I beg you, beg you by your life, your parents - don't let the dogs devour me by the Argive ships! Wait, take the princely ransom of bronze and gold, the gifts my father and mother will give to you - but give my body to friends

I beg you, beg you by your life, your parents –
don’t let the dogs devour me by the Argive ships!
Wait, take the princely ransom of bronze and gold,
the gifts my father and mother will give to you –
but give my body to friends to carry home again
so Trojan men and Trojan women can do me honor
With fitting rites of fire once I am dead.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 22, lines 399-405. Struggling for breath and about to die, the injured Hector pleads with Achilles to give his body to friends to bring home so that he may a proper funeral. He promises that his parents Priam and Hecuba will provide Achilles with a princely ransom. Hector is dying after his windpipe was slashed by Achilles’s spear.

Homer Quotes