Background Information (page 4)
Greek Drama--Introduction--Myth of Oedipus
| King Laios and Queen Jocasta of Thebes learned from an oracle that their newborn son would kill his father and marry his mother. Horrified by this prediction, they gave their baby to a shepherd with orders to pin the baby's ankles together, and leave the infant to die on a nearby mountainside. But the shepherd took pity on the baby. Instead of abandoning him, he gave him to a Corinthian shepherd, who in turn gave the baby to the childless king and queen of Corinth. They named him Oedipus, which means “swollen foot” or “club foot,” and raised him as their son. They never told him he was adopted. |
| When Oedipus was a young man, he learned of the prediction that made his true parents forsake him. Believing the king and queen of Corinth to be his real parents, he ran away from home to avoid such a terrible fate. In the course of his travels, he encountered an arrogant old man who tried to run him off the road with his chariot. Because honor was at stake, the two men fought, and Oedipus killed the stranger. Thinking no more of the incident—such occurrences were probably common on the roads in those days—Oedipus continued on his journey to the city of Thebes. |
| http://www.darksites.com/souls/goth/chastel/Oedipus.html |
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