Achilles As A Lover

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_ The Trojan War lasted ten years. Its object was to punish Paris, son of the King of Troy, for eloping with Helen, the wife of Menelaus, King of Sparta, and taking away a shipload of treasures to boot. The subject of Homer's _Iliad_ is popularly supposed to be this Trojan War; in reality, however, it covers less than two months (fifty-two days) of those ten years, and its theme, as the first lines indicate, is the wrath of Achilles--the ruinous wrath, which in the tenth year, brought on the other Greek warriors woes innumerable. Achilles had spent much of the intervening time in ravaging twelve cities of Asia Minor, carrying away treasures and captive women, after the piratical Greek custom. One of these captives was Briseis, a high priest's daughter, whose husband and three brothers he had slain with his own hand, and who became his favorite concubine. King Agamemnon, the chief commander of the Greek forces, also had for his favorite concubine a high priest's daughter, named Chryseis. Her father came to ransom the captive girl, but Agamemnon refused to give her up because, as he confessed with brutal frankness, he preferred her to his wife.[295] For this refusal Apollo brings a pestilence on the Greek army, which can be abated only by restoring Chryseis to her father. Agamemnon at last consents, on condition that some other prize of honor be given to him--though, as Thersites taunts him (II, 226-228), his tents are already full of captive women, among whom he always has had first choice. Achilles, too, informs him that he shall have all the women he wants when Troy is taken; but what really hurts Agamemnon's feelings is not so much the loss of his favorite as the thought that the hated Achilles should enjoy Briseis, while his prize, Chryseis, must be returned to her father. So he threatens to retaliate on Achilles by taking Briseis from his tent and keeping her for himself. "I would deserve the name of coward," retorts Achilles

"were I to yield to you in everything.... But this let me say--Never shall I lift my arm to strive for the girl either with you or any other man; you gave her, you can take her. But of all else, by the dark ship, that belongs to me, thereof you shall not take anything against my will. Do that and all shall see your black blood trickle down my spear."

[FOOTNOTE 295: Which, however, evidently was not saying much, as he immediately added that he was ready to give her up provided they gave him another girl, lest he be the only one of the Greeks without a "prize of honor." Strong individual preference, as we shall see also in the case of Achilles, was not a trait of "heroic" Greek love.]

Having made this "uncowardly," chivalrous, and romantic distinction between his two kinds of property--yielding Briseis, but threatening murder if aught else belonging to him be touched--Achilles goes and orders his friend Patroclus to take the young woman from the tent and give her to the king. She leaves her paramour--her husband's and brothers' murderer--unwillingly, and he sits down and weeps--why? because, as he tells his mother, he has been insulted by Agamemnon, who has taken away his prize of honor. From that moment Achilles refuses to join the assemblies, or take a part in the battles, thus bringing "woes innumerable" on his countrymen. He refuses to yield even after Agamemnon, alarmed by his reverses, seeks to conciliate him by offering him gold and horses and women in abundance; telling him he shall have back his Briseis, whom the king swears he has never touched, and, besides her, seven Lesbian women of more than human beauty; also, the choice of twenty Trojan women as soon as the city capitulates; and, in addition to these, one of the three princesses, his own daughters--twenty-nine women in all!

Must not a hero who so stubbornly and wrathfully resented the seizure of his concubine have been deeply in love with her? He himself remarks to Odysseus, who comes to attempt a reconciliation (IX., 340-44):

"Do the sons of Atreus alone of mortal men love their bedfellows? Every man who is good and sensible loves his concubine and cares for her as I too love mine with all my heart, though but the captive of my spear."

Gladstone here translates the word [Greek: alochos] "wife," though, as far as Achilles is concerned, it means concubine. Of course it would have been awkward for England's Prime Minister to make Achilles say that "every man must love his concubine, if he has sense and virtue;" so he arbitrarily changes the meaning of the word and then begs us to notice the moral beauty of this sentiment and the "dignity" of the relation between Achilles and Briseis! Yet no one seems to have denounced him for this transgression against ethics, philology, and common sense. On the contrary, a host of translators and commentators have done the same thing, to the obscuration of the truth.

Nor is this all. When we examine what the Achilles of Homer means by the fine phrase "every man loves his bedfellow as I love mine," we come across a grotesque parody even of sensual infatuation, not to speak of romantic love. If Achilles had been animated by the strong individual preference which sometimes results even from animal passion, he would not have told Agamemnon, "take Briseis, but don't you dare to touch any of my other property or I will smash your skull." If he had been what _we_ understand by a lover, he would not have been represented by the poet, after Briseis was taken away from him, as having "his heart consumed by grief" because "he yearned for _the battle_." He would, instead, have yearned for the girl. And when Agamemnon offered to give her back untouched, Achilles, had he been a real lover, would have thrown pride and wrath to the winds and accepted the offer with eagerness and alacrity.

But the most amazing part of the story is reached when we ask what Achilles means when he says that every good and sensible man [Greek: phileei kai kaedetai]--loves and cherishes--his concubine, as he professes to love his own. _How_ does he love Briseis? Patroclus had promised her (XIX., 297-99), probably for reasons of his own (she is represented as being extremely fond of him), to see to it that Achilles would ultimately make her his legitimate wife, but Achilles himself never dreams of such a thing, as we see in lines 393-400, book IX. After refusing the offer of one of Agamemnon's daughters, he goes on to remark:

"If the gods preserve me and I return to my home, Peleus himself will seek a wife for me. There are many Achaian maidens in Hellas and Phthia, daughters of city-protecting princes. Among these I shall select the one I desire to be my dear wife. Very often is my manly heart moved with longing to be there to take a wedded wife [Greek: mnaestaen alochon], and enjoy the possessions Peleus has gathered."

And if any further detail were needed to prove how utterly shallow, selfish, and sensual was his "love" of Briseis, we should find it a few lines later (663) where the poet naively tells us, as a matter of course, that

"Achilles slept in the innermost part of the tent and by his side lay a beautiful-cheeked woman, whom he had brought from Lesbos. On the other side lay Patroclus with the fair Isis by his side, the gift of Achilles."

Obviously even individual preference was not a strong ingredient in the "love" of these "heroes," and we may well share the significant surprise of Ajax (638) that Achilles should persist in his wrath when seven girls were offered him for one. Evidently the tent of Achilles, like that of Agamemnon, was full of women (in line 366 he especially refers to his assortment of "fair-girdled women" whom he expects to take home when the war is over); yet Gladstone had the audacity to write that though concubinage prevailed in the camp before Troy, it was "only single concubinage." In his larger treatise he goes so far as to apologize for these ruffians--who captured and traded off women as they would horses or cows--on the ground that they were away from their wives and were indulging in the "mildest and least licentious" of all forms of adultery! Yet Gladstone was personally one of the purest and noblest of men. Strange what somersaults a hobby ridden too hard may induce a man to make in his ethical attitude! _

Read next: Odysseus, Libertine And Ruffian

Read previous: Gladstone On The Women Of Homer

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