Bust of Aeschylus from the Capitoline Museums, Rome Aeschylus
was born in the city of Eleusis, near Athens, in 525 BC and died
in 456 BC. He was a Greek dramatist, the earliest of the city's
great tragic poets. As the predecessor of Sophocles and
Euripides, he is the founder of Greek tragedy. He fought
successfully against the Persians at Marathon in 490 BC, at
Salamis in 480 BC, and possibly at Plataea in the following
year. He made at least two trips, perhaps three, to Sicily,
where on his final visit he died at Gela. A monument was later
erected there in his memory. It was a major step for drama when
Aeschylus introduced the second actor. He also attempted to
involve the chorus directly in the action of the play. Aeschylus
is said to have written about 90 plays. His tragedies, first
performed about 500 BC, were presented as trilogies, or groups
of three, usually bound together by a common theme, and each
trilogy was followed by a satyr drama (low comedy involving a
mythological hero, with a chorus of satyr