In our post-kantian world we are much given to pious talk about dignity, the dignity of the person. Everyone has it; it cannot be lost; it inheres in being human, like opposable thumbs (which, however, can be lost). Dignity is sometimes contrasted to honor, which can be lost or simply not acquired, there being no special presumption you were born to it unless your parents had it, and which, even if they did have it, was yours for the losing. Honor, unlike dignity, was also there for the taking; it could be captured from others. Kant himself opposed dignity to price: “In the realm of ends everything has either a price or a dignity. What has a price is such that something else can also be put in its place as its equivalent; by contrast whatever is elevated above all price, and admits of no equivalent, has a dignity.” Our talionic peoples, though, had a different way of talking about something very closely akin to dignity, and it had a price.

We have seen that pretty near everything – the body, life, and even more abstract goods like honor – had a price, for even though you could not quite buy honor, you could surely buy honor back, or redeem it. In fact, the surest way of proving you were entitled to it was to reacquire it when it got taken away.