Iliad

This article is about the epic poem. For other uses, see Myrmidon contingent, calls an assembly to solve the
Iliad (disambiguation).
plague problem. Under pressure, Agamemnon agrees to
return Chryseis to her father, but also decides to take
Achilless
captive, Briseis, as compensation. Angered,
[1]
The Iliad (/lid/; Ancient Greek: Ilias, proAchilles declares that he and his men will no longer ght
nounced [i.li.s] in Classical Attic; sometimes referred to
as the Song of Ilion or Song of Ilium) is an ancient Greek for Agamemnon, but will go home. Odysseus takes a ship
epic poem in dactylic hexameter, traditionally attributed and brings Chryseis to her father, whereupon Apollo ends
to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege the plague.
of the city of Troy (Ilium) by a coalition of Greek states, it
tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles.
Although the story covers only a few weeks in the nal
year of the war, the Iliad mentions or alludes to many of
the Greek legends about the siege; the earlier events, such
as the gathering of warriors for the siege, the cause of the
war, and related concerns tend to appear near the beginning. Then the epic narrative takes up events prophesied
for the future, such as Achilles looming death and the
sack of Troy, pregured and alluded to more and more
vividly, so that when it reaches an end, the poem has told
The rst verses of the Iliad
a more or less complete tale of the Trojan War.
The Iliad is paired with something of a sequel, the
Odyssey, also attributed to Homer. Along with the
Odyssey, the Iliad is among the oldest extant works of
Western literature, and its written version is usually dated
to around the eighth century BC.[2] Recent statistical
modelling based on language evolution has found it to
date to 760710 BC.[3] In the modern vulgate (the standard accepted version), the Iliad contains 15,693 lines; it
is written in Homeric Greek, a literary amalgam of Ionic
Greek and other dialects.

In the meantime, Agamemnons messengers take Briseis

away. Achilles then asks his mother, Thetis, to ask Zeus
that the Greeks be brought to breaking point by the Trojans, so Agamemnon will realize how much the Greeks
need Achilles. Thetis does so, and Zeus agrees.
(2) Zeus sends a dream to Agamemnon, urging him to
attack the city. Agamemnon heeds the dream but decides
to rst test the morale of the Greek army by telling them
to go home. The plan backres, and only the intervention
of Odysseus, inspired by Athena, stops a rout.

Odysseus confronts and beats Thersites, a common soldier who voices discontent at ghting Agamemnons war.
After a meal, the Greeks deploy in companies upon the
Note: Book numbers are in parentheses and
Trojan plain. The poet takes the opportunity to describe
come before the synopsis of the book.
the provenance of each Greek contingent. When news of
the Greek deployment reaches king Priam, the Trojans
(1) After an invocation to the Muses, the story launches too sortie upon the plain. In a similar list to that for the
in medias res (in the middle of things) towards the end Greeks, the poet describes the Trojans and their allies.
of the Trojan War between the Trojans and the besieging (3) The armies approach each other on the plain, but beGreeks. Chryses, a Trojan priest of Apollo, oers the fore they meet, Paris oers to end the war by ghting a
Greeks wealth for the return of his daughter Chryseis, a duel with Menelaus, urged by his brother and head of the
captive of Agamemnon, the Greek leader. Although most Trojan army, Hector. While Helen tells Priam about the
of the Greek army is in favour of the oer, Agamem- Greek commanders from the walls of Troy, both sides
non refuses. Chryses prays for Apollos help, and Apollo swear a truce and promise to abide by the outcome of the
causes a plague throughout the Greek army.
duel. Paris is beaten, but Aphrodite rescues him and leads

Synopsis

After nine days of plague, Achilles, the leader of the him to bed with Helen before Menelaus could kill him.
1

1 SYNOPSIS

(4) Pressured by Hera's hatred of Troy, Zeus arranges

for the Trojan Pandaros to break the truce by wounding
Menelaus with an arrow. Agamemnon rouses the Greeks,
and battle is joined.

seis and extensive gifts to Achilles, who has been camped

next to his ships throughout, if only he would return to the
ghting. Achilles and his companion Patroclus receive
the embassy well, but Achilles angrily refuses Agamem(5) In the ghting, Diomedes kills many Trojans, includ- nons oer, and declares that he would only return to bating Pandaros, and defeats Aeneas, whom again Aphrodite tle if the Trojans reach his ships and threaten them with
rescues, but Diomedes attacks and wounds the goddess. re. The embassy returns empty-handed.
Apollo faces Diomedes, and warns him against warring (10) Later that night, Odysseus and Diomedes venture out
with gods. Many heroes and commanders join in, in- to the Trojan lines, killing the Trojan Dolon and wreaking
cluding Hector, and the gods supporting each side try to havoc in the camps of some Thracian allies of Troy.
inuence the battle. Emboldened by Athena, Diomedes (11) In the morning, the ghting is erce and Agamemwounds Ares and puts him out of action.
non, Diomedes, and Odysseus are all wounded. Achilles
(6) Hector rallies the Trojans and stops a rout; the Greek
Diomedes and the Trojan Glaukos nd common ground
and exchange unequal gifts. Hector enters the city, urges
prayers and sacrices, incites Paris to battle, bids his wife
Andromache and son Astyanax farewell on the city walls,
and rejoins the battle.

sends Patroclus from his camp to inquire about the Greek

casualties, and while there Patroclus is moved to pity by
a speech of Nestor.

(12) The Trojans assault the Greek wall on foot. Hector,

ignoring an omen, leads the terrible ghting. The Greeks
are overwhelmed in rout, the walls gate is broken, and
(7) Hector duels with Ajax, but nightfall interrupts the Hector charges in.
ght and both sides retire. The Greeks agree to burn their
(13) Many fall on both sides. The Trojan seer Polydamas
dead and build a wall to protect their ships and camp, urges Hector to fall back and warns him about Achilles,
while the Trojans quarrel about returning Helen. Paris of- but is ignored.
fers to return the treasure he took, and give further wealth
as compensation, but without returning Helen, and the (14) Hera seduces Zeus and lures him to sleep, allowing
oer is refused. A days truce is agreed for burning the Poseidon to help the Greeks, and the Trojans are driven
dead, during which the Greeks also build their wall and back onto the plain.
trench.
(15) Zeus awakes and is enraged by Poseidons inter(8) The next morning, Zeus prohibits the gods from in- vention. Against the mounting discontent of the Greekterfering, and ghting begins anew. The Trojans prevail supporting gods, Zeus sends Apollo to aid the Trojans,
and force the Greeks back to their wall while Hera and who once again breach the wall, and the battle reaches
Athena are forbidden from helping. Night falls before the the ships.
Trojans can assail the Greek wall. They camp in the eld (16) Patroclus can stand to watch no longer, and begs
to attack at rst light, and their watchres light the plain Achilles to be allowed to defend the ships. Achilles relike stars.
lents, and lends Patroclus his armor, but sends him o
with a stern admonition not to pursue the Trojans, lest
he take Achilless glory. Patroclus leads the Myrmidons
to battle and arrives as the Trojans set re to the rst
ships. The Trojans are routed by the sudden onslaught,
and Patroclus begins his assault by killing the Trojan hero
Sarpedon. Patroclus, ignoring Achilless command, pursues and reaches the gates of Troy, where Apollo himself stops him. Patroclus is set upon by Apollo and
Euphorbos, and is nally killed by Hector.
(17) Hector takes Achilless armor from the fallen Patroclus, but ghting develops around Patroclus body.
(18) Achilles is mad with grief when he hears of Patrocluss death, and vows to take vengeance on Hector; his
mother Thetis grieves, too, knowing that Achilles is fated
to die young if he kills Hector. Achilles is urged to help
retrieve Patroclus body, but has no armour. Made brilIliad, Book VIII, lines 24553, Greek manuscript, late 5th, early liant by Athena, Achilles stands next to the Greek wall
6th centuries AD.
and roars in rage. The Trojans are dismayed by his appearance and the Greeks manage to bear Patroclus body
(9) Meanwhile, the Greeks are desperate. Agamemnon away. Again Polydamas urges Hector to withdraw into
admits his error, and sends an embassy composed of the city, again Hector refuses, and the Trojans camp in
Odysseus, Ajax, Phoenix, and two heralds to oer Bri-

2.1

Achaeans

the plain at nightfall. Patroclus is mourned, and mean- minor characters.

while, at Thetis request, Hephaestus fashions a new set
of armor for Achilles, among which is a magnicently
wrought shield.
2.1 Achaeans
(19) In the morning, Agamemnon gives Achilles all the
promised gifts, including Briseis, but he is indierent to
them. Achilles fasts while the Greeks take their meal, and
straps on his new armor, and heaves his great spear. His
horse Xanthos prophesies to Achilles his death. Achilles
drives his chariot into battle.
(20) Zeus lifts the ban on the gods interference, and the
gods freely intervene on both sides. The onslaught of
Achilles, burning with rage and grief, is terrible, and he
slays many.
(21) Driving the Trojans before him, Achilles cuts o
half their number in the river Skamandros and proceeds
to slaughter them and lls the river with the dead. The
river, angry at the killing, confronts Achilles, but is beaten
back by Hephaestus restorm. The gods ght among
themselves. The great gates of the city are opened to receive the eeing Trojans, and Apollo leads Achilles away
from the city by pretending to be a Trojan.

The Achaeans () also called Hellenes

(Greeks), Danaans (), or Argives ().
Agamemnon King of Mycenae, leader of the
Greeks.
Achilles son of Peleus, foremost warrior,
leader of the Myrmidons, son of a divine
mother, Thetis.
Odysseus King of Ithaca, Greek commander.
Ajax the Greater son of Telamon and king
of Salamis.
Menelaus King of Sparta, husband of Helen
and brother of Agamemnon.
Diomedes son of Tydeus, King of Argos.

Ajax the Lesser son of Oileus, often partner

(22) When Apollo reveals himself to Achilles, the Troof Ajax the Greater.
jans had retreated into the city, all except for Hector,
Patroclus Achilles closest companion.
who, having twice ignored the counsels of Polydamas,
feels the shame of rout and resolves to face Achilles,
Nestor King of Pylos, and trusted advisor to
in spite of the pleas of Priam and Hecuba, his parents.
Agamemnon.
When Achilles approaches, Hectors will fails him, and
he is chased around the city by Achilles. Finally, Athena
tricks him to stop running, and he turns to face his op- 2.1.1 Achilles and Patroclus
ponent. After a brief duel, Achilles stabs Hector through
the neck. Before dying, Hector reminds Achilles that he Main article: Achilles and Patroclus
is fated to die in the war as well. Achilles takes Hectors Much debate has surrounded the nature of the relationbody and dishonours it.
(23) The ghost of Patroclus comes to Achilles in a dream
and urges the burial of his body. The Greeks hold a day
of funeral games, and Achilles gives out the prizes.
(24) Dismayed by Achilles continued abuse of Hectors
body, Zeus decides that it must be returned to Priam. Led
by Hermes, Priam takes a wagon out of Troy, across the
plains, and enters the Greek camp unnoticed. He grasps
Achilles by the knees and begs to have his sons body.
Achilles is moved to tears, and the two lament their losses
in the war. After a meal, Priam carries Hectors body
back into Troy. Hector is buried, and the city mourns.

Major characters

Main article: List of characters in the Iliad

See also: Category: Deities in the Iliad

Achilles Lamenting the Death of Patroclus (1855) by the Russian realist Nikolai Ge

ship of Achilles and Patroclus, as to whether it can be

The many characters of the Iliad are catalogued; the described as a homoerotic one or not. Classical and Hellatter-half of Book II, the "Catalogue of Ships", lists com- lenistic Athenian scholars perceived it as pederastic,[4]
manders and cohorts; battle scenes feature quickly slain while others perceived it as a platonic warrior-bond.[5]

2.2

Trojans

The Trojan men

Hector son of King Priam and the foremost
Trojan warrior.
Aeneas son of Anchises and Aphrodite.
Deiphobus brother of Hector and Paris.
Paris Helens lover-abductor.
Priam the aged King of Troy.
Polydamas a prudent commander whose advice is ignored; he is Hectors foil.
Agenor a Trojan warrior, son of Antenor,
who attempts to ght Achilles (Book XXI).

MAJOR CHARACTERS

poet Hesiod, were the rst artists to name and describe

their appearance and characters.[6]
In Greek Gods Human Lives: What We Can Learn From
Myths, Mary Lefkowitz discusses the relevance of divine action in the Iliad, attempting to answer the question of whether or not divine intervention is a discrete
occurrence (for its own sake), or if such godly behaviors are mere human character metaphors. The intellectual interest of Classic-era authors, such as Thucydides
and Plato, was limited to their utility as a way of talking about human life rather than a description or a truth,
because, if the gods remain religious gures, rather than
human metaphors, their existencewithout the foundation of either dogma or a bible of faithsthen allowed
Greek culture the intellectual breadth and freedom to
conjure gods tting any religious function they required
as a people.[7][8]

Sarpedon, son of Zeus killed by Patroclus.

Was friend of Glaucus and co-leader of the Lycians (fought for the Trojans).
In The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the
Glaucus, son of Hippolochus friend of Bicameral Mind, psychologist Julian Jaynes uses the IlSarpedon and co-leader of the Lycians (fought iad as a major supporting evidence for his theory of
Bicameralism, which posits that until about the time defor the Trojans).
scribed in the Iliad, humans had a much dierent mental Euphorbus rst Trojan warrior to wound Paity than present day humans, essentially lacking in what
troclus.
we call consciousness. He suggests that humans heard and
Dolon a spy upon the Greek camp (Book X). obeyed commands from what they identied as gods, un Antenor King Priams advisor, who argues til the change in human mentality that incorporated the
motivating force into the conscious self. He points out
for returning Helen to end the war.
that almost every action in the Iliad is directed, caused, or
Polydorus son of Priam and Laothoe.
inuenced by a god, and that earlier translations show an
Pandarus famous archer and son of Lycaon. astonishing lack of words suggesting thought, planning,
or introspection. Those that do appear, he argues, are
misinterpretations made by translators imposing a mod The Trojan women
ern mentality on the characters.[9]
Hecuba (, Hekabe) Priams wife,
mother of Hector, Cassandra, Paris, and oth The major deities:
ers.
Zeus (Neutral)
Helen () daughter of Zeus; Menelauss
wife; espoused rst to Paris, then to Dei Hera (Achaeans)
phobus; her abduction by Paris precipitated
Artemis (Trojans)
the war.
Apollo (Trojans)
Andromache Hectors wife, mother of
Hades (Neutral)
Astyanax.
Aphrodite (Trojans)
Cassandra Priams daughter.
Briseis a Trojan woman captured by Achilles
from a previous siege, over whom Achilless
quarrel with Agamemnon began.

Ares (Trojans)

Athena (Achaeans)
Hermes (Neutral)
Poseidon (Achaeans)

2.3

Gods

In the literary Trojan War of the Iliad, the Olympian gods,

goddesses, and minor deities ght and play great roles in
human warfare. Unlike practical Greek religious observance, Homers portrayals of them suited his narrative
purpose, being very dierent from the polytheistic ideals
Greek society used. To wit, the Classical-era historian
Herodotus says that Homer, and his contemporary, the

Hephaestus (Achaeans)
The minor deities:
Eris
Iris
Thetis
Leto

3.4

Wrath
Proteus
Scamander
Phobos
Deimos
Hypnos

3
3.1

Themes

5
station in life. In Book I, the Greek troubles begin with
King Agamemnons dishonorable, unkingly behavior
rst, by threatening the priest Chryses (1.11), then, by
aggravating them in disrespecting Achilles, by conscating Briseis from him (1.171). The warriors consequent
rancor against the dishonorable king ruins the Greek military cause.

3.4 Wrath

Nostos

Nostos (, homecoming) occurs seven times in

the poem.[10] Thematically, the concept of homecoming is much explored in Ancient Greek literature, especially in the post-war homeward fortunes experienced by
the Atreidae (Agamemnon and Menelaus), and Odysseus
(see the Odyssey). Thus, nostos is impossible without
sacking TroyKing Agamemnons motive for winning,
at any cost.

3.2

Kleos

Kleos (, glory, fame) is the concept of glory

earned in heroic battle.[11] For most of the Greek invaders
of Troy, notably Odysseus, kleos is earned in a victorious nostos (homecoming). Yet, Achilles must choose
only one of the two rewards, either nostos or kleos.[12]
In Book IX (IX.41016), he poignantly tells Agamemnons envoysOdysseus, Phoenix, Ajaxbegging his
reinstatement to battle about having to choose between
two fates ( , 9.411).[13]
The passage reads (the translation is Lattimores):
In forgoing his nostos, he will earn the greater
reward of kleos aphthiton ( , fame
imperishable).[13] In the poem, aphthiton (,
imperishable) occurs ve other times,[16] each occurrence denotes an object: Agamemnons sceptre, the
wheel of Hebe's chariot, the house of Poseidon, the
throne of Zeus, the house of Hephaestus. Translator
Lattimore renders kleos aphthiton as forever immortal and
as forever imperishableconnoting Achilless mortality
by underscoring his greater reward in returning to battle
Troy.
Achilles shield, crafted by Hephaestus and given to him
by his mother Thetis, bears an image of stars in the centre. The stars conjure profound images of the place of a
single man, no matter how heroic, in the perspective of
the entire cosmos.

3.3

Tim

Akin to kleos is tim (, respect, honor), the concept denoting the respectability an honorable man accrues
with accomplishment (cultural, political, martial), per his

The Wrath of Achilles (1819), by Michel Drolling.

The poems initial word, (mnin, accusative of

, mnis, wrath, rage, fury), establishes the Iliads principal theme: The Wrath of Achilles.[17] His
personal rage and wounded soldiers vanity propel the
story: the Greeks faltering in battle, the slayings of
Patroclus and Hector, and the fall of Troy. In Book
I, the Wrath of Achilles rst emerges in the Achillesconvoked meeting, between the Greek kings and the seer
Calchas. King Agamemnon dishonours Chryses, the Trojan priest of Apollo, by refusing with a threat the restitution of his daughter, Chryseisdespite the proered
ransom of gifts beyond count.[18] The insulted priest
prays his gods help, and a nine-day rain of divine plague
arrows falls upon the Greeks. Moreover, in that meeting,
Achilles accuses Agamemnon of being greediest for gain
of all men.[19] To that, Agamemnon replies:
But here is my threat to you.
Even as Phoibos Apollo is taking away my
Chryseis.
I shall convey her back in my own ship, with
my own
followers; but I shall take the fair-cheeked
Briseis,
your prize, I myself going to your shelter, that
you may learn well
how much greater I am than you, and another
man may shrink back
from likening himself to me and contending
against me.[20]

3 THEMES

After that, only Athena stays Achilless wrath. He vows

to never again obey orders from Agamemnon. Furious, Achilles cries to his mother, Thetis, who persuades
Zeuss divine interventionfavouring the Trojansuntil
Achilless rights are restored. Meanwhile, Hector leads
the Trojans to almost pushing the Greeks back to the
sea (Book XII). Later, Agamemnon contemplates defeat
and retreat to Greece (Book XIV). Again, the Wrath of
Achilles turns the wars tide in seeking vengeance when
Hector kills Patroclus. Aggrieved, Achilles tears his hair
and dirties his face. Thetis comforts her mourning son,
who tells her:
So it was here that the lord of men
Agamemnon angered me.
Still, we will let all this be a thing of the past,
and for all our
sorrow beat down by force the anger deeply
within us.
Now I shall go, to overtake that killer of a dear
life,
Hektor; then I will accept my own death, at
whatever
time Zeus wishes to bring it about, and the
other immortals.[21]

truly able nor willing to contest it. How fate is set is unknown, but it is told by the Fates and by Zeus through
sending omens to seers such as Calchas. Men and their
gods continually speak of heroic acceptance and cowardly
avoidance of ones slated fate.[22] Fate does not determine
every action, incident, and occurrence, but it does determine the outcome of lifebefore killing him, Hector
calls Patroclus a fool for cowardly avoidance of his fate,
by attempting his defeat; Patroclus retorts: [23]
No, deadly destiny, with the son of Leto,
has killed me,
and of men it was Euphorbos; you are only my
third slayer.
And put away in your heart this other thing that
I tell you.
You yourself are not one who shall live long,
but now already
death and powerful destiny are standing beside
you,
to go down under the hands of Aiakos great
son, Achilleus.[24]

Here, Patroclus alludes to fated death by Hectors hand,

and Hectors fated death by Achilless hand. Each accepts
the outcome of his life, yet, no-one knows if the gods can
alter fate. The rst instance of this doubt occurs in Book
XVI. Seeing Patroclus about to kill Sarpedon, his mortal
Accepting the prospect of death as fair price for avenging
son, Zeus says:
Patroclus, he returns to battle, dooming Hector and Troy,
thrice chasing him 'round the Trojan walls, before slaying
Ah me, that it is destined that the dearest
him, then dragging the corpse behind his chariot, back to
of men, Sarpedon,
camp.
must go down under the hands of Menoitios
son Patroclus.[25]

About his dilemma, Hera asks Zeus:

Majesty, son of Kronos, what sort of thing
have you spoken?
Do you wish to bring back a man who is
mortal, one long since
doomed by his destiny, from ill-sounding
death and release him?
Do it, then; but not all the rest of us gods shall
approve you.[26]

Achilles Slays Hector, by Peter Paul Rubens (163035).

3.5

Fate

Fate (, kr, fated death) propels most of the events

of the Iliad. Once set, gods and men abide it, neither

In deciding between losing a son or abiding fate, Zeus,

King of the Gods, allows it. This motif recurs when he
considers sparing Hector, whom he loves and respects.
Again, Hera asks him:
Father of the shining bolt, dark misted,
what is this you said?
Do you wish to bring back a man who is
mortal, one long since

4.1

The Iliad as oral tradition

doomed by his destiny, from ill-sounding

death and release him?
Do it, then; but not all the rest of us gods shall
approve you.[27]

The poem dates to the archaic period of Classical Antiquity. Scholarly consensus mostly places it in the 8th
century BC, although some favour a 7th-century date.
Herodotus placed Homer at approximately 400 years before his own time, which would place Homer at circa 850
Again, Zeus appears capable of altering fate, but does
BC.
not, deciding instead to abide set outcomes; yet, contrariwise, fate spares Aeneas, after Apollo convinces the over- The historical backdrop of the poem is the time of the
matched Trojan to ght Achilles. Poseidon cautiously Late Bronze Age collapse, in the early 12th century BC.
Homer is thus separated from his subject matter by about
speaks:
400 years, the period known as the Greek Dark Ages.
But come, let us ourselves get him away
Intense scholarly debate has surrounded the question of
from death, for fear
which portions of the poem preserve genuine traditions
the son of Kronos may be angered if now
from the Mycenaean period. The Catalogue of Ships in
Achilleus
particular has the striking feature that its geography does
kills this man. It is destined that he shall be
not portray Greece in the Iron Age, the time of Homer,
the survivor,
but as it was before the Dorian invasion.
that the generation of Dardanos shall not die
The title Ilias (genitive Iliados) is el...[28]
liptic for he poiesis Ilias, meaning the
Trojan poem. , of Troy, is the specically femmasculine
Divinely aided, Aeneas escapes the wrath of Achilles and inine adjective form from , Troy"; the
would be or .[30] It is used
survives the Trojan War. Whether or not the gods can adjective form[31]
alter fate, they do abide it, despite its countering their hu- by Herodotus.
man allegiances; thus, the mysterious origin of fate is a
power beyond the gods. Fate implies the primeval, tripartite division of the world that Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades
eected in deposing their father, Cronus, for its dominion. Zeus took the Air and the Sky, Poseidon the Waters,
and Hades the Underworld, the land of the deadyet they
share dominion of the Earth. Despite the earthly powers
of the Olympic gods, only the Three Fates set the destiny
of Man.

Venetus A, copied in the 10th century AD, is the oldest

fully extant manuscript of the Iliad.[32] The rst edition
of the Iliad,editio princeps, by Demetrius Chalcondyles
was printed in Florence in 1488.[33]

4.1 The Iliad as oral tradition

In antiquity, the Greeks applied the Iliad and the Odyssey

as the bases of pedagogy. Literature was central to the
educational-cultural function of the itinerant rhapsode,
3.6 The Male Totem
who composed consistent epic poems from memory and
Recently it was proposed that in the Iliad Homer looked improvisation, and disseminated them, via song and
into the soul of man the warrior. 'Kleos and warrior in- chant, in his travels and at the Panathenaic Festival of athterrelations are viewed through anthropological, ethno- letics, music, poetics, and sacrice, celebrating Athenas
birthday.[34]
logical animistic concepts.
Originally, Classical scholars treated the Iliad and the
Odyssey as written poetry, and Homer as a writer. Yet,
by the 1920s, Milman Parry (19021935) had launched
a movement claiming otherwise. His investigation of
the oral Homeric style"stock epithets and reiteration (words, phrases, stanzas) established that these
formulae were artifacts of oral tradition easily applied
to an hexametric line. A two-word stock epithet (e.g.
resourceful Odysseus) reiteration may complement a
character name by lling a half-line, thus, freeing the
[29]
poet to compose a half-line of original formulaic text
to complete his meaning.[35] In Yugoslavia, Parry and
his assistant, Albert Lord (19121991), studied the oral4 Date and textual history
formulaic composition of Serbian oral poetry, yielding the Parry/Lord thesis that established oral tradiFurther information: Homeric question and Historicity tion studies, later developed by Eric Havelock, Marshall
of the Iliad
McLuhan, Walter Ong, and Gregory Nagy.
the Iliad is a poetical rendition of male
phyletic fantasies. The Iliad is about klea andron, the glorious and terrible deeds of men in
relation to other men, the raw content of the
soul of man, but not of woman. It is a vast
lagoon of dream fragments of the male unconscious, haunted with eternal shadows that compete, strut, ght, kill and rape, and above all
seek the approval of other men.

In The Singer of Tales (1960), Lord presents likenesses

between the tragedies of the Greek Patroclus, in the Iliad, and of the Sumerian Enkidu, in the Epic of Gilgamesh, and claims to refute, with careful analysis of the
repetition of thematic patterns, that the Patroclus storyline upsets Homers established compositional formulae
of wrath, bride-stealing, and rescue"; thus, stock-phrase
reiteration does not restrict his originality in tting story
to rhyme.[36][37] Likewise, in The Arming Motif, Prof.
James Armstrong reports that the poems formulae yield
richer meaning because the arming motif diction
describing Achilles, Agamemnon, Paris, and Patroclus
serves to heighten the importance of ... an impressive moment, thus, "[reiteration] creates an atmosphere
of smoothness, wherein, Homer distinguishes Patroclus
from Achilles, and foreshadows the formers death with
positive and negative turns of phrase.[38][39]
In the Iliad, occasional syntactic inconsistency may
be an oral tradition eectfor example, Aphrodite is
laughter-loving, despite being painfully wounded by
Diomedes (Book V, 375); and the divine representations
may mix Mycenaean and Greek Dark Age (ca. 1150
800 BC) mythologies, parallelling the hereditary basileis
nobles (lower social rank rulers) with minor deities, such
as Scamander, et al.[40]

5
5.1

Warfare in the Iliad

Depiction of infantry combat

Despite Mycenae and Troy being maritime powers, the

Iliad features no sea battles.[41] So, the Trojan shipwright
(of the ship that transported Helen to Troy), Phereclus,
ghts afoot, as an infantryman.[42] The battle dress and
armour of hero and soldier are well-described. They
enter battle in chariots, launching javelins into the enemy formations, then dismountfor hand-to-hand combat with yet more javelin throwing, rock throwing, and if
necessary hand to hand sword and a shoulder-borne hoplon (shield) ghting.[43] Ajax the Greater, son of Telamon, sports a large, rectangular shield (, sakos)
with which he protects himself and Teucer, his brother:
Ninth came Teucer, stretching his curved bow.
He stood beneath the shield of Ajax, son of
Telamon.
As Ajax cautiously pulled his shield aside,
Teucer would peer out quickly, shoot o an arrow,
hit someone in the crowd, dropping that soldier
right where he stood, ending his lifethen he'd
duck back,
crouching down by Ajax, like a child beside its
mother.

WARFARE IN THE ILIAD

Ajax would then conceal him with his shining

shield.
(Iliad 8.26772, Ian Johnston, translator)
Ajaxs cumbersome shield is more suitable for defence
than for oence, while his cousin, Achilles, sports a large,
rounded, octagonal shield that he successfully deploys
along with his spear against the Trojans:
Just as a man constructs a wall for some high
house,
using well-tted stones to keep out forceful
winds,
thats how close their helmets and bossed
shields lined up,
shield pressing against shield, helmet against
helmet
man against man. On the bright ridges of the
helmets,
horsehair plumes touched when warriors
moved their heads.
Thats how close they were to one another.
(Iliad 16.2137, Ian Johnston, translator)
In describing infantry combat, Homer names the phalanx
formation,[44] but most scholars do not believe the historical Trojan War was so fought.[45] In the Bronze Age,
the chariot was the main battle transport-weapon (e.g. the
Battle of Kadesh). The available evidence, from the Dendra armour and the Pylos Palace paintings, indicate the
Mycenaeans used two-man chariots, with a long-speararmed principal rider, unlike the three-man Hittite chariots with short-spear-armed riders, and unlike the arrowarmed Egyptian and Assyrian two-man chariots. Nestor
spearheads his troops with chariots; he advises them:
In your eagerness to engage the Trojans,
don't any of you charge ahead of others,
trusting in your strength and horsemanship.
And don't lag behind.
charge.

That will hurt our

Any man whose chariot confronts an enemys

should thrust with his spear at him from there.
Thats the most eective tactic, the way
men wiped out city strongholds long ago
their chests full of that style and spirit.
(Iliad 4.30109, Ian Johnston, translator)
Although Homers depictions are graphic, it can be seen
in the very end that victory in war is a far more somber
occasion, where all that is lost becomes apparent. On
the other hand, the funeral games are lively, for the dead
mans life is celebrated. This overall depiction of war runs
contrary to many other ancient Greek depictions, where
war is an aspiration for greater glory.

5.2

Inuence on classical Greek warfare

While the Homeric poems (the Iliad in particular) were

not necessarily revered scripture of the ancient Greeks,
they were most certainly seen as guides that were important to the intellectual understanding of any educated
Greek citizen. This is evidenced by the fact that in the late
fth century BC, it was the sign of a man of standing to
be able to recite the Iliad and Odyssey by heart.[46] Moreover, it can be argued that the warfare shown in the Iliad,
and the way in which it was depicted, had a profound and
very traceable eect on Greek warfare in general. In particular, the eect of epic literature can be broken down
into three categories: tactics, ideology, and the mindset
of commanders. In order to discern these eects, it is
necessary to take a look at a few examples from each of
these categories.
Much of the detailed ghting in the Iliad is done by the
heroes in an orderly, one-on-one fashion. Much like the
Odyssey, there is even a set ritual which must be observed in each of these conicts. For example, a major hero may encounter a lesser hero from the opposing
side, in which case the minor hero is introduced, threats
may be exchanged, and then the minor hero is slain. The
victor often strips the body of its armor and military
accoutrements.[47] Here is an example of this ritual and
this type of one-on-one combat in the Iliad:
There Telamonian Ajax struck down the
son of Anthemion, Simoeisios in his striplings
beauty, whom once his mother descending
from Ida bore beside the banks of Simoeis
when she had followed her father and mother
to tend the sheepocks. Therefore they called
him Simoeisios; but he could not render again
the care of his dear parents; he was short-lived,
beaten down beneath the spear of high-hearted
Ajax, who struck him as he rst came forward beside the nipple of the right breast, and
the bronze spearhead drove clean through the
shoulder.[48]

Spartan, goes back to stand in his formation with mortal

wounds while the remaining two Argives go back to Argos to report their victory. Thus, the Spartans claimed
this as a victory, as their last man displayed the ultimate feat of bravery by maintaining his position in the
phalanx.[50]
In terms of the ideology of commanders in later Greek
history, the Iliad has an interesting eect. The Iliad expresses a denite disdain for tactical trickery, when Hector says, before he challenges the great Ajax:
I know how to storm my way into the struggle of ying horses; I know how to tread the
measures on the grim oor of the war god.
Yet great as you are I would not strike you by
stealth, watching
for my chance, but openly, so, if perhaps I
might hit you.[51]
However, despite examples of disdain for this tactical
trickery, there is reason to believe that the Iliad, as well as
later Greek warfare, endorsed tactical genius on the part
of their commanders. For example, there are multiple
passages in the Iliad with commanders such as Agamemnon or Nestor discussing the arraying of troops so as to
gain an advantage. Indeed, the Trojan War is won by a
notorious example of Greek guile in the Trojan Horse.
This is even later referred to by Homer in the Odyssey.
The connection, in this case, between guileful tactics of
the Greeks in the Iliad and those of the later Greeks is not
a dicult one to nd. Spartan commanders, often seen as
the pinnacle of Greek military prowess, were known for
their tactical trickery, and, for them, this was a feat to be
desired in a commander. Indeed, this type of leadership
was the standard advice of Greek tactical writers.[52]
Ultimately, while Homeric (or epic) ghting is certainly
not completely replicated in later Greek warfare, many of
its ideals, tactics, and instruction are.[53]

Hans van Wees argues that the period that the descriptions of warfare relate can be pinned down fairly
[54]
The biggest issue in reconciling the connection between specicallyto the rst half of the 7th century BC.
the epic ghting of the Iliad and later Greek warfare is
the phalanx, or hoplite, warfare seen in Greek history
well after Homers Iliad. While there are discussions of 6 Inuence on the arts and literasoldiers arrayed in semblances of the phalanx throughture
out the Iliad, the focus of the poem on the heroic ghting, as mentioned above, would seem to contradict the
tactics of the phalanx. However, the phalanx did have Main article: Trojan War in popular culture
its heroic aspects. The masculine one-on-one ghting of
epic is manifested in phalanx ghting on the emphasis of The Iliad was a standard work of great importance alholding ones position in formation. This replaces the sin- ready in Classical Greece and remained so throughout the
gular heroic competition found in the Iliad.[49]
Hellenistic and Byzantine periods. It made its return to
One example of this is the Spartan tale of 300 picked
men ghting against 300 picked Argives. In this battle
of champions, only two men are left standing for the Argives and one for the Spartans. Othryades, the remaining

Italy and Western Europe beginning in the 15th century,

primarily through translations into Latin and the vernacular languages. Prior to this reintroduction, a shortened
Latin version of the poem, known as the Ilias Latina, was

10

7 ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS

very widely studied and read as a basic school text. The

West, however, had tended to look at Homer as a liar as
they believed they possessed much more down to earth
and realistic eyewitness accounts of the Trojan War written by Dares and Dictys Cretensis who were supposedly
present at the events.

The 1954 Broadway musical The Golden Apple by librettist John Treville Latouche and composer Jerome Moross was freely adapted from the Iliad and the Odyssey,
re-setting the action to America's Washington state in the
years after the SpanishAmerican War, with events inspired by the Iliad in Act One and events inspired by the
Odyssey
in Act Two.
These late antique forged accounts formed the basis of
several eminently popular medieval chivalric romances, Christa Wolf's 1983 novel Cassandra is a critical engagemost notably those of Benoit de Sainte-Maure and Guido ment with the Iliad. Wolfs narrator is Cassandra, whose
delle Colonne. These in turn spawned many others in thoughts we hear at the moment just before her murder by
various European languages, such as the rst printed En- Clytemnestra in Sparta. Wolfs narrator presents a femiglish book, the 1473 Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye. nists view of the war, and of war in general. Cassandras
Other accounts read in the Middle Ages were antique story is accompanied by four essays which Wolf delivLatin retellings such as the Excidium Troiae and works ered as the Frankfurter Poetik-Vorlesungen. The essays
in the vernaculars such as the Icelandic Troy Saga. Even present Wolfs concerns as a writer and rewriter of this
without Homer, the Trojan War story had remained cen- canonical story and show the genesis of the novel through
tral to Western European medieval literary culture and its Wolfs own readings and in a trip she took to Greece.
sense of identity. Most nations and several royal houses David Melnick's Men in Aida (cf. ) (1983) is
traced their origins to heroes at the Trojan War. Britain a postmodern homophonic translation of Book One into
was supposedly settled by the Trojan Brutus, for instance. a farcical bathhouse scenario, preserving the sounds but
Subjects from the Trojan War were a favourite among an- not the meaning of the original.
cient Greek dramatists. Aeschylus' trilogy, the Oresteia,
comprising Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers, and The
Eumenides, follows the story of Agamemnon after his re6.2 Contemporary popular culture
turn from the war.
Homer also came to be of great inuence in European
An epic science ction adaptation/tribute by acclaimed
culture with the resurgence of interest in Greek antiquity
author Dan Simmons titled Ilium was released in 2003.
during the Renaissance, and it remains the rst and most
The novel received a Locus Award for best science ction
inuential work of the Western canon.
novel of 2003.
William Shakespeare used the plot of the Iliad as source
A loose lm adaptation of the Iliad, Troy, was released in
material for his play Troilus and Cressida, but focused
2004. Though the lm received mixed reviews, it was a
on a medieval legend, the love story of Troilus, son of
commercial success, particularly in international sales. It
King Priam of Troy, and Cressida, daughter of the Trogrossed $133 million in the United States and $497 miljan soothsayer Calchas. The play, often considered to be
lion worldwide, placing it in the 88th top-grossing movies
a comedy, reverses traditional views on events of the Troof all time.[56]
jan War and depicts Achilles as a coward, Ajax as a dull,
Age of Bronze is an American comics series by
unthinking mercenary, etc.
writer/artist Eric Shanower retelling the legend of the
William Theed the elder made an impressive bronze
Trojan War. It began in 1998 and is published by Image
statue of Thetis as she brought Achilles his new armor
Comics.[57][58][59]
forged by Hephaesthus. It has been on display in the
[60]
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City since Published October 2011, Alice Oswald's sixth collection, Memorial, is based on the Iliad but departs from the
2013.
narrative form of the Iliad to focus on, and so commemoRobert Browning's poem Development discusses his
rate, the individually-named characters whose deaths are
childhood introduction to the matter of the Iliad and his
mentioned in that poem.[61][62][63] Later in October 2011,
delight in the epic, as well as contemporary debates about
Memorial was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize,[64] but
its authorship.
in December 2011, Oswald withdrew the book from the
shortlist,[65][66] citing concerns about the ethics of the
prizes sponsors.[67]

6.1

20th century

Simone Weil wrote the essay The Iliad or the Poem of

Force in 1939 shortly after the commencement of World
7 English translations
War II. The essay describes how the Iliad demonstrates
the way force, exercised to the extreme in war, reduces
both victim and aggressor to the level of the slave and the Further information: English translations of Homer
unthinking automaton.[55]

11
tation in rendering the Iliad to English; commenting upon
the versions contemporarily available in 1861, he identies the four essential poetic qualities of Homer to which
the translator must do justice:
[i] that he is eminently rapid; [ii] that he
is eminently plain and direct, both in the evolution of his thought and in the expression of
it, that is, both in his syntax and in his words;
[iii] that he is eminently plain and direct in the
substance of his thought, that is, in his matter
and ideas; and, nally, [iv] that he is eminently
noble.
After a discussion of the metres employed by previous
translators, Arnold argues for a poetical dialect hexameter translation of the Iliad, like the original. Laborious as
this meter was, there were at least half a dozen attempts
to translate the entire Iliad or Odyssey in hexameters; the
last in 1945. Perhaps the most uent of them was by J.
Henry Dart [1862] in response to Arnold.[70] In 1870,
the American poet William Cullen Bryant published a
blank verse version, that Van Wyck Brooks describes as
simple, faithful.

Wenceslas Hollar's engraved title page of a 1660 edition of the

Iliad, translated by John Ogilby.

Since 1950, there have been several English translations.

Richmond Lattimore's version (1951) is a free six-beat
line-for-line rendering that explicitly eschews poetical
dialect for the plain English of today. It is literal, unlike older verse renderings. Robert Fitzgerald's version
(Oxford Worlds Classics, 1974) strives to situate the Iliad in the musical forms of English poetry. His forceful
version is freer, with shorter lines that increase the sense
of swiftness and energy. Robert Fagles (Penguin Classics, 1990) and Stanley Lombardo (1997) are bolder than
Lattimore in adding dramatic signicance to Homers
conventional and formulaic language. Barry B. Powell's
translation (Oxford University Press, 2014) renders the
Homeric Greek with a simplicity and dignity reminiscent
of the original.

George Chapman published his translation of the Iliad, in

instalments, beginning in 1598, published in fourteeners, a long-line ballad metre that has room for all of
Homers gures of speech and plenty of new ones, as well
as explanations in parentheses. At its best, as in Achilles
rejection of the embassy in Iliad Nine; it has great rhetorical power.[68] It quickly established itself as a classic
in English poetry. In the preface to his own translation, A recent book oers a comparative review of translations
Pope praises the daring ery spirit of Chapmans ren- of the Iliad [71]
dering, which is something like what one might imagine Homer, himself, would have writ before he arrived at
years of discretion.

8 Manuscripts

John Keats praised Chapman in the sonnet On First

Looking into Chapmans Homer (1816). John Ogilby's
There are more than 2000 manuscripts of Homer.[72][73]
mid-seventeenth-century translation is among the early
Some of the most notable manuscripts include:
annotated editions; Alexander Pope's 1715 translation, in
heroic couplet, is The classic translation that was built
Rom. Bibl. Nat. gr.6 + Matriti. Bibl. Nat. 4626
on all the preceding versions,[69] and, like Chapmans, it
from 870-890 AD
is a major poetic work in its own right. William Cowper's
Miltonic, blank verse 1791 edition is highly regarded for
Venetus A = Venetus Marc. 822 from the 10th cenits greater delity to the Greek than either the Chapman
tury
or the Pope versions: I have omitted nothing; I have in Venetus B = Venetus Marc. 821 from the 11th cenvented nothing, Cowper says in prefacing his translation.
tury
In the lectures On Translating Homer (1861), Matthew
Arnold addresses the matters of translation and interpre Ambrosian Iliad

12

10 NOTES

Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 20
Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 21
Codex Nitriensis (palimpsest)

See also

[20] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 1.1817.
[21] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 18.111
16.
[22] Fate as presented in Homers The Iliad, Everything2
[23] Iliad Study Guide, Brooklyn College

Hellenismos portal
Mask of Agamemnon

10

Notes

[1] Iliad. Random House Websters Unabridged Dictionary.

[2] Vidal-Naquet, Pierre. Le monde d'Homre (The World of
Homer), Perrin (2000), p. 19
[3] Linguistic evidence supports date for Homeric epics Altschuler - 2013 - BioEssays - Wiley Online Library.
Onlinelibrary.wiley.com. 2013-02-18. Retrieved 201403-13.

[24] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 16.849
54.
[25] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 16.4334.
[26] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 16.4403.
[27] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 22.178
81.
[28] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 20.3004.

[4] Aeschylus does portray it so in Fragment 134a.

[29] Nikoletseas, Michael. M. (2012). The Iliad: The Male

Totem, p. 26. ISBN 978-1482069006.

[5] Hornblower, S. and Spawforth, A. The Oxford Companion

to Classical Civilization (1998) pp. 3, 347, 352.

[30] , , . Liddell, Henry George; Scott,

Robert; A GreekEnglish Lexicon at the Perseus Project

[6] Homers Iliad, Classical Technology Center.

[31] Hist. 2.116

[7] Lefkowitz, Mary. Greek Gods, Human Lives: What We

Can Learn From Myths (2003) New Haven, Conn.: Yale
University Press

[32] Robot Scans Ancient Manuscript in 3-D, Wired.

[8] Taplin, Oliver. Bring Back the Gods, The New York
Times 14 December 2003.
[9] Jaynes, Julian. (1976) The Origin of Consciousness in the
Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Pg. 221

[33] Nikoletseas, Michael M. (2012). The Iliad: Twenty

Centuries of Translation: A Critical View. ISBN 9781469952109
[34] The Columbia Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition (1994) p.173

[10] 2.155, 2.251, 9.413, 9.434, 9.622, 10.509, 16.82

[35] Porter, John. The Iliad as Oral Formulaic Poetry (8 May

2006) University of Saskatchewan. Retrieved 26 November 2007.

[11] The Concept of the Hero in Greek Civilization. Athome.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2010-04-18.

[36] Lord, Albert. The Singer of Tales Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press (1960) p.190

[12] Heroes and the Homeric Iliad. Uh.edu. Retrieved 201004-18.

[37] Lord, Albert. The Singer of Tales Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press (1960) p.195

[13] Volk, Katharina. " Revisited". Classical Philology, Vol. 97, No. 1 (Jan., 2002), pp. 6168.

[38] Iliad, Book XVI, 13054

[14] 9.410-416
[15] Homer. The Iliad. Richmond Lattimore, translator.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951)

[39] Armstrong, James I. The Arming Motif in the Iliad. The

American Journal of Philology, Vol. 79, No. 4. (1958),
pp.33754.

[16] II.46, V.724, XIII.22, XIV.238, XVIII.370

[40] Toohey, Peter. Reading Epic: An Introduction to the Ancient Narrative. New Fetter Lane, London: Routledge,
(1992).

[17] Rouse, W.H.D. The Iliad (1938) p.11

[41] Iliad 3.4550

[18] Homer. The Iliad, Richmond Lattimore, translator.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 1.13.

[42] Iliad 5965

[19] Homer. The Iliad, Richmond Lattimore, translator.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press (1951). 1.122.

[43] Keegan, John. A History of Warfare (1993) p.248

[44] Iliad 6.6

13

[45] Cahill, Tomas. Sailing the Wine Dark Sea: Why the Greeks
Matter (2003)
[46] Lendon, J.E."Soldiers and Ghosts (2005) p.36
[47] Lendon, J.E. Soldiers and Ghosts (2005) p. 223
[48] Iliad. 4.473-83, Lattimore, translator
[49] Lendon, J.E. Soldiers and Ghosts (2005) p.51
[50] 5.17
[51] (Iliad. 7.237-43, Lattimore, translator)
[52] Lendon, J.E. Soldiers and Ghosts (2005) p.240
[53] A large amount of the citations and argumentation in
this section of the article must be ultimately attributed
to:Lendon, J.E. Soldiers and Ghosts: A History of Battle
in Classical Antiquity. New Haven, CT: Yale UP, 2005.
[54] Greek Warfare: Myth and Realities [Paperback] Hans
Van Wees, p 249
[55] Bruce B. Lawrence and Aisha Karim (2008). On Violence:
A Reader. Duke University Press. p. 377. ISBN 978-08223-3769-0.
[56] IMDB. All Time Worldwide Box Oce Grosses, Box
Oce Mojo
[57] A Thousand Ships (2001, ISBN 1-58240-200-0)
[58] Sacrice (2004, ISBN 1-58240-360-0)
[59] Betrayal, Part One (2008, ISBN 978-1-58240-845-3)
[60] Oswald, Alice (2011). Memorial: An Excavation of the Iliad. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-274161.
[61] Holland, Tom (17 October 2011). The Song of Achilles
by Madeline Miller / Memorial by Alice Oswald. Surng
the rip tide of all things Homeric.. The New Statesman
(London: New Statesman). Retrieved 1 June 2012.
[62] Kellaway, Kate (2 October 2011). Memorial by Alice Oswald review. The Observer (London: Guardian
News and Media Limited). Retrieved 1 June 2012.
[63] Higgins, Charlotte (28 October 2011). The Song of
Achilles by Madeline Miller, and more review. The
Guardian (London: Guardian News and Media Limited).
Retrieved 1 June 2012.
[64] Flood, Alison (20 October 2011). TS Eliot prize 2011
shortlist revealed. The Guardian (London: Guardian
News and Media Limited). Retrieved 1 June 2012.
[65] Waters, Florence (6 December 2011). Poet withdraws
from TS Eliot prize over sponsorship. The Telegraph
(London: Telegraph Media Group Limited). Retrieved
2012-02-13.
[66] Flood, Alison (6 December 2011). Alice Oswald withdraws from TS Eliot prize in protest at sponsor Aurum.
The Guardian (London: Guardian News and Media Limited). Retrieved 2012-02-13.

[67] Oswald, Alice (12 December 2011). Why I pulled out

of the TS Eliot poetry prize. The Guardian (London:
Guardian News and Media Limited). Retrieved 2012-0213.
[68] The Oxford Guide to English Literature in Translation,
p.351
[69] The Oxford Guide to English Literature in Translation,
p.352
[70] The Oxford Guide to English Literature in Translation,
p.354
[71] Nikoletseas, Michael M. The Iliad: Twenty Centuries of
Translation: A Critical View, 2012
[72] OCLC 722287142
[73] Bird, Graeme D. (2010). Multitextuality in the Homeric
Iliad : the witness of the ptolemaic papyr. Washington,
D.C.: Center for Hellenic Studies. ISBN 0-674-05323-0.

11 References
Budimir, Milan (1940). On the Iliad and Its Poet.
Mueller, Martin (1984). The Iliad. London: Allen
& Unwin. ISBN 0-04-800027-2.
Nagy, Gregory (1979). The Best of the Achaeans.
Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
ISBN 0-8018-2388-9.
Powell, Barry B. (2004). Homer. Malden, Mass.:
Blackwell. ISBN 978-1-4051-5325-6.
Seaford, Richard (1994). Reciprocity and Ritual.
Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19815036-9.
West, Martin (1997). The East Face of Helicon. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-8152213.
Fox, Robin Lane (2008). Travelling Heroes: Greeks
and their myths in the epic age of Homer. Allen Lane.
ISBN 978-0-7139-9980-8.

12 Further reading
Murray, A.T.; Wyatt, William F., Homer: The Iliad, Books I-XII, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard
University Press, 1999, ISBN 978-0-674-99579-6
Kirk, G.S., The Iliad: A Commentary: Volume
I, Books 1-4, Cambridge University Press, 1985.
ISBN 0-521-23709-2
Kirk, G.S., The Iliad: A Commentary: Volume
II, Books 5-8, Cambridge University Press, 1990.
ISBN 0-521-23710-6

14

13

EXTERNAL LINKS

Hainsworth, Bryan; Kirk, G.S., The Iliad: A Commentary: Volume III, Books 9-12, Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0-521-23711-4

The Iliad of Homer, Translated into English Blank

Verse by William Cowper, edition c.1860. Online
at Project Gutenberg.

Edwards, Mark W.; Janko, Richard; Kirk, G.S., The

Iliad: A Commentary: Volume IV, Books 13-16,
Cambridge University Press, 1992. ISBN 0-52128171-7

The Opening to the Iliad (Proem), Read in Ancient

Greek with a simultaneous translation.

Edwards, Mark W.; Kirk, G.S., The Iliad: A Commentary: Volume V, Books 1720, Cambridge University Press, 1991. ISBN 0-521-30959-X

Published English translations of Homer, with samples and some reviews by translator and scholar Ian
Johnston

Richardson, Nicholas; Kirk, G.S., The Iliad: A Commentary: Volume VI, Books 2124, Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0-521-30960-3

Digital facsimile of the rst printed publication (editio princeps) of the Iliad in Homeric Greek by
Demetrios Chalkokondyles, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek

West, Martin L., Studies in the text and transmission

of the Iliad, Mnchen : K.G. Saur, 2001. ISBN 3598-73005-5

13

External links

D. B. Monro, Homer: Iliad, Books I-XII, with an

Introduction, a Brief Homeric Grammar, and Notes
(3rd ed., 1890)
D. B. Monro, Homer: Iliad, Books XIII-XXIV, with
Notes (4th ed., 1903)
D. B. Monro, A Grammar of the Homeric Dialect
(2nd ed., 1891)
Iliad in Ancient Greek: from the Perseus Project
(PP), with the Murray and Butler translations and
hyperlinks to mythological and grammatical commentary; via the Chicago Homer, with the Lattimore
translation and markup indicating formulaic repetitions
Links to translations freely available online are included in the list above.
Gods, Achaeans and Troyans. An interactive visualization of Iliads characters ow and relations.
The Iliad: A Study Guide
Classical images illustrating the Iliad. Repertory of
outstanding painted vases, wall paintings and other
ancient iconography of the War of Troy.
Comments on background, plot, themes, authorship,
and translation issues by 2008 translator Herbert
Jordan.
The Iliad of Homer a Parsed Interlinear Text, Books
1-24: Kindle edition
Flaxman illustrations of the Iliad
The Iliad study guide, themes, quotes, teacher resources

The Iliad Map, map of locations in The Iliad

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14.1

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

Text

Iliad Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iliad?oldid=673843745 Contributors: Derek Ross, Brion VIBBER, Vicki Rosenzweig, Bryan
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TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

shaha, Supdiop, KasparBot, Adam9007 and Anonymous: 1031

14.2

Images

File:Akhilleus_Patroklos_Antikensammlung_Berlin_F2278.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/

Akhilleus_Patroklos_Antikensammlung_Berlin_F2278.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: User:Bibi Saint-Pol, own work, 2008
Original artist: Sosias (potter, signed). Painting attributed to the Sosias Painter (name piece for Beazley, overriding attribution) or the
Kleophrades Painter (Robertson) or Euthymides (Ohly-Dumm)
File:Beginning_Iliad.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/96/Beginning_Iliad.svg License: Public domain
Contributors: Own work (using Wikisource for text) Original artist: User:Bibi Saint-Pol
File:Cadmus_teeth.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/Cadmus_teeth.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: [1] Original artist: Maxeld Parrish
File:Commons-logo.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg License: ? Contributors: ? Original
artist: ?
File:Folder_Hexagonal_Icon.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/48/Folder_Hexagonal_Icon.svg License: Cc-bysa-3.0 Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
File:Homer_British_Museum.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/Homer_British_Museum.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Originally from en.wikipedia; description page is/was here.. Original uploader was JW1805 at
en.wikipedia Original artist: ?
File:Iliad1660Frontis.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/Iliad1660Frontis.jpg License: Public domain
Contributors: 1660 Edition of The Iliad Original artist: Homer, Hollar
File:Iliad_VIII_245-253_in_cod_F205,_Milan,_Biblioteca_Ambrosiana,_late_5c_or_early_6c.jpg Source:
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wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Iliad_VIII_245-253_in_cod_F205%2C_Milan%2C_Biblioteca_Ambrosiana%2C_late_5c_
or_early_6c.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Transferred from en.wikipedia; transfered to Commons by User:Twice25 using
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File:Laurel_wreath_fa13.gif Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Laurel_wreath_fa13.gif License: Copyrighted free use Contributors: http://fa13.com Original artist:
File:Nikolay_Ge_002.jpeg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bc/Nikolay_Ge_002.jpeg License: Public domain Contributors: http://fotki.yandex.ru/users/hds-shah/view/210878?page=2 Original artist: Nikolai Ge
File:Portal-puzzle.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fd/Portal-puzzle.svg License: Public domain Contributors: ?
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File:Slays_Hector.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/Slays_Hector.jpg License: Public domain Contributors:
http://www.umich.edu/~{}homeros/Representations%20of%20Homer{}s%20Ideas/Marisa%20-%20Self-identity%20in%20the%
20Iliad.htm
Original artist: Peter Paul Rubens
File:Symbol_book_class2.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/89/Symbol_book_class2.svg License: CC
BY-SA 2.5 Contributors: Mad by Lokal_Prol by combining: Original artist: Lokal_Prol
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File:Wrath_of_Achilles2.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/Wrath_of_Achilles2.jpg License: Public
domain Contributors:
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Original artist: Michel Martin Drolling

14.3

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