hero whose death was caused by his mother Althaea.

HTML index: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_libation_bearers_se/characters