Oedipus Rex Group

Question:

jullie
jullie

Did "Oedipus Rex" exist or is he just a legend?

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Posted by jullie on Monday March 9, 2009 at 8:05 PM and tagged with greek, herodotus, myth, oedipus, oedipus rex, sophocles, sources.

Answers:


  1. robertwilliam

    eNotes Editor

    There's no evidence that Oediups ever existed beyond myth, legend and drama: so it's unlikely that he ever actually existed. He pops up in a variety of texts from about the early 6th century onward: Homer, Herodotus, Hesiod and the (anonymous) Thebaid.

    So when Sophocles comes to dramatise him in his famous plays (and, incidentally, there are other plays that have not survived by other Greek dramatists which do treat on the Oedipus myth) the story would likely already be known to his audience. Which tells you something about how that play is trying to work.

    Moreover, oral tradition played a large part in passing these stories down - and because a relatively small percentage of texts have survived today, it's impossible to tell where the story travels from and through. But to answer your question - no, Oedipus wasn't real!

    Hope it helps!

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    Posted by robertwilliam on Tuesday March 10, 2009 at 4:10 AM