The Ancient Greek Demigod Who Broke the Laws of Hospitality
In ancient Greek lore, Ixion was a son of the war god Ares and a mortal woman, who became king of the Lapiths tribe in northern Greece. From early on, he became infamous as somebody who was mad, bad, and dangerous to know. His misdeeds on earth – and up in the heavens as well – led the gods to inflict a terrible punishment upon him. He first offended the Olympians when he promised his father-in-law a valuable present as a bride price – wealth paid by a groom to the bride’s parents. He reneged, however, and failed to pay after the marriage.
The father-in-law seized some of Ixion’s valuable horses as security for the promised bride price. Ixion pretended to shrug it off, invited his father-in-law to a feast, and there, shoved him into a bed of burning coals. That murder was particularly odious in Greek eyes because it violated Xenia – the laws of hospitality between guests and hosts. The breach of Xenia left Ixion defiled, unfit to live amidst men, and shunned by fellow Greeks. Nobody wanted to perform the necessary religious rituals that would cleanse him of his guilt. So Ixion had to live in the wilderness as an outlaw. That was bad, but as seen below, it got way worse for him.
