The man invented tragedy. Of
course, he died like this.
The résumé. Aeschylus was born into a noble family in 525 BC. He fought
at Marathon. He wrote over 90 plays. According to Aristotle, he expanded the
number of characters in theatre and allowed conflict among them — basically, he
invented drama as we know it. The greatest playwright in the ancient world, a
war hero, a genius.
And then a bird killed him with a
turtle.
The prophecy. Here's where it gets deliciously Greek. An oracle had
predicted that Aeschylus would be killed by a falling object. Now, if you know
anything about Greek mythology, you know that trying to outrun a prophecy is
always, always a terrible idea. But Aeschylus was rational. He had a
plan.
He took the precaution of trusting
himself only under the canopy of the heavens — staying outdoors, away from
buildings, away from rooftops, away from anything that could fall on him.
Solid logic. Airtight, even. Except
for one thing he never considered.
The exile. After creating his Oresteia trilogy, his greatest work,
Aeschylus became very unpopular with Athenians, who didn't appreciate his
openly aristocratic tendencies. Disappointed, he left for Sicily. He was
sitting outside one sunny afternoon — safe, he thought, under the open sky.
The moment. Here it is, preserved for eternity by the Roman historian
Valerius Maximus:
"He was in Sicily. Leaving the
walls of the town, he sat down in a sunny spot. An eagle carrying a tortoise
was above him. Deceived by the gleam of his hairless skull, it dashed the
tortoise against it, as though it were a stone, in order to feed on the flesh
of the broken animal."
Two tragedies in one — Aeschylus
died, and the eagle was deprived of its dinner.
The cosmic joke. The man who spent his entire life writing about the
inescapability of fate — Oedipus, Agamemnon, Prometheus — died proving
his own point. He hid from falling objects by going outside. The universe sent
a bird to drop one on him anyway. His death remains the only documented case in
human history of someone being killed by a tortoise.
And his epitaph? Written by himself,
inscribed on his tomb in Sicily? It mentions his valor at Marathon. Not a
single word about his plays.
The Father of Tragedy wanted to be
remembered as a soldier. History remembered him as the guy the turtle landed
on.
He would have written it exactly this
way. 🐢
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