The Erinyes: The Furies, Ancient Avengers of Blood Guilt and the Guardians of Moral Order
Orestes Pursued by the Furies — William-Adolphe Bouguereau, 1862. Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk. The son who killed his mother to avenge his father, driven to madness by the Erinyes: the living image of guilt that cannot be reasoned with. There are forces in the moral universe that do not argue, do not negotiate, and do not accept excuses. They do not care about your reasons, your circumstances, your intentions, or the justice of your cause. They care about one thing only: blood has been shed . Family blood, specifically — the blood of kin at the hands of kin. And until that debt is answered, until the pollution of the blood-guilt is somehow resolved, they will pursue. They will not stop. They cannot be bribed or appealed to or outwitted. They are the Erinyes — called the Furies by the Romans — and they are among the oldest divine forces in the Greek religious imagination. Hesiod traces them to the beginning of time: they were born from the drops of Ouranos's blood that ...