Oedipus the King

The story of Oedipus appears in Greek literature as early as Homer, and soon passed into the poetic heritage, undergoing several modifications until at last it reached the hands of the dramatists. "It was prophesied to Laius and Jocasta, King and Queen of Thebes, that the son to be born to them would murder his father and marry his own mother. To avert this disaster they exposed the child with his feet pinned together (hence the name Oedipus, "swollen-foot") to die on the mountain side."