From Corinth Oidipous’s memory skips back to the crossroads and the violent encounter that left several men dead, one of whom was his father. Rather than realizing that the blood he spilled there was a sacrifice ordained by the god at Delphi, however, he imbues the paths, the glen, the oaks, the steep hillsides, and the porous earth with consciousness. To them he grants the capacity for outrage at being made to drink the blood of the father drawn by the hand of the son. To them he grants memory. Of them he supposes the capacity for knowledge even of events in far-off Thebes. This animism is new in him, although the Chorus has earlier been heard to express similar views, but it represents yet another failure, or refusal, to see things aright; it fails to acknowledge Apollo, the god whose words, as Oidipous himself reported them, foretold the necessity of “drawing paternal blood with my own hands” (ll. 995-6). Oidipous appears now suddenly altogether to have forgotten that prophecy and so entirely to fail to appreciate its precision. The god’s efforts have been wasted on him, but they may yet be appreciated by the play’s audience. To reestablish harmony with the god it is essential to compare events and outcomes with prophecy and, when these match, to acknowledge the god as their author. [Mpea] [Mip] [P]