Abstract
In the register of piety as a norm, the family of hosiē, hosios, hosiotēs occupies an important place. The various occurrences of the noun hosiē in theOdyssey and Homeric Hymns areclosely linked to the honors that men must pay to the superhuman world. The term also designates appropriate attitudes towards other humans, under the gaze of the gods who sanction these gestures and words. In this respect, the negative expression oukhosiē is very close to ou themis in its regulatory scope. But while themis is a vast regulatory net that encompasses the order of the world of which Zeus is the guarantor, the scope ofhosiē is limited to the standards of behavior that form men's obligations to the gods. After the end of the Archaic period, the noun is hardly ever used anymore, but the adjective hosios takes over to designate this type of norm, at the same time as the noun eusebeia and words in its family also develop. Plato's Socrates, in theEuthyphron, will use both families of words interchangeably, and will also point out thathosion is part of dikaion, and therefore inseparable from justice. Consequently,eusebeia is piety seen from the angle of the scrupulous respect elicited by the gods, whilehosion is piety seen from the angle of the norm they produce. These two views of piety both include them in the register of what is right.
