For Haarah sent the Sphinx, whose mother was a kidna and her father typhan. And she had the face of a woman, the breast and feet and tail of a lion, and the wings of a bird. And having learned a riddle from the muses, she sat on Mount Pickium and propounded to the Thebans. And the riddle was this, what is that which has one voice and yet becomes four footed and two footed and three footed? Now the Thebans were in possession of an oracle, which declared that they should be rid of the Sphinx whenever they had read her riddle. So they often met and discussed the answer, and when they could not find it, the sphinx used to natch away one of them and gobble him up. When many had perished, and last of all Creon's son Hymn, Creon made proclamation that to him who should read the riddle, he would give both the kingdom and the wife of Lias. On hearing that, Oedipus found the solution, declaring that the riddle of the Sphynx referred to man. For as a babe, he is four footed, going on four limbs. As an adult, he is two footed and as an old man, he gets besides a third support in a staff. So the Sphinx threw herself from the citadel and Oedipus both succeeded to the kingdom and unwittingly married his mother and begat sons by her, Polyniques and Ettiacles and daughters is Mini and Antigony. Oh hi, hello there, this is let's talk about Mitz baby, and I am your host, she who loves the ancient Greek city of Thebes more than any other live. Thebes is just gods, it's so fascinating. Obviously, as I've rambled on and on and on and on about it in the past, I came to my love of the Greek Thebes via the story of Cadam's and Harmonia. Yes you know, but it turns out this city is just the most interesting. It features the most mythology, some of the most famous mythology. Like it's just the best, even if it's most famous tory is the play that I covered for you all over the past three weeks, And maybe it's not the best thing for it to be known for. One thing to always remember, though, when it comes to plays like Edipis Tranos, is that they were written from an Athenian point of view. My episodes on that play were so long and detailed, I didn't want to weigh them down by like reminding you all of that, but it is important. Sophocles, the tragedian behind Edipis Tterranos, was like the other two surviving Tradedians, an Athenian. He wrote his plays in Athens for an Athenian audience, but he just happened to feature this one in Thebes. I mean, find the myth features there too, but still in fact, probably almost a majority of mythological plays that survive are set in Thebes, or at least an enormous number of them. That's both because Thebes had this incredible amount of mythology tied to it and then for the tragedians to work with, and because it was an often enemy of Athens, and thus featuring tragedy and wild family dynamics sons murdering fathers and marrying mothers, and gods returning to their homeland to have their cousins ripped to shreds by their mothers. I mean, sure those moments were theban stories in the first place, but it certainly helped that they could then tell these kinds of stories beyond the confines of the Athenian world. But of course what I love about Thebes is just how rich it is in this mythology, certainly more than any other individual city state. I've told you so many of its myths already, the story of Cadmus and Harmonia, and how they came to mythologically found the city, how their children have all of their own incredible and violent mythologies. Semile being the mother of Dionysus by Zeus, which left her dead, Pentheus being the son of a gaway, which left him dead at her hands. There's Io, whose story had her transform into a sea goddess. And then Acteon, who's another grandchild of Cadmus and Harmonian. He was ripped to shreds by his own dogs. And then just another generation down, we get Lias, famed father of Oedipus, Lias, son of Labdacus, son of Polydorus, son of Cadmus Lias, who most famously was the king when the city was being plagued by a certain sphinx. This is episode two twelve. Who doesn't like a good, if deadly riddle Thebes and the Greek sphinx. The story of the sphinx in Thebes is a fascinating one, even if just because of its very specific and limited sourcing, we know that she was a very, very ancient creature. Visually, the sphinx appears in absolutely countless places across the ancient Greek and wider Mediterranean world. She is regularly featured in architecture. She became a fixture just like all over the place. The later Roman writer Elian even wrote of her quote, every painter and every sculptor who devotes himself and has been trained to the practice of his art figures the sphinx as winged, and finally's talking about her wings. But the point is everyone knows a fucking sphinx. But her story is far more limited than the visual representations of her which covered the ancient world, and the details of her time in Sphinx are even more so. First and foremost, though the Greek sphinx was a creature with the head of a woman, the body of a lion, and the wings of an eagle, she is different from the Egyptian sphinx for a few reasons, but the most obvious one is that the Egyptian creature is gendered male, whereas the Greek is female. There are a few different ideas for who her monster parents might have been in the Greek mythology. Maybe she was a child of Orthus, the two headed dog, often forgotten in favor of the more famous three headed dog, and the chimera. My personal favorite mythological monster from the East is lion, goat, snake all in one. Or maybe the Sphinx was the child of Typhon and Echidna, those famous monsters who spawned all the other famous monsters. Now I personally prefer the first option, because the chimera is the best. That possibility comes to us from none other than he Seid too, making it one of the oldest surviving sources for the Sphinx. He seie it doesn't say much about her, just that those were her parents and that she was the bane of the Cadmians, the Thebans. So even as far back as he see it, we know that the Sphinx was linked to Thebes. One thing about that too, which has always fascinated me, but like I don't know nearly enough to speak with any real confidence about like the history and the why. But there's this connection with Egypt I mean, the sphinx features so famously in both of these ancient cultures, even though like these they are in these really distinct ways, Like again, she's a woman in the Greek and she has wings, but on top of that we have the Thebes of it all. It'thologically. They say that the Greek Thebes was like named for the Egyptian Thebes, but of course the Egyptian Thebes when it was called that because it's lux or now was in itself like Thebes is a Greek name. Kind of like how it just very recently occurred to me the etymology behind the word Mesopotamia. It's just been like an ancient place and culture for so long in my head that I never considered the word itself. But I recently came upon a modern Greek town called Mesopotomo, and my brain just went, well, duh, literally just means like between or in the middle of two rivers, which like obviously that's kind of the whole thing about ancient Mesopotamias, the Tigris and the Euphrates. But I digress, because I love nerdy etymology. My point is that there has got to be some kind of additional connection with Egypt but I don't know it. You're welcome for that incredibly sale and tangent back to the Greek Sphinx, as I mentioned when I was covering Oedipis Tyranos. Though we have that mention of him and Jocasta by her other name Epicaste as far back as Homer, we don't have much of their story and sources that survive from before Sophocles's play, So for the most part we have to get the story from Oedipus Tranos and are left to wonder what Sophocles might have invented and why he was, after all, creating a piece of art entertainment. He wasn't necessarily concerned with keeping true to the source material that he had to work with and that we don't, and because of that, our questions about the Sphinx are only more pronounced because she doesn't really feature in Sophocles's play at all. Beyond mentions of her historical importance to Oedipus and his Tyranny of Thebes, we simply know that he was the one who could finally solve her riddle and thus defeat her, saving the city from the terrorizing that she'd been doing. And then he was made the king because of it. But what did that terrorizing look like? What was that famous riddle? The answer to those questions, for the most part, come from much later sources, some of which I've already just read to you at the top of the episode. And well, we have to return to the Lias of it all, the king of Thebes and first husband of Jocasta. Ironically, one of the most detailed versions of this story Lias Oedipus, Jocasta and the Sphinx and her terrorizing of Thebes beyond the play is found in Pseudo Apollodorus's Library of Greek Mythology. I say ironically because someone wants told me, and I mentioned all the time. He is basically the TLDR of Greek myth He is so brief, he just makes these statements of facts. Still he gives us so many details that we don't always get elsewhere, So we appreciate this late and mysterious author. It's Pseudo a Polyodorus that I read at the top of this episode. But we're gonna go deeper into it now. Lias was the king of Thebes, and he married Jocasta or sometimes her name is epicaste A. Polyodorus also includes this Homeric option of her name, but the character herself remains the same regardless of her name. They learned very quickly, as we know, that they should not have a child together, specifically a son, because he would be destined to kill his father. Still, as this version tells us, one drunken night was what ruined all of their plans. On that wine drunk night, the married couple had sex a surprise surprise, and Joe Casta became pregnant because they always do. When the baby was born and it was a boy, Lias panicked. Exposure is always the mythological solution to problems like these, But just leaving the baby to die and the elements wasn't enough for Lias. He also pierced the baby's ankles together, maiming him, and this poor broken baby was then given to a herdsman to be taken out and just left. But one must never trust others to kill our babies for us, that's asking too much. At least that was the case in the play, but here in Apollodorus, the baby is in fact left to die, only to be found by the King of Corinth himself. Polybus. Then things progress, as we remember, the baby is raised as a prince of Corinth by the name of Oedipus, and eventually grows to wonder about his parentage and ask the oracle, and determines never to return home to Krinth lest he do, as was destined by said oracle, kill his father and have sex with his mother. And as he was fleeing Corinth, he came upon a crossroads. There this road rage incident caused the death of a man that Oedipus did not know was actually the king of Thebes. But here is where things get interesting. Enough time passes in this version of the story for Creon to take control of Thebes as a brother of Jocasta, because God's only know a woman would never be allowed to rule on her own the horror. Still, what interests me is how these things line up, not only with the play, but the possibility that all of these seemingly contradictory or differing details might be older than the play and were just changed by Sophocles for the sake of his narrative, like Creon taking over control of Thebes. And so while Creon ruled Thebs, Harrah sent the Sphinx to torment the city. The beautiful and terrifying creature that was the Sphinx had learned a riddle from the muses themselves, and she had taken to asking those that came upon her to solve it. As I read at the top, the riddle was this, though translations of it very slightly, what has one voice walks on four legs? Then two, then three? Sometimes it will specify time periods, like perhaps throughout the day the number of legs changes, or throughout life. Regardless, someone has to answer the riddle of this sort. The Thebans learned from the oracle that the only way to defeat this Sphinx, who also killed everyone who failed to answer her riddle, or maybe just eight people whole, regardless of the riddle, was that they had to answer the riddle. So the Thebans would just get together they would discuss this this riddle, just like sort out their ideas. They would be rainstorm. They couldn't, though, ever figure it out, and so many theban Men perished in the jaws of the Sphinx due to their inability to sort it. And finally it was down to Creon's own son, Hymen, who attempted to answer the riddle like all the others, but he too died at her hands in this version, because sometimes he's just alive regardless. It was at this death, this death in this version, that led Creon to announce that whoever could finally defeat her answer her riddle would be made king of Thebes and be given Creon's sister Jocasta to marry. And so shortly after this, Edipus came along and he had the answer. Humans, as babies, they crawl and four limbs, and adults walk on two, and then when they're elderly they use a cane, giving the illusion of three legs. That wasn't actually an easy one, Like, I don't know if i'd get it. There's some easy riddles out there, but it's deceptive. Who with her riddle answered, the Sphinx throws herself off the citadel where she had sat for so long terrorizing the city, and Oedipus becomes king. But why you ask, would Harah send the Sphinx two Thebes in the first place. That's where we have to turn to. Yeah, another source, or rather just like more sources. Pseudo Polydorus does mention this little detailed, though minimally. But Lias, it seems, had a history of being awful, even beyond the whole you know, pinning the baby's feet together thing, something new and different for a man of Greek myth. See, before Lias became king of Thebes, he was forced to live elsewhere while the city was being run by two other famed theban kings, Amphion and Zethus. Theirs is a story for another time, if I haven't already told it before. Regardless, Lias lives for a time in the Peloponnese with another famed and shitty king, Pelops. Pelops is of course one of the main cursed as all fuck members of the House of Tantalus. He's Tantalus's son who was partially eaten by the gods before being mostly restored. But he goes on to curse his own fans and then his own children, Atrius and Thiestes, just that they keep it all going. We all know I love the curse. But you see, before all of that, Pelops had another child, an illegitimate child named Chrysippus, and it seems that while Lias was staying with Pelops, he developed a thing for Chrysippus, you know, the one. The translations like to say he fell in love with Chrysippus, and I mean, hell like, maybe he did, but he hailed it poorly. And we don't know what Chrysippus thought about it, like, if anything at all, he probably wasn't into this weird old man that was there. Anyway, he abducted Chrysippus, and one can assume, because that is simply the story of abduction and myth, he raped him. And for this, Harah seeks to punish Lias by sending the sphinx to Thebes. And yes, I realized this is tricky to understand because the very source suggests that the sphinx didn't arrive until after Lias was already dead, which seems like a silly punishment, especially for something as horrifying as assaulting a young man. Regardless, this story of Lias assaulting Chrysippus seems to have been very widespread in the ancient world, though most of the sources are lost when it comes to any detail. But Euripides even had a lost play about Chrysippus and potentially his quote unquote relationship with Lias. Still, yet again, I'm gonna talk about a thing that alien said. So Elien, as I mentioned earlier, was this later Roman writer. But he suggests the idea that actually Euripides wrote the play Chrysippus in honor of a man that he loved. He says, quote, they say that the poet Euripides was also in love with the same Agathon he has said to have composed the play Chrysippus in his honor. I am not able to state that is fact, but I can say that it is very frequently asserted Euripides loved Agathon. Oh my God, be still my heart. It just suits Euripidies. We're believing Elian canon this story. I'm sorry, this episode is wow, but there's so much good stuff in it. This story of Lias and Chrysippus, though it exists mostly little fragments or like much later sources, is so interesting in the way it links two deeply famous mythological families, and even the two most recent plays that I have covered on the podcast, like Arrestes, is part of this deeply cursed line of Pelops, and between that familial line and the line of Thebes, we are talking essentially the two most famous and famously cursed dynasties of all Greek mythology, and here they are not only linked by this somewhat lost moment in myth, but linked through tragedy. It also gives us another reason to dislike Lias and be happy for you can does escape from him, for her finding real and lasting love after such a horrible husband, even if that love well turned out to be just a bit tragic in itself. Though their story is so fragmented, it's also really long lasting. Between these mentions in Elien and another in pseudo Plutarch that is like Plutarch's parallel lives, but seemingly one that we're not certain was written by the actual Plutarch, he goes into more detail when it comes to Lias and Chrysippus and their quote unquote relationship. This story, impossibly Plutarch adds a whole new level of intrigue and will just like really emphasizes that cursed as fuck family. He suggests that after Lias abducted Chrysippus, he was caught by Pilops' two legitimate sons, Atreus and Thiestes, and that Pelops showed mercy on Lias because he loved Christypis which's a great example of how the assault of men can be just as equally fucked up as the assault of women. Equality. Anyway, this story shifts then to be more about Chrysippus. Hippodamia, Pelops's wife and the mother of his legitimate children. Apparently she wanted Chrysippus dealt with because he would be competition for her sons gaining the throne after Pelops and Atrusynthistes once had actually no desire to kill their brother knew for them, and so Hippodamia took it upon herself. In this version, at night while Lias slept next to Chrysippus, which we can, if we can, we like take that to mean maybe it wasn't entirely non consensual. While Lias and Chrysippus slept, Hippodamia snuck in and took Lias's sword, thrusting it into Chrysippus, wounding but not killing him just yet. Lias was suspected of being the wielder of the sword, the one who stabbed Chrysippus, because it was his sword, but Chrysippus, while he was dying, was able to say that it wasn't Lias, but actually Hippodamia confusing story, so many sources. I still think it's interesting. I hope you do too, And hey, maybe we can see there's as an actual romance if we want. There's a lot of Lately, I've been trying to hold onto details like these that suggests that maybe things weren't always awful, Like if Chrysippus didn't want Lias to go down for his death, and they were like sleeping contentedly together, like maybe it wasn't so bad. Apparently this was also the first story of a man abducting another man for sexual reasons, so progress it's not clear. I'm making some very dark jokes here. I do not actually think that there was anything good about this moment, aside from these ideas that maybe there was some love there at some point in their stories. It's just that one can only read so many stories of abduction and assault in Greek myth without being forced to make it at least the tiniest bit lighthearted. There aren't many stories of men abducting and assaulting other men in the realm of Greek mythology, but those that are are equally horrific to all the many stories of it happening to women. Oh, that's important to say alongside all the wildness I'm going through today. Regardless, this story is fascinating in that it links all of these incredibly ancient stories and characters, but for the most part, only exists in really brief and often very late sources. It shows the intricacy of surviving sources, but also just like really emphasizes how long these stories lasted in the ancient world, how long they continue to focus on stories even from the most ancient and often Homeric sources, even into the Roman period, they were still fascinated by these characters. Of course, other versions of this altered details, like suggesting that it was at the Nimian Games that Lias abducted Chrysippus, finding him just too beautiful to resist, or that it was in the end Atreus and Thiestes who actually killed him on the order of their mother. There's even seemingly maybe an ancient version of like a typo. In one source, it says that it was Theseus who abducted him, though the fact that it was Lias is well established. Not that we wouldn't put it past Theseus to do something like that, would we The background of Lias abducting Chrysippus and the Sphinx being sent by Hara as a punishment for that act actually adds whole new layers to the events of Oedipus Tyrannos. Firstly, there's the idea that Haah sent the Sphinx as punishment, either to punish Lias directly, or it seems more likely to punish the people of Thebes for not sufficiently punishing Lias for his crimes. Of course, firstly, this implies that Harah considered it a crime when Lias abducted Chrysippus. Explicitly, this is because Harah was the goddess of marriage and the act went against the traditions of marriage. But for more selfish reasons, I think we can see it as a good thing that Haah did, or at least good in divine terms, in comparison to all the times she punished women for the acts of her husband. It's an example of punishment that she was physically able to exact, whereas she wasn't ever able to punish Zeus because he's Zeus, but Sphinx aside, it's also really interesting when we look at the fate of Lias more broadly, here's a man who abducted, and we assume assaulted a man younger than him, committed this very specific type of crime, and then later learned that if he had a son of his own, he would be killed by that son. This probably isn't a coincidence, and instead it's an additional commentary on what Lias did. He committed a crime against another man's son and against the young man himself, and so his own son would be his ruin. It's only adding insult to injury that the aforementioned son would also come to marry Lias's widow, and we can gather love her far more and far better than Lias ever did. Nothing is really said about Jocasta and Lias's marriage, but that she was very happily in love with Oedipus does seem to be this commonly understood idea, and Liia seems like a piece of shit. There's been some wild discourse on Twitter lately about the idea of heroes in ancient Greece and how they were seen and understood. And also, I realize I'm writing this episode like weeks after this happened, because I'm working so far in advance. But bear with me. The discourse on that damned bird up was around Odysseus specifically, but it revolved around right wing traditionalist weirdos imagining that, you know, young men of today don't have someone like Odysseus to emulate anymore, and so they're not learning about men like that in school, and that's like this generation is lost without manly, heroic men like Odysseus. It hinges on the idea that heroes were intended to be emulated in the Greek world, and that's just like seriously wrong. Enter Oedipus. Oedipus is famous for being a tragic hero, but he also fits with the general idea of what a hero was in Greek mythology, tragic or otherwise. He was tied to a certain city, Thebes. He went on a hero's quest, He defeated a famed mythical beast. He is, for all intents and purposes, a hero, just like Odysseus or anyone else save maybe Heracles, who was really in a category of his own. And yet do the traditionalist, right wing fucking weirdos on the internet imagine that he should be emulated. The ancient Greeks didn't strive to emulate their heroes. They didn't look at Achilles and his rage and think, yeah, I want to be just like him. They saw aspects of him, like his skill and prowess, and might have intended to emulate such very specific things, but they didn't strive to be like the heroes as a whole. Didn't look Odysseus and all the horrors he committed on route from Troy and think, yeah, I want that life. The modern Western white idea that this could have been the case in the ancient world is inextricably tied to the colonialist, white supremacist notions of antie Greece in Rome that exist today, and they have nothing to do with the actual ancient world, Like these heroes did objectively awful things most of their lives. In the stories anyway, I just need to tie up this episode, and that's all I could think about. So here we are. The anti Greeks didn't look at theseus and think they wanted to be just like him. They worshiped him as a hero, They appreciated what he did for their city. They respected and admired him. But they did not, by and large, strive to emulate their heroes because they had sense. But before I leave you on that depressing note, there's a Roman tragedy of Oedipus by Seneca. And while I haven't read the entire thing or Seneca at all, actually the one day we will look at his Medea. There's a great line by Oedipus in this play, and he speaks about his experience with the Sphinx. It isn't something we get in Sophocles like at all. It's the most like visceral and just like fun and violent description we have the Sphinx. So I want to read it to you. Here goes far from me is the crime and shame of cowardice. And my valor knows not. Dastard fears the Sphinx, weaving her words and darkling measures. I fled not. I faced the bloody jaws of this fell prophetess, and the ground white with scattered bones. And when from a lofty cliff, already hovering over her prey, she prepared her pinions, and lashing her tail like a savage lion, stirred up her threatening wrath. I asked her riddle, whereupon came a sound of dread, Her jaws crashed, and her talents brooking no delay, eager for my vitals, tore at the rocks, the lot's intricate, guile, entangled words, the grim riddle of the winged Beast I solved. Why too late do you now, in madness pray for death? You had your chance to die. This scepter is your need of praise. This your reward for the sphinx destroyed. That dust, that cursed dust of the artful monster, is warring against me. Still that pest which I destroyed, is now destroying thieves. Hugh Herse Nerds, Nerds, thank you as always for listening. Didn't realize until I was recording it how kind of messy and in congruent this episode is. But here we are. I needed to tell it. Thank you. This job is uh so fun, even if sometimes episodes come out like this. I just like to dive into any and all fragmentary and brief and weird sources to tease out whatever there is to be found. Usually I try to make a coherent but I'm glad covering oedipis Trendo's inspired this episode because regardless, it was fun and a bit silly and also seriously enlightening when it comes to the background of this story, Like I didn't know much about Lias before. I think I'd read the Crispus bit in passing at some point, but knowing more about his history. Gods, it just makes us respect Oedipis and Jocasta more, doesn't it. Obviously I'm truly fascinated by the idea that they actually loved each other and that that's the tragedy in the end. It's fucking heartbreaking, and the modern notions of Oedipus as just like the dude who married his mom, just does not convey the actuality of the story, like how horrifying the realizations would have been. This play and the story behind it are such good examples of how I personally have changed this play, not this episode, but the play we did. How I have changed over the course of this podcast, like learning more, understanding more of the history and the nuance just the volume that I read. It's led me to have an entirely different understanding of Oedipus than when I told you the story in the first place, almost six years ago. God, this is not trip anyway. I think it's fun. The Oedipis episodes were certainly fun, and I still stand by, but this background knowledge on the Sphinx and Lias is beneficial, even if confusing. As always, let's end the episode with a five star review from one of you lovely listeners. These make my day and they help me keep the show going more than you could ever understand, So please consider leaving me one if you haven't already. Maybe based it off of the Epipus episodes and not this one. Also, the funnier or quirkier they are, the more likely I am to read it here, because why on guys areth not? This one is an example of that and comes from a user called myth Vet in the Netherlands warning dangerously great podcast. God damn it, I can't enjoy Stephen fries Troy anymore because this podcast made me too darn feminist, or a lot of other retellings for that matter. All jokes aside. Love the podcast. I don't have enough time for the incredible amount of hours of content that Live is put out, but I'm trying my best to listen to all of it. The storytelling is great, the experts are awesome, and the myth busting is amazing. Keep up the good work, Live PS. I absolutely love the Atlantis and Sparta series even though they are a myth. Thank you so much for that. Also, it was amazing timing because I'd also just read a not so great review of someone who was really mad about my Atlantis series and thought it was boring and pointless, so hearing the opposite was a real confidence boost. You are the best, let's talk about. Miss Baby is written and produced by me Live Albert MICHAELA. Smith is the Hermes to my Olympians and handles so many podcasts related things, from running the YouTube, to creating promotional images and videos, to editing and research. Stephanie Foley works to transcribe the podcast for YouTube captions and accessibility. The podcast is hosted and monetized by iHeartMedia, helped me continue bringing you the world of Greek mythology and the Ancient Mediterranean. By becoming up patron, we're gonna get access to bonus episodes and more. Visit patreon dot com slash myths Baby, or click the link in this episode's description. Thank you all for listening. I say it all the time, but it's always true. It means the world to me how much you all love the show and support me. You're cool and nice I am live, and I love this shit.

For Haarah sent the Sphinx, whose mother was a kidna and her father typhan. And she had the face of a woman, the breast and feet and tail of a lion, and the wings of a bird. And having learned a riddle from the muses, she sat on Mount Pickium and propounded to the Thebans. And the riddle was this, what is that which has one voice and yet becomes four footed and two footed and three footed? Now the Thebans were in possession of an oracle, which declared that they should be rid of the Sphinx whenever they had read her riddle. So they often met and discussed the answer, and when they could not find it, the sphinx used to natch away one of them and gobble him up. When many had perished, and last of all Creon's son Hymn, Creon made proclamation that to him who should read the riddle, he would give both the kingdom and the wife of Lias. On hearing that, Oedipus found the solution, declaring that the riddle of the Sphynx referred to man. For as a babe, he is four footed, going on four limbs. As an adult, he is two footed and as an old man, he gets besides a third support in a staff. So the Sphinx threw herself from the citadel and Oedipus both succeeded to the kingdom and unwittingly married his mother and begat sons by her, Polyniques and Ettiacles and daughters is Mini and Antigony. Oh hi, hello there, this is let's talk about Mitz baby, and I am your host, she who loves the ancient Greek city of Thebes more than any other live. Thebes is just gods, it's so fascinating. Obviously, as I've rambled on and on and on and on about it in the past, I came to my love of the Greek Thebes via the story of Cadam's and Harmonia. Yes you know, but it turns out this city is just the most interesting. It features the most mythology, some of the most famous mythology. Like it's just the best, even if it's most famous tory is the play that I covered for you all over the past three weeks, And maybe it's not the best thing for it to be known for. One thing to always remember, though, when it comes to plays like Edipis Tranos, is that they were written from an Athenian point of view. My episodes on that play were so long and detailed, I didn't want to weigh them down by like reminding you all of that, but it is important. Sophocles, the tragedian behind Edipis Tterranos, was like the other two surviving Tradedians, an Athenian. He wrote his plays in Athens for an Athenian audience, but he just happened to feature this one in Thebes. I mean, find the myth features there too, but still in fact, probably almost a majority of mythological plays that survive are set in Thebes, or at least an enormous number of them. That's both because Thebes had this incredible amount of mythology tied to it and then for the tragedians to work with, and because it was an often enemy of Athens, and thus featuring tragedy and wild family dynamics sons murdering fathers and marrying mothers, and gods returning to their homeland to have their cousins ripped to shreds by their mothers. I mean, sure those moments were theban stories in the first place, but it certainly helped that they could then tell these kinds of stories beyond the confines of the Athenian world. But of course what I love about Thebes is just how rich it is in this mythology, certainly more than any other individual city state. I've told you so many of its myths already, the story of Cadmus and Harmonia, and how they came to mythologically found the city, how their children have all of their own incredible and violent mythologies. Semile being the mother of Dionysus by Zeus, which left her dead, Pentheus being the son of a gaway, which left him dead at her hands. There's Io, whose story had her transform into a sea goddess. And then Acteon, who's another grandchild of Cadmus and Harmonian. He was ripped to shreds by his own dogs. And then just another generation down, we get Lias, famed father of Oedipus, Lias, son of Labdacus, son of Polydorus, son of Cadmus Lias, who most famously was the king when the city was being plagued by a certain sphinx. This is episode two twelve. Who doesn't like a good, if deadly riddle Thebes and the Greek sphinx. The story of the sphinx in Thebes is a fascinating one, even if just because of its very specific and limited sourcing, we know that she was a very, very ancient creature. Visually, the sphinx appears in absolutely countless places across the ancient Greek and wider Mediterranean world. She is regularly featured in architecture. She became a fixture just like all over the place. The later Roman writer Elian even wrote of her quote, every painter and every sculptor who devotes himself and has been trained to the practice of his art figures the sphinx as winged, and finally's talking about her wings. But the point is everyone knows a fucking sphinx. But her story is far more limited than the visual representations of her which covered the ancient world, and the details of her time in Sphinx are even more so. First and foremost, though the Greek sphinx was a creature with the head of a woman, the body of a lion, and the wings of an eagle, she is different from the Egyptian sphinx for a few reasons, but the most obvious one is that the Egyptian creature is gendered male, whereas the Greek is female. There are a few different ideas for who her monster parents might have been in the Greek mythology. Maybe she was a child of Orthus, the two headed dog, often forgotten in favor of the more famous three headed dog, and the chimera. My personal favorite mythological monster from the East is lion, goat, snake all in one. Or maybe the Sphinx was the child of Typhon and Echidna, those famous monsters who spawned all the other famous monsters. Now I personally prefer the first option, because the chimera is the best. That possibility comes to us from none other than he Seid too, making it one of the oldest surviving sources for the Sphinx. He seie it doesn't say much about her, just that those were her parents and that she was the bane of the Cadmians, the Thebans. So even as far back as he see it, we know that the Sphinx was linked to Thebes. One thing about that too, which has always fascinated me, but like I don't know nearly enough to speak with any real confidence about like the history and the why. But there's this connection with Egypt I mean, the sphinx features so famously in both of these ancient cultures, even though like these they are in these really distinct ways, Like again, she's a woman in the Greek and she has wings, but on top of that we have the Thebes of it all. It'thologically. They say that the Greek Thebes was like named for the Egyptian Thebes, but of course the Egyptian Thebes when it was called that because it's lux or now was in itself like Thebes is a Greek name. Kind of like how it just very recently occurred to me the etymology behind the word Mesopotamia. It's just been like an ancient place and culture for so long in my head that I never considered the word itself. But I recently came upon a modern Greek town called Mesopotomo, and my brain just went, well, duh, literally just means like between or in the middle of two rivers, which like obviously that's kind of the whole thing about ancient Mesopotamias, the Tigris and the Euphrates. But I digress, because I love nerdy etymology. My point is that there has got to be some kind of additional connection with Egypt but I don't know it. You're welcome for that incredibly sale and tangent back to the Greek Sphinx, as I mentioned when I was covering Oedipis Tyranos. Though we have that mention of him and Jocasta by her other name Epicaste as far back as Homer, we don't have much of their story and sources that survive from before Sophocles's play, So for the most part we have to get the story from Oedipus Tranos and are left to wonder what Sophocles might have invented and why he was, after all, creating a piece of art entertainment. He wasn't necessarily concerned with keeping true to the source material that he had to work with and that we don't, and because of that, our questions about the Sphinx are only more pronounced because she doesn't really feature in Sophocles's play at all. Beyond mentions of her historical importance to Oedipus and his Tyranny of Thebes, we simply know that he was the one who could finally solve her riddle and thus defeat her, saving the city from the terrorizing that she'd been doing. And then he was made the king because of it. But what did that terrorizing look like? What was that famous riddle? The answer to those questions, for the most part, come from much later sources, some of which I've already just read to you at the top of the episode. And well, we have to return to the Lias of it all, the king of Thebes and first husband of Jocasta. Ironically, one of the most detailed versions of this story Lias Oedipus, Jocasta and the Sphinx and her terrorizing of Thebes beyond the play is found in Pseudo Apollodorus's Library of Greek Mythology. I say ironically because someone wants told me, and I mentioned all the time. He is basically the TLDR of Greek myth He is so brief, he just makes these statements of facts. Still he gives us so many details that we don't always get elsewhere, So we appreciate this late and mysterious author. It's Pseudo a Polyodorus that I read at the top of this episode. But we're gonna go deeper into it now. Lias was the king of Thebes, and he married Jocasta or sometimes her name is epicaste A. Polyodorus also includes this Homeric option of her name, but the character herself remains the same regardless of her name. They learned very quickly, as we know, that they should not have a child together, specifically a son, because he would be destined to kill his father. Still, as this version tells us, one drunken night was what ruined all of their plans. On that wine drunk night, the married couple had sex a surprise surprise, and Joe Casta became pregnant because they always do. When the baby was born and it was a boy, Lias panicked. Exposure is always the mythological solution to problems like these, But just leaving the baby to die and the elements wasn't enough for Lias. He also pierced the baby's ankles together, maiming him, and this poor broken baby was then given to a herdsman to be taken out and just left. But one must never trust others to kill our babies for us, that's asking too much. At least that was the case in the play, but here in Apollodorus, the baby is in fact left to die, only to be found by the King of Corinth himself. Polybus. Then things progress, as we remember, the baby is raised as a prince of Corinth by the name of Oedipus, and eventually grows to wonder about his parentage and ask the oracle, and determines never to return home to Krinth lest he do, as was destined by said oracle, kill his father and have sex with his mother. And as he was fleeing Corinth, he came upon a crossroads. There this road rage incident caused the death of a man that Oedipus did not know was actually the king of Thebes. But here is where things get interesting. Enough time passes in this version of the story for Creon to take control of Thebes as a brother of Jocasta, because God's only know a woman would never be allowed to rule on her own the horror. Still, what interests me is how these things line up, not only with the play, but the possibility that all of these seemingly contradictory or differing details might be older than the play and were just changed by Sophocles for the sake of his narrative, like Creon taking over control of Thebes. And so while Creon ruled Thebs, Harrah sent the Sphinx to torment the city. The beautiful and terrifying creature that was the Sphinx had learned a riddle from the muses themselves, and she had taken to asking those that came upon her to solve it. As I read at the top, the riddle was this, though translations of it very slightly, what has one voice walks on four legs? Then two, then three? Sometimes it will specify time periods, like perhaps throughout the day the number of legs changes, or throughout life. Regardless, someone has to answer the riddle of this sort. The Thebans learned from the oracle that the only way to defeat this Sphinx, who also killed everyone who failed to answer her riddle, or maybe just eight people whole, regardless of the riddle, was that they had to answer the riddle. So the Thebans would just get together they would discuss this this riddle, just like sort out their ideas. They would be rainstorm. They couldn't, though, ever figure it out, and so many theban Men perished in the jaws of the Sphinx due to their inability to sort it. And finally it was down to Creon's own son, Hymen, who attempted to answer the riddle like all the others, but he too died at her hands in this version, because sometimes he's just alive regardless. It was at this death, this death in this version, that led Creon to announce that whoever could finally defeat her answer her riddle would be made king of Thebes and be given Creon's sister Jocasta to marry. And so shortly after this, Edipus came along and he had the answer. Humans, as babies, they crawl and four limbs, and adults walk on two, and then when they're elderly they use a cane, giving the illusion of three legs. That wasn't actually an easy one, Like, I don't know if i'd get it. There's some easy riddles out there, but it's deceptive. Who with her riddle answered, the Sphinx throws herself off the citadel where she had sat for so long terrorizing the city, and Oedipus becomes king. But why you ask, would Harah send the Sphinx two Thebes in the first place. That's where we have to turn to. Yeah, another source, or rather just like more sources. Pseudo Polydorus does mention this little detailed, though minimally. But Lias, it seems, had a history of being awful, even beyond the whole you know, pinning the baby's feet together thing, something new and different for a man of Greek myth. See, before Lias became king of Thebes, he was forced to live elsewhere while the city was being run by two other famed theban kings, Amphion and Zethus. Theirs is a story for another time, if I haven't already told it before. Regardless, Lias lives for a time in the Peloponnese with another famed and shitty king, Pelops. Pelops is of course one of the main cursed as all fuck members of the House of Tantalus. He's Tantalus's son who was partially eaten by the gods before being mostly restored. But he goes on to curse his own fans and then his own children, Atrius and Thiestes, just that they keep it all going. We all know I love the curse. But you see, before all of that, Pelops had another child, an illegitimate child named Chrysippus, and it seems that while Lias was staying with Pelops, he developed a thing for Chrysippus, you know, the one. The translations like to say he fell in love with Chrysippus, and I mean, hell like, maybe he did, but he hailed it poorly. And we don't know what Chrysippus thought about it, like, if anything at all, he probably wasn't into this weird old man that was there. Anyway, he abducted Chrysippus, and one can assume, because that is simply the story of abduction and myth, he raped him. And for this, Harah seeks to punish Lias by sending the sphinx to Thebes. And yes, I realized this is tricky to understand because the very source suggests that the sphinx didn't arrive until after Lias was already dead, which seems like a silly punishment, especially for something as horrifying as assaulting a young man. Regardless, this story of Lias assaulting Chrysippus seems to have been very widespread in the ancient world, though most of the sources are lost when it comes to any detail. But Euripides even had a lost play about Chrysippus and potentially his quote unquote relationship with Lias. Still, yet again, I'm gonna talk about a thing that alien said. So Elien, as I mentioned earlier, was this later Roman writer. But he suggests the idea that actually Euripides wrote the play Chrysippus in honor of a man that he loved. He says, quote, they say that the poet Euripides was also in love with the same Agathon he has said to have composed the play Chrysippus in his honor. I am not able to state that is fact, but I can say that it is very frequently asserted Euripides loved Agathon. Oh my God, be still my heart. It just suits Euripidies. We're believing Elian canon this story. I'm sorry, this episode is wow, but there's so much good stuff in it. This story of Lias and Chrysippus, though it exists mostly little fragments or like much later sources, is so interesting in the way it links two deeply famous mythological families, and even the two most recent plays that I have covered on the podcast, like Arrestes, is part of this deeply cursed line of Pelops, and between that familial line and the line of Thebes, we are talking essentially the two most famous and famously cursed dynasties of all Greek mythology, and here they are not only linked by this somewhat lost moment in myth, but linked through tragedy. It also gives us another reason to dislike Lias and be happy for you can does escape from him, for her finding real and lasting love after such a horrible husband, even if that love well turned out to be just a bit tragic in itself. Though their story is so fragmented, it's also really long lasting. Between these mentions in Elien and another in pseudo Plutarch that is like Plutarch's parallel lives, but seemingly one that we're not certain was written by the actual Plutarch, he goes into more detail when it comes to Lias and Chrysippus and their quote unquote relationship. This story, impossibly Plutarch adds a whole new level of intrigue and will just like really emphasizes that cursed as fuck family. He suggests that after Lias abducted Chrysippus, he was caught by Pilops' two legitimate sons, Atreus and Thiestes, and that Pelops showed mercy on Lias because he loved Christypis which's a great example of how the assault of men can be just as equally fucked up as the assault of women. Equality. Anyway, this story shifts then to be more about Chrysippus. Hippodamia, Pelops's wife and the mother of his legitimate children. Apparently she wanted Chrysippus dealt with because he would be competition for her sons gaining the throne after Pelops and Atrusynthistes once had actually no desire to kill their brother knew for them, and so Hippodamia took it upon herself. In this version, at night while Lias slept next to Chrysippus, which we can, if we can, we like take that to mean maybe it wasn't entirely non consensual. While Lias and Chrysippus slept, Hippodamia snuck in and took Lias's sword, thrusting it into Chrysippus, wounding but not killing him just yet. Lias was suspected of being the wielder of the sword, the one who stabbed Chrysippus, because it was his sword, but Chrysippus, while he was dying, was able to say that it wasn't Lias, but actually Hippodamia confusing story, so many sources. I still think it's interesting. I hope you do too, And hey, maybe we can see there's as an actual romance if we want. There's a lot of Lately, I've been trying to hold onto details like these that suggests that maybe things weren't always awful, Like if Chrysippus didn't want Lias to go down for his death, and they were like sleeping contentedly together, like maybe it wasn't so bad. Apparently this was also the first story of a man abducting another man for sexual reasons, so progress it's not clear. I'm making some very dark jokes here. I do not actually think that there was anything good about this moment, aside from these ideas that maybe there was some love there at some point in their stories. It's just that one can only read so many stories of abduction and assault in Greek myth without being forced to make it at least the tiniest bit lighthearted. There aren't many stories of men abducting and assaulting other men in the realm of Greek mythology, but those that are are equally horrific to all the many stories of it happening to women. Oh, that's important to say alongside all the wildness I'm going through today. Regardless, this story is fascinating in that it links all of these incredibly ancient stories and characters, but for the most part, only exists in really brief and often very late sources. It shows the intricacy of surviving sources, but also just like really emphasizes how long these stories lasted in the ancient world, how long they continue to focus on stories even from the most ancient and often Homeric sources, even into the Roman period, they were still fascinated by these characters. Of course, other versions of this altered details, like suggesting that it was at the Nimian Games that Lias abducted Chrysippus, finding him just too beautiful to resist, or that it was in the end Atreus and Thiestes who actually killed him on the order of their mother. There's even seemingly maybe an ancient version of like a typo. In one source, it says that it was Theseus who abducted him, though the fact that it was Lias is well established. Not that we wouldn't put it past Theseus to do something like that, would we The background of Lias abducting Chrysippus and the Sphinx being sent by Hara as a punishment for that act actually adds whole new layers to the events of Oedipus Tyrannos. Firstly, there's the idea that Haah sent the Sphinx as punishment, either to punish Lias directly, or it seems more likely to punish the people of Thebes for not sufficiently punishing Lias for his crimes. Of course, firstly, this implies that Harah considered it a crime when Lias abducted Chrysippus. Explicitly, this is because Harah was the goddess of marriage and the act went against the traditions of marriage. But for more selfish reasons, I think we can see it as a good thing that Haah did, or at least good in divine terms, in comparison to all the times she punished women for the acts of her husband. It's an example of punishment that she was physically able to exact, whereas she wasn't ever able to punish Zeus because he's Zeus, but Sphinx aside, it's also really interesting when we look at the fate of Lias more broadly, here's a man who abducted, and we assume assaulted a man younger than him, committed this very specific type of crime, and then later learned that if he had a son of his own, he would be killed by that son. This probably isn't a coincidence, and instead it's an additional commentary on what Lias did. He committed a crime against another man's son and against the young man himself, and so his own son would be his ruin. It's only adding insult to injury that the aforementioned son would also come to marry Lias's widow, and we can gather love her far more and far better than Lias ever did. Nothing is really said about Jocasta and Lias's marriage, but that she was very happily in love with Oedipus does seem to be this commonly understood idea, and Liia seems like a piece of shit. There's been some wild discourse on Twitter lately about the idea of heroes in ancient Greece and how they were seen and understood. And also, I realize I'm writing this episode like weeks after this happened, because I'm working so far in advance. But bear with me. The discourse on that damned bird up was around Odysseus specifically, but it revolved around right wing traditionalist weirdos imagining that, you know, young men of today don't have someone like Odysseus to emulate anymore, and so they're not learning about men like that in school, and that's like this generation is lost without manly, heroic men like Odysseus. It hinges on the idea that heroes were intended to be emulated in the Greek world, and that's just like seriously wrong. Enter Oedipus. Oedipus is famous for being a tragic hero, but he also fits with the general idea of what a hero was in Greek mythology, tragic or otherwise. He was tied to a certain city, Thebes. He went on a hero's quest, He defeated a famed mythical beast. He is, for all intents and purposes, a hero, just like Odysseus or anyone else save maybe Heracles, who was really in a category of his own. And yet do the traditionalist, right wing fucking weirdos on the internet imagine that he should be emulated. The ancient Greeks didn't strive to emulate their heroes. They didn't look at Achilles and his rage and think, yeah, I want to be just like him. They saw aspects of him, like his skill and prowess, and might have intended to emulate such very specific things, but they didn't strive to be like the heroes as a whole. Didn't look Odysseus and all the horrors he committed on route from Troy and think, yeah, I want that life. The modern Western white idea that this could have been the case in the ancient world is inextricably tied to the colonialist, white supremacist notions of antie Greece in Rome that exist today, and they have nothing to do with the actual ancient world, Like these heroes did objectively awful things most of their lives. In the stories anyway, I just need to tie up this episode, and that's all I could think about. So here we are. The anti Greeks didn't look at theseus and think they wanted to be just like him. They worshiped him as a hero, They appreciated what he did for their city. They respected and admired him. But they did not, by and large, strive to emulate their heroes because they had sense. But before I leave you on that depressing note, there's a Roman tragedy of Oedipus by Seneca. And while I haven't read the entire thing or Seneca at all, actually the one day we will look at his Medea. There's a great line by Oedipus in this play, and he speaks about his experience with the Sphinx. It isn't something we get in Sophocles like at all. It's the most like visceral and just like fun and violent description we have the Sphinx. So I want to read it to you. Here goes far from me is the crime and shame of cowardice. And my valor knows not. Dastard fears the Sphinx, weaving her words and darkling measures. I fled not. I faced the bloody jaws of this fell prophetess, and the ground white with scattered bones. And when from a lofty cliff, already hovering over her prey, she prepared her pinions, and lashing her tail like a savage lion, stirred up her threatening wrath. I asked her riddle, whereupon came a sound of dread, Her jaws crashed, and her talents brooking no delay, eager for my vitals, tore at the rocks, the lot's intricate, guile, entangled words, the grim riddle of the winged Beast I solved. Why too late do you now, in madness pray for death? You had your chance to die. This scepter is your need of praise. This your reward for the sphinx destroyed. That dust, that cursed dust of the artful monster, is warring against me. Still that pest which I destroyed, is now destroying thieves. Hugh Herse Nerds, Nerds, thank you as always for listening. Didn't realize until I was recording it how kind of messy and in congruent this episode is. But here we are. I needed to tell it. Thank you. This job is uh so fun, even if sometimes episodes come out like this. I just like to dive into any and all fragmentary and brief and weird sources to tease out whatever there is to be found. Usually I try to make a coherent but I'm glad covering oedipis Trendo's inspired this episode because regardless, it was fun and a bit silly and also seriously enlightening when it comes to the background of this story, Like I didn't know much about Lias before. I think I'd read the Crispus bit in passing at some point, but knowing more about his history. Gods, it just makes us respect Oedipis and Jocasta more, doesn't it. Obviously I'm truly fascinated by the idea that they actually loved each other and that that's the tragedy in the end. It's fucking heartbreaking, and the modern notions of Oedipus as just like the dude who married his mom, just does not convey the actuality of the story, like how horrifying the realizations would have been. This play and the story behind it are such good examples of how I personally have changed this play, not this episode, but the play we did. How I have changed over the course of this podcast, like learning more, understanding more of the history and the nuance just the volume that I read. It's led me to have an entirely different understanding of Oedipus than when I told you the story in the first place, almost six years ago. God, this is not trip anyway. I think it's fun. The Oedipis episodes were certainly fun, and I still stand by, but this background knowledge on the Sphinx and Lias is beneficial, even if confusing. As always, let's end the episode with a five star review from one of you lovely listeners. These make my day and they help me keep the show going more than you could ever understand, So please consider leaving me one if you haven't already. Maybe based it off of the Epipus episodes and not this one. Also, the funnier or quirkier they are, the more likely I am to read it here, because why on guys areth not? This one is an example of that and comes from a user called myth Vet in the Netherlands warning dangerously great podcast. God damn it, I can't enjoy Stephen fries Troy anymore because this podcast made me too darn feminist, or a lot of other retellings for that matter. All jokes aside. Love the podcast. I don't have enough time for the incredible amount of hours of content that Live is put out, but I'm trying my best to listen to all of it. The storytelling is great, the experts are awesome, and the myth busting is amazing. Keep up the good work, Live PS. I absolutely love the Atlantis and Sparta series even though they are a myth. Thank you so much for that. Also, it was amazing timing because I'd also just read a not so great review of someone who was really mad about my Atlantis series and thought it was boring and pointless, so hearing the opposite was a real confidence boost. You are the best, let's talk about. Miss Baby is written and produced by me Live Albert MICHAELA. Smith is the Hermes to my Olympians and handles so many podcasts related things, from running the YouTube, to creating promotional images and videos, to editing and research. Stephanie Foley works to transcribe the podcast for YouTube captions and accessibility. The podcast is hosted and monetized by iHeartMedia, helped me continue bringing you the world of Greek mythology and the Ancient Mediterranean. By becoming up patron, we're gonna get access to bonus episodes and more. Visit patreon dot com slash myths Baby, or click the link in this episode's description. Thank you all for listening. I say it all the time, but it's always true. It means the world to me how much you all love the show and support me. You're cool and nice I am live, and I love this shit.