Oedipus

Adrastus bided his time, and when the sons of the Seven (known as the Epigonoi, or second generation; hence the appli cation of the word to successors of the Diadochi (q.v.), the im mediate successors of Alexander the Great) came to manhood, he once more attacked the city. On the advice of Teiresias (q.v.) the Thebans evacuated the place by night. Adrastus led his army back, but died on the way, at Megara, from grief at the death of his son Aigialeus, the only one of the Epigonoi to fall in the campaign.

There is no reason to doubt that this legend has a historical basis, probably in the events of Minoan-Mycenaean times. Gems from Thisbe show incidents strongly resembling the fight be tween Oedipus and Laius, and the former's encounter with the Sphinx; see Sir A. Evans in .1 ourn. Hell. Stud. xlv. (1925), p. 27 et seq. Several incidents, such as the prophecies and the in cestuous marriage, are patently folk-tales.

For further details, and the various attempts to make Oedipus a "faded" god of one sort or another, see the relevant articles in Roscher's Lexikon and Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyklopadie, also Preller Robert, Gr. Mythologie, ii., p. 13o; 876 et seq.; Farnell, Hero-Cults, p. 332 et seq.

Mediaeval Legends.

In the Golden Legend of Jacobus de Voragine (13th century) and the Mystere de la Passion of Jean Michel (15th century) and Arnoul Greban (15th century), the story of Oedipus is associated with the name of Judas. The

main idea is the same as in the classical account. The Judas legend, however, never really became popular, whereas that of Oedipus was handed down both orally and in written national tales (Albanian, Finnish, Cypriote). The Theban legend, which reached its fullest development in the Thebais of Statius and in Seneca, reappeared in the Roman de Thebes (the work of an unknown imitator of Benoit de Sainte-More). Oedipus is also the subject of an anonymous mediaeval romance (15th century), Le Roman d'Oedipus, fils de Layus, in which the sphinx is de picted as a cunning and ferocious giant. The Oedipus legend was handed down to the period of the Renaissance by the Roman and its imitations, which then fell into oblivion. The legend has survived amongst the modern Greeks, without any traces of the influence of Christianity (B. Schmidt, Griechische Marchen, 1877). The works of the ancient tragedians (especially Seneca, in preference to the Greek) came into vogue, and were followed by modern imitators down to the 17th century.

See L. Constans, La Legende d'Oedipe dans l'antiquite, au moyen age, et dans les temps moderns (1881) ; D. Comparetti's Edipo and Jebb's introduction to his ed. of Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus; for the "Oedipus Complex" see PSYCHOLOGY. (H. J. R.)