The Iliad Achilles Quotes

Then he’d yoke his racing team to the chariot-harness,
lash the corpse of Hector behind the car for dragging
and haul him three times round the dead Patroclus’ tomb,
and then he’d rest again in his tents and leave the body
sprawled facedown in the dust.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 17-21. Achilles’s hatred for Hector is so extreme that it doesn’t stop even after he slays him. This passage describes the desecration of Hector’s body by Achilles, who drags it behind his chariot three times around the tomb of his friend Patroclus.

But murderous Achilles – you gods, you choose to help Achilles.
That man without a shred of decency in his heart…
his temper can never bend and change – like some lion
going his own barbaric way, giving in to his power,
his brute force and wild pride, as down he swoops
on the flocks of men to seize his savage feast.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 46-51. Apollo complains about Achilles’s treatment of the body of fallen Trojan hero Hector. In an epic simile he likens him to a barbaric lion, unleashing his brute force and wild pride to feast on men’s flocks.

But this Achilles – first he slaughters Hector,
he rips away the noble prince’s life
then lashes him to his chariot, drags him round
his beloved comrade’s tomb. But why, I ask you?
What good will it do him? What honor will he gain?
Let that man beware, or great and glorious as he is,
we mighty gods will wheel on him in anger – look,
he outrages the senseless clay in all his fury!

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 58-65. The gods take pity on fallen Trojan hero Hector, after Achilles in a rage drags the body behind his chariot and plans further disgrace to it. Apollo addresses the gods asking why they don’t allow Hector a proper burial and funeral. He questions what honor will it bring Achilles and warns that the gods will turn on him in anger for this outrage.

how long will you eat your heart out here in tears and torment?
All wiped from your mind, all thought of food and bed?
It’s a welcome thing to make love to a woman…
You don’t have long to live now, well I know:
already I see them looming up beside you – death
and the strong force of fate.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 156-161. Thetis finds Achilles still grieving for Patroclus. She wonders how long he is going to torment himself without food and sleep, suggesting that "it’s a welcome thing to make love to a woman" – there is a strong insinuation of a homosexual love relationship between the two men here. Thetis also reminds her son that she sees death and the strong force of fate looming up beside him.

How can you think of going down to the ships, alone,
and face the glance of the man who killed your sons,
so many fine brave boys? You have a heart of iron!
If he gets you in his clutches, sets his eyes on you –
that savage, treacherous man – he’ll show no mercy,
no respect for your rights!

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 241-246. Hecuba tries to convince Priam not to go down to the Achaean ships to ask Achilles for their son Hector’s body back. She believes that Achilles is a savage without compassion and will kill her husband, having already killed his sons.

and straightaway the Father launched an eagle –
truest of Zeus’s signs that fly the skies
the dark marauder that mankind calls the Black-wing.
Broad as the door of a rich man’s vaulted treasure chamber,
well-fitted with sturdy bars, so broad each wing of the bird
spread out on either side as it swept in through the city
flashing clear on the right before the king and queen.
All looked up, overjoyed – the people’s spirits lifted.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 374-381. When King Priam prays to Zeus that Achilles will receive him with kindness in his bid to take back his son Hector’s body, Zeus sends him an eagle as a sign to reassure him. A beautiful epic simile describes the magnificence of the broad-winged bird.

Awesome – as when the grip of madness seizes one
who murders a man in his own fatherland and flees
abroad to foreign shores, to a wealthy, noble host,
and a sense of marvel runs through all who see him –
so Achilles marveled, beholding majestic Priam.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 563-567. Achilles is amazed to see Trojan king Priam in his hut. His reaction is captured in an epic simile about a man who murders someone in his own land, then flees to the home of a rich man in a foreign land, where those who see him are seized with wonder.

Remember your own father, great godlike Achilles –
as old as I am, past the threshold of deadly old age!
No doubt the countrymen round about him plague him now,
with no one there to defend him, beat away disaster.
No one – but at least he hears you’re still alive
and his old heart rejoices, hopes rising, day by day,
to see his beloved son come sailing home from Troy.
But I – dear god, my life so cursed by fate…
I fathered hero sons in the wide realm of Troy
and now not a single one is left, I tell you.
…But one, one was left me, to guard my walls, my people –
the one you killed the other day, defending his fatherland,
my Hector!

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 570-579, 584-586. Priam pleads with Achilles for the return of Hector’s body for a proper funeral. He attempts to gain the sympathy of Achilles by making a comparison between himself and Achilles’s father Peleus. Appealing to any sense of compassion Achilles might have, Priam speaks of Peleus alone and surrounded by enemies with no one to defend him. But at least he still had the hope of seeing his beloved son returning home from Troy. Priam tells Achilles that he now has no hero son left to protect him since he killed Hector.

Poor man, how much you’ve borne – pain to break the spirit!
What daring brought you down to the ships all alone,
to face the glance of the man who killed your sons,
so many fine brave boys? You have a heart of iron.
Come please sit down on this chair here…
Let us put our griefs to rest in our own hearts.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 605-610. Achilles says this when Priam comes to beg for the return of his son Hector’s body. The Greek warrior recognizes the humanity in even his enemies and is overcome by compassion at the sadness a father mourning for his son. He admires the bravery of Priam in facing the man who killed his sons. There is certainly a heroism about the Trojan king in his willingness to face Achilles.

Feel no anger at me, Patroclus. if you learn –
even there in the House of Death – I let his father
have Prince Hector back. He gave me worthy ransom
and you shall have your share from me, as always,
your fitting, lordly share.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 695-699. As Achilles lifts Hector’s body up and lays it down on a bier to return to his father Priam, he calls out to the ghost of his friend Patroclus. He asks Patroclus not to be angry with him for letting Priam have his son back.

Hector, dearest to me by far of all my sons…
and dear to the gods while we still shared this life –
and they cared about you still, I see, even after death.
Many the sons I had whom the swift runner Achilles
caught and shipped on the barren salt sea as slaves
to Sarnos, to Imbros, to Lemnos shrouded deep in mist!
But you, once he slashed away your life with his brazen spear
he dragged you time and again around his comrade’s tomb,
Patroclus whom you killed – not that he brought Patroclus
back to life by that. But I have you with me now…
fresh as the morning dew you lie in the royal halls
like one whom Apollo, lord of the silver bow,
has approached and shot to death with gentle shafts.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 880-892. Hecuba speaks to the body of her son Hector, eulogizing him and the other sons Achilles took from her, many of them shipped across the sea as slaves. Achilles dragged her son’s body around his comrade’s tomb, after Hector killed Patroclus. But the gods cared for Hector even in death, by allowing his body to return home, where he now lay "fresh as the morning dew" (simile). She says that Hector appears to have been shot by an arrow from Apollo – this foreshadows that Achilles will die from an arrow guided by Apollo.
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