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The vanquishing of the father, in whichever of its manifold guises it may be represented, is one of the major themes—indeed, it could almost be termed the major theme—of myth and legend. And this is understandable enough, for the overcoming of the father might be called the normal aim and desire of the son, and in fact his appointed destiny.
As compared with this all but universal theme, the killing of the mother is sufficiently rare, at any rate in Greek mythology, to challenge inquiry into why it occurs and what it may mean, since obviously it is rather less explicable on its face than the overthrowing of the father. And, as far at least as Greek mythology is concerned, the killing of the mother is further notable in being attributed to a figure who outstrips even Oedipus as a central personage of Greek drama, of which, indeed, he has been called (by Gilbert Murray) the most typical tragic hero.1
This person is Orestes, who, like Hamlet, returned from abroad to slay in vengeance the murderer of his father and paramour-become-husband of his mother, 'guileful Aegisthus', but who, unlike Hamlet, suffered few of the paralyzing doubts and hesitations which so notoriously beset the Danish hero. Also unlike Hamlet, he followed this righteous act of vengeance by the slaying of his mother, Klytemnestra.2 On this