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[492] Τειρεσίας belongs to the Theban cycle of legend. Different stories were current as to the cause of his blindness, some referring it to the anger of Athena, others to that of Hera. Zeus is represented as having given him the power of prophecy and length of days as compensation for his blindness. After the war of the Epigoni, he died (as the story goes) near Haliartus, and his tomb was shown there in the time of Pausanias (7. 3. 1; 9. 18. 4). There was an oracle of Teiresias in Orchomenus. His name either comes im mediately from “τέρας”, as implying the ‘interpreter of portents,’ or else from its derivative “τείρεα”, the ‘signs of heaven,’ or ‘constellations.’

Homer's Odyssey. W. Walter Merry. James Riddell. D. B. Monro. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1886-1901.

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