Achilles (Mythological character); Classical literature; Epic poetry, Greek -- Translations into English; Trojan War
He laughed as he spoke and drove the horses over the ditch, while
the other Achaeans followed him gladly. When they reached the
strongly built quarters of the son of Tydeus, they tied the
horses with thongs of leather to the manger, where the steeds of
Diomed stood eating their sweet corn, but Ulysses hung the
blood-stained spoils of Dolon at the stern of his ship, that they
might prepare a sacred offering to Minerva. As for themselves,
they went into the sea and washed the sweat from their bodies,
and from their necks and thighs. When the sea-water had taken all
the sweat from off them, and had refreshed them, they went into
the baths and washed themselves. After they had so done and had
anointed themselves with oil, they sat down to table, and drawing
from a full mixing-bowl, made a drink-offering of wine to
Minerva.
BOOK XI.
In the forenoon the fight is equal, but Agamemnon turns the
fortune of the day towards the Achaeans until he gets wounded and
leaves the field—Hector then drives everything before him till he
is wounded by Diomed—Paris wounds Diomed—Ulysses, Nestor, and
Idomeneus perform prodigies of valour—Machaon is wounded—Nestor
drives him off in his chariot—Achilles sees the pair driving
towards the camp and sends Patroclus to ask who it is that is
wounded—This is the beginning of evil for Patroclus—Nestor makes
a long speech.
And now as Dawn rose from her couch beside Tithonus, harbinger of
light alike to mortals and immortals, Jove sent fierce Discord
with the ensign of war in her hands to the ships of the Achaeans.
She took her stand by the huge black hull of Ulysses’ ship which
was middlemost of all, so that her voice might carry farthest on
either side, on the one hand towards the tents of Ajax son of
Telamon, and on the other towards those of Achilles—for these two
heroes, well assured of their own strength, had valorously drawn
up their ships at the two ends of the line. There she took her
stand, and raised a cry both loud and shrill that filled the
Achaeans with courage, giving them heart to fight resolutely and
with all their might, so that they had rather stay there and do
battle than go home in their ships.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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