This occurs after Agamemnon is forced to relinquish his slave girl Chryseis to avert a plague. In the tenth year of the war, as recounted in Homer’s Iliad, Agamemnon and Achilles quarrel over Briseis, a slave girl. Before the Greek fleet departed, Agamemnon insulted the goddess Artemis and was forced to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia to make amend an act which his wife Clytemnestra never forgave. After Helen of Troy and Paris ran off, Agamemnon gathered the various Greek contingents to invade Troy. The king of Mycenae, commander of the Achaean army, and brother of Menelaus, Agamemnon was the most powerful lord in Greece. 460 BC, courtesy Museum of Fine Arts Boston Īgamemnon: Commander of the Greek Army at Troy Mixing bowl, Calyx krater with the killing of Agamemnon b y the Dokimasia Painter, ca. Achilles is a popular Trojan War Hero in both Ancient and Modern art. Achilles goes on to kill Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, and Memnon king of Ethiopia, both of whom were Trojan allies before he himself is killed by the Trojan hero Paris. He then holds elaborate funeral games in honor of Patroclus the nature of their relationship has been debated for centuries though many believe them to have been lovers. Given new armor forged by the god Hephaestus, Achilles goes on a rampage slaughtering hundreds of Trojans, fights the river god Scamander, and kills the Trojan hero Hector.

Patroclus saves the Greeks but is killed, causing Achilles to rejoin the war. Finally, Patroclus, his cousin and close friend, convinces Achilles to allow him to take his place at the head of Achilles’ troops. As the situation deteriorates for the Greeks Achilles rejects all attempts to mollify him. Homer’s Iliad begins with Achilles withdrawing himself and his soldiers from the war after quarreling with Agamemnon, commander of the Greek army.

To avoid this, Thetis was said to have dipped him in the river Styx to make him invulnerable critically she missed his heel where she held him. It was prophesied that he would either live long in obscurity or die young and obtain glory. Achilles was trained by the centaur Chiron who taught him the art of war. Greatest of all the Achaean heroes who fought at Troy, and the central character of Homer’s Iliad, Achilles was the son of the Argonaut and companion Peleus and the Nereid Thetis, a goddess of the sea. Achilles: Greatest Trojan War Hero of the Greek Army Figured Vessel in the Form of Achilles’ Head in a Helmet Asia Minor, 2nd century, courtesy State Hermitage Museum

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