Abstract

Hybris, the concept which is briefly discussed in this article, is frequently looked upon, in archaic and classical Greek culture, as an outrage against mortals or immortals. For a hybris to exist, an excess is required regarding a given thresholdand a retaliatory counterpart, from a themistosynē, a specific sense of justice, a little different from dikaiosynē. This article proposes to think of hybris against physis (a concept which is also briefly discussed here), as a way of understanding both the punitive counterpart that results in illness (individual or collective) and the means to avoid or circumvent the outcome or even the perpetration of hybris through the application of particular knowledge.