Introduction. Euripides (c.485-406 B.C.) was the last of the three great Fifth Century B.C. Athenian tragedians. "Alcestis", dated to 438 B.C. is his first surviving play, but it is not a tragedy, as it was produced in the place of a satyr play, the semi-comic treatment of a myth, to accompany a set of three tragedies. The background to this extract is as follows. The god Apollo had been condemned by Zeus to serve as the slave of Admetus, King of Pherae, for one year. Because Admetus had treated...