L'arte mantica alla prova dello scetticismo nell'Edipo re

Abstract

Since the beginning of the Sophoclean drama OT, King Oedipus, in his attempt to contrast the plague that afflicts Thebes, has to confront the traditional influence of the Delphic oracles and the opinion of the local seer, Tiresias, who is demanding to interpret the words of the God Apollo. In this sense, the Sophoclean drama seems to set into the Attic scene the main traits of its contemporary public debate (second half of the 5th Century BC) about power and fallibility of both oracles and their human interpreters, the so-called manteis. This paper aims by means of a detailed analysis of the dramatic discourse to investigate the positions expressed by the different characters involved in the discussion (from Oedipus and Jocasta to Tiresias, Creon, and the Chorus) concerning the status and the epistemic value of the mantic art (mantikè téchne) with a peculiar focus on the following question: does the mantic art stand scepticism (particularly by Jocasta)?