Honor, Glory, and Piety in Ancient Literature

Introduction

The history of literature begins with the history of writing, in Bronze Age Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt, although the oldest literary texts that have come down to us date to a full millennium after the invention of writing, to the late 3rd millennium BC. The earliest literary authors known by name are Ptahhotep and Enheduanna, dating to ca. the 24th and 23rd centuries BC, respectively.

Discussion

Theses three elements have an important role in ancient literature. For example in has been seen that , for all practical purposes, the transformation from external to internal honor was completed by the mid eighteenth century and was universally accepted as an ideal before the end of the nineteenth. This study will stop at this point, because a brief reconnaissance into twentieth-century literature has revealed no significant changes or new departures in meaning. Moreover, the mass of evidence to be sifted and the lack of historical perspective would tend to make all judgements both difficult and dubious.

In tracing the gradual development of the old German word êra into its modern derivative Ehre, this study has shown how the slight change in pronunciation was accompanied by a far more radical change in meaning: a shift from denoting respect, deference, prestige, rank, or superiority to denoting admirable conduct, personal integrity, or innner sense of right and wrong. Honor changed completely in essence; yet it remained constant in function; in both cases it was a spur to virtue, that is to say, an incentive to good and a deterrent from evil. The ancient Teutons admired men who showed courage in battle through a sense of honor, in its original meaning of concern for good reputation. Nineteenth century Germans also admired men who did good deeds through a sense of honor, but in its altered meaning of disinterested obedience to absolute moral law. The chief catalyst for this transformation was the Christian faith, which first convinced the Teutons of a divine law transcending the opinions of men. Through promise of reward and threat of punishment, the Church gradually persuaded the converts to practice, or at least to acknowledge, a code of behavior incompatible with their traditional ethos. In presenting their ethic of humility, the missionaries combatted the native idea of honor and damned it as the sin of pride. Being a good of the world, honor was no fitting reward for virtue, ...