[Cause]

Azath I think you’re arguing about a disagreement which only you see. Zeus law might be an anachronism but as you yourself agree the concept of Xenia was real, Zeus was primarily the god responsible for guarding it. So is it really worth arguing about? Zeus law is a much simpler way of explaining the concept, along with treat strangers well because Zeus likes disguises.

Norse mythology I believe has an identical concept. Odin too likes disguises.

The Hebrew bible similiarly dating back 3000 years has moral stories about being kind to strangers. As do countless other cultures. Before cars, planes, cars, post and even their ancient predecessors were a thing travel was incredibly difficult and there is an almost universal concept of exhorting you to be kind to strangers as result. We don’t need to be Pendantic about the name.

Spoiler

Nolan’s take on the Trojan horse violating Xenia is however I think entirely his invention. Combined with quite brilliant use of the noticeable concurrence of sea people raids, if the real Troy war date by historians is trustworthy. In any event the illiad and odyssey were written centuries after the fact so are myth and not history.

I’m not an Ancient Greek historian but my recollection is that Athena was on the side of the Greeks and she herself as Odysseus sponsor was maybe even the inspiration for the idea. Zeus was neutral. Poseidon and Apollo sided with Troy. The Trojan horse was meant as an offering for Poseidon for favorable conditions on the journey back. He was the god of horses, and the ocean, and earthquakes (his portfolio is just bizarre).

One point of the Iliad is that tragedy befalls those who defy the gods and fate. They wouldn’t have knowingly transgressed Zeus. They saw the Trojan ploy as a brilliant and celebrated move of cunning. Not as the spark of receipt that doomed civilization.

On the color thing. In all human languages the pattern seems to be dark/bright > black/white > red (blood) > everything else in different orders > blue. Despite the sky and ocean being blue it’s always the last color to enter a language. There were no ways to create artificial blue dyes for centuries and so I believe the scholarly consensus is that Homer used wine-dark as you say as a description of saturation. I’m color blind so this whole idea has always fascinated me. Different cultures identify different number of bands in the rainbow and cultures which have more names for shades of greens are naturally more sensitive to noticing shades of greens that other cultures would ignore. I just think this amongst other things shows however that we just can’t really appreciate how our ancestors of 3000 years ago thought about things. Owning slaves would have been as common and as morally objectionable as a shepherd owning sheep. They could not fathom the number 0 or what it represents and they had no idea of the mathematical concept of odds. To them a throw of the dice,bones was gods will. Honor and reputation were far more important and real than they might be today. We are raised with thought-software , for lack of a better term, they literally didn’t have and which we don’t even notice. And of course vice-versa.

Of course outside of academic exercises what people dead 3000 years ago thought of Xenia doesn’t matter. It’s a 2026 film, for a 2026 audience and the odyssey cachet is because it’s fascinated us for over a millennia.