The Iliad Paris Quotes

Menelaus sees Paris facing him in battle - The Iiad

Soon as the warrior Menelaus marked him,
Paris parading there with his big loping strides,
flaunting before the troops, Atrides thrilled
like a lion lighting on some handsome carcass,
lucky to find an antlered stag or wild goat
just as hunger strikes – he rips it, bolts it down,
even with running dogs and lusty hunters rushing him.
So Menelaus thrilled at heart – princely Paris there,
right before his eyes.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 23-31. Menelaus reacts to the sight of Paris in the opposing Trojan army. Using an epic simile, Homer says the Greek warrior and king of Mycenae is like a lion attacking and ripping a stag or wild goat.

But soon as magnificent Paris marked Atrides
shining among the champions, Paris’ spirit shook.
Backing into his friendly ranks, he cringed from death
as one who trips on a snake in a hilltop hollow
recoils, suddenly, trembling grips his knees
and pallor takes his cheeks and back he shrinks.
So he dissolved again in the proud Trojan lines,
dreading Atrides – magnificent, brave Paris.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 34-41. When Paris sees Menelaus facing him in battle, he is described as being wary and nervous. An epic simile tells us how Paris reacts like he has tripped on a snake, he recoils, goes weak at the knees and shrinks back into the relative safety of the Trojan ranks. Homer is being sarcastic and ironic when he calls Paris magnificent and brave here, since he trembles at the prospect of facing Menelaus.
Paris, appalling Paris! Our prince of beauty - Hector in The Iliad

Paris, appalling Paris! Our prince of beauty –
mad for women, you lure them all to ruin!
Would to god you’d never been born, died unwed.
That’s all I’d ask. Better that way by far
than to have you strutting here, an outrage –
a mockery in the eyes of all our enemies. Why,
the long-haired Achaeans must be roaring with laughter!
They thought you the bravest champion we could field.
and just because of the handsome luster on your limbs.
but you have no pith, no fighting strength inside you.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 43-52. Hector rebukes his younger brother Paris for his cowardice and lack of honor after he backs away from combat with Menelaus and hides within the Trojan ranks. Hector says that Paris is an embarrassment to his family and to Troy. The man who later kills Achilles by shooting an arrow through his heel is portrayed by Homer as weak, cowardly, and a womanizer who doesn’t pull his weight on the battlefield.
Menelaus agrees to fight duel with Paris for Helen

I intend that we will part in peace, at last,
Trojans and Achaeans. Look what heavy casualties
you have suffered just for me, my violent quarrel,
and Paris who brought it on you all. Now we’ll fight –
and death to the one marked out for doom and death!
But the rest will part in peace, and soon, soon.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 119-124. Menelaus agrees to fight Paris in a duel in order to end the war. He agrees that if he wins he can bring his stolen wife Helen home, while if Paris is victor he may keep Helen and no more soldiers will be killed over Helen.

Now Paris and Menelaus, Atrides loved by Ares,
will fight it out with their rugged spears for Helen,
and Helen and all her treasures go to the man who wins.
The rest will seal in blood their binding pacts of friendship.
Our people will live in peace on the rich soil of Troy.
Our enemies sail home to the stallion-land of Argos,
the land of Achaea where the women are a wonder.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 303-308. The crier announces to Trojan King Priam the single combat duel arranged between Paris and Menelaus. They are to fight to decide who will get Helen – she is to be the winner’s prize. The fierce warrior-king Menelaus is loved by god of war Ares, we learn.

Not a single Trojan, none of their famous allies
could point out Paris to battle-hungry Menelaus.
Not that they would hide him out of friendship,
even if someone saw him –
all of them hated him like death, black death.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 3, lines 529-533. Paris disappears from the battlefield after Aphrodite saves him from being killed by Menelaus. She scoops him up and transports him back to his bedroom in Troy. Both Trojans and Greeks search for him. The reason why all the Trojans hate Paris "like death" is because he stole the Spartan queen Helen from Menelaus and started the Trojan War.

Meriones killed Phereclus – son of Tecton,
son of the blacksmith Harmon – the fighter’s hands
had the skill to craft all kinds of complex work
since Pallas Athena loved him most, her protege
who had built Paris his steady, balanced ships,
trim launchers of death, freighted with death
for all of Troy and now for the shipwright too:
what could the man know of all the gods’ decrees?

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 5, lines 64-71. The Greek captain from Crete Meriones kills the Trojan shipbuilder Phereclus. A protege of goddess Athena and much loved by her, Phereclus was a target for the Greeks because he built Paris’s ship, including the boat he used to kidnap Helen.

Look,
your people dying around the city, the steep walls,
dying in arms – and all for you, the battle cries
and the fighting flaring up around the citadel.
You’d be the first to lash out at another – anywhere –
you saw hanging back from this, this hateful war.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 6, lines 386-391. Hector scolds his brother Paris because he has been missing from the battlefield. Using metaphorical language he talks of fighting flaring all over the city as though it were a fire, and people dying everywhere. Yet Paris is nowhere to be seen, instead Hector finds him at home with Helen and her handmaidens.

As a stallion full-fed at the manger, stalled too long,
breaking free of his tether gallops down the plain,
out for his favorite plunge in a river’s cool currents,
thundering in his pride – his head flung back, his mane
streaming over his shoulders, sure and sleek in his glory.
knees racing him on to the fields and stallion-haunts he loves –
so down from Pergamus heights came Paris, son of Priam,
glittering in his armor like the sun astride the skies,
exultant, laughing aloud, his fast feet sped him on.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 6, lines 604-672. Paris, who has been scolded by his brother Hector for avoiding battle, now sets off for the battle lines. Here in this epic animal simile he is compared to a proud stallion, sure in his glory, breaking free of his tether and galloping on to the battlefield.

Both men bent on combat, on they fought like wind
when a god sends down some welcome blast to sailors
desperate for it, worked to death at the polished oars,
beating the heavy seas, their arms slack with the labor –
so welcome that brace of men appeared to the Trojans
desperate for their captains.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 7, lines 3-8. The Trojan troops welcome their leaders Hector and his brother Paris back to the fighting. An epic simile compares the soldiers’ relief to a welcome blast of wind sent to tired sailors, who have been laboring to death at their oars in heavy seas.

That left the famous spearman Odysseus on his own,
not a single Argive comrade standing by his side
since panic seized them all. Unnerved himself,
Odysseus probed his own great fighting heart.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 11, lines 473-476. When his friend Diomedes is hit in the foot by an arrow from Paris, Odysseus decides to remain on the battlefield long enough to allow him escape. All of his fellow soldiers have fled, leaving him alone, and the Trojans are coming. But Odysseus shows her heroic qualities by staying in the fight.

Hector! Dearest to me of all my husband’s brothers –
my husband, Paris, magnificent as a god…
he was the one who brought me here to Troy –
Oh how I wish I’d died before that day!
But this, now, is the twentieth year for me
since I sailed here and forsook my own native land,
yet never once did I hear from you a taunt, an insult.
But if someone else in the royal halls would curse me,
one of your brothers or sisters or brothers’ wives
trailing their long robes, even your own mother –
not your father, always kind as my own father –
why, you’d restrain them with words, Hector,
you’d win them to my side…
you with your gentle temper, all your gentle words.
And so in the same breath I mourn for you and me,
my doom-struck, harrowed heart. Now there is no one left
in the wide realm of Troy, no friend to treat me kindly –
all the countrymen cringe from me in loathing!

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 24, lines 895-912. Even Helen, the captive woman snatched from her husband by Hector’s brother Paris, has warm words to say about the dead Hector. She pays tribute to his kindness, gentleness and friendship during the twenty years she has been gone from her native land. Now she has no friend left in Troy to treat her kindly, she laments.
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