24.468–506

The power of these scenes can confound analysis at times. Yet they are built, like all Homeric poetry, on repeated forms, and we may begin our discussion there. The entire episode in the Greek camp is a version of the “Visit Scene,” where the visitor enters and finds the host engaged in some activity, is welcomed and offered a seat and a meal, after which conversation begins. Sometimes the scene ends with the guest being given a bed for the night. The closest parallel in the Iliad comes in Book 9, when Odysseus, Phoenix, and Ajax go to Achilles’s hut to plead with him to return to battle (9.182–668). Even closer is the episode in the Odyssey describing the arrival of Odysseus at the palace of Alcinous (7.14–181). There, Athena covers Odysseus in a mist and escorts him to the royal residence. He stops to gaze in wonder at the lavish architecture, then enters unseen and finds the Phaeacians having their last libation of the day. On the advice of the royal princess Nausicaa, whom he has met earlier outside of town, he goes to the queen Arete, kneels and grabs her knees, at which moment the mist disperses and everyone is stunned into silence as the stranger makes his supplication and sits in the hearth. Alcinous recovers, takes Odysseus by the hand and seats him a chair.

Like Odysseus, Priam penetrates the king’s dwelling undetected, startling onlookers. In place of Odysseus’s admiration for Alcinous’s palace, we hear the curious description of how Achilles’s hut was built. Both heroes are avatars of Hermes in his role as trickster, crossing boundaries and shaking up the settled order they find. The trickster, a common figure in folktales from all over the world, can be an agent of disruption, but he may also bring welcome fresh air into the closed precincts of the powerful. In Greek literature, the trickster can lurk beneath the common narrative pattern of evil in the past, the arrival of a stranger, followed by death. Odysseus is the prime example of such a figure, repeating the role all the way across the Mediterranean on his way back from Troy, leading up to his triumph over the suitors, which begins with him penetrating his own royal palace disguised as a beggar. The plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides all draw on the power of the paradigm. Priam will remain a stranger only for a moment, but he generates profound upheaval in the Greek camp and its principal hero.

We have not seen Achilles since his terse exchange with Thetis. He acquiesced then to Priam ransoming Hector’s body, but his emotional opacity gave no hint as to whether the rage had subsided or was still seething below the surface. The first signs are mixed:

γέρων δ᾽ ἰθὺς κίεν οἴκου,
τῇ ῥ᾽ Ἀχιλεὺς ἵζεσκε Διῒ φίλος: ἐν δέ μιν αὐτὸ
εὗρ᾽, ἕταροι δ᾽ ἀπάνευθε καθήατο: τὼ δὲ δύ᾽ οἴω
ἥρως Αὐτομέδων τε καὶ Ἄλκιμος ὄζος Ἄρηος
ποίπνυον παρεόντε: νέον δ᾽ ἀπέληγεν ἐδωδῆς
ἔσθων καὶ πίνων: ἔτι καὶ παρέκειτο τράπεζα

The old man went straight into the house,
where Achilles, dear to Zeus, was sitting. He found him
inside, and his companions were sitting apart; only two,
the hero Automedon and Alkimos, scion of Ares,
busied themselves beside him. He had just finished his meal,
eating and drinking, and the table was still nearby.

Iliad 24.471–76

Achilles has eaten, perhaps a move back toward ordinary human rituals, but he is still mostly apart from his companions, underscored by the emphatic last position in the verse of οἴω (473). We are reminded too that Patroclus, the hero’s usual dining companion (9.186–91; 19.315–19), is not there.

Next comes the most dramatic moment in the Iliad, inexpressibly powerful and unbearably poignant. The poet has been preparing us for this encounter for a long time, and the challenge is to make his poetry rise to the moment. He does not fail us:

τοὺς δ᾽ ἔλαθ᾽ εἰσελθὼν Πρίαμος μέγας, ἄγχι δ᾽ ἄρα στὰς
χερσὶν Ἀχιλλῆος λάβε γούνατα καὶ κύσε χεῖρας
δεινὰς ἀνδροφόνους, αἵ οἱ πολέας κτάνον υἷας.

Great Priam entered unseen by the others, and standing beside him
clasped the knees of Achilles and kissed his hands,
dreadful, manslaughtering, which had killed so many of his sons.

Iliad 24.477–79

Priam is μέγας only here in Homeric epic. Though we do not need to be reminded of his status, the epithet makes his next act all the more poignant. The painful intimacy of his gesture is unparalleled in the Homeric poetry, but as usual its impact has been carefully prepared. Since the death of Patroclus, the touch of a hand has come to symbolize both the tenderness and the violence that that characterize human contact in the poem. When Hermes first appears out of the darkness, terrifying Priam and his old servant, he reassures the old king by taking his hand (24.369–70). The disguised god’s sympathetic words then prompt Priam to exclaim that some god must be “holding his hand over me” (24.374). After Priam kisses his hands, Achilles takes him by the hand, gently eases him back, then lifts him to his feet (24.507–17).

The phrase δεινὰς ἀνδροφόνους (479), seems to be a traditional pairing. Twice, Achilles is said to lay his “manslaughtering hands” on the chest of the dead Patroclus (18.317; 23.18), a gesture that captures the ambivalent potential in those hands that we feel when Priam kisses them. The uncanny resonance of the phrase there only increases when we realize that elsewhere, the adjective “manslaughtering” appears only in the genitive singular (ἀνδροφόνοιο), almost always (11x) with ῾´Εκτορος. The full impact of these crosscurrents is not easy to describe, but they touch the web of associations between Achilles, Patroclus, Hector, and Priam. Another figure will soon be added, bringing Achilles closer to the end of his spiritual journey.

The poet pulls us away from the intense atmosphere of Priam’s supplication with a simile:

ὡς δ᾽ ὅτ᾽ ἂν ἄνδρ᾽ ἄτη πυκινὴ λάβῃ, ὅς τ᾽ ἐνὶ πάτρῃ
φῶτα κατακτείνας ἄλλων ἐξίκετο δῆμον
ἀνδρὸς ἐς ἀφνειοῦ, θάμβος δ᾽ ἔχει εἰσορόωντας,
ὣς Ἀχιλεὺς θάμβησεν ἰδὼν Πρίαμον θεοειδέα:
θάμβησαν δὲ καὶ ἄλλοι, ἐς ἀλλήλους δὲ ἴδοντο.

As when blind delusion takes one who has killed
a man in his own land, and arrives at the country of others,
at the home of a rich man, and wonder grips those who look on,
so Achilles was amazed looking at godlike Priam;
and the others wondered and looked at each other.

Iliad 24.480-84

The comparison is strange, seeming to cast each man in the role we would expect for the other. Priam becomes the exiled killer, Achilles the rich man. This kind of “reverse simile” is rare in Homeric poetry and invites further thought. The reversal seems to blur the identities of the two men, reminding us of the parallels between them, as grieving men looking for consolation. At the same time, the roles assigned are not entirely inappropriate. Priam’s desperation is real, and like the exile, he is vulnerable before the man he approaches. Achilles faces the father of a killer who has brought him misery. On another level, the simile probes the nature and value of the “riches” both men possess. Priam is legendarily wealthy, Achilles has power beyond other men’s, and both are reduced to abject despair. The relationship between outer appearance and inner worth is a continuing theme in the Iliad, also embodied in the powerful and enigmatic figures of Paris and Helen.

Priam’s first words invoke the crucial set of relationships that will allow Achilles to reach the end of his evolution toward adult maturity. The old king urges him to “remember your father,” then explores the ways that he and Peleus are alike, alone and besieged by those around them, missing their sons. The web of associations that began with Hermes stepping from the darkness to fill the role of Priam’s son (370–71) (see essay on 24.339–71), comes to fruition. The verb μιμνήσκω has a resonance that goes beyond our usual understanding of “remember,” as in:

ἀνέρες ἔστε φίλοι, μνήσασθε δὲ θούριδος ἀλκῆς

"Be men, dear friends, and summon up your furious valor"

Iliad 6.112; 8.174; 11.287;
15.487, 734; 16.270; 17.185

In these cases and elsewhere, μιμνήσκω, reaches beyond simply having something from the past in mind to the act of bringing something into one’s mind to tap its power in the present. The valor that the soldiers “remember” must be summoned from the past to the present as a more concrete resource. Insofar as that connotation is present in Priam’s words, it suggests that the old king wants Achilles to make contact with Peleus and draw on the power that figure brings with him.

Zeus impelled Thetis toward her part in fulfilling the first imperative for males reaching adult maturity when he summoned her to Olympus (24.93–119; 126–40). The symbolic ceremony of consolation then allowed Achilles’s mother to accept his mortality and let go of him, so that he in turn could let go of Hector’s corpse. The second requirement has now come into view, as Achilles is invited to see Peleus in Priam and through the old king make contact with his father’s mortal world of death and change. Allowing Priam to take his son back to Troy for burial will in turn give Hector the γέρας θανόντων that will confirm his mortality and final rest (cf. 16.453–61). The symbolic connection that the poet has established between Achilles and the dead bodies of Patroclus and Hector means that Achilles, too, can find rest in his new acceptance.

Priam has come to Achilles, he says, to ransom his son:

τοῦ νῦν εἵνεχ᾽ ἱκάνω νῆας Ἀχαιῶν
λυσόμενος παρὰ σεῖο, φέρω δ᾽ ἀπερείσι᾽ ἄποινα.
ἀλλ᾽ αἰδεῖο θεοὺς Ἀχιλεῦ, αὐτόν τ᾽ ἐλέησον
μνησάμενος σοῦ πατρός: ἐγὼ δ᾽ ἐλεεινότερός περ,
ἔτλην δ᾽ οἷ᾽ οὔ πώ τις ἐπιχθόνιος βροτὸς ἄλλος,
ἀνδρὸς παιδοφόνοιο ποτὶ στόμα χεῖρ᾽ ὀρέγεσθαι.

"Because of him I have come to the Achaean ships,
to win him back him from you, and I bring boundless wealth.
But respect the gods, Achilles, and pity me,
remembering your father. For I am still more pitiable,
I who have endured what no other mortal on earth has,
to bring to my mouth the hands of he who has killed my children."

Iliad 24.501–6

Verse 502 takes us back to the poem’s first rescue mission, by Chryses, priest of Apollo in the poem’s opening scene: λυσόμενός τε θύγατρα φέρων τ᾽ ἀπερείσι᾽ ἄποινα (1.13). The priest urges Agamemnon to revere the gods and return his daughter, the Greek commander’s captive from the war. That precedent, insofar as it might be felt here in Achilles’s hut, is not promising. Agamemnon’s arrogant abuse of Apollo’s servant brings plague, which in turn sparks the deadly quarrel and Achilles’s wrath. Now the old king asks for two things from Achilles:

ἀλλ᾽ αἰδεῖο θεοὺς Ἀχιλεῦ, αὐτόν τ᾽ ἐλέησον
μνησάμενος σοῦ πατρός: ἐγὼ δ᾽ ἐλεεινότερός περ,
ἔτλην δ᾽ οἷ᾽ οὔ πώ τις ἐπιχθόνιος βροτὸς ἄλλος,
ἀνδρὸς παιδοφόνοιο ποτὶ στόμα χεῖρ᾽ ὀρέγεσθαι.

"But revere the gods, Achilles, and pity me,
remembering your father; for I am even more pitiful.
I have endured what no other mortal man has suffered,
to draw to my lips the hand of the man who killed my son."

Iliad 24.503–6

Judging from Apollo’s earlier accusations, Priam’s prospects for success should be dim:

ὣς Ἀχιλεὺς ἔλεον μὲν ἀπώλεσεν, οὐδέ οἱ αἰδὼς
γίγνεται…

So Achilles has destroyed pity, nor is there in him
any reverence in him…

Iliad 24.44-45

Further Reading

Edwards, M. 1987. Homer: Poet of the Iliad, 61–87. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Van Nortwick, T. 1992. Somewhere I Have Never Travelled: The Second Self and the Hero’s Journey in Ancient Epic, 79–80. New York: Oxford University Press.