Medea and Jason

Much of what has been written on slavery in Euripides has to do with the captive women taken in the Trojan War. But even ordinary household slaves like Medea's Nurse may 'betray characteristics of the free which the free themselves do not possess' (N. T. Croally, Euripidean Polemic, Cambridge, 1994:102-3) and in this way cast some light on the status of their masters and what the slave/free definition means in the play and in …

…e real Medea dominates Jason with his own (also specious) logoi. Logos is associated with words of mastery, but finally gold is more powerful than words or reason (965) and more persuasive to a bride than even her new husband. Having mastered the words and the man, in a final manipulation she refers to Jason's new wife as 'my mistress' (970), a final irony, a final justification of her deeds, a final rejection of the subordinate role.