Philoctetes (Sophocles)

Philoctetes
Philoctetes by Jean-Germain Drouais
Written by	Sophocles
Chorus	Greek Sailors
Characters	Odysseus Neoptolemus Philoctetes a trader Heracles
Date premiered	409 BC
Place premiered	Athens
Original language	Ancient Greek
Genre	Tragedy
Setting	Before a cave at Lemnos

Philoctetes (Ancient Greek: Φιλοκτήτης, Philoktētēs; English pronunciation: /ˌfɪləkˈtiːtiːz/, stressed on the third syllable, -tet-) is a play by Sophocles (Aeschylus and Euripides also each wrote a Philoctetes but theirs have not survived). The play was written during the Peloponnesian War. It is one of the seven extant tragedies by Sophocles. It was first performed at the City Dionysia in 409 BC, where it won first prize. The story takes place during the Trojan War (after the majority of the events of the Iliad, but before the Trojan Horse). It describes the attempt by Neoptolemus and Odysseus to bring the disabled Philoctetes, the master archer, back to Troy from the island of Lemnos.

When Heracles was near his death, he wished to be burned on a funeral pyre while still alive. Sophocles references the myth in which no one but Philoctetes would light the fire, and in return for this favor Heracles gave him his bow (seen in later texts, such as Ovid's Metamorphoses). Philoctetes left with the Greeks to participate in the Trojan War, but was bitten on the foot by a snake while walking on Chryse, a sacred ground. The bite caused him constant agony, and emitted a horrible smell. For this reason he was left by Odysseus and the Atreidai (sons of Atreus) on the desert island Lemnos.