One flaw that existed in ancient greek times and still exists today is greed. One can see acts of greed by the suitors when Telemachus is talking to Athena he says “All the nobles who rule the islands round about, Dulichion, and Same, and wooded Zacynthus too, and all who lord it in rocky Ithaca as well— down to the last man they court my mother, they lay waste my house! And mother … she neither rejects a marriage she despises nor can she bear to bring the courting to an end— while they continue to bleed my household white. Soon—you wait—they’ll grind me down as well”(1.286-294). Greed is shown by the described behavior of the suitors, they take as much from odysseus’s household as they want however they contribute very little. Their acts of greed are unacceptable especially when it is considered that the suitors contributed very little or nothing to the household. Another example of greed in the Odyssey is when is when Odysseus’s crew mistakes a bag of wind for plunder and opens it hoping to steal some gold. One man said “Look at our captain’s luck—so loved by the world, so prized at every landfall, every port of call. Heaps of lovely plunder he hauls home from Troy, while we who went through slogging just as hard, we go home empty-handed”(10.idk the line number). Then the shipmates opened the bag expecting to find gold, silver, and plunder but instead they found squalls that whipped them back out to sea. Odysseus and his crew were so close to home when acts of jealousy and greed launched them back to king Aeolus’s island. A second consequence of this greedy act is king Aeolus would not offer Odysseus and his crew with a second bag of winds which means Odysseus’s crew gas to paddle back to their home land. If it was not for this act of greed and jealousy they would have had a much easier journey home. A final example of greed from the Odyssey is when Eurymachus is hosting friends in Odysseus’s house and he is angry at the beggar for begging for food and he throws a stool at the beggar (Odysseus in disguise) Antinous says “What spirit brought this pest to plague our feast? Back off! Into the open, clear of my table, or you, you’ll soon land in an Egypt, Cyprus, to break your heart! What a brazen, shameless beggar! Scrounging food from each man in turn, and look at their handouts, reckless, never a qualm, no holding back, not when making free with the next man’s goods— each one’s got plenty here”(18.need to get page number). And then Eurymachus throws a stool at Odysseus. Eurymachus shows greed when he attacks the beggar because he is mad at him for begging for food even though he is living in Odysseus house and eating Odysseus’s food. Even though Eurymachus does not know that the beggar is Odysseus in a disguise he is eating for free and chooses not to share with the hungry beggar. A second flaw of humanity that can be observed in the Odyssey is ego. There are many times Odysseus’s ego get him in a lot of trouble. A great example of when ego gets in the way and gets Odysseus in trouble is when he is attacking the cyclops and he says “Cyclops— if any man on the face of the earth should ask you who blinded you, shamed you so—say Odysseus, raider of cities, he gouged out your eye, Laertes’ son who makes his home in Ithaca!” (9.502-506). Odysseus had previously tricked the cyclops into thinking his name is nobody so when he would call for help he would say “help nobody is attacking me!” and the other cyclops would not help because thew thought that their fellow cyclops was not being attacked. If it was not for his ego Odysseus would have had a much easier trip home. A second example of ego as a flaw of humanity in the book The Odyssey is after Odysseus and his crew escape the cyclops and they are discussing the escape Odysseus says “Did I not keep my nerve, use my wits, to find a way out for us?” (12.776-777). Odysseus is only thinking about himself and what he did right, not about what he did right or what his crew did right but he is solely focused on his ego and what he did. The third example of ego as a flaw of humanity in the book The Odyssey is when Odysseus kills all the suitors and those who served them (quote here)(22.idk line). Odysseus can not forgive those who tried to mary his wife and wrecked his house. Because of Odysseus inability to forgive the suitors and those who served them the result was the killing of the suitors and servants/maids/priests who served them. This is the best example for ego as a flaw of humanity because it shows how extreme someone’s ego can become and the results it has.