Atê
“ruin/blind folly”
idea · 2 works · 9 mentions · 10 anchored passages
also in the atlas: Ate the deity
atê · derangement · cruel mischief · spite · that transgression · the ruin · veering · wrong
in the texts
Iliad
The concept of ruinous, god-sent folly or delusion, explicitly named in Greek as atê by Helen in describing the cause of the war's suffering.
Still, brother, come in and rest upon this seat, for it is you who bear the brunt of that toil [ ponos] that has been caused by my hateful self and by the veering [ atê] of Alexander - both of whom Zeus has doomed to be a theme of song among those that shall be born hereafter.
for they forgave not the wrong [ atê] done them by Alexander in disdaining the goddesses who came to him when he was in his sheepyards, and preferring her who had offered him a wanton to his ruin.
As when some cruel spite [ atê] has befallen a man that he should have killed some one in his own country, and must flee to a great man's protection in a land [ dêmos] of strangers, and all marvel who see him, even so did Achilles marvel as he beheld Priam.
Odyssey
The concept of ruinous mischief or blind folly, explicitly glossed as the harm Odysseus attributes to his ill-timed sleep.
‘Father Zeus,’ I exclaimed, ‘and all you other gods who live in everlasting bliss, you have done me a cruel mischief [ atê] by the sleep into which you have sent me;
Heaven put it in her heart to do wrong, and she gave no thought to that transgression [ atê], which has been the source of all our sorrows [ penthos].
Neleus seized violently [ biê] his goods and held them for a whole year, during which he was a close prisoner in the house of king Phylakos, and in much distress of mind both on account of the daughter of Neleus and because he was haunted by a great sorrow [ atê] that dread Erinyes had laid upon him.