The Oracle and the Crossroads

Before you read

Thebes, Corinth and Delphi, in the age of heroes

The story of Oedipus, king of Thebes, is one of the oldest Greek myths. Homer already knew it, but the version everyone remembers is the tragedy Oedipus the King by the Athenian playwright Sophocles, first performed around 429 BCE. Sophocles also wrote Oedipus at Colonus and Antigone, and together they are often called the Theban plays. We will read the whole story in five parts.

King Laius and Queen Jocasta of Thebes went to the oracle of Apollo at Delphi and were told that their son would kill his father and marry his mother. When the baby was born, Laius had his ankles pinned together and gave him to a shepherd to leave on Mount Cithaeron. The shepherd felt sorry for the baby and gave him to a shepherd from Corinth, and the childless king and queen of Corinth, Polybus and Merope, brought him up as their own. They called him Oedipus, which means “swollen foot”.

As a young man, Oedipus heard a drunken guest say that he was not really the king’s son. He went to Delphi to ask, and the oracle did not answer his question; it only repeated the prophecy. Horrified, Oedipus decided never to go back to Corinth, so that he could never harm the people he believed were his parents. On the road, at a place where three roads meet, an old man in a chariot tried to force him off the road and struck him. In anger, Oedipus fought back and killed the old man and his servants, except one, who escaped. He did not know who the old man was.

Running away from a problem is not the same as escaping it.

The story

Retold for this lesson from Sophocles’ Oedipus the King and other ancient versions of the myth.

In the city of Thebes, King Laius and Queen Jocasta had no children, and so Laius went to Delphi to ask the oracle of Apollo why. The answer froze his blood: “You will have a son, and that son will kill his father and marry his mother.” When a baby boy was born, Laius pinned the child’s ankles together and gave him to a shepherd. “Take him up Mount Cithaeron,” he said, “and leave him there.”

But the shepherd could not do it. On the mountain he met a shepherd from Corinth, on the other side of the hills, and gave the baby to him. The Corinthian took the child to his king and queen, Polybus and Merope, who had no children and longed for a son. They loved the boy and called him Oedipus, “swollen foot”, because of the wounds on his ankles. Oedipus grew up as a prince of Corinth and never imagined that he had been born anywhere else.

One night, at a feast, a guest who had drunk too much shouted that Oedipus was not the king’s real son. His parents told him to ignore it, but the words would not leave him. In secret he went to Delphi to ask the god who his parents were. The oracle did not answer. It only told him that he would kill his father and marry his mother. Horrified, Oedipus swore that he would never go home to Corinth again, so that the prophecy could never come true.

He was travelling east on foot when he came to a narrow place where three roads meet. A chariot was coming the other way, with an old man in it and servants around him. The driver shouted at Oedipus to get out of the road, and as he passed, the old man struck him on the head with his staff. Oedipus was proud and angry. He struck back, and in the fight he killed the old man and all his servants, except one, who ran away. Then he walked on towards Thebes, and he never asked the old man’s name.

Talk and write

Discussion and writing

Retell it. In pairs, retell the story so far in ten sentences, using narrative tenses and the future in the past.

Discuss. 1. Could Oedipus have escaped his fate? What else could he have done? 2. Was Laius right to give the baby away? 3. Do you believe in fate, or do we make our own future?

Write (120–150 words). The crossroads. Tell the meeting at the crossroads from the point of view of the servant who escaped. Use narrative tenses and purpose clauses.