All 5 Uses of
transgress
in
The Odyssey, by Homer (translated by: Butcher & Lang)
- Oh that the gods would clothe me with such strength as his, that I might take vengeance on the wooers for their cruel transgression, who wantonly devise against me infatuate deeds!†
Book 3 *transgression = an act that violates a rule, promise, or social norm
- Even then the goodly Odysseus awoke where he slept on his native land; nor knew he the same again, having now been long afar, for around him the goddess had shed a mist, even Pallas Athene, daughter of Zeus, to the end that she might make him undiscovered for that he was, and might expound to him all things, that so his wife should not know him neither his townsmen and kinsfolk, ere the wooers had paid for all their transgressions.†
Book 13transgressions = acts that violate rules, promises, or social norms
- May Zeus requite them, the god of suppliants, seeing that he watches over all men and punishes the transgressor!†
Book 13transgressor = someone who violates a rule, promise, or social norm
- Then Odysseus of many counsels looked fiercely on him, and said: 'Eurymachus, not even if ye gave me all your heritage, all that ye now have, and whatsoever else ye might in any wise add thereto, not even so would I henceforth hold my hands from slaying, ere the wooers had paid for all their transgressions.†
Book 22transgressions = acts that violate rules, promises, or social norms
- But the goodly swineherd was ware thereof, and quickly he spake to Odysseus who stood nigh him: 'Son of Laertes, of the seed of Zeus, Odysseus, of many devices, lo, there again is that baleful man, whom we ourselves suspect, going to the chamber; do thou tell me truly, shall I slay him if I prove the better man, or bring him hither to thee, that he may pay for the many transgressions that he has devised in thy house?'†
Book 22
Definitions:
-
(1)
(transgress) to violate a rule, promise, or social norm
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Much more rarely (and archaically), transgress can mean: "spread over land, especially along a subsiding shoreline" as in "The sea transgresses along the West coast of the island."