Chryses pleading with Agamemnon for his daughter (360–350 BC)
Main article: Iliad...compare to the tragidy of...
Chryses, a priest of Apollo and father of Chryseis, came to Agamemnon to ask for the return of his daughter. Agamemnon refused, and insulted Chryses, who prayed to Apollo to avenge his ill-treatment. Enraged, Apollo afflicted the Achaean army with plague. Agamemnon was forced to return Chryseis to end the plague, and took Achilles' concubine Briseis as his own. Enraged at the dishonour Agamemnon had inflicted upon him, Achilles decided he would no longer fight. He asked his mother, Thetis, to intercede with Zeus, who agreed to give the Trojans success in the absence of Achilles, the best warrior of the Achaeans.
After the withdrawal of Achilles, the Achaeans were initially successful. Both armies gathered in full for the first time since the landing. Menelaus and Paris fought a duel, which ended when Aphrodite snatched the beaten Paris from the field. With the truce broken, the armies began fighting again. Diomedes won great renown amongst the Achaeans, killing the Trojan hero Pandaros and nearly killing Aeneas, who was only saved by his mother, Aphrodite. With the assistance of Athena, Diomedes then wounded the gods Aphrodite and Ares. During the next days, however, the Trojans drove the Achaeans back to their camp and were stopped at the Achaean wall by Poseidon. The next day, though, with Zeus' help, the Trojans broke into the Achaean camp and were on the verge of setting fire to the Achaean ships. An earlier appeal to Achilles to return was rejected, but after Hector burned Protesilaus' ship, he allowed his close friend[105] and relative Patroclus to go into battle wearing Achilles' armour and lead his army. Patroclus drove the Trojans all the way back to the walls of Troy, and was only prevented from storming the city by the intervention of Apollo. Patroclus was then killed by Hector, who took Achilles' armour from the body of Patroclus.
Triumphant Achilles dragging Hector's body around Troy, from a panoramic fresco of the Achilleion
Achilles, maddened with grief, swore to kill Hector in revenge. He was reconciled with Agamemnon and received Briseis back, untouched by Agamemnon. He received a new set of arms, forged by the god Hephaestus, and returned to the battlefield. He slaughtered many Trojans, and nearly killed Aeneas, who was saved by Poseidon. Achilles fought with the river god Scamander, and a battle of the gods followed. The Trojan army returned to the city, except for Hector, who remained outside the walls because he was tricked by Athena. Achilles killed Hector, and afterwards he dragged Hector's body from his chariot and refused to return the body to the Trojans for burial. The Achaeans then conducted funeral games for Patroclus. Afterwards, Priam came to Achilles' tent, guided by Hermes, and asked Achilles to return Hector's body. The armies made a temporary truce to allow the burial of the dead. The Iliad ends with the funeral of Hector.
After the Iliad
Penthesilea and the death of Achilles
• The judgement of the arms, and its aftermath: wrongful either way
o Ajax clearly not in the right to want to kill Agamemnon, Menelaus, and Odysseus for losing the decision: this is the consequence of the old authority of the independent hero
o But Odysseus is clearly also not in the right: even he agrees that Ajax should have gotten the arms, 1339, and if Ajax is right Odysseus may have used wrongful means of persuasion: clearly a consequence of an authority that depends on persuasion
Note that persuasion, in the context of community authority --such as the authority that now rules the Athenian democracy! -- is more forceful that the power of the hero
Achilles killing the Amazon Penthesilea
Shortly after the burial of Hector, Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, arrived with her warriors.Penthesilea, daughter of Otrere and Ares, had accidentally killed her sister Hippolyte. She was purified from this action by Priam, and in exchange she fought for him and killed many, including Machaon[108] (according to Pausanias, Machaon was killed by Eurypylus),and according to another version, Achilles himself, who was resurrected at the request of Thetis.Penthesilia was then killed by Achilles who fell in love with her beauty after her death. Thersites, a simple soldier and the ugliest Achaean, taunted Achilles over his love[108] and gouged out Penthesilea's eyes.Achilles slew Thersites, and after a dispute sailed to Lesbos, where he was purified for his murder by Odysseus after sacrificing to Apollo, Artemis, and Leto.
While they were away, Memnon of Ethiopia, son of Tithonus and Eos,came with his host to help his stepbrother Priam.He did not come directly from Ethiopia, but either from Susa in Persia, conquering all the peoples in between,or from the Caucasus, leading an army of Ethiopians and Indians.Like Achilles, he wore armour made by Hephaestus.In the ensuing battle, Memnon killed Antilochus, who took one of Memnon's blows to save his father Nestor.Achilles and Memnon then fought. Zeus weighed the fate of the two heroes; the weight containing that of Memnon sank,and he was slain by Achilles.Achilles chased the Trojans to their city, which he entered. The gods, seeing that he had killed too many of their children, decided that it was his time to die. He was killed after Paris shot a poisoned arrow that was guided by Apollo.In another version he was killed by a knife to the back (or heel) by Paris, while marrying Polyxena, daughter of Priam, in the temple of Thymbraean Apollo,the site where he had earlier killed Troilus. Both versions conspicuously deny the killer any sort of valour, saying Achilles remained undefeated on the battlefield. His bones were mingled with those of Patroclus, and funeral games were held.Like Ajax, he is represented as living after his death in the island of Leuke, at the mouth of the Danube River,where he is married to Helen
The Judgment of Arms
The suicide of Ajax (from a calyx-krater, 400–350 BC, Vulci)
A great battle raged around the dead Achilles. Ajax held back the Trojans, while Odysseus carried the body away.When Achilles' armour was offered to the smartest warrior, the two that had saved his body came forward as competitors. Agamemnon, unwilling to undertake the invidious duty of deciding between the two competitors, referred the dispute to the decision of the Trojan prisoners, inquiring of them which of the two heroes had done most harm to the Trojans.Alternatively, the Trojans and Pallas Athena were the judges in that, following Nestor's advice, spies were sent to the walls to overhear what was said. A girl said that Ajax was braver:
For Aias took up and carried out of the strife the hero, Peleus'
son: this great Odysseus cared not to do.
To this another replied by Athena's contrivance:
Why, what is this you say? A thing against reason and untrue!
Even a woman could carry a load once a man had put it on her
shoulder; but she could not fight. For she would fail with fear
