Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
noun
- Classical Mythology. a daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta who defied her uncle, King Creon, by performing funeral rites over her brother, Polynices, and was condemned to be immured alive in a cave.
- (italics) a tragedy (c440 b.c.) by Sophocles.
noun
- Greek myth daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta, who was condemned to death for cremating the body of her brother Polynices in defiance of an edict of her uncle, King Creon of Thebes
daughter of Oedipus, her name may mean “in place of a mother” in Greek, from anti- “opposite, in place of” (see anti-) + gone “womb, childbirth, generation,” from root of gignesthai “to be born” related to genos “race, birth, descent” (see genus).
In classical mythology, a daughter of King Oedipus. Her two brothers killed each other in single combat over the kingship of their city. Although burial or cremation of the dead was a religious obligation among the Greeks, the king forbade the burial of one of the brothers, for he was considered a traitor. Antigone, torn between her religious and legal obligations, disobeyed the king’s order and buried her brother. She was then condemned to death for her crime.
A tragedy by Sophocles. It concerns the punishment of Antigone for burying her brother, an act that was forbidden because he had rebelled against his own city. Antigone argues that the burial is required by divine law as opposed to human law.