American Journal of Philology

. This article offers a comprehensive comparison of the funeral rites that Aischylos has Klytaimestra perform for Agamemnon in the Oresteia with historically customary, and so normative, rites as reconstructed for the classical period from extant historical sources. I examine the extent to which Aischylos manipulates traditional funeral rites in order to demonstrate the health of an oikos; I argue that Klytaimestra performs corrupt funeral rites as an indication of the unhealthy and illegitimate household she now heads, whereas Orestes and Elektra perform customary rites as proof of their allegiance to the healthy and thus legitimate oikos of their father.