In Sophocles' Antigone1 the motif of birds is seen throughout the play. In ancient Greece, birds had a variety of different roles. Birds were associated with creation, deities, love, wisdom, and specifically prophecies. Mentions of this prophetic animal and related terms occur directly eleven times, thus: "birds  (35, 230, 386, 1104, 1125), "eagle  (127, 1152), "wings  (128,1108), "nest  (472), and "vultures  (781). Sophocles uses the motif of birds to foreshadow the future actions in the play. The description of birds is used throughout the play to illustrate Polynices' irony, Antigone's love, and Creon's consequences for his actions. The chorus describes Polynices as a "wild eagle screaming insults "(127) to represent the chaos Etocles and Polynices instigated. The Chorus describes Polynices the eagle as feasting on their blood, "jaws were glutted with our gore  (136). When Oedipus died, he left his two sons the throne to Thebes. Etocles and Polynices abused the throne with arrogance or "the boast of a proud tongue (141). When Polynices was killed, Creon took the throne of Thebes and forbids the burial of Polynices. In the opening of the play Antigone describes Polynices' dead body as "a sweet treasure for carrion birds to find as they search for food  (35). This highlights the irony of Polynices because he once was a "screaming eagle  (127), who brought disaster to the town of Thebes. Now Polynices is the one who is dead and disaster is being brought on him. Sophocles began the story with Antigone describing him as food for birds and later, he is described has a wild eagle. With Antigone, the motif strengthens her character. She is "a mother bird that comes back to a stripped nest  (472). Antigone is determined to bury her brother the proper way, even if that means going against Creon's orders. By describing Antigone as a "mother bird crying bitterly  (471) over her "young ones stolen  (473), Sophocles p