INTRODUCTION More specifically, she opposes to Kreon's authority the traditional au thority of the old aristocratic families to honor and bury their dead The care for the dead was especially the prerogative of women, and it as increasingly restricted in Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries as the democracy sought to limit the power of the aristocratic clans, but it was nevertheless widely respected. The Athenian institution of the public, city funeral for warriors who died in battle, established around the middle of the century, sharpened the confict between the familys unwritten laws"that pertain to the burial of the dead, which are also the"custom-laws"(another meaning of nomoi or nomima)that have a lace within every city and rest on the sanctity, as she says, of"Justice, who resides in the same house with the gods below the earth"and on the authority of Zeus himself(translation 495-501 /Greek 450-55) 9 Thus, while she is so human and moving in the fragile strength of her defiance of the ruler, she has on her side the weight of religious tra- dition, the universal recognition of the rights of burial, and the perfor- mance of those offices for the dead that traditionally belong to women in the polis and in the family Viewed more broadly, Antigone brings down to earth and to purely human characters some of the conficts of Aiskhylos'Oresteia. Antig- Boss position has some affinities with that of the Furies in Aiskhylos ict between Olympian and chthonic, upper and lower worlds, in he last play of the Oresteia, the Eumenides. Here the newer and younger Olympians, Apollo and Athena, who belong to the reign of Zeus, are identified with the male-dominated political institutions of e ancient gods, the Erinyes or Furies, daughters of primordial Night, defend the bonds of blood and birth and the rights of the mother and of Earth in their vengeful pursuit of the matricide, Orestes. To be sure, the issue of Antigone is burial, not vengeance; the cosmic order is in the background, not the foreground; and the focus is on the family as a whole and not on the rights of the father as against those of the mother. Antigone also presents the conflict in terms of the more impersonal "eternal laws of the gods" rather tha ment in the play see my Sophocles' Tragic World: Divinity aspect of the play by William Tyrrell and Larry Bennett, Recapturing Sophoce mima)of the gods"of which Antigone speaks in 5oo-5or +54-55 refer primarily to the sanctity surrounding burial rites. Yet her word nomoi, literally "laws, in 498/452, also indicates that broader issues are involINTRODUCTIO N More specifically, she opposes to Kreon's authority the traditional au￾thority of the old aristocratic families to honor and bury their dead. The care for the dead was especially the prerogative of women, and it was increasingly restricted in Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries as the democracy sought to limit the power of the aristocratic clans, but it was nevertheless widely respected.7 The Athenian institution of the public, city funeral for warriors who died in battle, established around the middle of the century, sharpened the conflict between the family's mourning and the public ceremony, and this conflict is doubtless in the play's background.8 Against Kreon's laws (nomoz) Antigone sets the "unwritten laws" that pertain to the burial of the dead, which are also the "custom-laws" (another meaning of nomoz or nomima) that have a place within every city and rest on the sanctity, as she says, of "Justice, who resides in the same house with the gods below the earth" and on the authority of Zeus himself (translation 495-501 / Greek 450-5 5 ).9 Thus, while she is so human and moving in the fragile strength of her defiance of the ruler, she has on her side the weight of religious tra￾dition, the universal recognition of the rights of burial, and the perfor￾mance of those offices for the dead that traditionally belong to women in the polis and in the family. Viewed more broadly, Antigone brings down to earth and to purely human characters some of the conflicts of Aiskhylos' Oresteia. Antig￾one's position has some affinities with that of the Furies in Aiskhylos' conflict between Olympian and chthonic, upper and lower worlds, in the last play of the Oresteia, the Eumenides. Here the newer and younger Olympians, Apollo and Athena, who belong to the reign of Zeus, are identified with the male-dominated political institutions of the city, whereas the ancient gods, the Erinyes or Furies, daughters of primordial Night, defend the bonds of blood and birth and the rights of the mother and of Earth in their vengeful pursuit of the matricide, Orestes. To be sure, the issue of Antigone is burial, not vengeance; the cosmic order is in the background, not the foreground; and the focus is on the family as a whole and not on the rights of the father as against those of the mother. Antigone also presents the conflict in terms of the more impersonal "eternal laws of the gods" rather than through the 7. For the importance of female lament in the play see my Sophocles' Tragic World: Divinity, Nature, and Society (Cambridge, Mass., 1995), 119-20, 125-27, 135-36. 8. This aspect of the play is stressed by William Tyrrell and Larry Bennett, Recapturing Sophocles' Antigone (Lanham, Md., 1998), especially 5-14, 115-17. 9. Bernard Knox, The Heroic Temper (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1964), 97, shows that the (literally) "unwritten and secure custom-laws (nomima) of the gods" of which Antigone speaks in 500-501 / 454-55 refer primarily to the sanctity surrounding burial rites. Yet her word nomoi, literally "laws," in 498 / 452, also indicates that broader issues are involved. 5