dipus

As for the influence of the spelling, both variants are in the original OED for "Œdipus," so spelled, but only the "ee" pronunciation is given for "economical," so spelled, which rather spoils your theory.

languagehat.com: "MISPRONOUNCED" WORDS. 2004

At night, when I lay awake in bed, vast processions passed along in mournful pomp; friezes of never-ending stories, that to my feelings were as sad and solemn as if they were stones drawn from times before Œdipus or Priam, before

The Opium Habit Horace B. Day

With a Thessalian hat of this kind Ismene appears in "[Œ] dipus in Kolonos."

Museum of Antiquity A Description of Ancient Life

Therefore, what I shall tell of the earlier period, believe; and to what I may relate of the later time, give only such credit as may seem due; or doubt it altogether; or, if doubt it ye cannot, then play unto its riddle the dipus.

Eleonora 1917

We are not, like dipus, the blind slaves of a fate that has ordained beforehand the crimes we are to commit, and the punishment those crimes involve, and from which there is no hope or possibility of escape.

Criticisms and Interpretations. II. By Charles Edward Turner 1917

At the same time, it must be admitted that the over-quoted and somewhat antiquated dictum of Coleridge, by which Tom Jones is grouped with the Alchemist and dipus Tyrannus, as one of the three most perfect plots in the world, requires revision.

Criticisms and Interpretations. III. By Austin Dobson 1917

Mr. Tulliver had a destiny as well as dipus, and in this case he might plead, like dipus, that his deed was inflicted on him rather than committed by him.

XIII. Mr. Tulliver Further Entangles the Skein of Life. Book I—Boy and Girl 1917

Could Laius have the proper feelings of a father towards dipus, announced as his destined destroyer by infallible oracles, and felt to be such by every conscious fiber of his soul?

On a Certain Condescension in Foreigners 1914

The verse below, quoted from a tragedy, must refer to Laius and his son, born against the warning of the oracle, Œdipus.

Cicero Plutarch 1909

He quoted the authority of the Rabbis, and some passages from St. Bonaventure, to prove that the Œdipus of Sophocles was the work of the evil spirit; that Terence was excommunicated ipso facto; and added, that doubtless Brutus, who was a very severe Jansenist, assassinated Julius Cæsar for no other reason but because he, who was Pontifex Maximus, presumed to write a tragedy the subject of which was Œdipus.

Letter XXIII-On the Regard That Ought to be Shown to Men of Letters Voltaire 1909