Achilles

Penthesilea hurled a spear at Ajax and declared that she was the daughter of the god of war. His armour turned the spear aside, and Ajax and Achilles laughed. Ajax rushed against the Trojan soldiers. Achilles raised his heavy spear, which no other man could throw, and drove it through Penthesilea’s breast. She kept one hand on her sword, but before she could draw it, Achilles speared her horse. Horse and rider fell together.

Penthesilea lay in the dust with her helmet fallen away. The Greeks gathered around her and saw a young woman of great beauty. Achilles bent down and removed the helmet. Her face was undimmed by death. With her loose hair and graceful form, she seemed to them like Artemis asleep after hunting in the mountains. Some traditions show Achilles holding her as she dies. Others show him carrying her body from the battlefield.

Achilles felt pity and sorrow. He thought that he should have spared Penthesilea and married her in his own country. He had killed the woman who might have been his lover, and he fell in love with her after seeing her face. The Trojans fled in fear. Achilles continued to rebuke Penthesilea, asking whether she had come to win a reward from King Priam and why she had left women’s work to face him.

The Greek warrior Thersites mocked Achilles for grieving over the dead Amazon and accused him of lusting after her. Achilles flew into a rage and killed Thersites. Penthesilea’s death was later treated as the beginning of the Amazons’ decline. Diodorus Siculus says that she was the last Amazon to gain distinction for bravery. After her death, the race diminished and disappeared.

Achilles drove the Trojans before him towards the walls of Troy after killing Memnon in single combat. Memnon’s death was his last battle. Achilles reached the Scaean gates, where Paris shot an arrow at him. In many accounts, Apollo guided the arrow to the one place where Achilles could be wounded, his heel. The arrow struck him there and killed him. Some accounts describe it as a poisoned Trojan arrow. Another places the wound at his ankle.

Achilles had returned to the war after Hector killed Patroclus, his beloved companion. His purpose was vengeance rather than victory for the Greeks. He killed Hector, stripped away his armour, and allowed the Greeks to attack the corpse. Achilles then fastened Hector’s body to his chariot and dragged it around Troy for twelve days. The gods intervened, and Thetis persuaded him to let King Priam ransom Hector’s body. Priam entered Achilles’ tent, and the two men shared their grief, each thinking of his own father.

After this, Achilles continued fighting. He killed Penthesilea, the Amazon queen who fought for Troy. When Thersites mocked Achilles for mourning her death, Achilles killed him. He then fought Memnon and killed him, driving the Trojans back to their gates. Paris killed Achilles during the fighting there. Achilles’ mother, Thetis, had intended to make him invulnerable at his birth by dipping him into a substance, but the place by which she held him remained vulnerable. Later poets identified that place as his heel. Achilles had accepted the possibility of an early death in exchange for lasting fame, and his death at Troy fulfilled that choice.

Achilles killed Memnon and pursued the Trojans towards the city. Paris and Apollo struck him with an arrow in the ankle outside the Scaean Gates. The wound killed him. During the fight for his body, Aias killed Glaucos, picked up Achilles, and carried him through the enemy ranks while Odysseus held off the attackers. The army mourned Achilles and buried him.

His fate after death differed between tellings. In one telling, Achilles descended to Hades and told Odysseus that he would rather live as a poor man than rule over the dead. In another, Thetis took him to the White Island, revived him, and made him immortal. A further telling had Thetis carry him to the Isles of the Blessed, a distant home for those whom the gods had absolved from death.

The Isles of the Blessed and Elysium were far-off homes for immortalised human beings. They lay at the ends of the earth, near Oceanos, and later Elysium became part of the Underworld. The blessed lived there in a favourable climate and enjoyed an easy life. Achilles entered Elysium after his death in tellings that placed him among the blessed.

In a later telling, Ibycus and Simonides placed Achilles in Elysium with Medea. They made Achilles her husband after both had reached the company of the blessed.

The Greek fleet gathered at Aulis before sailing for Troy. The winds turned against it and continued to blow from the north. Ships and cables suffered while the army waited and began to lose hope. The delay lasted for a long time, and the Greeks could not leave the harbour.

Calchas, the soothsayer, declared that Artemis had caused the wind. In one account, Agamemnon had accidentally killed a deer sacred to the goddess. Another says that the Greeks had slain a hare and its young, one of Artemis’s beloved wild creatures. Calchas said that the goddess required the sacrifice of Iphigenia, Agamemnon’s daughter, before the fleet could sail.

Agamemnon sent for Iphigenia and Clytemnestra. He concealed the purpose of the summons by announcing that Iphigenia would marry Achilles at Aulis. Iphigenia came to the camp, believing that a wedding awaited her. Achilles later discovered that his name had been used to bring her there. He attempted to defend her when he learned that Agamemnon intended to sacrifice her to Artemis.

The accounts differ over what followed. Aeschylus says that Agamemnon sacrificed Iphigenia, although she pleaded for her life. In Euripides’s Iphigenia in Tauris, Artemis rescued her at the last moment and placed a deer on the altar in her stead. The goddess then carried Iphigenia to Tauris, on the northern coast of the Black Sea. There she became Artemis’s priestess and prepared foreigners for ritual human sacrifice by the Taurians.

Fire spread across a Greek ship while Patroclus spoke with Achilles. Hector had driven the Trojans through the rampart to the ships. Diomedes, Odysseus, Agamemnon, and Machaon were wounded, and the Greeks faced the loss of their route back to Greece. Ajax had grown too weary to hold his great shield. Hector cut the bronze head from his spear, and Ajax retreated while flames covered his ship. Achilles saw the fire, struck his thigh, and urged Patroclus to prepare quickly.

Patroclus had left Eurypylus, whose wound he had been tending, when he saw the Greek danger. He ran to Achilles and urged him to put aside his anger against Agamemnon. If the Trojans believed that Achilles had returned, they might pause and give the Greeks time to recover. If Achilles still refused to fight for men who had dishonoured him, Patroclus asked to wear his armour and lead his men. Nestor had earlier given similar advice. He had told Patroclus, as the elder man, to guide Achilles, and had said that the sight of Achilles' armour might drive the Trojans back.

Achilles agreed to lend Patroclus his armour, his horses, and his troops. He ordered him to drive the Trojans from the ships, but not to pursue them beyond that point. Patroclus put on the shining armour that all the Trojans feared. Automedon, Achilles' squire, harnessed Xanthus and Balius to the chariot. The horses were said to have been children of the West Wind. A led horse stood beside them in the side traces. Achilles' two thousand men, who were called Myrmidons, gathered for the charge.

Patroclus led the Myrmidons into battle. The Trojans wavered when they saw the armour, because they believed that Achilles himself had returned. The fresh warriors struck at once and drove the Trojans back from the ships. For a short time, the borrowed armour and the charge of the Myrmidons gave the Greek fleet a defence.

Memnon came to Troy with a great army from the land of the sunrising, near the river Oceanus. His warriors had nothing white about them except their teeth, because of the sun’s heat in their own country. On the journey, Memnon fought the Solymi for a whole day and drove them into the hills. At Troy, King Priam welcomed him with a great golden cup filled with wine. Memnon drank it at one draught, then said that battle would show whether he was a good warrior. He went to sleep rather than boast or drink through the night.

Memnon entered the fighting and killed Antilochus, Nestor’s son. Nestor crossed the body in grief and anger. He called on his other son, Thrasymedes, to drive Memnon away, but Memnon defeated him. Nestor then attacked with his sword. Memnon told him to leave, since he would not strike an old man. Nestor withdrew because age had weakened him. Memnon and his army then charged the Greeks, killing them and stripping their bodies.

Nestor mounted his chariot and hurried to Achilles, weeping and asking him to rescue Antilochus’s body. Achilles went out to meet Memnon. Memnon lifted a great stone that marked a field and hurled it at Achilles’ shield, but the blow did not shake him. Achilles ran forward and killed Memnon in single combat. This was Achilles’ last battle. He drove the Trojans back towards Troy and its wall.

At the Scaean gates, Paris shot an arrow at Achilles. Apollo guided it to his heel, the one place where he could be wounded. The arrow struck, and Achilles fell beside the gates.

Achilles ambushed Troilus and killed him. Troilus was a young Trojan prince, the son of Priam and Hecuba. In one telling, Apollo was his father instead. His death fulfilled the condition that bound Troy’s survival to his life.

While Troilus lived, Troy could not be taken. His continued life protected the city from destruction. In another telling, this protection lasted only if Troilus lived until he reached the age of twenty. Achilles attacked him before that condition was met and ended the protection that had guarded Troy. The city’s safety had depended on Troilus remaining alive, so his death removed the safeguard on which Troy depended.

Troilus became the Trojan whose life was tied to the endurance of the city. Achilles removed him from the living through an ambush and killing. The condition that preserved Troy was then broken. Troilus no longer lived to protect the city, and the power attached to his survival was lost. His parentage differed between the tellings, since Priam and Hecuba were named as his parents in one, while Apollo was named as his father in another. The condition also differed in its exact form, since one telling required Troilus to remain alive, while another required him to live until the age of twenty. In both tellings, Achilles killed Troilus before Troy could retain the protection linked to his life. His death left the city without the safeguard that had allowed it to endure.

The Muses began the lament for Achilles, singing in turn with their beautiful voices. Thetis mourned with them, as did the other gods and the mortal Argives. For seventeen days and nights they grieved. On the eighteenth day, the Greeks gave Achilles to the fire. They killed well-fed sheep and cattle around him, burned him in clothing fit for the gods, and anointed him with fragrant unguent and sweet honey. Many Achaean fighters performed an armed dance around the pyre, while a great cry rose from the assembly.

After the cremation, the Greeks gathered Achilles’ bones and placed them in a golden urn. They buried them in a mound beside the Hellespont. This is the burial described in the Homeric account. The Odyssey presents Achilles as dead and later shows him in Hades, where he complains to Odysseus about his fate as ruler of the shades.

The Aethiopis gives a different fate. Thetis, with the Muses and her sisters, snatched Achilles’ body from the fire and carried it to Leuke, the White Island in the Black Sea. In this account, Thetis is understood to have revived Achilles and made him immortal. His immortal spirit then dwelt on the island. Leuke was sacred to Achilles, and ancient sources associated it with his ghost. Archaeological remains of shrines to Achilles have been found on the small island now identified as Zmeinyi Island, east of the Danube’s mouth. Another tradition placed Achilles among the Isles of the Blessed, while Ibycus and Simonides placed him in Elysium with Medea.

Odysseus blackened his eyebrows and beard, put on a Phoenician merchant’s dress, and entered the court of King Lycomedes on Scyros. The Greek chiefs had come because they suspected that Achilles was hidden on the island. They watched Lycomedes’s daughters dance and play at ball, but Achilles was so young, slim, and beautiful that they did not recognise him among the women. An oracle had said that Troy could not be taken without him.

Odysseus displayed goods carried by Phoenician traders, including fine cloth, embroideries, gold jewellery, and amber necklaces. Among the merchandise he placed weapons. When the women gathered to examine the offerings, Achilles ignored the feminine ornaments and seized the shield and spear. In another version, Odysseus caused a trumpet to sound, with shouts and the clashing of arms. Believing that an attack had begun, Achilles threw off his women’s clothing and took up weapons for defence. His military training exposed him.

Odysseus named him as Achilles, son of Peleus, and told him that he would become chief warrior of the Achaeans. Achilles was glad to leave his life among maidens. He was dressed as a man and sent away with ten ships. During his stay on Scyros, he had fathered Neoptolemus with Deidamia, one of Lycomedes’s daughters. Neoptolemus later went to Troy.

This episode is not found in Homer’s account, where Achilles remained with Peleus until Nestor and Odysseus came for him. Another tradition places Achilles’s arrival on Scyros after the Greek attack on Mysia. In the Scyros story, the weapons revealed him and led to his joining the war.

Achilles stormed Lyrnessus, a city near Troy, during the years of the Trojan War. He killed its defenders, including Mynes, the city’s king and Briseis’s husband. He also killed her three brothers. The Greeks seized Briseis as a war captive and awarded her to Achilles. She became his concubine, and Achilles regarded her possession as a sign of his valour in war.

In the tenth year of the war, Agamemnon returned Chryseis to her father, Chryses, a priest of Apollo. Chryses had sought her release, and Apollo had sent a plague against the Greek army after Agamemnon refused him. Agamemnon then demanded Briseis from Achilles as compensation for giving up Chryseis. Achilles regarded the demand as an insult and as an attack on the honour represented by his prize. Agamemnon’s men took Briseis from him, and Achilles withdrew from the fighting.

Achilles called on his divine mother, Thetis, and asked her to persuade Zeus to let the Trojans prevail. He wanted Agamemnon to learn the cost of his pride. The Trojans then defeated the Greeks. Odysseus, Phoenix, and Aias went to Achilles and asked him to return to the battle. They promised him Briseis, together with other gifts, but Achilles refused to fight at that time.

The conflict continued. Hector breached the Greek wall and set fire to the ships. Patroclus, Achilles’ closest friend, died among the Greeks who fell. Agamemnon then returned Briseis to Achilles, but her return came after many Greeks had died. The death of Patroclus and the return of Briseis moved Achilles to resume the fighting, and he returned to battle to save the Greek cause.

After Achilles was killed at Troy, Alexander and Apollo carried out the attack that struck him with an arrow in the ankle before the Scaean Gates. The Greeks and Trojans then fought over his body. Aias killed Glaucos and carried Achilles away, while Odysseus held back the attackers. The Greek army mourned Achilles and prepared his burial.

In the Aethiopis, Thetis took Achilles’ body from the fire with the Muses and her sisters. They carried him across the sea to Leuke, the White Island in the Black Sea. The island was sacred to Achilles in later ancient accounts. Another tradition, preserved in the Homeric account of the Odyssey, says that the Greeks mixed his bones in a golden urn and buried them in a mound beside the Hellespont. The connection between Achilles and the White Island may have entered that account through a later gloss referring to the Isles of the Blessed.

Helen’s fate also has different accounts. Stesichorus said that she never went to Troy, but was carried by the gods to Egypt, where Menelaus later found her. Euripides followed this version and gave Paris a phantom Helen, while the real Helen remained in Egypt. Among the accounts preserved by Pausanias, one says that Helen was hanged on Rhodes. Another says that, after her death, she joined Achilles as his bride on the White Island. In this later tradition, the dead Achilles and Helen live together among the blessed in the afterlife.