Thread by @sentantiq

Homer provides few universal rights for human beings, but one that emerges in the Iliad is the expectation of proper burial, lamentation, and memorial.

The γέρας…θανόντων (Geras thanontôn).

Literally, something like the "honor prize of the dead"

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γέρας (geras) is charged in the Iliad. The whole conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles starts when Agamemnon deprives Achilles of Briseis, his γέρας (geras), which is a token of the honor (timê) he has in his community.

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But as Achilles finds out, physical tokens are essentially meaningless when you're going to die anyway.

He insists "let us mourn Patroklos, for that is the geras of the dead" (Πάτροκλον κλαίωμεν· ὃ γὰρ γέρας ἐστὶ θανόντων) at the beginning of book 23.

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Earlier, when Zeus flirts with the idea of saving Sarpedon, Hera tells him that's not right and instead to send him home "where his cousins and relatives will bury him / with a mound and a stele. for this is the geras of the dead"

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ἔνθά ἑ ταρχύσουσι κασίγνητοί τε ἔται τε
τύμβῳ τε στήλῃ τε· τὸ γὰρ γέρας ἐστὶ θανόντων.

The Iliad ends with Zeus and Apollo arguing for a proper burial of Hektor despite Hera's and Achilles' wishes. I mean, the rites of burial are a big deal.

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They are central to Greek poetry and tragedy, best known perhaps in Sophocles' Antigone where even the asshole Creon is willing to offer proper rites to the nephew who died for the city.

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So properly honoring the dead--especially those who have died for you--is (1) primal and ancient and (2) a bare minimum threshold for civilization.

not doing so brings plague and pollution on your state.

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