What is the role of women in Oedipus Rex?

As well
as , we also have the ordinary women of Thebes. At the start of the play, they go to the palace
to plead withto end their suffering. The terrible plague afflicting the city has wiped out
entire families, and the women are desperate for Oedipus to do something, anything, to lift this
abominable curse. What this episode illustrates is that women in Ancient Greece were confined to
a limited role in life, as mothers, daughters, and sisters. It's in such capacities that the
Theban women approach Oedipus for help.

Oedipus's adopted mother, Merope,
shows herself to be as unwilling to face up to the truth as Jocasta. She had an opportunity to
tell Oedipus about his real parentage when he asked her but declined to do so, as she was
reluctant to defy fate....