Zenia Duell

Xenia was a vital thread in the social fabric of both the Homeric world and the eighth century BC. However, due to its very importance and due to the changing environment of the world in which Homer was composing, xenia is flagged as a cause for concern in Homer through the portrayal of certain characters, situations and relationships: examples of xenia appear throughout the Odyssey and are persistently problematic. Through these examples of xenia, Homer inspires a discussion about it, which implies that it was vulnerable to abuse and change, and that the boundaries of such relationships were not concretely defined. Homer demonstrates that xenia was a way of gauging the level of civilisation of a community, which Odysseus must identify as he encounters new and alien groups on his voyage and must either depend on their hospitality or escape from their enmity. Homer also uses certain examples of xenia to define that it was a personal relationship rather than as a system of exchange that could benefit a wider community. He places xenia on a spectrum of exchange, which encompasses concerns about its relation to trade and piracy. Throughout, xenia is flagged as a concept of huge importance, yet also of huge concern, and thus an essential issue for discussion in the epic.

Alexander's death as much immortalised him as proved his mortality. For years after his death, scholars, doctors, historians, novelists and archaeologists have tried to trace back from the scant and often unreliable evidence what killed one of the most powerful and enigmatic men ever to walk the earth. This essay explores the political and social agendas of two accounts of his death: the Liber de Morte, and the University of Maryland's diagnosis.