After the death Œdipus, Antigone and Ismene returned to Thebes, and lived in the king's house with Eteocles, their brother. But the seven great captains from Argos, whom Polyneikes had called to help him, came against Thebes to destroy it, and were hardly driven back. And the two brothers having died by each others hands, the people of the city made Creon their king, as being wise and prudent, and next of kin to the dead: and he issued his decree that Eteocles should be buried with due honour, but that no man should dare to bury Polyneikes, who had come purposing to lay waste the city and all the temples of the Gods.
- ↑ The starting-point of the Antigone was found in the closing scene of the Seven against Thebes of Æschylos. There the herald of the Council of Thebes proclaims the decree that Polyneikes is to be left unburied, and Antigone declares her resolve to bury him in spite of it. There, however, she is helped by the Chorus of her Maidens. Her lofty, solitary courage, in defiance of her sister's entreaties and Hæmon's love for her, sprang out of Sophocles' imagination.
Though placed here as the sequel to the two Œdipus tragedies, the Antigone was, in order of composition, in all probability, the earliest of the three. We find in them, accordingly, some references to it, but none in it to them; no passing hint even at the wonderful death of Œdipus at Colonos.
