Arete

When Odysseus enters the hall, he supplicates Arete first, and she receives him. At the feast she notices that the cloak and tunic he wears are her own weaving, and she asks who gave them to him. The question tests his story, and his answer—that Nausicaa helped him—satisfies her.

Arete’s authority is domestic but decisive. In a poem about hospitality, the queen’s approval is as important as the king’s, and the poem gives her the practical intelligence that makes the household work.

Arete appears again when Odysseus asks about the Trojan women in Book XI, and she is present at the departure in Book XIII. She does not have a long speech or an independent storyline, but her presence shapes the Phaeacian court as a partnership rather than a monarchy of one.

Her name means “excellence” or “virtue,” and the poem uses her to embody the best version of the hostess: watchful, generous, and unwilling to be deceived.