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SCENE 1

Macedon / the royal palace at Pella / King Philip is receiving the Molossan Prince, Arymbas

Arymbas
O! dragon king of many-headed Greece,
This Macedon of yours more a marvel
Made of prosp’rous & godly fertile plains,
Mountains as those which bear Olympus’ throne
& forests bubbling & barking with game,
All rul’d from this fine capital, Pella,
Of pebbl’d floors & collonaded courts,
Whose terracottan pipes fresh waters gush
Into well-builded houses, I am bless’d
To be here, in this city, meeting thee.

King Philip
Arymbas, most welcome, your Molossa
As my Macedon, tho Greek in spirits
Are hardier, more noble, than those south
& so, this union that you suggest
By marital conveyance, I’ll concur
My wife Audata, barren is, an heir
Soon needed to secure this lineage
Therefore, as is the law, as stand my rights
Willing am I to wed another wife,
Please, paint your sister with honest applause.

Arymbas
My Polyxena is delightful, kind
As bonnie as a lily in the snow
O pretty Polyxena, she is fair
With flaming hair as red as hungry blood
Charms blending with happy temperament
Her eyes are blue as skies without a cloud
Her form is fair her face a seemly disc
To bless the Polykrietus figurines
& of her spirit, all her know her swear
She warrior was in the Age of Gold.

Eurynoe
Noble Arymbas, as ye embassy
To Macedon, as thy sister’s patron,
So I, Eurynoe, my brother’s eyes
Shall be, on permittance of my presence
In thine own palace, where I shall surmount
The pillars of assessment, there to count
The graces & the favours of the Gods
Bestown on thine own sister, hope to find
Her fit & fated matching to the crown
Befitting our flourishing nationhood.

King Philip
Quite confident my sister will announce
The certainties of Polyxena’s praise
That lead to merry conjugals, combin’d
With the necessity of uniting
Our lands, staunching grave Illyrian threats
Let us ally, & gladly sacrifice
Seven heifers white & vernally young
Feasting a treaty ‘neath Apollos gaze,
That come the history of now will prove
A shock of fountain glory ever more.

King Philip cuts the throat of a white heifer

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SCENE 2

The royal palace of Molossa / Eurynoe, Arymbas & Polyxena are gather’d

Arymbas
Your Royal Highness, welcome to our court
& all the sweetest fruits of Epirus,
Compar’d to Macedon we might be poor
Being more of a pastoral people
But we are rich in substance of the soul,
Only the Pindus peak us keeps apart,
But see my sister’s pulchritude transcends
Them all, our father, Neoptelemus,
Alive remains within the healthy vine
That soon our noble houses will unite

Eurynoe
Your hospitality shames Danaan spheres
As when Athenian Themistocles
Accused of treason by congressing Greeks
Was sanctuary offer’d by your king,
Admetus the Immovable, who stood
Defiantly against the Spartan threat
Of total war, persuaded by his Queen
Aclestis, to enable the escape
Of their fugitive, who sold her jewels
To aid abscondance from a certain doom.

Polyxena
Aclestis, happy ancestor, sublime
In thought, has form’d her kindred souls in we
Women of Molossa, each quite unlike
The servant wives of Hellas & here isles
This farly-forward thinking realm of ours
Hands women equal shares in property
& other trappings of citizenship
I hope that Macedon will respect this
& me & my natural traditions
Of equality atwyx life’s sexes.

Eurynoe
Princess, you are a wondrous specimen
Of just how beauty manifests itself
Like water in a flood, that fills all space
& noble too! I have an idea,
To let King Philip meet you in person
In Samothraki, this coming summer
At the Sanctuary of the Great Gods
If all goes well, just rank’d as they deserve
Your sons will thrive in prosp’rous luxury,
Unpretentious in the Macedon style.

Polyxena
The Sanctuary of Samothraki!
In summer when her Mysteries unleash’d
A perfect choice, methinks, for I have heard
Of rites most sensuous upon the Earth,
Of Orpheus, of streams of lovely things
Aye, I’ll go, proud as befits the Aecid
Whose dyanasty dawn’d by the Trojan shore
Not far from Samothraki, when Hektor
Widow’d Andromache, good company
Let us toast this prospect most exciting!

The company raise their vessels & consume their wines

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SCENE THREE

Samothraki / the Sanctuary of the Great Gods / Enter King Philip, Polyxena & Arymbas

Arymbas
Welcome to Samothraki’s sacred isle
Where Corybantes & Curetes range
With radiant, Idaean Dactyli
Where Jasion & Dardanus once dwelt
Before they built the walls of Ilium
At Ida’s foot, & there the Trojans taught
The Mysteries yourself & my sister
Shall this day accede, as with all my heart
I wish thee happy unions, within
This Sanctuary of the Greater Gods

Polyxena
Greetings to thee, Philip of Macedon
Our meeting at these sacred mysteries
Endows our young engagement with romance
As when, first flourishing in maidenhood
I visited, in royal pilgrimage
The Samian temple at Naucratis
Binding myself to Hera, royal queen
To Zeus a consort – bless’d by deity
I see thou art a god in mortal form
& I will be thy goddess if thou wil’t.

King Philip
As when a Heron perches on a rock
As still as stone, beak cock’d & pointed down
Waiting a silver streak to shimmer by
In tense anticipations stand I here
Awaiting thee, & all thy precious fruits
As luscious as this waterfall island
As firm in spirit as those noble oaks
Aswarm the slopes of Saos, where once strode
Orpheus, young & singing, yet untrain’d,
Before he, too, observ’d these Mysteries.

Arymbas
These mysteries! from the Phrygian Mount
Came sorceressic Daktyloi, whose rites
Amaz’d the gazing nations of the world
Explicating how Kabeiroi protect
Initiates with unexpected aid
In the midst of desperate perilage
More just & better in ev’ry respect
& pious too, a perfect place to meet
When fledgeling love shall to an eagle grow
Tall-nested on these nebulosic peaks!

Enter Thyotes

Thyotes
Salutations to our royal clients
I am Thyotes, archpriest of this isle
Guiding presiding Anaktotelestes
Today our mysteries shall be revealed
Under the watchful gaze of Deemeter
With Korybantes nine flooding thine ears
With roaring war dance, Bacchic frenzy fuel’d
They wait within the Sacristy, as do
Fellow initiates, let us attend
The mysteries of which we must not sing.

Exit Thyotes with Philip & Polyxena / Arymbas watches them leave with affection then exits the scene