ὕβρις] which corresponds with the preceding in some points, while it differs in others, is ‘an injury or annoyance inflicted, involving disgrace to the sufferer; for no benefit that is expected to accrue to the aggressor except the mere fact of its having been done, in other words the pleasure of doing it: for retaliation is not wanton outrage but vengeance or punishment’. This is the locus classicus for the explanation of ὕβρις, so important in the Orators and the Athenian law. See note on I 12. 26, where it is examined from this point of view. The outraged personal dignity, the wounded honour, which gives its special sting to an act of ὕβρις, and distinguishes it from a mere assault, αἰκία, is noted in the text by the phrase ἐφ᾽ οἷς αἰσχύνη ἐστὶ τῷ πάσχοντι, and the rest of the definition describes the ‘wantonness’ of the aggression, which ὕβρις has in common with ἐπηρεασμός, and in which the ὀλιγωρία is shewn. Compare I 13. 10, where the two same characteristics of ὕβρις reappear; οὐ γὰρ εἰ ἐπάταξε πάντως ὕβρισεν, ἀλλ᾽ εἰ ἕνεκά του, οἷον τοῦ ἀτιμάσαι ἐκεῖνον ἢ αὐτὸς ἡσθῆναι. ὕβρις therefore is wanton outrage, an insult or injury which disgraces and humiliates its victim, and is prompted by no motive but the mere momentary gratification of humiliating another and therein indulging the love and the sense of power. Some illustrations of acts of ὕβρις are to be found in Polit. VIII (V), 10, 1311 a 33. Personal outrage, ἐπὶ τὸ σῶμα, is one of the causes of conspiracy and revolution. τῆς δ᾽ ὕβρεως οὔσης πολυμεροῦς, ἕκαστον αὐτῶν αἴτιον γίνεται τῆς ὀργῆς: τῶν δ̓ ὀργιζομένων σχεδὸν οἱ πλεῖστοι τιμωρίας χάριν ἐπιτίθενται, ἀλλ̓ οὐχ ὑπεροχῆς, οἷον κ.τ.λ. and then follows a number of examples. It is plain however from a comparison of this with what immediately follows in the Rhet. § 6, where ὕβρις is traced to the love of ὑπεροχή, that the ὕβρις here spoken of is confined to insults or outrages of a particular kind, offered to the person, εἰς τὸ σῶμα.
Commentary on the Rhetoric of Aristotle. Edward Meredith Cope. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1877.
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