oedipal

[ed-uh-puh l, ee-duh-]

adjective (often initial capital letter)

of, characterized by, or resulting from the Oedipus complex.

Origin of oedipal

First recorded in 1935–40; Oedip(us complex) + -al¹

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for oedipal

Contemporary Examples of oedipal

It was like an Oedipal thing because Chevy left, and there was a feeling like he left them.
Bill Murray’s Words of Wisdom: On Comedy, the Greatness of In-N-Out, and Searching For Great Love
Marlow Stern
October 10, 2014
He knows how to be a narcissistic fighter and an Oedipal fighter.
Obama Has a Mean Streak and He Turned It on Romney This Week
Lloyd Grove
May 26, 2012
“There are two kinds of fighting—narcissistic fighting and Oedipal fighting,” Frank went on.
Obama Has a Mean Streak and He Turned It on Romney This Week
Lloyd Grove
May 26, 2012
The idea for these edgy Oedipal works came to Prince when he was looking through a catalogue of de Kooning's Women series.
Richard Prince's Tribute to Willem de Kooning
Evelyne Politanoff
March 28, 2011

Word Origin and History for oedipal

Oedipal

adj.

1939, "of or pertaining to desire felt for opposite-sex parent," from Oedipus complex (1910), coined by Freud from Sophocles' play "Oedipus Tyrannus," in which the title character, the Theban hero, answers the Sphinx's riddle and unknowingly kills his father and marries his own mother; from Greek Oedipus. The name was used figuratively in English from 1550s for "one who is clever at guessing riddles," which had adjectival form Oedipean (1620s).

Medicine definitions for oedipal