Antigone — who's who

The play's protagonist. Daughter of Oedipus and Iocasta, sister of Ismene and of the two dead brothers, engaged to Creon's son Haemon. Enters the play with the decision already made. She buries Polyneices with a thin scattering of dust, is caught at the second attempt, and is brought before Creon. She does not deny the act, does not beg, does not retract. She is led to a rock-cut cave to be sealed in alive and hangs herself there before Creon's reversal can reach her.

Antigone's younger sister and the first person Antigone tells. Refuses, in the prologue, to help with the burial — they are women, the men hold the power, the family is already destroyed by Oedipus's curse; one more transgression will end the line. Sophocles is not unkind to her. When Antigone is caught, Ismene tries to claim a share of the guilt so she can share the death; Antigone refuses to let her. She does not appear after Scene 5. Her fate is left ambiguous.

The new king. Brother of Iocasta, uncle of Antigone, husband of Eurydice, father of Haemon. Took the throne when both his nephews killed each other. His first act of governance is the edict against burying Polyneices; his second is to enforce it against his own niece. He is reasonable in his first speech, defensive in his second, paranoid by his fourth, and broken by the end. He survives the play. Whether that survival is a mercy is the play's last open question.

Creon's only surviving son and Antigone's fiancé. Comes to his father in Scene 7 not to plead for his bride but to offer counsel — the city is murmuring, the edict feels wrong, the trees that bend in a flood survive while those that resist are torn out. Creon hears it as treason. Haemon storms out. He goes to the cave where Antigone has been sealed in, finds her hanged, lunges at his father with a sword, misses, and falls on the blade himself.

Appears once, in the final scene. Comes out of the palace having overheard the messenger's news, asks him to tell her plainly, listens to the whole account of her son's death, and goes back inside without a word. She kills herself at the household altar with a sword, calling down a curse on Creon with her last breath as the killer of her child. Her single scene is famous for its silence — Sophocles withholds her grief and lets the audience supply it.

The old seer, blind, led by a boy. Has never yet brought Thebes a false word and Creon knows it. Arrives in Scene 9 with the warning that the gods are angry — the altars are polluted, the birds will not feed, the city is sick. Creon accuses him of being bribed. Tiresias, provoked, prophesies the death of Creon's son in payment for the burial Creon has refused. Then he leaves. Within minutes Creon is running to free Antigone, too late.

Fifteen Theban elders summoned by Creon at the start to witness his accession and endorse his edict. Sing the famous Ode to Man early on — a hymn to human cleverness that the rest of the play quietly tests against the limits of cleverness. They never openly defy Creon. They watch, hedge, and eventually realize the man they are advising is walking toward ruin they could have helped him avoid. It is the chorus, finally, that prompts the reversal — and it comes too late.

The soldier assigned to watch the body of Polyneices. Drew the lot to bring Creon the bad news — first that the corpse has been mysteriously buried, second that the burier is a young woman caught in the act. His two scenes are the play's only comic relief: a frightened ordinary man trying to save his neck while delivering news that is going to get someone killed. He survives the play; he is the one figure in it who knows when to stop talking.

Arrives in the final scene to report what has happened at the cave. Tells the story of Haemon's discovery of Antigone's body, the lunge at Creon, the fall on the sword. Stays onstage to witness Eurydice's silent exit, then a second messenger comes from inside the palace with the news that the queen has killed herself at the altar. His role is the one Greek tragedy reserves for someone who has seen what cannot be staged: the deaths happen offstage and arrive as words.