Sphinx in the ancient sources

Ancient Sources / Figures / Sphinx

11 passages from 7 ancient authors that tell of Sphinx, in the original with English translation, author by author in the order the Greeks read them. A sphinx was a mythical monster, which had the head of a human and the body of a lion. Sphinxes also appeared in Egyptian mythology; the two cultures ... For the story in one place, read our article on Sphinx.

Hesiod (1)

Hesiod, Theogony 305–334Echidna's offspring: Cerberus, the Hydra, the Chimaera and the Sphinx (305-334)Typhaon is joined in love to Echidna, and their offspring are Orthus, Cerberus, the Hydra and the Chimaera. The Hydra is nourished by Hera and killed by Heracles with Iolaus's help, and the Chimaera is killed by Pegasus and Bellerophon. Echidna and Orthus bear the Sphinx and the Nemean lion, which Hera rears, and the section ends with Ceto and Phorcys's youngest child, the serpent that guards the golden apples.

Apollodorus (1)

Apollodorus, The Library (Bibliotheca), with the Epitome 3.5.1–9Dionysus, Pentheus, Niobe and OedipusDionysus roams Egypt, Syria and Thrace, where Lycurgus is punished, and returns to Thebes, where Agave tears her son Pentheus apart; he also turns the Tyrrhenian pirates into dolphins. Cadmus and Harmonia go to the Encheleans and become serpents, and the house of Labdacus continues through Laius, Antiope with Zethus and Amphion, and Niobe, whose children are shot by Apollo and Artemis. Laius, warned against fathering a son, exposes the infant Oedipus, who kills him unknowingly, answers the Sphinx's riddle, marries Jocasta and learns the truth.

Sophocles (2)

Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus 1–77Prologue: the Priest asks Oedipus to save ThebesOedipus finds a crowd of suppliants with olive branches before the palace and asks why they have come. The Priest of Zeus describes the plague that blights the crops, the herds and the women of Thebes, and begs the king, who freed the city from the Sphinx, to find a remedy. Oedipus answers that he shares their pain and has already sent Creon to Apollo's oracle at Delphi, and that he is troubled by his long absence.
Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus 463–511First stasimon: the Chorus are shaken by the seer's wordsThe Chorus sing of the murderer named by the Delphic oracle, and imagine him as an outlaw wandering the mountains in flight from his doom. They say that the seer's words have shaken them but that they have no proof against Oedipus, who saved the city from the Sphinx. They say that Zeus and Apollo know the truth, and that until they see the charge proved they will not blame Oedipus.

Euripides (4)

Euripides, Phoenician Women 1–87Prologue: Jocasta tells the story of the house of OedipusJocasta tells how Laius ignored the oracle and begot Oedipus, who killed his father at the crossroads and married her after solving the Sphinx's riddle. She says that Oedipus blinded himself when he learned the truth, and that his sons shut him in the palace and he curses them. Eteocles refused to give up the throne after a year, and Polyneices has come with an Argive army, but she has arranged a meeting under truce.
Euripides, Phoenician Women 784–832Second choral song: the Chorus reproaches Ares and recalls the curse on ThebesThe Chorus asks Ares why he loves blood and war instead of the festivals of Bromius. They wish that Oedipus had died on Cithaeron and the Sphinx had never come. They recall the Sown Men, the wedding of Harmonia and the building of the walls to Amphion's lyre.
Euripides, Phoenician Women 1639–1766Exodos: Antigone defies Creon; Oedipus goes into exileAntigone argues against Creon's decree, vows to bury Polyneices and refuses to marry Haemon, choosing to share her father's exile. Oedipus embraces his dead family and says that he is to die at Colonus in Athens. He bids the citizens farewell and leaves with Antigone.
Euripides, Phoenician Women 1019–1066Third choral song: the Sphinx, Oedipus, and praise for MenoeceusThe Chorus sings of the Sphinx and her seizing of Theban youths, and of Oedipus, who solved her riddle and then married his mother. They admire the youth who has died for his country, and pray that they may bear such sons. They call on Pallas, who helped Cadmus against the serpent.

Pausanias (1)

Pausanias, Description of Greece 9.26.1–8The Cabirian plain, the Sphinx's mountain, Onchestus and Thespiae: Saviour ZeusPausanias describes the plain of Tenerus and the sanctuary of Hercules the Horse-binder near the Cabirian sanctuary, and the mountain of the Sphinx with three different accounts of who she was. He passes the ruins of Onchestus with its temple of Poseidon and comes to Thespiae, telling how Menestratus saved the city from a dragon by wearing a breast-plate studded with fish-hooks, which gave Zeus the surname Saviour.

Epic Cycle (1)

Epic Cycle, Summaries and Fragments 1.1–2.3Titanomachy and OedipodeaThe Epic Cycle begins with the union of Heaven and Earth, who make three hundred-handed sons and three Cyclopes. The fragments of the War of the Titans name Aether, Aegaeon and Zeus dancing, and the Oedipodea fragments say that Oedipus' sons were born of Euryganeia, not Iocasta, and that the Sphinx killed Haemon.

Lycophron (1)

Lycophron, Alexandra 1–114Alexandra 1–114: The slave's report; Troy burnt before, and the judge of three goddesses sails to seize a wifeA slave appointed to watch Cassandra tells Priam that he will repeat her prophecies, which she once poured out in confused riddling cries like the Sphinx's. As the Greek sailors loose their cables at dawn, she begins by lamenting a city already burnt once before by a hero called a lion begotten in three evenings, and sees it fired a second time. She then turns on a herdsman-turned-sailor, once the judge of the beauty of three goddesses, and foretells that a ship will carry him to Gytheion, where he will seize a woman like a wolf taking a heifer.