The Iliad Polydamas Quotes

For suddenly, just as the men tried to cross,
a fatal bird sign flashed before their eyes,
an eagle clutching a monstrous bloody serpent in both talons,
still alive, still struggling – it had not lost its fight,
writhing back to strike it fanged the chest of its captor
right beside the throat – and agonized by the bites
the eagle flung it away to earth, dashed it down
amidst the milling fighters, loosed a shriek
and the bird veered off along the gusting wind.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 12, lines 230-239. As the Trojans led by Hector and Polydamas try to storm and breach the Achaean wall, Zeus sends a sign, an omen. An eagle with a serpent in its talons flies over the Trojan army. But the great bird is in agony from the serpent’s bites and flings it down to earth among the fighters.

How can you hope to garner all the gifts at once?
One man is a splendid fighter – a god has made him so –
one’s a dancer, another skilled at lyre and song,
and deep in the next man’s chest farseeing Zeus
plants the gift of judgment, good clear sense.
And many reap the benefits of that treasure:
troops of men he saves, as he himself knows best.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 13, lines 842-848. Polydamas begs Hector to be reasonable and to fall back and regroup. Because some god has exalted Hector in battle, Polydamas warns him that he thinks he can beat the rest at tactics too. But Polydamas points out that the gods give each person a gift, one is a great fighter, another a dancer, another has the gift of judgment. He is advising Hector to have regard to his own limits.

The god of war is impartial:
he hands out death to the man who hands out death.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 18, lines 359-360. Hector to Polydamas, who suggests at a Trojan war council that the army remain in the city to fight off any Achaean attack as the return of Achilles makes it too dangerous to battle in the open. Hector rejects this advice, saying he will never run and will stand up to Achilles. In this passage Hector refers to war god Ares as he rallies the Trojan soldiers. He tells them to collect their possessions from the battlefield, eat, and camp outside the Trojan walls for another night before they attack the next morning.

No way out. If I slip inside the gates and walls,
Polydamas will be first to heap disgrace on me –
he was the one who urged me to lead our Trojans
back to Ilium just last night, the disastrous night
Achilles rose in arms like a god. But did I give way?
Not at all. And how much better it would have been!
Now my army’s ruined, thanks to my own reckless pride,
I would die of shame to face the men of Troy
and the Trojan women trailing their long robes…
Someone less of a man than I will say, "Our Hector –
staking all on his own strength, he destroyed his army!"

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 22, lines 118-128. Hector probes his own heart as he waits to fight Achilles. He blames his own reckless pride for not listening to Polydamas’s advice to retreat after Achilles returned to the battlefield. However, if he slips back behind the city walls, he will be called a disgrace and lose his honor. Hector knows that he is in a bad situation, but cannot get out of it.
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