A list of the extant plays of the three great 5th century ancient Greek tragedians
This is a list of all the extant tragic plays — year written (often approximate) in brackets.
~ The ones I’ve read, I’ve added the translator’s name in blue. ~
For all manner of interesting visuals related to ancient Greece, check out my ancient Greece Pinterest board or my page of BBC documentaries.
Aeschylus – (525/4 – 456/5 BCE) – over 80 plays, 7 extant
Persians (472) – Seth Bernardete
Seven Against Thebes (467) – Alan Sommerstein
Suppliants (463)
Orestia (458) – the only full trilogy we have from Ancient Greece:
– Agamemnon – Robert Fagles
– Libation Bearers – Robert Fagles
– Eumenides – Robert Fagles
Prometheus Bound (apparently there is some debate whether Aeschylus wrote this one!) – H.W. Smyth* // James Scully**
Sophocles – (497/496/495-406 BCE) over 100 plays, 7 extant
Aias [usually “Ajax” in English] (441) – James Scully
Electra (418-410) – Robert Bagg
Oedipus the King (430) – Robert Fagles
Antigone (442-441) – Robert Fagles
Women of Trakhis (450-424?)
Philoktetes (409) – James Scully
Oedipus at Colonus (401) – Robert Fagles
Euripides – 480-406 BCE – 90 plays, 19 extant
Alcestis (438)
Medea (431) – Oliver Taplin
Heracleidae (430?)
Hippolytus (428) – Robert Bagg
Andromache (426?)
Hecuba (425?) – Tony Harrison (didn’t like this translation very much…)
The Suppliants (423?)
Electra (420?) – John Davie
Heracles (422?)
The Trojan Women (415?) – Richard Lattimore
Iphigenia in Tauris (414)
Ion (414)
Helen (412) – Richard Lattimore (touched up by Griffith & Most – U of C, 3rd ed.)
The Phoenician Women (409?)
Orestes (408)
The Bacchae (405?)
Iphigenia at Aulis (405?)
Rhesus (?)
Cyclops (?)
* Some rather confusing lines in this Smyth translation. I think he was trying to make it sound “archaic” with the use of some utterly incomprehensible (to me) Middle English sounding words.
** James Scully translation much better