The Iliad

Heroes in ancient Greek tradition are defined not by their inherent goodness and moral correctness, as they are in modern times; rather, they belong to an earlier age of mortals who were closer to the gods and possessed superhuman abilities. This conception comes down through Hesiod’s Works and Days, which dates to the same broad historical period as Homer (archaic Greece). Hesiod describes his generation as belonging to the fifth age of mortals that followed the age of heroes, mortals who were descended directly from the gods. Because they were so close to the gods, heroes caused quarrels among them. Fearful that these quarrels would destabilize his rule, Zeus destroyed the heroes through wars, at Thebes and Troy. The Iliad makes several cryptic references to this underlying goal complementing Zeus’s promise to Thetis, most notably in the opening stanza: “the will of Zeus was moving toward its end” (77). The competition and conflicts among the gods occupy much of the narrative, as Achaean defenders Athena, Poseidon, and Hera face off against Apollo, Ares, and Aphrodite, who support Troy.

The warriors whom readers/listeners encounter in the Iliad belong to Hesiod’s age of heroes, as suggested by repeated references to their superhuman physical strength, divine parentage, and direct contact (antagonistic and supportive) with the gods. Modern readers may be puzzled by their often-excessive behavior and poor decision-making, but both are characteristics that heroes possess. Just as their strengths are excessive, so are their mistakes, and they repeatedly take things too far. For example, Achilles warns Patroclus to turn back after securing the ships, but Patroclus becomes so caught up in his success that he fails to heed his limits. When Apollo orders Patroclus three times to retreat from Troy’s walls, Patroclus defies before he is finally killed by him. In Book 10, when Diomedes and Odysseus raid the Thracian camp for their prized horses, Diomedes pauses to consider what outrageous act he might commit. However, unlike Patroclus, when Athena prompts Diomedes to restrain himself, lest he draw the attention of an antagonistic god, Diomedes heeds her advice, and he and Odysseus make it safely back to the Achaean camp.

Diomedes and Patroclus’s experiences can be understood as compressed narratives that echo the larger narrative around Achilles and Hector, the Iliad’s two central heroes who undergo similar, though in some ways inverted, journeys. Both expect high honors, from mortals and gods, that push them beyond their limits, and both are ultimately compelled to humbly accept their mortality.

Achilles’s rage is so all-consuming that he allows scores of warriors to die rather than intercede on their behalf. His grief after Patroclus’s death also pushes him past mortal limits set or overseen by the gods: He slaughters Trojans indiscriminately, ignoring suppliants, fights the river god Xanthus, and drags Hector’s body in the dirt. It is not until he stops obsessing about being honored that he connects to his mortality. This does not necessarily mean only accepting that he must die or going willingly to his death but also seeing others’ mortal limits in himself. When Priam asks him to remember his father, it is a reminder that Achilles, like Hector, will die, leaving his father unprotected. In Hector’s case, he assumes the gods’ support means that he is destined for victory and supremacy, but it is instead a cruel prelude to the fulfillment of prophecy that he will die and Troy will fall.

It is possible that the heroes’ journeys in the poem enact the hero as he was conceptualized and worshipped in ancient hero cults, as a legendary ancestor whose sacrifice becomes a community rallying point. The importance placed on securing heroes’ remains—Achaeans and Trojans fight tirelessly over their comrades’ corpses—may speak to the importance of the hero’s body being entombed and that tomb serving as a lodestone, as Ilus’s tomb does in the Iliad’s narrative. Further, the funeral rite of burning, which was not practiced during the archaic age, may be a reference to the process of immortalization. In the myth of Heracles, which is repeatedly referenced in the Iliad, his immortalization occurs at the moment his body goes up in flames. The poet also repeatedly refers to the funeral garments that warriors are wrapped in as ambrosial or deathless. The funeral games held for Patroclus resemble seasonal festivals held in honor of past heroes.