We've crossed the threshold with Odysseus.
He's making his way through this extraordinarily wealthy palace.
He gets over close to Arete and Alcinous, the queen and the king.
The fog lifts her around him and he makes his lunge.
And grabs the queen's knees. That seems kind of strange.
This is bizarre behavior. Why is that someone just walks up to
someone else and grabs hold of their knees?
Well, he's engaging in a Greek custom that gives him instant status.
As a guest friend. To grab hold of someone's need makes you
their suppliant and they then owe you guest friendship and then they owe you the
kind of hospitality that is required of great Greek person to give to someone
who's one of those guest friends. Now to become a guest friend is a good
thing and it entitles you all kind of stuff of the, of your hosts, if your hosts
of good hosts. If your hosts of bad hosts you never know
what you're going to get. But good hosts demonstrate how good they
are by their hospitality. This hospitality is not just any kind.
It's a special, overwhelming kind of hospitality.
In Greek, they gave it a special word. It's called, xenia, there written in the
Greek characters. If you wanna try to pronounce it's, zenia
is just fine, as if it starts with a Z. Or even to get a little bit fancier, you
can pronounce it with a. Ks sound at the beginning.
Xenia. Think of taxi without the ta at the
beginning. Xenia.
And this gives you it, it, it labels a custom of extraordinary, overwhelming
hospitality. If a person washes up on someone else's
shore, that, the, the, other person whose shore is being washed up on.
Owes that, that guest who was a stranger to their household overwhelming
hospitality. Now, the hospitality is the not just, you
know, giving the person a drink of water, patting them on the back, and sending them
on their way. It is something that is a, a sacred right.
It's an important central component of, of, of aristocratic Greek behavior.
Visitors are thought to come from Zeus, we hear in book seven.
Suppliant's rights are sacred, we hear. The prominent Phoenician in book seven,
page. Pages 184 and -five sets down and lays
down the whole law, saying, we got to watch out for this, yes.
We got to be really nice to these, to these guests because that's a sacred duty
of ours. The need to be hospitable is also
mentioned by Nausicaa to her maidens on page 175 in the Fagles translation.
She's saying, come on, we got to be nice to this person.
We got to make sure that we give some hospitality here, food and whatever we can
because it's necessary. These strangers come from Zeus.
Zeus oversees this whole region. It's a further marker of just how
important it is. Now, the hospitality, is thought to answer
to a scale, where. Always, more is better.
The more lavish. The more extravagant you can offer.
Gifts you can offer your stranger the more you're practicing xenia.
And also at the same time conversely the more you demonstrate yourself to be one of
the great people that's capable of giving all kinds of great stuff to someone else.
So it's performative as well. You demonstrate your own status by your
ability to give lavish gifts. So you might start with food and a chance
to, for the person to wash themselves. Then there'll be new clothes and a bed,
and why don't you stay with us and we'll hold a massive feast for you.
We'll slaughter many dozens of expensive animals.
We'll hold games in your honor. We'll invite people from all around our
community, come in the tens and hundreds to join us in celebrating you, a stranger,
whoever you are, and take a 100 golden tripods if you like and why don't you
marry my daughter and come and inherit my kingdom?
These are all things that you're supposed to do on the scale of xenia.
You just offer overwhelming stuff to the person, to the point where it's almost
embarrassing, too much is better than enough.
And the more you do the better person you are.
So, all of this is happening, while, at the same time, we don't get anything back
from a stranger. Notice what Odysseus' obligations are,
zero. He's just there to be willingly
entertained, fed, taken care of, flattered, cajoled.
Just to be the center of attention. That's all Odysseus has to do is go along
with it. He's under no obligation at all.
In fact it's so extreme, his lack of obligation, that they don't even bother to
ask him his name. They don't even know who he is up through
book eight. Only at the close of book eight does King
Alcinous think it's now appropriate, after the extraordinary hospitality has been
lavished on the guest, does he at this point think it's appropriate even to ask
our stranger's name. Now, so, what is it about xenia?
Why this kind of hospitality? It's probably answerable best by a single
word. Trade.
Remember that Mediterranean Sea we looked at, at the beginning of the class and
talking about it as a corrupting sea bringing all kinds of ancient cultures
together? Well, it's true that in cultures that are
going to benefit from mutual trade with one another, having a cultural plank in
your cultural platform that says that you ought to treat strangers really well.
That helps grease the wheels of trade for all the cultures involved.
And the Greeks surely benefited from this and the demonstration of overwhelming
hospitality was at the same time a way to ensure that people thought that your
shores will be friendly ones. And will look at you kindly as trading
partners. Extremely, extremely valuable, thing for
people to, to do. So we've seen Odysseus now already put his
wits to use in regaining his powers of speech and persuasion.
He got himself his pair of clothes. He's now worked himself into a center of
what is going to be a very powerful society that's helpful for him.
He gets hold of the knees which now has earned him instant suppliant status from
these people that are clearly capable of giving him all, everything that he needs.
And now we're going to watch him piece together in the rest of book seven and
eight the kinds of things that he needs next, which is food, a safe secure place
to recover, a chance to rest, a chance to recharge himself and then eventually also
a conveyance home. The Phaeacians are gonna be Odysseus'
link, not only back into human society and to giving him the chance to rebuild
himself or there are also going to be his link back to Ithaca.