 Odysseus and his son prepare to take on their remaining foes, but at this juncture Athena appears in awesome glory, ordering the disputants to desist from hostilities. They obey her, but Odysseus nonetheless has second thoughts and attempts to attack again. Zeus casts a smoke-shrouded bolt of lightning, and Athena again orders Odysseus to call a halt, warning him of Zeus' wrath if he doesn't lay down his arms. Odysseus at last complies, happily. Assuming the appearance and voice of Mentor, Athena strikes an alliance between the two sides for the time to come. This narrative density, which includes events occurring in several spaces and contexts at the same time, creates a hectic conclusion to the crisis of revenge that ends the Odyssey. The accelerated pace, which brings to mind the picaresque novel, 68 is unlikely to give rise to detailed and exacting preoccupation with the careful establishment of the court and a judicial procedure. The Odyssey presents the world of myth, which is "chaotic, full of contradictions, impossible versions, adaptations and fabrications." 69 Odysseus' confrontation with the suitors is the last station along the turbulent route that includes, among other things, charged encounters with monsters, goddesses, Sirens and Cyclopes. The focus throughout remains on the way in which, although impeded and delayed, Odysseus returns home. This direction is unlikely to align with a competing detailed story about the establishment of judicial procedure that turns into the heart of the narrative, as in the story crafted by Aeschylus in the Oresteia.
Contrarily, The Eumenides leads gradually but consistently from the commencement of the crisis of revenge towards its closure by means of the establishment of legal justice. Throughout the course of the narrative the protagonists conduct discussions of an adversarial nature, some before the establishment of the court, some afterwards. Such discussions, featuring mainly the exchange of arguments and counter-arguments, occur between the Erinyes and Apollo, Orestes and Athena, Athena and the Erinyes, and Apollo and the Erinyes; they focus on the question of what justice Orestes is deserving of, using rhetoric that is saturated with references to law, justice and judging. Already at the beginning of the play Apollo, who agrees to take Orestes under his wing, directs him "to the city of Pallas" 70 and the legal track: And there shall we have judges of your cause, and words to charm them, and shall discover means to release you forever from this distress. 71 Orestes internalizes the judicial rhetoric employed by Apollo and immediately upon arriving at Athena's temple he does not ask for mercy, but demands to be put on trial: I come to your house; your image, goddess. Will I guard here as I await the issue of the trial? 72 As soon as Athena becomes involved, she too employs judicial rhetoric. After the Erinyes tell her their demands, she asks whether they are willing to accept her judicial verdict: "Would you commit to the settlement of the charge?", 73 and is answered: "Surely, we reverence you as worthy and of worthy parentage." 74 After some further exchange of remarks with Orestes, he again demands her verdict: "Whether I acted justly or unjustly, you decide the case! For however I may fare, I shall rest content with your decision." 75 The foundation thus having been laid, after mulling some more over the issue of authority, Athena proclaims the establishment of a human court as the only way out of the dilemma: The matter is harder than any mortal thinks to judge of; it is not right even for me to decide a trial for murder that brings down fierce wrath; … But since this matter has devolved on me … judges … of murder, respecting the covenant of their oaths, which I shall establish for all time … I will select the best among my citizens, and will return, to decide this issue in all sincerity. 76 The Eumenides features a widening track studded with references to judging, which at its climax leads naturally to Athena's festive proclamation of the establishment of a court and the civilian duty to maintain and protect it. The background to the materialization of the formal judicial procedure and its taking center-stageboth artistically and publicallyis built up gradually from the beginning of the play. In other words, the poetic choices in the Oresteia pave the road towards the establishment of legal justice.

B. Tragedy and the Legal Proceeding as Spectacles
The generative legal narrative molded by Aeschylus is based on a powerful presentation of a legal proceeding as a spectacle. The Eumenides is a detailed account of the transfer of divine authority to a human responsibility, and an exemplar of how the judicial spectacle should be conducted.
The nature of the stage created by Aeschylus makes it not only possible but also natural to epitomize the judicial procedure in detail. As Aristotle told us, Aeschylus introduced significant innovations to the staging of tragedy: "Aeschylus first introduced a second actor; he diminished the importance of the Chorus, and assigned the leading part to the dialogue." 77 These innovations, marking the transition from monologue to dialogue, gave rise to drama as we know it today. Hundreds of years later, the Roman poet Horace mentioned Aeschylus in his Ars Poetica, a work dedicated to artistic expression. Among other things, Horace reviews the history of the tragic form. He first mentions Thespis, "said to have invented a new kind of tragedy," accompanied by novel visual effects -"and to have carried his pieces about in carts, which [certain strollers], who had their faces besmeared with lees of wine, sang and acted." 78 He then turns to Aeschylus' performative innovations: After him Aeschylus, the inventor of the vizard mask and decent robe, laid the stage over with boards of a tolerable size, and taught to speak in lofty tone, and strut in the buskin. 79 Using linguistic and visual formats, texts and images, law aspires to signal that the decision reached in court is due and apposite. The poetic tool is necessary to achieve this aim. It is put into action in two arenasthe visual and the verbalby means of practices that I have proposed calling formal and informal poetics. 80 These practices shape the form and content of judicial procedures, as well as the spaces in which they transpire.
The most important representation of doing justice is the adversarial proceduretwo sides argue before the bench, according to known rules, in an event that is unrepeatable, although it echoes familiar formats.
For the judicial procedure to constitute an efficient representation of doing justice, it must convince its addressees that its methods are fair. To that end, the element of visibility is harnessed. The festive entry of the judges into the courtroom, which serves as a stage, and the audience's rising to receive them are markers of the place and time in which justice is done. The judicial procedure is thus simultaneously both a mechanism of doing justice and a representation of doing justice.
Similarly, Aeschylus harnesses the dramatic stage in order to shape the first act of judicial justice in history. Visibility is the central element inherent to the judicial procedure, and Aeschylus was active at a time when the performative tradition made it possible to show a procedure. The establishment of the first court and emplacement of the rule of law require a visual representation of certain complexity. The spectacle of the court in the Oresteia illustrates and manifests the basic principle regarding the public nature of the procedure, which ensures its fairness and correctness and at the same time expresses the vital link between seeing and doing justice. In parallel, the text composed by Aeschylus, which refers to the contents of the judicial procedure conducted by Athena, brings to mind the verbal poetics, both formal and informal, according to which an adversarial judicial procedure is conducted.
Upon summoning the judges, who are expected to commit to "respecting the covenant of their oaths, which I shall establish for all time," 81 Athena goes into the details, proclaiming not only the obligatory existence of the judicial procedure from now onwards, but also how it will be conducted. In effect, she establishes a poetics of procedure that will serve society forever: Do you summon witnesses and proofs, sworn evidence to assist justice. 82 She goes on to specify the procedure's public attributes: Make proclamation, herald and bid the people to their places! And let the shrill Tyrrhenian trumpet filled with human breath show to the people its high-pitched note! For this court is filled, it is proper that silence be kept … 83 Afterwards, Athena conducts the debate in an adversarial manner, giving the disputants as well as the defendant an opportunity to have their say. After a public count of the judges' votes, and a declaration, also public, of her decision in favor of the defendant, the procedure reaches its climax with the head of the court's announcement: "This man stands acquitted on the charge of murder." 84 To recap, Aeschylus creates a new kind of representation of the judicial spectacle. Even if judicial activities of various kinds existed already in the myth, reflected in the epos and practiced in Greek and Athenian society as well, Aeschylus, by means of the poetics that he innovated and sophisticated, presents a drama which crystallizes these factors into "the rule of law" and connects the rule of law to the judicial performance. 85 The poetics of the tragedy works in tandem with the legal orientation of the polis. As Vernant puts it, "Tragedy is not only an art