Far removed from today's individualistic society, is the ancient Greece portrayed in Homer's The Odyssey, where hospitality and good-will were customary. In the epic, Zeus decrees that those who seek clemency from the gods must welcome travelers with hospitality. A man was obliged to give his finest foods, lodging, and assistance before ever asking for his guest's name or intent. There is a sense that those of high status are the main givers of hospitality, however, the wealthy are not the only ones commanded to offer a level of friendliness. Homer emphasizes hospitality from everyone during Telemachus' and Odysseus' journeys, using a man's cordiality with his guest to infer his character. If a man is disingenuous, then he doesn't show hospitality and Homer makes sure that individual faces the vengeance of those he has wronged. To acknowledge the importance of a major principle in ancient Greek culture, the purpose of this essay is to examine the role that hospitality plays in The Odyssey.
Gestures of hospitality in The Odyssey were used as an instrument to tell the reader who were the protagonists and who were the antagonists. None of the antagonists in the story ever exhibited any form of hospitality towards Odysseus or Telemachus. One such example of this is the first encounter that the reader faces between Odysseus and a potential host. At the cave of the cyclops, Polyphemus, a son of Poseidon, Odysseus and his men are denied a hospitable welcome and, instead, several are attacked and eaten by Polyphemus. At this point, Homer offers us the first major consequence for denying Odysseus hospitality. Through Odysseus' characteristic cunning, the men get the cyclops drunk on wine, and then proceed to blind his only eye while he is asleep. Due to his inability to see, Polyphemus then is unable to stop the men from escaping, and as a result of his ignorance for the law of cordiality, loses many of his prized sheep, as well as his vision for the remainder of his life.
