When Achilles’ arms grew weary from the killing he plucked out of the river ten young men alive as blood payment for the killing of Patroklos, Menoetius’ son. He led them up onto dry land like stupefied fawns, tied their hands behind them using belts they wore around their woven tunics and gave them to his men to lead back to the ships. Then he jumped in again, eager to keep killing.
Iliad XXI.32-46, trans. Ian Johnston
Like fawns running over a field Suddenly give up and stand Puzzled in their heavy coats.
@readingancientclassics on Instagram is dedicated to discussions of ancient texts, reviews of myth retellings, and group read-alongs of classical literature. I’d love for you to join me there
It is the grief at the very heart of the Iliad - a memorial not only to the war dead, but to the human condition: ‘that whip of sparks / And then it’s gone’
my review of Alice Oswald’s Memorial: An Excavation of the Iliad is up now on Instagramandgoodreads
Protesilaus Ebdoma Prot-eh-sil-OW-us. EBB-do-mah. “Ebb” as in what the tide does. “Doma” as in “domain”. NOTE: Protesilaus is the first hero to die at Troy. He is also the first man who dies as a result of the Lyctor Trials. “Johnny Quickdeath” would’ve also been a good pick.
—Tamsyn Muir, “A Little Explanation of Naming Sytems”, in Gideon the Ninth
The first to die was PROTESILAUS A focused man who hurried to darkness With forty black ships leaving the land behind Men sailed with him from those flower-lit cliffs Where the grass gives growth to everything
