When he says that he wants any Theban in possession of the facts to point them out to him, his words can be taken also to mean point at him; he is the sign and the signified. Oidipous is wrong to assume that the guilty party is either a native or a foreigner, wrong to assume that the guilty party knows who he is, and wrong to assume that the guilty one acts out of fear. He is in fact acting out of ignorance, not due to lack of the facts, but from his incapacity to connect them to one another. He is also wrong to promise that the killer will suffer nothing other than to leave the country; he will have to live with the knowledge that he killed his father, married his mother, and polluted his city. Nor will Oidipous be the one to see to the killer’s “reward”—the gods will do that. And rather than enjoying the gratitude he now promises, he will react with horror and aversion. In every detail of his declaration, then, the audience can see error. Reality appears to be a riddle that Oidipous cannot solve and whose solution will therefore have to be forced upon him. [Mpea] [Mw] [Ap]