From hospitality to foreignness

We start with a short review of the evolution from the ancient tradition of the familiar hospitality to a public institution controlled by the póleis, regulating the private and public foreign relations. Afterwards, we deal with the problem of finding the reasons leading the post-homeric term πρόξενος, related etymologically with ξένος «foreigner», to bear sometimes the inusual meaning of «witness». A careful analysis of the incidences in Homer of the term μάρτυρος «witness», leads to the conclusion that yet in the homeric epics there were premonitory signs of the later synonimy between πρόξενος and μάρτυρος. Finally we underline the coincidences, mainly lexical, between the analyzed homeric pas¬sages and some of the more ancient inscriptions where πρόξενοι is applied to the «witnesses», particularly in the covenant between Sibarites and Serdaîoi and in some ancient donations from Greek colonies in the South of Italy. The paper ends with a short commentary on the earlier epigraphic examples of πρόξενος with its institutional meaning and on a classical decree of proxenía.