Examples Of Hospitality In The Odyssey

In The Odyssey an epic poem by Homer, Odysseus goes on a twenty year voyage which includes the Trojan War when a sea nymph named Kalypso holds Odysseus captive. During this trip Odysseus meets a lot of new people and when he meets these new people they treat him like he is family, this concept is known as hospitality. In this epic poem this theme is constantly shown by some of the main characters and other characters too. Most forms of hospitality are good but at times there is also bad hospitality shown. Both positive and negative examples of hospitality exist in The Odyssey; Homer uses both these examples to suggest that good hospitality shows loyalty and nobility to others while bad hospitality shows that that person does not care about
Telemakhos gives a warm greeting to Athena when she walks into his house and says “Greetings stranger! Welcome to our feast[…] A maid/ brought them a silver finger bowl and filled it/ out of a beautiful spouting golden jug” (1.154-171). When Athena came into their house they immediately welcomed her and brought out their nicest jugs and bowls. Telemakhos does this to make her feel welcomed. In this quotes you can see that good hospitality shows loyalty towards others. When Athena walked in to Telemakhos’s house he automatically cared towards her and made her feel at home, this was one of the many examples of good hospitality in The Odyssey. In this epic poem by Homer there are lots of examples of good hospitality but there are also some bad examples too. Good hospitality shows your loyalties and shows to the gods how caring of others you are to them, while bad hospitality shows that you do not care about how others view you and also shows how selfish you are. Thousands of years later, today hospitality is shown to our guests and to try to make them feel welcomed in our homes, this shows how important hospitality is and how it is still present after many of years have