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Q83MYTH Greek Mythology: lecture 4
The Theban Cycle 1
Foundation
Hesiod Catalogue of Women (cf. Apollonius Argonautica 1.735ff)
‘Of Zethos and Amphion. Hesiod and some others relate that they built the
walls of Thebes by playing on the lyre.’
Euripides Heracles 29ff
‘Before the sons of Zeus, those white-horsed charioteers Amphion and
Zethus, ruled this city of seven bastions, the throne was held by one Lycus,
husband of Dirce.’
Pindar Pythian 3.88ff
The Muses sang at the wedding of Cadmus & Harmonia in Thebes; the gods
feasted them & gave wedding gifts.
Hdt. 2.145
‘From the birth of Dionysus, son of Semele, daughter of Cadmus, to the
present day is a period of about 1000 years only; from Heracles the son of
Alcmena, about 900 years...’
Early kingship
Euripides Bacchae (405BC)
Dionysus arrives in Thebes disguised as a mortal. Cadmus has handed
kingship to his grandson Pentheus, who forbids the worship of D. C and
Teiresias dress up in bacchic gear and join the Maenads on Cithaeron; P is
enraged and has D arrested. But he causes an earthquake and breaks free, and
persuades P to spy on the bacchants, including his mother Agave. P dresses
up as a woman and hides in a pine tree, but D betrays him and the Maenads
uproot the tree and tear him to pieces. C returns with the body and A
recognises her dead son. D prophesies the sack of Thebes, the exile of A and
her sisters, and the transformation to snakes and immortalisation of C and
Harmonia.
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Pindar Olympian 2.38-40
‘...from that day when his fated son met and killed Laios and fulfilled the
oracle declared long ago at Pytho.’
The House of Labdacus
Homer, Odyssey 11.271ff
‘I saw the beautiful Epikaste, Oidipodes’ mother, who in the ignorance of her
mind had done a monstrous thing when she married her own son. He killed
his father and married her, and the gods soon made it all known to mortals.
But he, for all his sorrows, in beloved Thebes continued to be lord over the
Kadmeians, while she went down to Hades of the gates, the strong one,
knotting a noose and hanging sheer from the high ceiling...’
[Cinaethon] Oedipodeia
Oedipus’ children were born to Euryganea...Sphinx’s riddle: ‘there is on earth
a two-footed and four-footed creature with a single voice, and three-footed,
changing its form alone of all creatures that move in earth, sky, or sea. When
it walks on the most legs, then the strength of its limbs is weakest’...Sphinx
devoured Haemon.
Sophocles Oedipus Tyrannus (429-20BC)
Oedipus is king in Thebes and married to Jocasta, widow of Laius. A plague
strikes the city, so O sends his brother-in-law, Creon, to Delphi for an oracle.
The Thebans must banish or kill L’s murderer to lift the curse. They send for
the seer Teiresias, who, after trying to refuse, tells O that he is L’s killer. He is
angry and accuses T of conspiracy with C to take the throne. J intervenes,
citing the unreliability of oracles – L received one that he would be killed by
his own son, and look what happened. A servant who witnessed the killing is
sent for. O fears he may be the killer after all – after receiving an oracle that he
would kill his father and marry his mother, he fled from Corinth and
quarrelled with a man on the road, killing him. As J prays, a messenger
arrives with the news that Polybus, O’s father, is dead – but that he was not
his father after all. O is a foundling, received by the messenger from L’s
servant as an exposed baby. J realises the truth and exits; the servant arrives,
and he and the messenger realise O was not only the exposed baby, but also
the murderer...J hangs herself and O blinds himself with her brooch-pins, and
begs to be cast out of the land. C confines him until the god’s will is revealed.
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Sophocles Oedipus at Colonus (401BC?)
After many years, Oedipus is exiled from Thebes. He and his daughter,
Antigone, arrive at Colonus near Athens and take shelter in the grove of the
Eumenides. He explains to the Chorus that his presence will bless the city. His
other daughter, Ismene, arrives with the news that his sons, Eteocles and
Polynices, have rebelled against Creon’s regency and each other, and that E
has cast out P, who has gone to Argos to raise an army. Theseus, king of
Athens, grants O sanctuary, but C arrives to bring him home – an oracle has
confirmed that he must be buried at the border of Thebes to prevent war with
Athens. O refuses and curses C and Thebes, but C kidnaps the girls and tries
to force him before Th rescues them. P arrives and begs for help – he has an
oracle that says victory may be granted by O’s patronage. O refuses – his sons
did nothing to prevent his banishment – and curses P. A thunderbolt
summons O to his death, and he exits to die in secrecy, becoming a
benevolent protector of Athens against Thebes. His daughters ask to be
returned home.
Bibliography:
W. Burkert, The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture
in the Early Archaic Age, Cambridge MA 1982, pp. 106-114.
L. Edmunds, Oedipus: The Ancient Legend and its Later Analogues, Baltimore
1985, esp. pp.1-57.
W. Hansen, Classical Mythology: A Guide to the Mythical World of the Greeks and
Romans, Oxford 2004, pp. 247-49, 297-99.
T. Gantz, Early Greek Myth: A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Baltimore
1993/1996, pp. 467-530.
J. R. March, The Creative Poet: Studies of the Treatment of Myths in Greek Poetry,
BICS Supplement 49, London 1987, pp.119-54 (good collation of sources but
tends to make sweeping assumptions; read with care).
F. I. Zeitlin, ‘Thebes: Theater of Self and Society in Athenian Drama’, in J. J.
Winkler, & F. I. Zeitlin (eds.) Nothing to do with Dionysos? Athenian Drama in its
Social Context, Princeton 1990, pp. 130-67.
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