The Song of Achilles: A Novel

Gods and Immortals

APHRODITE. The goddess of love and beauty, the mother of Aeneas, and a champion of the Trojans. She particularly favored Paris, and in Book 3 of the Iliad she intervened to save him from Menelaus.

APOLLO. The god of light and music, and a champion of the Trojans. He was responsible for sending the plague down upon the Greek army in Book 1 of the Iliad, and was instrumental in the deaths of both Achilles and Patroclus.

ARTEMIS. The twin sister of Apollo and the goddess of the hunt, the moon, and virginity. Angry about the bloodshed the Trojan War would cause, she stopped the winds from blowing, stranding the Greek fleet at Aulis. After the sacrifice of Iphigenia, she was appeased and the winds returned.

ATHENA. The powerful goddess of wisdom, weaving, and war arts. She was a fierce supporter of her beloved Greeks against the Trojans and a particular guardian of the wily Odysseus. She appears often in both the Iliad and the Odyssey.

CHIRON. The only “good” centaur, known as a teacher of the heroes Jason, Aesculapius, and Achilles, as well as the inventor of medicine and surgery.

HERA. The queen of the gods and the sister-wife of Zeus. Like Athena, she championed the Greeks and hated the Trojans. In Vergil’s Aeneid, she is the principal antagonist, constantly harassing the Trojan hero Aeneas after Troy has fallen.

SCAMANDER. The god of the river Scamander near Troy and another champion of the Trojans. His famous battle with Achilles is told in Book 22 of the Iliad.

THETIS. A sea-nymph and shape-changer, and the mother of Achilles. The fates had prophesied that Thetis’ son would be greater than his father, which frightened the god Zeus (who had previously desired her). He made sure to marry Thetis to a mortal, in order to limit the power of her son. In post-Homeric versions of the story she tries a number of ways to make Achilles immortal, including dipping him by his ankle in the river Styx and holding him in a fire to burn away his mortality.

ZEUS. The king of the gods and the father of many famous heroes, including Heracles and Perseus.

Mortals

ACHILLES. The son of the king Peleus and the sea-nymph Thetis, he was the greatest warrior of his generation, as well as the most beautiful. The Iliad calls him “swift-footed” and also praises his singing voice. He was raised by the kindly centaur Chiron and took the exiled prince Patroclus as his constant companion. As a teenager, he was famously offered a choice: a long life and obscurity or a short life and fame. He chose fame and sailed to Troy along with the other Greeks. However, in the ninth year of the war he quarreled with Agamemnon and refused to fight any longer, returning to battle only when his beloved Patroclus was killed by Hector. In a rage, he slew the great Trojan warrior and dragged his body around the walls of Troy in vengeance. He was eventually killed by the Trojan prince Paris, with the assistance of the god Apollo.

Achilles’ most famous myth—his fatally vulnerable heel—is actually a very late story. In the Iliad and Odyssey Achilles isn’t invincible, just extraordinarily gifted in battle. But in the years after Homer, myths began popping up to explain and elaborate upon Achilles’ seeming invincibility. In one popular version, the goddess Thetis dips Achilles in the river Styx to try to make him immortal; it works, everywhere but the place on his heel where she holds him. Since the Iliad and Odyssey were my primary sources of inspiration, and since their interpretation seemed more realistic, I chose to follow the older tradition.

AENEAS. The son of the goddess Aphrodite and the mortal Anchises, the Trojan noble Aeneas was renowned for his piety. He fought bravely in the Trojan War but is best known for his adventures afterwards. As Vergil tells in the Aeneid, Aeneas escaped the fall of Troy and led a group of survivors to Italy, where he married a native princess and founded the Roman people.

AGAMEMNON. The brother of Menelaus, Agamemnon ruled Mycenae, the largest kingdom in Greece, and served as the over-general of the Greek expedition to Troy. During the war he often quarreled with Achilles, who refused to acknowledge Agamemnon’s right to command him. Upon Agamemnon’s return home after the war, he was murdered by his wife, Clytemnestra. Aeschylus depicts this incident and its aftermath in his famous tragic cycle the Oresteia.

AJAX. The king of Salamis and a descendent of Zeus, who was known for his enormous size and strength. He was the second greatest Greek warrior after Achilles, and memorably stood against the Trojans’ attack on the Greek camp when Achilles refused to fight. However, after Achilles’ death, when Agamemnon chose to honor Odysseus as the most valuable member of the Greek army, Ajax went mad with grief and rage, and killed himself. His story is movingly told in Sophocles’ tragedy Ajax.

ANDROMACHE. Born a princess of Cilicia, near Troy, she became the loyal and loving wife of Hector. She hated Achilles, who had killed her family in a raid. During the sack of Troy, she was taken captive by Pyrrhus and carried back to Greece. After Pyrrhus’ death, she and Helenus, Hector’s brother, founded the city of Buthrotum, which they built to resemble the lost Troy. Vergil tells their story in Book 3 of the Aeneid.

AUTOMEDON. Achilles’ charioteer, skilled at handling his divine, headstrong horses. After Achilles’ death, he served his son Pyrrhus.

BRISEIS. Taken captive by the Greeks in their raids on the Trojan countryside, Briseis was given as a war-prize to Achilles. When Achilles defied him, Agamemnon confiscated her as a punishment. She was returned after Patroclus’ death, and in Book 19 of the Iliad, she and the other women of the camp mourn over his body.

CALCHAS. A priest who advised the Greeks, encouraging Agamemnon to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia and to return the captive slave-girl Chryseis to her father.

CHRYSES AND CHRYSEIS. Chryses was an Anatolian priest of Apollo. His daughter, Chryseis, was taken as a slave by Agamemnon. When Chryses came to retrieve her, offering a generous ransom, Agamemnon refused, then insulted him. Enraged, Chryses called upon his god Apollo to send a plague to punish the Greek army. When Achilles publicly urged Agamemnon to return Chryseis to her father, Agamemnon erupted, precipitating their dramatic rift.

DEIDAMEIA. The daughter of King Lycomedes and the princess of the island kingdom of Scyros. To keep him from the war, Thetis dressed Achilles as a girl and hid him among Deidameia’s ladies-in-waiting. Deidameia discovered the trick and secretly married Achilles, conceiving the child Pyrrhus.

DIOMEDES. The king of Argos. Known for both his guile and his strength, Diomedes was one of the most valued warriors in the Greek army. Like Odysseus, he was a favorite of the goddess Athena, who in Book 5 of the Iliad grants him supernatural strength in battle.

HECTOR. The oldest son of Priam and the crown prince of Troy, Hector was known for his strength, nobility, and love of family. In Book 6 of the Iliad, Homer shows us a touching scene between Hector; his wife, Andromache; and their young son, Astyanax. He was killed by Achilles in the final year of the war.

HELEN. The legendary most beautiful woman in the world, Helen was a princess of Sparta, the daughter of the queen Leda and the god Zeus (in the form of a swan). Many men sought her hand in marriage, each swearing an oath to uphold her union with whoever prevailed. She was given to Menelaus, but later ran away with the Trojan prince Paris, setting in motion the Trojan War. After the war, she returned home with Menelaus to Sparta.

HERACLES. The son of Zeus and the most famous of Greek heroes. Known for his tremendous strength, Heracles was forced to perform twelve labors as penance to the goddess Hera, who hated him for being the product of one of Zeus’ affairs. He died long before the Trojan War began.

IDOMENEUS. The king of Crete and grandson of King Minos, of Minotaur fame.

IPHIGENIA. The daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, promised in marriage to Achilles and brought to Aulis to appease the goddess Artemis. Her sacrifice made the winds blow again, so that the Greek fleet could sail to Troy. Her story is told in Euripides’ tragedy Iphigenia at Aulis.

LYCOMEDES. The king of Scyros and the father of Deidameia. He unknowingly sheltered Achilles disguised as a girl in his court.

MENELAUS. The brother of Agamemnon and, after his marriage to Helen, the king of Sparta. When Helen was kidnapped by Paris, he invoked the oath sworn by all of her suitors and, with his brother, led an army to retrieve her. In Book 3 of the Iliad he dueled with Paris for possession of Helen, and was winning before the goddess Aphrodite intervened on Paris’ behalf. After the war, he and Helen returned to Sparta.

NESTOR. The aged king of Pylos and the former companion of Heracles. He was too old to fight in the Trojan War but served as an important counselor to Agamemnon.

ODYSSEUS. The wily prince of Ithaca, beloved by the goddess Athena. He proposed the famous oath requiring all of Helen’s suitors to swear a vow to uphold her marriage. As his reward, he claimed her clever cousin Penelope as his wife. During the Trojan War, he was one of Agamemnon’s chief advisers, and later devised the trick of the Trojan horse. His voyage home, which lasted ten years, is the subject of Homer’s Odyssey, which includes the famous tales of his encounters with the Cyclops, the witch Circe, Scylla and Charybdis, and the Sirens. Eventually Odysseus returned to Ithaca, where he was welcomed by his wife, Penelope, and grown son, Telemachus.

PARIS. The son of Priam who became the judge of the famous “beauty contest” between Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, with the golden apple as a prize. Each goddess tried to bribe him: Hera with power, Athena with wisdom, and Aphrodite with the most beautiful woman in the world. He awarded the prize to Aphrodite, and she in turn helped him spirit Helen away from her husband, Menelaus, thus starting the Trojan War. Paris was known for his skill with a bow and, with Apollo’s help, killed the mighty Achilles.

PATROCLUS. The son of King Menoitius. Exiled from his home for accidentally killing another boy, Patroclus found shelter in Peleus’ court, where he was fostered with Achilles. He is a secondary character in the Iliad, but his fateful decision to try to save the Greeks by dressing in Achilles’ armor sets in motion the final act of the story. When Patroclus is killed by Hector, Achilles is devastated and takes brutal vengeance upon the Trojans.

PELEUS. The king of Phthia and the father of Achilles by the sea-nymph Thetis. The story of Peleus overpowering the shape-changing Thetis in a wrestling match was a popular one in antiquity.

PHOINIX. A longtime friend and counselor of Peleus, who went with Achilles to Troy as his adviser. In Book 9 of the Iliad, Phoinix spoke of having cared for Achilles when he was a baby, and vainly tried to persuade him to yield and help the Greeks.

POLYXENA. The Trojan princess whom Pyrrhus sacrificed at his father’s tomb, before leaving Troy for the voyage home.

PRIAM. The elderly king of Troy, who was renowned for his piety and his many children. In Book 24 of the Iliad, he bravely made his way into Achilles’ tent to beg for his son Hector’s body. During the sack of Troy, he was killed by Achilles’ son, Pyrrhus.

PYRRHUS. Formally named Neoptolemus but called “Pyrrhus” for his fiery hair, he was the son of Achilles and the princess Deidameia. He joined the war after his father’s death, participating in the trick of the Trojan horse and brutally murdering the old king of Troy, Priam. In Book 2 of the Aeneid, Vergil tells the story of Pyrrhus’ role in the sack of Troy.