Essay/Term paper: The iliad

Essay, term paper, research paper:  Position Papers

The Iliad



Outline &explain the qualities of a "Homeric Hero". Who best fits the bill? Why?



The Homeric hero strives to be the best among his peers. His goal is to achieve



the greatest glory in order to earn the highest honor from his peers, his commander, and



finally from his warrior society. He strives for excellence in particular areas of human



behavior, such behaviors are strength, skill, and determination. These are necessary on



the both the athletic and battlefields, it is known as the idea of arete.



The Homeric hero judges his own arete by what his warrior society thinks of him.



How well the Homeric hero will be remembered and honored is determined upon how



well he fights, how his heroic adversity is, and how well he faces death. He feels that



society"s attitude towards him is more important than is own attitude. He chooses to act



in a way that will make him acquire public approval that he needs in order to have self-



esteem.



The greatest insult to a Homeric hero is to with hold the honor that he has earned.



He is completely shattered when honor is denied him. The honor that he would not have



received would be from a battle, not receiving an appropriate impressive prize, or being



judged a loser in a competition he should have won. The highest and most honored prize



is called the prize of honor. In the Iliad this prize is the most attractive, intelligent,



and skilled female captive. The most absolute honor is everlasting fame. It is the only



for of immortality that a mortal can acquire. This places the Homeric hero lower than the



gods, but higher than the ordinary man.



Achilles, Hector, Agamemnon, and Patroclus are considered Homeric heroes.



Achilles acted childish when he did not receive the appropriate prize. He said, "you



threaten to take away my prize of honor, which I earned and which the Greeks gave to



me. Whenever I sack a town, my prize is never as great as yours, even though I am the



greatest Greek fighter. Even so, my small prize is my own. So now I will return to my



homeland. I refuse to stay here, dishonored, in order to win greater wealth for you!" He



is upset that he did not receive a great prize as Agamemnon did. Achilles had worked so



hard to earn a prize and Agamemnon had taken the credit for it and gotten the better



prize.



Hector is considered a Homeric hero because he chooses between life and death.



He chooses even though an honorable death will bring the immortality of everlasting



fame. His death is in the hands of Achilles. This shows that Achilles is the greater



warrior and Hector is the greater man.





Discuss the functions of the gods in the Iliad. Name several occurrences that are a direct or indirect result of the god"s wishes.



The functions of the gods were to participate in giving advice to mortals. The



advice was both good and bad. It supplied thoughts and ideas, strength and skill, courage



and determination, and by causing weapons to hit or miss their marks. The Homeric gods



certainly had favorites among the mortals and made an effort to help them. A mortal,



earned divine esteem and goodwill by the way he treats both the gods and other mortals.



The gods were partial to heroes because they appreciated and enjoyed heroic deeds.



His or her own personality and ability concluded a mortal"s actions. The gods



could not change a mortal"s life or death situation. If one was going to die, they could



not change their fate. The Homeric gods were ageless and immortal. The gods



possessed a great knowledge of the future. The gods are influenced by the request of



another and mortal"s prayers.



Achilles" mother, the sea goddess Thetis, did not want to accept the fact that her



son Achilles was going to die someday because he was half mortal. When Achilles was



an infant, Thetis tried to burn away his mortality by secretly placing him in a fire. Peleus,



Achilles" father found out about this and was outraged. Thetis was very upset and angry



at this so she left her husband to go back and live at her home in the sea. She had left



Achilles with his father until she would one day return.



One night, Thetis took Achilles down to the River Styx in the Underworld. She



then held him by his heel and dipped him into the water. Every part the river water



touched on his body, he would not be injured. The only way that Achilles could then be



killed was if he was wounded on the back of one heel. Due to Thetis doing this, other



warriors knew where Achilles" weakness was and soon Achilles life was taken away.





Discuss the qualities of an epic poem and cite examples from the Iliad to prove it to be such a poem.





An epic poem often has repeated descriptions such as, "Bronze coated Greeks"



and speeches:



"Strange man! Your countrymen are dying in battle upon the wall and within the city, and here you sit! And yet you are the person responsible for the raising of the war cry around Troy. You yourself would be very angry with any coward you caught shrinking away from this hateful war. So arise and help defend your city before it is burned to the ground!"



Sometimes the speeches were exactly and other times they had a slight change. The



poem was usually designed in the form of a tree. The principle plot formed the trunk of



the tree, with many stories branching off from the trunk. The poem would often include



some of the supporting stories in order to instruct particular characters in major plots.



The poem often started from the middle and moved in many directions to make the story



interesting. Sometimes it took months for one tale to be completed.



The poem would normally be a long narrative, generally about a particular person



important to a culture:



"Dearest wife, I too have thought of this, but our people would look upon me with shame if I were to shrink like a coward from battle. My own heart cannot tolerate such behavior. I was taught to be courageous always and to lead the Trojans into battle to win great glory for my father and myself."



Hector is speaking there. He is considered a great person to the Trojans because he is



their hero. He chooses to leave his wife a widow and his son an orphan in order to save



his city. He wants to fight to save other, not only himself.





Discuss the quest for honor as evidence by Hector, Agamemnon, Achilles, & Paris.



Every hero wishes for honor because honor is the most extraordinary prize.



Hector looked for honor from his countrymen. He went to battle knowing that he was



going to die. He did not turn around and run away, he kept his promise to help them to



win the war. This was a sign of arete. Hector wanted to be honored by no one else



except his warrior society.



Paris looked for honor within hubris. The feeling of hubris would lead the hero to



think that he was greater than the heroes who were his peers and that he had the limitless



power that he attributed to the gods. On account of what Paris did for the goddess



Aphrodite, he thinks that he is a gift to the world. Paris thinks that he is better than



the other heroes. He causes trouble and doesn"t even have to fight his own battles,



he has his warriors there for that.



Agamemnon was interested in nothing but materialistic honor. He wanted the



best prizes, the best respect, the best of everything. His didn"t care much about anything.



That is what made him so different from all of the other heroes. He worshiped



materialistic things, and everyone else worshiped honor that you cannot see.



Achilles found honor within ate, which means blind, rash behavior. Ate



would eventually lead to retribution, or nemesis. The gods would sometimes punish the



hero directly; sometimes other human beings would punish him. He wanted the people



of Greece to bow down to him. He wanted to hear the people say that they needed his



help. He wanted to hear that they needed him, and that is why he stayed out of the war.



He wanted to hear that the people needed him. To Achilles that meant that his people



honored him.