In reporting Iokaste’s death, the staffperson confirms what the myth allowed the audience to anticipate, but in describing her as θεῖον–“godly”—the staffperson confirms the audience’s insight that the town as a whole holds its rulers to be like gods, an impiety to which the god is bound to react. [P] [Aj] Iokaste’s miserable death stands in contrast to the high esteem in which she was held by her people and in which she held herself, for she believed in her own ability to defeat Delphic prophecy and the god who authorizes it. She set herself higher than the gods, and she encouraged her husband and ordered her staff to do the same. Yet while her death clearly demonstrates the error of such thinking, the staffperson’s description of her as “divine” shows that she has not yet understood that. The town as a whole is not yet in the clear. [Mpe] [Mw]