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Jocasta

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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or Iocasta ('IoKaarn; in Homer, 'E7rLKao-rn), in Greek legend, wife of Laius, mother (afterwards wife) of Oedipus, daughter of Menoeceus, sister (or daughter) of Creon. According to Homer (Od. xi. 271) and Sophocles (Oed. Tyr. 1241), on learning that Oedipus was her son she immediately hanged herself; but in Euripides (Phoenissae, 1 455) she stabs herself over the bodies of her sons Eteocles and Polynices, who had slain each other in single combat before the walls of Thebes.