Achilles
（
Ἀχιλλεύς).
1.
A son of Earth, to whom Heré fled from the pursuits of Zeus, and who persuaded
her to return and marry that deity.
2.
The teacher of the centaur
Chiron (q.v.).
3.
The inventor of the ostracism (q. v).
4.
A son of Zeus and Lamia, whose beauty was so great that, in the judgment of Pan, he bore
away the prize in every contest. This so offended Aphrodité that she inspired Pan
with a fruitless passion for the nymph
Echo (q.v.),
and further gave him a hideous appearance.
5.
The famous son of Peleus, king of Phthiotis in Thessaly, by Thetis, the sea-deity.
According to Lycophron, Thetis became the mother of seven male children by Peleus, six of
whom she threw into the fire, because they were not of the same nature with herself, and
because the treatment she had received was unworthy of her rank as a goddess. The scholiast
on Homer, however, states, that Thetis threw her children into the fire in order to ascertain
whether they were mortal or not, the goddess supposing that the fire would consume what was
mortal in their natures, while she would preserve what was immortal. The scholiast adds that
six of her children perished by this harsh experiment, and that she had, in like manner,
thrown the seventh, afterwards named Achilles, into the flames, when Peleus, having beheld
the deed, rescued his offspring from this perilous situation. Tzetzes assigns a different
motive to Thetis in the case of Achilles. He makes her to have been desirous of conferring
immortality upon him, and states that with this view she anointed him with ambrosia
during the day, and threw him into fire at evening. Peleus, having discovered the goddess in
the act of consigning his child to the flames, cried out with alarm, whereupon Thetis,
abandoning the object she had in view, left the court of Peleus and rejoined the nymphs of
the ocean. Dictys Cretensis makes Peleus to have rescued Achilles from the fire before any
part of his body had been injured but the heel. What has thus far been stated in relation to
Achilles, with the single exception of the names of his parents, Peleus and Thetis, is
directly at variance with the authority of Homer, and must therefore be regarded as a mere
postHomeric fable. Equally at variance with the account given by the bard is the more popular
fiction that Thetis plunged her son into the waters of the Styx, and by that immersion
rendered the whole of his body invulnerable, except the heel by which she held him. There are
several passages in the
Iliad which plainly show that the poet does not
ascribe to Achilles the possession of any peculiar physical defence against danger.
The care of his education and training was intrusted, according to the common authorities,
to the centaur Chiron, and to Phoenix, son of Amyntor. Homer specifically mentions Phoenix as
his first instructor. Those, however, who pay more regard in this case to the statements of
other writers, make Chiron to have had charge of Achilles first, and to have fed him on the
marrow of wild animals; according to Libanius, on that of lions. Calchas having predicted,
when Achilles had attained the age of nine years, that Troy could not be taken without him,
Thetis, well aware that her son, if he joined that expedition, was destined to perish, sent
him disguised in female attire to the court of Lycomedes, king of the island of Scyros, for
the purpose of being concealed there. At the court of Lycomedes, he received the name of
Pyrrha (
Πυρρά, Rufa), from his golden locks, and became the
father of Neoptolemus by Deïdamia, one of the monarch's daughters. In this state of
concealment Achilles remained until discovered by Odysseus, who came to the island in the
disguise of a travelling merchant. The chieftain of Ithaca offered, it seems, various
articles of female attire for sale, and mingled with them some pieces of armor. On a sudden
blast being given with a trumpet, Achilles discovered himself by seizing upon the arms. The
young warrior then joined the army against Troy. This account, however, of the concealment of
Achilles is contradicted by the express authority of Homer, who represents him as proceeding
directly to the Trojan war from the court of his father. (
Il. ix. 439.) The Greeks, having made good their landing on the shores
of Troas, proved so superior to the enemy as to compel them to seek shelter within their
walls. No sooner was this done than the Greeks were forced to turn their principal attention
to the means of supporting their numerous forces. A part of the army was therefore sent to
cultivate the rich vales of the Thracian Chersonesus, then abandoned by their inhabitants on
account of the incursions of the barbarians from the interior. But the Grecian army, being
weakened by this separation of its force, could no longer deter the Trojans from again taking
the field, nor prevent succour and supplies from being sent into the city. Thus the
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Priam before Achilles. (Relief by Thorwaldsen, Munich.)
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siege was protracted to the length of ten years. During a great part of this time,
Achilles was employed in lessening the resources of Priam by the reduction of the tributary
cities of Asia Minor. With a fleet he ravaged the coasts of Mysia, made frequent
disembarkations of his forces, and succeeded eventually in destroying eleven cities. Among
the spoils of one, Achilles obtained the beautiful Briseïs, while, at the taking of
Thebé, Chryseïs, the daughter of Chryses, a priest of Apollo at Chrysa,
became the prize of Agamemnon. A pestilence shortly after appeared in the Grecian camp, and
Calchas, encouraged by the proffered protection of Achilles, ventured to attribute it to
Agamemnon's detention of the daughter of Chryses, whom her father had endeavored to ransom,
but in vain. The monarch, although deeply offended, was compelled at last to surrender his
captive; but, as an act of retaliation, and to testify his resentment, he deprived Achilles
of Briseïs. Hence arose “the anger of the son of Peleus,” on
which is based the action of the
Iliad. Achilles, on his part, withdrew his
forces from the contest, and neither prayers nor entreaties, nor direct offers of
reconciliation, couched in the most tempting and flattering terms, could induce him to return
to the field. The death of his friend Patroclus, however, by the hand of Hector, roused him
at length to action and revenge, and a reconciliation having thereupon taken place between
the two Grecian leaders, Briseïs was restored. As the arms of Achilles, having been
worn by Patroclus, had become the prize of Hector, Hephaestus, at the request of Thetis,
fabricated a suit of impenetrable armour for her son. Arrayed in this, Achilles took the
field, and after a great slaughter of the Trojans, and a contest with the god of the
Scamander, by whose waters he was nearly overwhelmed, he met Hector, chased him thrice around
the walls of Troy, and finally slew him by the aid of Athené. According to Homer,
Achilles dragged the corpse of Hector at his chariot-wheels thrice round the tomb of
Patroclus, and from the language of the poet he would appear to have done this for several
days in succession. Vergil, however, makes Achilles to have dragged the body of Hector twice
round the walls of Troy. In this it is probable that the Roman poet followed one of the
cyclic or else the tragic writers. The corpse of the Trojan hero was at last yielded up to
the tears and supplications of Priam, who had come for that purpose to the tent of Achilles,
and a truce was granted the Trojans for the performance of the funeral obsequies. Achilles
did not long survive his illustrious opponent. According to the more generally received
account, as it is given by the scholiast on Lycophron, and also by Dictys Cretensis and
Dares Phrygius, Achilles, having become enamoured of Polyxena, the daughter of Priam,
signified to the monarch that he would become his ally on condition of receiving her hand in
marriage. Priam consented, and the parties having come for that purpose to the temple of the
Thymbraean Apollo, Achilles was treacherously slain by Paris, who had concealed himself
there, being wounded by him with an arrow in the heel. The ashes of the hero were mingled in
a golden urn with those of his friend Patroclus, and were said to repose at Sigaeum.
