Oedipus

Oedipus (Oidipous, ‘swollen-foot’), in Greek myth, the son of Laius, king of Thebes. When Amphion and Zethus gained possession of Thebes (see ANTIOPE), Laius had taken refuge with Pelops, but had carried off his host's son Chrȳsippus. The god Apollo warned him that, as punishment, if he fathered a son that son would kill him. Laius recovered his kingdom after the death of Amphion and Zethus, and married Jocasta (Epicastē in Homer). Accordingly, when a son was born, he was given to a servant to expose on Mount Cithaeron, his feet having been transfixed by a spike. Instead the servant gave him to a shepherd who brought him to Polybus, king of Corinth, and Meropē, his queen. These two, being childless, brought him up as their own son, naming him Oedipus from the deformity of his feet.

When Oedipus was grown up, being taunted with being no true son of Polybus, he went to Delphi to enquire about his parentage. He was told only that he would kill his father and marry his mother. Deciding therefore never to return to Corinth he wandered in the direction of Thebes and by chance encountered Laius (whom he did not know) at a place where three roads met. A quarrel ensued in which Oedipus killed Laius. He went on to Thebes, which was at that time terrorized by the Sphinx, a monster who destroyed those who could not answer the riddle she posed. Creon, brother of Jocasta and regent of Thebes, offered the kingdom and Jocasta as wife to whoever should overcome this pest. Oedipus guessed the answer to the riddle and the Sphinx killed herself. He married Jocasta and they had two sons, Eteoclēs and Polyneicēs, and two daughters, Antigonē and Ismenē.

According to Homer, when it was discovered that Oedipus had married his mother, the latter hanged herself, but Oedipus continued to rule in Thebes. In Sophocles' tragedy Oedipus Tyrannus, discovery was precipitated by plague and famine, and the pronouncement of the Delphic Oracle that these could be averted only if the killer of Laius was expelled from the city. Oedipus' attempts to discover the truth revealed that he himself was Laius' son and killer; Jocasta hanged herself and Oedipus blinded himself. Oedipus was deposed and went into retirement, at first shut up in Thebes; later he went into exile, wandering, attended by Antigone, to Colonus in Attica, where he was protected by Theseus and where he died (see OEDIPUS AT COLONUS). His sons having quarrelled about who should succeed to the throne, Oedipus before he died put a curse on them that they should each kill the other. When they first took the throne they agreed to divide the inheritance, ruling in alternate years. Eteocles ruled first, but when his year of kingship had elapsed he refused to make way for Polyneices. The latter had spent his year of absence from Thebes at the court of Adrastus, king of Argos, and had married his daughter Argeia. Adrastus supported his son-in-law and gathered an army, headed by seven champions, the Seven Against Thebes. Their names (as usually given) are: Adrastus, Polyneices, Tȳdeus (the other son-in-law of Adrastus), Capaneus, Hippomedon, Parthenopaeus, and Amphiaraus. Each champion was stationed at one of the seven gates of Thebes, and Eteocles similarly assigned a Theban defender to each gate, deciding to confront Polyneices himself. The Argive army was routed and all the champions killed except Adrastus. The brothers Eteocles and Polyneices both died.

Creon, now king of Thebes, ordered that the bodies of the enemy, including that of Polyneices, should not be buried (thus preventing their spirits from entering the Underworld, according to traditional belief). What followed is variously told. One version is given by Euripides in the Suppliants. Sophocles, in Antigone, tells how Antigone, rebelling against Creon's decree, contrived secretly to perform the burial rite for her brother. For this Creon had her placed alive in a stone tomb, although she was to marry his son Haemon. There she hanged herself, and Haemon stabbed himself beside her body. The story was related in the lost poem of the epic cycle Thebāis. See also EPIGONOI.