The Trojan War Story told in the Iliad "summary"
book 1: The Iliad opens with the narrator's appeal to the Muse ('Goddess') to sing the wrath of Achilles and its dire consequences for thousands of Achaeans (one of the Homeric terms for the invading forces, which the poem never refers to as 'Greeks'). The Muse, now implicitly the narrator, begins the song with a quarrel that erupts between Agamemnon and Achilles after Chryses, a priest of Apollo, had come to the Greek camp to ransom his captive daughter Chryseis. When Agamemnon dismissed the priest out of hand, Chryses appealed to Apollo, who avenged the insult by sending a plague into the camp.
On the 10th day of the plague, day 1 of the poem's action, Achilles convenes an assembly to discern why Apollo is angry and what must be done to appease him. The seer Kalchas pronounces Agamemnon the cause of the plague and prescribes returning the girl as the only remedy. Angry over the loss of his war-prize and the prestige she represents, the commander agrees to give her up only if the Achaean kings replace her with one of their captive women. Achilles denounces Agamemnon's military leadership as a charade rooted in greed and his demand for a replacement prize as outrageous, considering that the armies had come to Troy to help him and to pile up booty for themselves. Moreover, all the plunder had already been distributed; it would not be right to take it back. Not one to brook a public challenge, Agamemnon tells Achilles that he can go home now, but without his war-prize Briseis, whom Agamemnon claims for his own. Achilles draws his sword with intent to take the other man's life, but is restrained by Athene, who promises that waiting will pay off in prizes worth three times what Agamemnon is taking away. When Achilles finally concedes, Chryseis is returned to her father, Briseis is taken from Achilles' shelter, and the offended hero goes to the seashore to call upon his mother Thetis for help. He persuades her to ask Zeus to help the Trojans drive the Achaeans back among their ships until they recognize the madness of dishonoring the best of the Achaeans.
Day 14
True to her word, after Zeus's return to Olympos twelve days later, Thetis goes to him with Achilles' request and gains his consent. When Hera takes Zeus to task for plotting with the sea-nymph against the Trojans, a quarrel ensues. Distracted, however, by Hephaestos's antics, Hera, Zeus, and the rest of the gods end the day with laughter, feasting, music, and finally, sleep.
Book 2: That night, Zeus sends a deceitful dream to Agamemnon, projecting victory for the Greeks on the next day if he will marshal them for battle.
Day 15: First day of battle
Books 2-7: In the morning Agamemnon summons the kings who form his council and tells them about the dream. He declares his purpose to test the morale of the troops in a public assembly by reporting that the war is a lost cause instead of revealing the hopeful message of the dream. If the leader of the Greek forces was hoping to rally the troops to the war effort by using reverse psychology, he was sorely disappointed. Upon his announcement in the assembly the men make for the ships and must be forcibly reassembled by Odysseus. Urged by members of his council, who now share the blame in the event of failureâ to stay the course, Agamemnon relents and sends the Achaians to eat and prepare for battle. The poet invokes the Muse again and embarks on a lengthy catalog, first of the Greek leaders and contingents and then of the Trojan and allied leaders.
The two armies take the field, but instead of engaging they consent to a duel between Paris and Menelaos to determine the outcome of the war. The narrative shifts to Troy, where Helen, summoned to a vantage point on the wall, points out the Achaean leaders to Priam and the elders of the city. Back on the battlefield, Menelaos is decisively winning the single combat when Aphrodite sweeps Paris safely back to his bedroom, where he is joined by Helen. While they make love, Menelaos claims victory in the duel by default, and a truce is called.
The scene shifts again, this time to Olympos, where the gods conspire to restart the war, in which all now have a stake, by inciting the Trojan archer Pandaros to break the truce. His arrow grazes Menelaos and the two armies join battle. The narrative first follows the exploits (known as an aristeia) of Diomedes on the battlefield. When Aphrodite tries to sweep Aineias out of his path, Diomedes wounds her, sending her crying to her mother. Hektor, with Ares at his side, gains temporary advantage, but Athene takes charge of Diomedes' chariot and urges him to attack the war-god himself. Ares complains to Zeus and the gods retire from the battlefield. When the tide of battle again turns in favor of the Greeks, Hektor slips back into the city to instruct the women to appeal to Athene, their patron goddess, for help. While there he finds and seems to say his farewells to his wife Andromache and their young son Astyanax.
Hektor returns to the plain of Troy to find the battle still raging. On the prompting of Helenos, he calls for another duel to decide the war, this time between him and a champion of the Greeks' choosing. Telamonian Ajax, known as the bulwark of the Achaeans and famous for defensiive war craft, is chosen by lot and the duel commences. Nightfall brings it to an indeterminate end. Returning to their respective dwellings, the Achaeans are counseled to dig a trench and construct an associated palisade to protect the ships, while the Trojans debate returning Helen to her husband.
Day 16 (truce)
Early in the morning, the Trojans propose a truce, to which the Greeks agree, so that each side may bury their dead.
Day 17 (truce)
The Greeks take advantage of the ceasefire to dig a trench and build a palisade between their ships, drawn up on the shore, and the plain of Troy. Angered that they had built the wall without first offering sacrifice, Poseidon protested that its memory would outlast that of the wall he and Apollo had built around the city. Zeus assures his brother that when the Achaeans depart Troy he may wipe out every trace of the makeshift fortifications.
Day 18 Second Day of Battle
Books 8-10: Zeus orders the gods to stay out of the battle and himself watches the action from the vantage point of Mt. Ida. The scale he uses to weigh the fates of the two armies indicates that the Trojans will win the day. Following a Trojan advance the Greeks enjoy a brief resurgence, but Hektor is unstoppable and the Greeks are soon driven back behind the wall. Nightfall finds the Achaeans dispirited and the Trojans camped on the plain, eager to force their way among the Greek ships at morning's light.
Agamemnon summons the Greek generals to private council and, now with utter seriousness, advises abandoning Troy that night in order to escape with their lives. Diomedes rashly advocates staying the course. Nestor, however, gently urges Agamemnon to placate Achilles with gifts and conciliatory words, knowing that Diomedes' plan is doomed to fail apart from the fighting power of the offended king. In a thinly veiled effort to obligate and subordinate Achilles, Agamemnon sends Odysseus, Ajax, and Phoinix to his shelter with a rich offer of ransom. The embassy attempts to effect his return by recasting Agamemnon's ransom as a generous gift, by enticing Achilles with the possibility of killing Hektor and winning glory, and by exploiting their bonds of friendship and filial duty, but to no avail. Asserting that he must choose between a long but inglorious life in his native Phthia and death at Troy, which would bring him undying fame, Achilles declares his intent to set sail for home the next day. That his only choice, however, is to die at Troy is evinced when he concludes that he will not leave but will also not take up arms until the Trojans threaten to set his own vessels ablaze. The embassy reports disingenuously that Achilles will leave for home the next day and he advises others to do the same. Dismayed, the council nonetheless approves Diomedes' flawed plan to carry on the war without their best combatant. Odysseus and Diomedes, clad in animal skins, set out on a noctural spying mission in hopes of discovering the designs of the Trojans, whose campfires flicker ominously on the plain.
Day 19 Third day of battle
Books 11-18: Agamemnon leads the armies out and himself kills a number of Trojans, allowing the Greek forces to gain the upper hand temporarily. When he is wounded and carried in a chariot back to the ships, Hektor recognizes it as a sign that Zeus will now favor the Trojans. Diomedes and Odysseus also retreat from the battlefield wounded, while Ajax holds the Trojans at bay. The three injured leaders are shortly followed by Machaon the physician, who is struck by an arrow and carried back to the camp in Nestor's chariot. Achilles, watching the wounded come in, suggests to Patroklos that perhaps now the Achaeans' situation is dire enough that they will come to him on bended knee. He sends his friend off to Nestor's shelter to inquire about the injured man (and perhaps to give the old king opportunity to counsel the leaders to do what is right by Achilles).
With Hektor pressing ever nearer to the palisade, Patroklos chafes to ask his question of Nestor and hurry back to Achilles. But the old man indulges in a long speech, urging his young guest to persuade Achilles either to join battle or, failing that, to send Patroklos out in Achilles' armor at the head of the Myrmidons to frighten the Trojans and buy the Greeks some breathing space. Patroklos is further delayed in returning to Achilles' shclter when he comes across a wounded companion, Eurypylos, and stops to tend him. Meanwhile Ajax manages to defend the wall surrounding the ship until Hektor comes close enough to smash one of the gates with a stone, allowing the Trojans to pour through the breach. At this moment, Zeus is temporarily distracted, perhaps by Hera's seduction, as we will see, and Poseidon takes advantage of his inattention to join the battle and rally the Greeks. The three wounded leaders, Agamemnon, Diomedes, and Odysseus also make an appearance and urge on their troops fighting among the ships. With renewed vigor, the Achaeans turn the Trojans in flight back across the ditch. Ajax hurls a huge stone at Hektor and sends him reeling; his companions manage to haul him to safety where he lies on the ground in a daze. And all the while Zeus is oblivious, having fallen into a deep sleep after being seduced by his wife.
The king of the gods awakens to find that his plan to help the Trojans, and thus fulfil his promise to Thetis, has been derailed: Hektor is on the ground vomiting blood and the Greeks are streaming out through the walls in hot pursuit. Zeus quickly orders the gods helping the Achaeans to leave the battlefield and sends Apollo to revive Hektor and help the Trojans recover the ground lost while he was sleeping. With Apollo's help, the palisade is breached a second time so that the Trojans are able to cross it in waves. The Achaeans fall back and the fighting rages among the ships; Hektor reaches for one of the prows and prepares to torch it.
Patroklos, hearing the noise of battle coming nearer, leaves Eurypolos and carries Nestor's message to Achilles. Achilles consents to let his friend lead the Myrmidons out in his armor on the condition that Patroklos not pursue the Trojans all the way to the city wall. The ruse works for a time, and Patroklos slaughters Trojans until he is stopped by Apollo, who knocks off his helmet, and Hektor, who deals him a death blow. A tug-of-war ensues over the corpse, by now stripped of its marvelous armor. When Achilles hears of his friend's death, he steps to the wall and utters a terrifying war cry, a flame emerging from his head; this frightens the Trojans so that the Achaeans recover Patroklos' body. Achilles mourns, lying in the dust, but also steels himself to return to battle with one goal: to kill Hektor. Soon afterward, he will meet his own end. Hektor now wears Achilles' arms, so Thetis asks Hephaistos to make a new set for her son.
Day 20 Fourth Day of Battle
Books 19-22: Achilles receives his new armor and summons the Achaeans to assembly in preparation for combat. He announces the end of his anger, regretting the day he had captured the woman Briseis who became the object of such a ruinous quarrel, and urges the men to marshal for battle at once. He is delayed, however, first by Agamemnon who denies personal responsibility for the quarrel and extends the same offer of ransom as he had the night before, and by Odysseus, who insists on taking a common meal before going into combat. Achilles brushes aside both symbols of reconciliation with Agamemnon, vowing to neither eat nor drink until he avenges Patroklos' death. While the men eat, Athene fortifies him with nectar and ambrosia; he then arms himself for war.
Zeus assembles the gods on Olympos and gives them leave to rejoin the fighting, in part to keep Achilles from storming the city walls contrary to his destiny. Achilles nearly kills Aineias, who is fated to survive the war, but Poseidon sweeps him out of danger. He captures 12 Trojans and sends them to the camp to die on Patroklos' funeral pyre. Lykaon, whom he had sold into slavery before, he now hews down as the Trojan warrior begs for his life. Achilles' savage slaughter of enemy warriors intensifies until he literally chokes the River Skamandros with their corpses and the river rises up against him, enraged. Up to now the gods have left Achilles on his own, but when he calls out for help against this elemental force of nature, Hera sends Hephaistos to overcome the flooding river with fire. The gods return to comic skirmishes among themselves while the berserk mortal hero cuts down the Trojans, who are now retreating in panic. Apollo distracts Achilles momentarily, allowing the last of the Trojans to escape to safety behind the city walls, except Hektor who alone remains outside. Gripped by fear, Hektor takes flight and Achilles chases him in a grim life or death race around the circuit of the city. When Athene appears near Hektor in the form of his brother, he takes courage, thinking he is not alone, and turns to face his dread opponent. He asks for an agreement that whoever is victor will return the corpse of his victim to the family for burial, but Achilles disavows any such settlement. As Priam and Hekabe look on in horror, Achilles rushes upon Hektor and drives the spear though the soft part of his neck, the only spot left vulnerable by his own glorious armor. Refusing the offer of ransom gasped out by the dying man, the raging hero counters that if he could he would hack Hektor's flesh away and eat it raw; as it is, he will leave that messy work to dogs and birds. With that, Achilles lashes the dead man's feet to his chariot and drags him back to the Achaean camp.
Book 23: That night, after the Greeks share a funeral meal, the ghost of Patroklos visits Achilles in a dream and requests a swift burial.
Day 21
The Greeks burn Patroklos on a funeral pyre, together with offerings and the 12 captured Trojans.
Day 22
Patroklos' bones are gathered and buried under a mound of earth. Achilles announces funeral gamesâ including a chariot race, boxing, wrestling, and a footraceâ where he presides, distributes the prizes, and settles quarrels but does not participate.
Days 23-33
Book 24: Achilles is still mourning his friend and daily for 12 days drags Hektor's corpse around the funeral mound.
Day 34
The gods meet in council and debate stealing the corpse in order to put an end to Achilles' senseless abuse and allow Hektor's family to perform funeral rites. Zeus, however, arranges for a settlement that Achilles had earlier disavowed: he sends instructions to Priam to take ransom to Achilles for the release of his son's body and instructions to Achilles to accept the ransom. That night with Hermes as guide, the king of Troy makes his way into the Achaean camp and slips unnoticed into Achilles' shelter. He takes hold of the powerful man by the knees, a gesture of supplication, and kisses his hands. Achilles is moved to pity by the reminder of his own elderly father. The two men weep together for their respective losses and Achilles agrees to accept the fabrics and other precious objects Priam has brought as ransom and to send the old man back to Troy with his sonâÄôs body. A meal is shared and Achilles agrees to restrain the Greeks for the 12 days needed to complete the funeral rites.
Days 35-43
Before dawn, Priam is roused early to return to Troy, carrying his dead son on the cart previously loaded down with treasure. Hektor is lamented first by his wife Andromache, then by his mother Hekabe, and finally by Helen. For nine days the Trojans gather wood for the funeral pyre.
Day 44
Hektor is burned on the funeral pyre.
Day 45
The Trojans gather Hektor's bones for burial, with which the Iliad ends.
SUMMARY OF THE ODYSSEY
1. The story opens with a conclave of the gods; Athene asks why Odysseus is kept prisoner by Calypso. Zeus answers, "Because he blinded Polyphemus, the son of Poseidon, and Poseidon keeps a grudge against him." Then Athena goes to Ithaka, and finds the house of Odysseus full of a horde of bullies who have quartered themselves there until Penelope should choose one for a husband. She meets his son Telemachus, and hears all about it and advises him to call a public meeting and then to go to Pylos in search of news. He enters the hall and asserts himself for the first time - he is still a boy - to the surprise of his mother and the wooers alike.
2. He calls a town-meeting, and complains of the doings of those men. One of them, Antinous, answers in violent words, and there is a debate. Telemachus goes down to the seashore and there Athena meets him and promises her help. In the shape of Mentor she procures a ship and a crew and they embark in the night.
3. The ship reaches Pylos, and they are entertained by King Nestor. The king does not know anything about Odysseus but his rambling recollections help us to understand parts of the story of Troy which lies behind this. Athena flies away in tho shape of a sea-eagle, but Telemachus remains; and next day Nestor sends him to Sparta in charge of his eldest son.
4. Menelaus entertains them and tells more about the Trojan war and its results. Helen enters and guesses that this is Telemachus. Menelaus says he knows nothing of the fate of Odysseus, except that he was told by a sea-goddess, that he was held prisoner by Calypso. While they are busy at dinner, the wooers in Ithaka hear that he has found a ship and gone; they are furious and decide to lie in wait for him and murder him on the way home.
(Note: while the wooers are holding their watch and while feasting is going on in Sparta - that is, while nothing is happening in the story of Telemachus - Homer takes his chance to tell what is happening to Odysseus.
5. The gods hold a meeting and decide to send Odysseus home again. Hermes, the King's messenger of Heaven is dispatched to Calypso's island and in an amusing scene he gives her the message from Zeus. Odysseus builds a raft, or rather a rude vessel, and voyages over stormy seas, until he is cast ashore on the island of Phaeacia, and falls asleep in the bush.
6. He is awakened by the voices of girls at play, and comes forward to find the King's daughter, Nausicaa, with her maidens, who had come to the sea-shore to wash the soiled linen in their washing-tanks. Nausicaa gives him food and clothes and leads him to the city.
7 He enters th palace of King Alcinous, who receives him hospitably and promises him a safe-conduct to his own country.
8. Next day games and sports are held, in which Odysseus takes part. This is a piece of comedy; all the persons' names are inventions and the song which the minstrel sings afterwards raises unquenchable laughter. He then sings of the Trojan War and Odysseus is deeply moved, the King sees this, and asks his host who he is.
9. "I am Odysseus" , he answers and tells the long story of his adventures: The Lotus-Eaters and the dramatic tale of Cyclops the Goggle-eye, and the marvellous escape from his cave.
10. Next he describes how he visited the Island of the Winds and how Aeolus bottled up all the winds in a bag except the West Wind, which was to blow him home; how the sailors undid the bag to see what was in it and winds came out and blew them to the island of Circe the witch; how Circe turned the men into pigs, and how Odysseus made her turn them back into men. There they stayed for a year, then Circe let them go and they passed the land of eternal night.
11. And visited the kingdom of the dead, where Odysseus talked with the souls of ancient heroes and women of old days, and Teiresias the seer told him how he would come to die in the end, and his mother's ghost was there and told him of his father.
12. After leaving the kingdom of the dead, he tells how he passed the isle of the Sirens with their beautiful song, which attracts all who hear it; how he plugged the men's ears with wax and made them tie hin to the mast that he might hear the song himself, telling them to row away whatever he says or does. Thus they escaped this peril, and passed next between Scylla and Charybdis; they kept clear of Charybdis and her whirlpool, and rowed past Scylla's cave. Scylla is a monster with 6 heads at the end of 6 long necks and she caught up 6 men, one with each head, while the rest escaped. They reached the island of the Sun, and the men offended the Sun by killing his cattle; so when they sailed away Zeus struck the ship with a thunderbolt and all were drowned except Odysseus. That brings him to the shore of Phaeacia where he now is.
13. The Phaeacians convey Od. to Ithaka. (Poseidon turns the returning vessel into stone) . Athena meets Odysseus in Ithaka, and tells him what has been going on. She bids him first visit his old swineherd, Eumaeus.
14. He does so , and there is a charming description of this faithful old man and their long talk together. Then they go to sleep and Homer takes the opportunity to carry us to Sparta.
15. He describes how Telemachus came home; and while he voyages, Homer fits in an evening talk when the swineherd tells Odysseus about his wife and his father, gives the sad story of his own life. They go to sleep, and we return to Telemachus, who is now landing on the coast at dawn.
16. Telemachus makes his way to the swineherd's hut, and there father and son meet. Telemachus describes the goings-on of those who were wooing his mother, and the father makes himself known to his son. The wooers learn, from their spies, that Telemachus has returned, and they are dismayed.
17. Telemachus returns to his mother, and afterwards Odysseus and, the swineherd go down to the great house. The old hound Argos hears his master's voice and pricks up his ears and dies of joy; he is the first who knows Odysseus. Then Odysseus enters the hall, and the bullies treat him rudely.
18. Irus the town beggar comes in and provokes Odysseus to fight; Odysseus gives him a gentle tap and breaks his jawbone, and there is great merriment in the hall. Penelope comes into the hall and reproaches the wooers for their behaviour.
19. In the evening Odysseus tells his son to remove all the arms and armour from the hall. Penelope comes and questions Odysseus but she does not recognize him. He tells a tale of his travels, partly true and partly invented, for he cannot reveal himself yet. After their talk she tells her old nurse to wash his feet, the nurse feels on his leg the scar of an old wound, and knows him, for she nursed him as a baby and knew him well. He warns her to say nothing and his wife does not notice. Then they talk, and his wife asks him to interpret a dream, and tells him of a plan she had to put an end to the wooing. She would set them a shooting match with her husband's great bow.
20. In the morning Odysseus is heartened by good omens. The faithful drover Philoetius comes in from the mainland. The banquet is prepared for the wooers on this feast day of Apollo. A bird of omen sent by Zeus deters the suitors from the plan to kill Telemachus. The soothsayer Theoclymenus who had come back with Telemachus from Pylos prophesies doom, but the wooers take no notice.
21. Penelope brings down her husband's great bow and the quiver full of arrows, and Telemachus sets up a long row of axes in the floor, each with an opening in the blade. Penelope tells them that Odysseus was accustomed to shoot an arrow through and promises to marry the one who can string the bow and shoot through the axes. Telemachus tries first, and almost strings the bow; then at a nod from his father he leaves it for the others. While they are trying to string the bow, Odysseus goes outside and reveals himself to the drover and swineherd who promise to stand by him. They return to the hall and find that no-one could string the bow. Odysseus asks if he may try and with the greatest of ease he strings the bow, and shoots the first arrow through the holes.
22. Now he takes up another arrow, and shoots Antinous, the wooers' ringleader. There is great consternation and they look around for arms but find none. Odysseus shoots them one by one, and meanwhile Telemachus runs to the storeroom and brings armour for himself and his father and the two men. A terrible fight follows and all the wooers are slain.
23. The old nurse is sent for Penelope, tells her that her husband is in the house, and all the bullies are dead. Penelope cannot believe it, but she comes down to see; she is afraid of being tricked and she dares not acknowledge her husband. He smiles and says "We have secrets which only we know". She sets a little trap for him: she tells the maids to lay him a bed on his old bed-stead outside the door of the chief room. He says "Who has moved my-bed! That could hardly be done, for the bedpost was a tree rooted in the ground!" Then his wife is convinced and falls into his ams.
24. The souls of the dead men are escorted down to Hades by the god Hermes, and tell their fate to the souls of the heroes there. Odysseus goes with his son to the farm of old Laertes his father. Meanwhile Antinous' father has aroused the people to revolt; Odysseus and his people await attack from the kinsmen of the dead. As they meet, Athena comes down from heaven and reconciles both parties in peace together.
