A king vs. a hero, a bully vs. a thinker, a warrior vs. a lover. These describe the two most important and very different Achaean heroes, Agamemnon and Achilles, in Homer’s epic poem The Iliad. The conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon is one of the major plot lines in the Iliad. Agamemnon is a powerful king of the Achaeans, and he’s also powerful through family and marriage. His younger brother is Menelaus of Sparta, who won the hand of Helen of Sparta, the most beautiful woman ever. Helen falls in love with the Trojan prince Parisand runs away with him. So Agamemnon, who commands considerable power, gets his ships together and sails for the city of Troy. The ensuing Trojan War lasts 10 years but ends in victory for Agamemnon and Menelaus. He marries Clytemnestra, Helen’s twin sister. Together, they have four children. When he cannot get a favorable wind to sail for Troy, Agamemnon sacrifices his eldest daughter, Iphigenia.
Achilles is the son of the sea goddess, Thetis, and her mortal husband, Peleus. Though he is still a human, Achilles is stronger than many. He is the leader of the Myrmidons. He has a childhood friend named Patroclus, who has come to war with him. Earlier in the war, before the start of the events in The Iliad, Achilles captured a princess named Briseis. The two have fallen in love, and Briseis imagines they will be married upon his return to his home of Phthia.
Achilles has a strange fate hanging over him. He has two choices: fighting the Trojan War and become a hero but die young or stay out of the war and live a long life but win no glory. Achilles chooses the former. In short, Achilles is a very different type of man and leader than the older
Agamemnon. The differences in their personalities and leadership play a huge role in the conflict between them.
Though they’re the leaders of different tribes, both Achilles and Agamemnon are Achaeans. This means that they are both commanders of large groups of men, though Agamemnon is superior in rank and brings them into direct conflict with each other. Problems between Agamemnon and Achilles start right around the same time as the events in The Iliad. The Greeks sacked the city of Chryse, where was a temple of Apollo, and a priest that served the temple. And when they divided the spoil, they gave to King Agamemnon with other gifts, the priest’s daughter, Chryseïs. There upon there came to the camp Chryses, the priest, wishing to ransom his daughter. Much gold he brought with him, and on his staff of gold he carried the holy garland, that men might reverence him the more. He went to all the chiefs, and to the sons of Atreus first of all, saying,— “Loose, I pray you, my dear daughter, and take the ransom for her; so may the gods that dwell in Olympus grant you to take the city of Troy, and to have safe return to your homes.” Then all the others spake him fair, and would have done what he wished. Only Agamemnon would not have it so.
“Get thee out, graybeard!” he cried in great wrath. “Let me not find the elingering now by the ships, neither coming hither again, or it shall be the worse for thee, for all thy priesthood. And as for thy daughter, I shall carry her away to Argos, when I shall have taken this city of Troy.” Then the old man went out hastily in great fear and trouble. And he walk edinhis sorrow by the shore of the sounding sea, and prayed to his god Apollo. “Hear me, god of the silver bow! If I have built thee a temple, and offered thee fat of many bullocks and rams, hear me, and avenge my tear son the Greeks with thine arrows!” And Apollo heard him. Wroth wash ethatmen had so dishonored his priest, and he came down from the top of Olympus, where he dwelt. Dreadful was the rattle of his arrows as he went, and his coming was as the night when it cometh over the sky. Then he shot the arrows of death, first on the dogs and the mules, and then on the men; and soon all along the shore rolled the black smoke from the piles of wood on which they burnt the bodies of the dead.
For nine days the shafts of the god went throughout the host; but onthetenth day Achilles called the people to an assembly. So Junobade him, for she loved the Greeks, and grieved to see them die. When they were gathered together he stood up among them, and spake to Agamemnon: “Surely it were better to return home, than that we should all perish hereby war or plague. But come, let us ask some prophet or priest or dreamer of dreams why it is that Apollo is so wroth with us.
Then stood up Calchas, best of seers, who knew what had been, and what was, and what was to come, and spake:
“Achilles, thou biddest me tell the people why Apollo is wrothwiththem. Lo! I will tell thee, but thou must first swear to stand by me, for I knowthat what I shall say will anger King Agamemnon, and it goes ill withcommon men when kings are angry.”
“Speak out, thou wise man!” cried Achilles; “for I swear by Apollothat
while I live no one shall lay hands on thee, no, not Agamemnon’sself,
though he be sovereign lord of the Greeks.” Then the blamelessseer
took heart, and spake – “It is not for vow or offering that Apolloiswroth;
it is for his servant the priest, for he came to ransomhis daughter, but
Agamemnon scorned him, and would not let the maiden go. Now, then,
ye must send her back to Chryse without ransom, and with her ahundred beasts for sacrifice, so that the plague may be stayed.” ThenAgamemnon stood up in a fury, his eyes blazing like fire.
After quite a conflict cried Achilles, and his face was as black as a thunder-storm: “Surely thou art altogether shameless and greedy, and, in truth, an ill ruler of men. No quarrel have I with the Trojans. They never harried oxen or sheep of mine in fertile Phthia, for many murky mountains lie between, and a great breadth of roaring sea. But I have been fighting in thy cause, and that of thy brother Menelaus. Naught carest thou for that. Thou leavest me to fight, and sittest in thy tent at ease. But when the spoil is divided, thine is always the lion’s share. Small, indeed, is my part,—‘a little thing, but dear.’ And this, forsooth, thou wilt take away! Now am I resolved to go home. I have no mind to heap up goods and gold for thee, and be myself dishonored.”
And King Agamemnon answered, “Go, and thy Myrmidons with thee! I have other chieftains as good as thou art, and ready, as thou art not, to pay me due respect; and Zeus, the god of council, is with me. I hate thee, for thou always lovest war and strife. And as for the matter of the spoil, know that I will take thy share, the girl Briseïs, and fetch her myself, if need be, that all may know that I am sovereign lord here in the host of the Greeks.”
Then Achilles was mad with anger, and he thought in his heart, “Shall I rise and slay this caitiff, or shall I keep down the wrath in my breast?” And as he thought he laid his hand on his sword-hilt, and hadhalf-drawnhis sword from the scabbard, when lo! the goddess Athene stood behind him (for Juno, who loved both this chieftain and that, had sent her), and caught him by the long locks of his yellow hair. But Achilles marveled much to feel the mighty grasp, and turned and looked, and knew the goddess, but no one else in the assembly might see her. Terrible was the flash of his eyes as he cried, “Art thou come, child of Zeus, to see the insolence of Agamemnon? Of a truth, I think that he will perish for his folly.”
Achilles said, “I were a slave and a coward if I owned thee as my lord. Not so; play the master over others, but think not to master me. As for the prize which the Greeks gave me, let them do as they will. They gave it; let them take it away. But if thou darest to touch aught that is mine own, that hour thy life-blood shall redden on my spear.” Then the assembly was dismissed. Chryseis was sent to her home with due offerings to the god, the wise Ulysses going with her. And all the people purified themselves, and offered offerings to the Gods; and the sweet savor went up to heaven in the wreathing smoke. But King Agamemnonwould not go back from his purpose. So he called to him the heralds, Talthybius and Eurybates, and said,— “Heralds, go to the tents of Achilles, and fetch the maiden Briseïs. But if he will not let her go, say that I will come myself with many others to fetch her; so will it be the worse for him.”
Meanwhile Ulysses drew near to Chryseis with the holy offerings. They furled the sail, and laid it in the ship, and lowered the mast, and rowed the ship to her moorings. They cast out the anchor stones, and made fast the cables from the stern. After that they landed, taking with them the offerings and the maid Chryseïs. To the altar they brought the maid, and gave her into the arms of her father, and the wise Ulysses said, “Seenow; Agamemnon, King of men, sends back thy daughter, and with her a hundred beasts for sacrifice, that we may appease the god who hathsmitten the Greeks in his wrath.”
Then the priest received his daughter right gladly, and when they had ranged the beasts about the altar, and poured out the water of purification, and taken up handfuls of bruised barley, then the priest prayed, “Hear me, God of the silver bow! If before thou didst hear kentomy prayer, and grievously afflict the Greeks, so hear me now, and staythis plague which is come upon them.” So prayed he, and the god gaveear.
Then they cast the barley on the heads of the cattle, and slew them, and flayed them, and they cut out the thigh-bones and wrapped them upin folds of fat, and laid raw morsels on them. These the priest burned on fagots, pouring on sparkling wine; and the young men stood by, having the five-pronged forks in their hands. And when the thighs were consumed, then they cut up the rest, and broiled the pieces carefully on spits. This being done, they made their meal, nor did any one lack his share. And when the meal was ended, then they poured a little wine into the cups to serve for libations to the Gods. After that they sat till sunset, singing a hymn to the Archer God, and making merry; and he heard the irvoice and was pleased.
When the sun went down, they slept beside the stern-cables; and when the dawn appeared, then they embarked, raising the mast and spreading the sail; and Apollo sent them a favoring wind, and the dark blue wave hissed about the stem of the ship as she went: so they came to the camp of the Greeks. But all the time Achilles sat in wrath beside his ships; he went not to the war, nor yet to the assembly, but sat fretting in his heart, because he longed for the cry of the battle. I believe that the choice of Achilles was not correct. He was one of the prominent warriors of the Achaeans. Since he was a son of a goddess, he was gifted with particular power. Definitely, as a man, he had a right to be offended. Nevertheless, then the lives of his people were in danger, he had to forget his offenses and help. His behavior was selfish. Thus, the criticism provided by Diomedes can be treated as fair. As for Ajax’s argument that even someone who has lost a relative must accept some form of compensation and reconcile, it is ambiguous. On the one hand, no gift can replace a close person. On the other hand, if the fate of many people depends on a person’s behavior in grief, that person should not consider just his or her feelings.
[…] A king vs. a hero, a bully vs. a thinker, a warrior vs. a lover. These describe the two most important and very different Achaean heroes, Agamemnon and Achilles, in Homer’s epic poem The Iliad. The conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon is one of the major plot lines in the Iliad. Agamemnon is a powerful king of the Achaeans, and he’s also powerful through family and marriage. His younger brother is Menelaus of Sparta, who won the hand of Helen of Sparta, the most beautiful woman ever. Helen falls in love with the Trojan prince Parisand runs away with him. So Agamemnon, who commands considerable power, gets his ships together and sails for the city of Troy. The ensuing Trojan War lasts 10 years but ends in victory for Agamemnon and Menelaus. He marries Clytemnestra, Helen’s twin sister. Together, they have four children. When he cannot get a favorable wind to sail for Troy, Agamemnon sacrifices his eldest daughter, Iphigenia. … (Read More) […]