Sometimes αἰδὼς is an excess of deference, or what we might call scrupulosity; the feeling which carries the fastidious observance of some right sentiment towards others up to the point where it threatens to interfere with a public or other clear duty. So Telemachus begs of Nestor, ‘tell me the truth,’
μηδέ τί μ’ αἰδόμενος μειλίσσεο, μηδ’ ἐλεαίρων[817].
In the Doloneia, Agamemnon, fearful that Diomed will choose Menelaus as a companion out of deference, says, ‘Do not let αἰδὼς influence you: choose the best man.’ Sometimes it is compassion, or ruth; as when Achilles, before the ransom, is said to show no αἰδὼς towards the body of Hector. But here αἰδὼς includes the idea of shame and self-respect. Sometimes it is reverence towards a superior, as in Od. xiv. 505, and in αἰδοῖος applied by Helen to Priam in Il. iii. 172. In this manner it becomes applicable to the sentiments a man should entertain towards the gods,
ἀλλ’ αἰδεῖο θεοὺς, Ἀχιλεῦ[818].
And this is a very remarkable use of the term, because Priam certainly does not mean to urge upon Achilles a dread of the gods, but something quite distinct. Sometimes it is applied by a superior to an inferior; and means ‘his or her dues,’ as among the Immortals, where Jupiter says to Thetis, that he reserves the honour of the ransom for Achilles,
αἰδῶ καὶ φιλότητα τεὴν μετόπισθε φυλάσσων[819].
It may also be felt towards an inferior among men: Agamemnon is exhorted to feel it towards Chryses[820], for it is not a personal sentiment, but implies an object, outside the mere person who is the immediate occasion of it. So Achilles is intreated to revere (αἴδεσθαι) Lycaon, a vanquished and suppliant enemy[821].
Sometimes it signifies the constitution of a special relation, over and above the general bond between man and man. A person’s αἰδοῖοι are his relations, friends, guests, and the like. Even so a wanderer is αἰδοῖος to the gods (Od. v. 447). Sometimes it means purely mental modesty, as in Od. viii. 171, ὁ δ’ ἀσφαλέως ἀγορεύει αἰδοῖ μειλιχίῃ; he speaks with that engaging bashfulness and careful indication of respect for his audience, which forms a principal grace of the orator. Sometimes the physical, as well as mental, quality of modesty; as when αἰδὼς kept the goddesses at home (Od. viii. 324). Sometimes, again, simply shyness; as when Telemachus is exhorted by Minerva to put away αἰδὼς in Od. iii. 14; or as in the phrase κακὸς δ’ αἰδοῖος ἀλήτης; ‘it will never do for a beggar to be shy.’
No finer shading of sentiment, I think, can be found in the language of the most civilized nations, nor any case so remarkable of a high and tender, and at the same time largely developed state of feeling at a time when material progress was so partial, rude, and slight. And of the vital importance of this element of the Greek moral code, we find a proof in the representation of Hesiod, who gives it as a characteristic of his iron, or post-Homeric, age, that αἰδὼς along with νέμεσις had fled from the earth.
Other cognate terms.