The Iliad

With the gods away from the battlefield, the Achaeans gain ground. The poet names Achaean leaders and their victims, detailing their form of death and providing personal details about them. Menelaus captures Adrestus alive. Adrestus supplicates for his life, and Menelaus is prepared to spare him, but Agamemnon rushes forward, calling his brother “soft” and asking whether he received “such tender loving care at home from the Trojans” (197). They kill Adrestus.

Diomedes and Glaucus come face-to-face. Diomedes asks Glaucus whether he is god or man, then recounts the story of Zeus striking Lycurgus blind to explain why he has no desire to go against a god. Glaucus replies that his lineage hardly matters, since men are like leaves “the wind scatters,” then tells a long story about his grandfather Bellerophon, father of his father Hippolochus (200). Diomedes drives his spear into “the earth that feeds us all” and warmly informs Glaucus that they are bound by the rules of guest-friendship (202). Diomedes’s grandfather Oeneus hosted Bellerophon, and the two exchanged “handsome gifts of friendship” (203). Diomedes proposes that they trade armor as a sign of their friendship and avoid each other on the battlefield. Glaucus agrees.

Concerned the Trojans will retreat, Hector’s brother Helenus instructs Aeneas to rally the troops and sends Hector back to the city to ask the women to pray to Athena. The women swarm Hector for news of their male relatives, friends, and loved ones. He meets Hecuba at the palace and instructs her to pray at Athena’s shrine, promising sacrifices for the deliverance of Troy. Hecuba complies, but Athena refuses the prayers. Hector finds Paris in his bedroom “fondling his splendid battle-gear” while Helen oversees her women’s embroidery work (206). Hector upbraids Paris for allowing others to die for him. Paris accepts the criticism, explaining that Helen has urged him to return to the battlefield. Helen laments her fate, wishing that she could have married a better man. Recognizing Hector is “hit hardest by the fighting,” she invites him to rest, but he declines (207). He wants to visit his wife and infant son, wondering whether it will be their last visit.

He finds Andromache and the baby—named Scamandrius but called Astyanax (“Lord of the City”)—at the Scaean Gates. Weeping, Andromache reminds him that he is all she has left; Achilles killed her father, Eetion, and her seven brothers when the Achaeans raided Thebe, and her mother later died. She suggests that Hector guard the most vulnerable part of the gates rather than return to the plain. Hector replies that he would be ashamed to shrink from battle, for he knows that Troy must fall. His greatest weight is her fate, being enslaved by an Achaean ruler. He wants to be dead when that happens.

He reaches for the baby, but he cries at the sight of his father’s helmet. His parents laugh, and Hector removes his helmet, then holds the baby, praying that he will be “a better man than his father” and “a joy to his mother’s heart” (211). Filled with pity for his wife’s grief, he reminds her that “no one alive has ever escaped” their fate. He then instructs her to return to her distaff and loom and “leave the fighting to the men” (212). Returning home, Andromache leads her women in “dirges for the dead,” though Hector is still alive (212).

Hector and Paris surge out of Troy’s gates and slaughter Achaeans. Athena rushes down from Olympus, Apollo on her heels. They agree to end the day’s fighting by having Hector challenge the best Achaean to step forward for a duel to the death. Recognizing the immortals’ intentions, Helenus passes the idea on to Hector, while Athena and Apollo settle atop a sacred oak “like carrion birds, like vultures” to watch (216).

Hector says that Zeus has brought their truce to nothing and proposes a duel; the winner will take the loser’s armor but leave his corpse for his comrades to mourn with the proper rituals. When no Achaean volunteers, Menelaus lashes out, calling his comrades disgraceful and putting himself forward. Agamemnon holds him back, since Hector is clearly the stronger man whom even Achilles dreads meeting in battle. Nestor tells the Achaeans that Peleus (Achilles’s father) would be embarrassed for them, laments that he is not young enough to take on Hector himself, and reminisces about his past achievements, taunting the Achaeans for cowardice. Nestor’s taunts prompt nine leaders to stand up, and Nestor draws lots for the winner. All are relieved when Ajax wins the draw and pray for him to win.

Hector’s heart pounds with fear as Ajax bears down on him with his mighty shield, whose qualities and maker are described in detail. The men trade insults, launch their spears at each other, then stab at each other. Ajax deals a nonlethal blow, then wrecks Hector’s shield with a boulder, but Apollo keeps him safe. Two of Zeus’s heralds, one from each side, tells them to “yield to night” since both are great fighters whom Zeus loves (223). Hector and Ajax agree and exchange gifts before parting.

Nestor proposes halting the fighting for a day to perform funeral rites for their dead and to build a protective wall and trench around the Achaean camp. The leaders all agree. Meanwhile, in Troy, Antenor proposes returning Helen and her treasures to the Achaeans since they have nothing to gain by fighting the Achaeans. Paris refuses to give up Helen but offers to return her treasure and add his own. At dawn, Priam sends a herald to deliver the proposal and to ask for time to mourn their dead.

The Achaeans respond to the proposal in silence, until Diomedes finally rejects it and the rest cheer. They agree to halt the fighting so Trojans and Achaeans can collect their dead; the men sometimes have to wash the bodies to know whether they are Achaean or Trojan. After performing their funeral rituals, the Achaeans build their wall while the gods “seated at ease” gaze down on them (229). Poseidon complains that they built the wall without offering the gods a sacrifice; it might become more famous than the Scaean Gates that Apollo and Poseidon built. Zeus tells him to stop complaining because only a weak god would fear such a thing. He then offers to let Poseidon destroy the wall after the Achaeans sail home. As Achaeans and Trojans feast, Zeus plots “fresh disaster for both,” sending thunder that causes both sides to panic and pour libations (230).

At dawn, Zeus gathers the immortals and sternly forbids them from interfering in the war on pain of being “whipped by lightning” or thrown into Tartarus (231). His threats are met with silence, until Athena assures him they would never oppose him and will only offer their favorites tactics. Zeus smiles, saying he meant nothing “in earnest” and means her “all the good will in the world” (232). Zeus decamps to his throne atop Mount Ida to watch the armies clash. When the sun hits high noon, he holds up his scales, places the Trojans in one side, the Achaeans in the other, and decrees “Achaea’s day of doom” (233). The Achaean side falls toward the earth while the Trojan rises “toward the sky” (234). Zeus releases crashing thunder that terrifies the men.

None of the Achaean leaders except Nestor hold their ground. Diomedes comes rushing to his defense, and they decide to take on Hector, first striking and killing his charioteer. Zeus sends a bolt of lightning at the feet of Diomedes’s horse. Recognizing it as sign that Zeus has marked the Trojans for victory, Nestor instructs Diomedes to turn the chariot around. Hector and the Trojans chase them, hurling spears and insults. Three times Diomedes is tempted to turn back, but each time, Zeus sends thunder to warn him back. Sensing victory, Hector sets his sights on torching the Achaean ships. He asks his horses, who Andromache has lovingly tended, to carry him to success. Outraged, Hera taunts Poseidon for abandoning the Achaeans who sacrifice to him so generously. Poseidon refuses to defy Zeus, whose power exceeds all of theirs combined.

Agamemnon uses taunts to rouse the Achaeans, then prays to Zeus in tears to allow the men to “escape with their lives” (239). Zeus pities him and sends an omen to renew their fighting spirit. The Achaean leaders come out in force. Greater Ajax uses his shield to protect himself and Little Ajax, who ducks behind the shield “quick as a youngster ducking under his mother’s skirts” (240). After they kill his charioteer, Hector hits Little Ajax with a rock. Greater Ajax shields him as others rush him back to camp.

Zeus whips up the Trojans again, sending the Achaeans retreating in panic. Hera, “filled with pity,” appeals to Athena, who complains that Zeus always spoils her plans without caring how many times she saved his son Heracles (242). Instructing Hera to harness her chariot, Athena dresses for battle, but Zeus sees them and sends Iris with a warning. Hera backs down, telling Athena they should not defy Zeus for the sake of mortals. It is for him to decide their fates.

Zeus returns to Olympus and assembles the gods. Only Athena and Hera keep their distance, muttering between themselves and “plotting Troy’s destruction” (246). When Zeus mocks them, Athena holds her tongue, but Hera angrily replies that they will obey him because he is stronger. Out of pity they offer tactics to their Achaean favorites. Zeus promises many Achaean deaths until Achilles returns to war to avenge Patroclus’s death.

As night descends, the Achaeans are relieved to see the day’s fighting end, but Hector is frustrated that he has not yet destroyed the Achaean ships. Hoping the tide has turned, he looks forward to the next day’s fighting.