115: Xenia/ξενία– Host & Guest

Xenia (Greek: ξενία) is an ancient Greek concept of hospitality. It is almost always translated as 'guest-friendship' or 'ritualized friendship'. It is an institutionalized relationship rooted in generosity, gift exchange, and reciprocity. Historically, hospitality towards foreigners and guests was understood as a moral obligation, as well as a political imperative. Hospitality towards foreigners honored Zeus Xenios (and Athene Xenia), patrons of foreigners. (Wikipedia)

"For Zeus is the avenger of both supplicants and strangers— God of Guests, he sees to strangers, and strangers deserve our respect."
Homer. The Odyssey 9.270-1

To prepare for this session find contrasting passages from Homer, or other Greek writers, for some of the steps in this “protocol,” passages that show how the step is performed in a different way, or absent/present, in the contrasting passages.

Step-by-step conventions of the standard Homeric hospitality scene (ξενία / xenia
· Meeting a young person
· Arrival at the destination
· Description of the surroundings, the residence
· Dog at the door
· Arrival at the threshold
· Supplication
· Immediate welcome (before questions)
· Attending to horses, boats
· Invitation inside
· Storing of the guest’s arms
· Ritual of seating and accommodation
· Explanation of the protocols
· Washing / cleansing (lustral care)
· Meal preparation
· Feasting begins
· Libation / prayer and a sense of the divine
· The meal is eaten in silence or light talk
· Only after eating: formal questions
· Storytelling / recognition arc
· Entertainment (often bardic song)
· Blessing of the host
· Bed and protection for the night
· Detaining of the guest
· Morning departure preparation
· Guest-gifts (xenia gifts)
· Departure Meal
· Departure Libation
· Departure Omen
· Exchange of names and bond-making
· Escort to next destination/ safe passage
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For this series on Homer's Odyssey we will be using the new translation by Daniel Mendelsohn: Homer: The Odyssey. Translated, with Introduction and Notes. University of Chicago Press, April 9th, 2025.

Sessions devoted to Daniel Mendelsohn’s translation will alternate with meetings focused on a broader range of “Odysseiana,” materials that illuminate the transmission, reception, and interpretation of Homer’s poem across time. These companion materials will include ancient textual witnesses, archaeological and visual evidence, and modern thematic and analytical work that together situate the Odyssey within its cultural, historical, and performative contexts.

Textual materials
• Early manuscripts on papyrus and parchment from as early as the third century BCE, along with later medieval codices, show how the text of the Odyssey was copied, stabilized, and annotated over many centuries.
• A clay tablet from Roman-era Olympia, inscribed with verses from Book 14, offers one of the earliest substantial epigraphic attestations of the poem and illustrates its circulation in public and sacred spaces.
• Later printed editions, informed by Alexandrian scholarship and modern textual criticism, will serve as points of comparison for issues of wording, lineation, and commentary.

Archaeological and visual materials
• Vase paintings and other images from Greek pottery that depict scenes associated with the Odyssey—such as shipwrecks, supplication, or women at the loom—will be used to explore how ancient artists visualized narrative moments and social practices found in the poem.
• Museum collections, such as those of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, provide objects like armor, textiles, and domestic furnishings that help reconstruct the material world of Odysseus and his contemporaries.
• These artifacts will help connect specific passages in Mendelsohn’s translation to ancient views of the gods, warfare, hospitality, and poetic performance.

Thematic and analytical materials
• Scholarly discussions of themes such as cunning and intelligence, homecoming and estrangement, and the tension between order and disorder will frame close readings of selected episodes.
• Attention to the Odyssey’s origins in oral performance, including formulaic language, meter, and narrative framing, will complement Mendelsohn’s effort to reproduce the poem’s formal features in English.
• Companion texts from later epic and narrative traditions will be brought in to show how Homeric patterns are adapted, challenged, or echoed in subsequent literature.

Mendelsohn’s translation is also available on Kindle and as an Audible audio book. About Daniel Mendelsohn read here.