Marriage In Oedipus The King

The ancient world is not something everyone ponders about, but do you know what marriage and love consisted of ages ago? Ancient fairytales, such as Prince Charming and Cinderella, lead you to believe at a young age that marriage is a piece of cake and when you see a guy, you are going to have an emotion feeling and know he is the one. Unfortunately, not every guy is a prince charming and not every girl is Cinderella. In the ancient world marriage was not ideal and definitely not a fairytale. Some marriages were out of love, when some were out of sin. Most marriages were binding and arranged, the spouses were put together by their guardians. Ancient stories from around these times illustrate to the readers that this holds true for the ancient …show more content…
The ancient tale of The Tragedy of Oedipus the King began when King Laius and Queen Jocasta had a baby boy, that was prophesied to kill his father and marry his mother. The young king and queen found out this knowledge, and the queen sent the boy to be murdered. The shepherd saved the boy and had him given to a family, which was the family of Corinth. The boy was named Oedipus, as he grew up he grew more curious about his family and spoke with the Oracle of Delphi, which told him that he was destined to kill his father and marry is mother. After hearing his fate, he fled from the lands of Corinth because he did not want the prophecy to come true. On the road, he came into contact with some travelers and killed them. He came upon a Sphinx which had people trap at a gate because they could not solve her riddle, but Oedipus solved the riddle. The people thanked him and said he should be their next king, so he did. He married Queen Jocasta and became king. When a plague ruined their city King Oedipus was determined to end the plague, but to do so he had to find out who killed the past king and kill them. This was Oedipus’s undoing, he found the killer, but it was himself. He found out he murder his father and married his mother. Not only did he marry his mother, but had children with her as well. The marriage in this ancient tale is not …show more content…
In The Oresteia, act one “Agamemnon” we learn of Agamemnon’s and Clyteamnestra’s marriage. During the act we read of Clyteamnestra’s knowledge that the Trojan war has ended and that her husband is coming home. A herald appears and tells them that Agamemnon will be arriving shortly. While reading the story you assume that Clyteamnestra is excited and ready to see her husband’s return home. Agamemnon arrives home with a Trojan princess named Cassandra. Clyteamnestra has laid out a red carpet fit for a god for Agamemnon to walk on. Agamemnon knowing, he is not a god tells her he will not walk on it but after a bit of arguing, he eventually walks down the red carpet into their home. Cassandra, the princess refuses to go inside the house. The chorus is standing around Cassandra as she starts to have a vision. She informs the chorus of what is going to happen, but they do not understand and do not want to believe her. Her vision was of her (Cassandra) and Agamemnon’s death by the hand of Clyteamnestra. Eventually Cassandra goes inside to face her death. The chorus hears screaming and among themselves try to figure out what to do but are too late. The chorus burst through the kingdom doors to find Clyteamnestra standing over Agamemnon and Cassandra’s dead bodies. Agamemnon’s wife killed him because when Agamemnon went to fight the Trojan’s the wind was not in