The Concept of Light and Dark in Uorebdis Tragedy

This paper deals with the concept of the terms light and darkness in Euripides’ tragedies. Euripides uses many expressions that refer to light in his tragedies, either nouns or adjectives or verbs, emphasizing light and fire and its sources, e.g. fîj, f£oj,fšggoj,a‡gla-h, aÙg£-h, ¢kt…j,sšlaj,lamprÒj, ¹mšra, ¼lioj, sel»nh, ¢st»r, pÚr, flÒx,  st…lbw aÙg£zw, ¢napet£nnàμι, ¢nšptw, fšlgw,  l£mpw.
For darkness, Euripides uses many terms that describe it and its sources, e. g. skÒtoj, Ôrfnh-a, mšlaj, nÚx, sterÒph, eÙfrÒnh. And there are many verbs of sight which accompany light and darkness, e.g. leÚssw, Ðr£w, e„sor£w, prosÒyomai, derkÒμαι, e„sderkÒμαι, blšpw, skopî.
The research ends with these results: Euripides uses terms of light and darkness to express Man’s characteristics, qualities and the things which influence his life, religiously, socially, politically, economically, morally and psychologically. He uses metaphors of light and darkness, to symbolize opposites of the human life; such as the religious faith and paganism, sight and blindness, life and death, virtue and vice, nobility and low-birth, freedom and slavery, prudence and imprudence, discipline and disorder, knowledge and ignorance, justice and injustice, honor and shame, chastity and sin, wealth and poverty, victory and defeat, happiness and misery. Euripides points to a clear relation between light and human life, virtues, ethics and moral values.