August 5, 2020

Aristeia covid-19: day 148 | US: GA | info | act

I fell down a editing rabbit hole this morning. I happened upon a word I was not familiar with in looking at instructor resources for World Literature. I came across a question about the aristeia of Achilles and Hector. While I was familiar with aristoi (the best people), but I had not heard of aristeia before.

At first Wikipedia was not much help, since the article was lacking sources. I thought, since I didn’t know the word, and I really should have, I would clean up the article. So, two hours later, the WP page is looking much better, and I have educated myself. Man, I love learning new stuff.

Just so I have it here, in my own words:

“ Aristeia: the hero’s greatest moment of battle—his moment of glory on the battlefield, usually more prolonged scene where the warrior reaches his zenith as a hero, and sometimes ending with his death. ”

I think it’s closely linked with arete, excellence or moral virtue, which I have written about. I have to add this term to some of my other notes.