A question has been posited by one of my scholarly students. Mason inquired as to the extreme hospitality shown to strangers/travellers throughout The Odyssey. He did so in the comment section of our first post.
Upon my first reading of this epic poem I, too, was confused by this. But there are explanationa, many of them.
I favor the explanation of humans' fear of the gods. I believe Athena, goddess of wisdom, appears to humans in disguise a number of times. Would you want to anger a Greek god with disrespect? The answer is no.
Also, one must recognize the fact that there were no hotels, restaurants, lodgings, tacverns, or inns available to travellers back then. People relied upon one another when travelling.
www1.union.edu/wareht/gkcultur/guide/8/web1.html
This web page provides a detailed explanation of your question about hospitality in the ancient Greek world. Please share your thoughts.
thank you for a fast response. what you said makes a lot of sense. i guse its like the suitors said to amphinomus that aneyone can be a god and you whould never know it. come to think of i shoud go back in time and start a chain of super8 motels
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