It costs Kreon nothing to reaffirm a point already established (ll. 128-9); namely, that a full investigation into Laios’ death was never mounted, but he goes farther now, adding: “we did not hear.” It might be thought that the fault lies with Teiresias for not speaking up, but Kreon’s wording suggests that in his view the failure was in the hearing. Surely Teiresias never revealed that Oidipous killed Laios. Prophecy did, however, say that Laios would die at his son’s hands. If the audience supposes that Kreon heard this prophecy, it can further infer that he must now be realizing that when Laios was reported killed he should have suspected (or perhaps he knew?) that a son had been born to Laios and Iokaste, and that it was he who killed Laios. This conclusion would have been the point of departure for his own personal investigation into those whose birth circumstances were unknown and who were not present in Thebes on the day when Laios was killed. Since Oidipous arrived hard on the heels of Laios’ death, Kreon might have made him the focus of special attention. For his failure to do this and its terrible consequences, Kreon may now be beginning to realize his own fault, which was to give the prophet’s words less than his complete faith; he too easily dismissed them. On the other hand, the audience would suppose that, had Kreon investigated, he may have prevented Oidipous’s marriage to his mother, and that would have left unrealized one of this myth’s chief prophecies. If the prophecy was to be fulfilled, Oidipous had to enjoy some success. Thus, Kreon’s failure is necessary to the god’s success. In combination with the previous realization that the noblest of mortal impulses can impede the god, the present realization that mortal error can serve the god’s needs confronts the audience with a paradox, for surely it must matter to the gods that mortals endeavor to cooperate with them. In regard to this paradox it is interesting that the prophecy Kreon ignores is the one that Laios must die at his son’s hands, whereas the prophecy that his failure helps to realize is the complementary prophecy that the son must kill his father and marry his mother. That the prophecies are similar but not altogether symmetrical suggests that something has changed. Whatever the nature of this change, the asymmetry it bespeaks suggests that the paradox may be less tightly locked than appears to be the case. This problem and its possible solution would have been keenly appreciated in Athens, which must have been sensitive to the implications of its own endeavor, similar to the efforts of Laios and Oidipous, to thwart prophecy. The Athenian audience might have been chilled by the consideration that it should not interpret the spectacular success Athens had been enjoying as a sign either of the gods’ approval or disinterest; rather, its achievements could, like Oidipous’s success in defeating the Sphinx, marriage to Thebes’ queen, and ascending to rule as Thebes’ tyrannos, be the preparation for a more dramatic fall—the defeat at Sparta’s hands promised Athens by the Pythia. [Apcma] [Gt-a] [Apa]