(Gk- blindness; ruin; pron. aw'-tay): in ancient Greek culture this term was used for criminal folly or reckless ambition of a man beyond his proper sphere; it can refer both to blind ambition, and also to that moral blindness which lacks the courage and humility to admit wrong and to ask forgiveness; in the Iliad, Book 9, Agamemnon confesses: "Mad, blind I was!" (IX.134) and Achilles' old friend Phoenix warns him about being "stiff-necked and harsh... blinded" (IX.621); in Greek mythology there was a goddess Ate (often translated "Ruin") who personified the fatal blindnesss and recklessness which produces crime, and the divine punishment which follows it and punishes it; Homer said that Ate was the eldest daughter of Zeus, "that maddening goddess...who blinds us all," and that Zeus cast her out of heaven after she once blinded even him (XIX.106-158; see also Fagles, Intro., p. 54)