The Iliad: The Nasty Ancient Greeks Behave Like Nasty Little Nasties

Background

The Iliad was written around 750 BC and purports to tell the story of the Trojan war at the height of the Bronze Age. The Bronze Age Civilization collapsed around 1200 BC and was followed by a long dark age where writing was lost in Greece for hundreds of years. During this dark age, an oral tradition of epic poetry formed where poets would regale audiences with stories of the warrior heroes of the past. The Iliad represents an amalgamation of these legends of Greece’s heroic past.

The Kernel of Civilization vs Snapshot of a Primitive Culture

Based on its pole position on any list of Great Books of Western Civilization, one might imagine that this book is the kernel of civilization from which all of our storytelling, morality, philosophy, rationality, scientific method, and technology emerged fully formed. In fact this book is more of a snapshot of a culture that would eventually merge with other cultures and evolve into ours. And oh boy what a nasty culture it was. Highly patriarchal and violent, this is a twisted tale of murder, rape, the mutilation of corpses, and other depravities. Homer does open the door for the audience to question aspects of this culture, and to that extent it does provide a spark for the idea that we don’t know jack about shit, which is probably the most powerful idea in Western thought.

Plot Summary

The Greeks have been camped out with their boats next to Troy for nine years. The war is based on the unbelievably petty premise that Menelaus is there to get even with Paris for stealing his wife, Helen. The plan is to conquer the city of Troy, raze it to the ground, kill all the men, and enslave all the women and children. Agamemnon, Menelaus’ older brother and all around terrible leader, steals Achilles' war prize, Briseis, a human woman, to take back to his tent and do whatever with. Achilles’ pride is wounded so he decides to sit out the war and prays to Zeus to make the Greeks pay. The Tojans kick the Greeks’ ass for a while until Achilles agrees to let his best friend Patroclus wear his armor and join the fight. Then the Greeks kick some Trojan ass for a while until Hector kills Patroclus. Hector wants to mutilate Patroclus’ dead body and they fight over the corpse for at least 10 pages. When Achilles finds out all hell breaks loose and he kills Hector and mutilates his body for a while. Then Hector’s dad, Priam, comes down and convinces Achilles to give Hector’s body back. The end.

Picking a Translation

I decided to read Stanley Lombardo’s translation for a couple reasons. First of all Lombardo is a professor at the University of Kansas and Rock Chalk Jayhawk, Go KU. Secondly, Lombardo’s translation uses updated language and drops the strict meter in favor of more accessible prose, making it more readable for rubes like me.

Modern storytelling

The most surprising thing about reading the Iliad for the first time is that the storytelling feels relatively modern. The drama is set out on a grand scale. You get a picture of thousands of troops massed on a beach. Homer uses similes that function almost like a cutscene in a movie. You go from some dialogue about getting the troops in formation, cut to a scene of insects swarming on a sandy beach

Swarming like insects over the beach, like bees That hum from a hollow rock in an endless line And fly in clusters over flowers in spring, Grouping themselves in aerial throngs.

Cut back to an overhead shot of Greek soldiers getting into formation. You can imagine the camera panning out showing the immensity of the force assembled. As the two armies clash you zoom into individuals in hand to hand combat. The action scenes feature violence befitting an HBO prestige television drama. Eyes pop out, brains get scrambled, and guts pour out onto the beach.

The struck each other at the same moment, … Menelaus’ sword smashing Peisander’s brow Just above the nose. The bones snapped, both eyeballs Popped out in blood at his feet In the dust, and Peisander doubled over and fell.

I feel like Christopher Nolan is going to have some fun with this shit.

Bronze Age Greeks Be Nasty

Here are some gross things in the book for you, sickos.

Treatment of Women

Of all the nastiness in this poem, the treatment of women is the most illegible to me. Women are used as sex slaves, bargaining chips, and forced laborers. When Achilles sets himself apart from the rest of the Greeks he questions the whole premise of being a warrior for honor and the whole logic of the culture that he is in. By extension the reader is invited to question the culture as well. I didn’t really feel that Homer was asking us to question the treatment of women, however. It was like of course we’re going to make sex slaves out of all the conquered female population. I guess if you’re committed to this kind of honor warfare this virulent paternalism makes a certain kind of sense. The pairing of polygyny with the sexual enslavement of the women in conquered regions enables this type of honor warfare without resulting in population collapse. The same number of babies will be born in the next generation no matter how men are slaughtered on each side. Gross.

Lack of Mercy

The story is rife with soldiers murdering unarmed people begging for their lives. You might take a soldier captive if you think their family is really rich and can pay you a ransom. Otherwise it’s totally ok to murder an unarmed person begging for their life. In fact, Achilles murders twelve trojan “boys” at Patroculs’s funeral.

Mutilating dead bodies

I really didn’t get the mutilation of dead bodies. Hector really wants to behead Patroculs’ corpse, skin his head, and display it on a pike on the city walls. Achilles drags Hector’s dead body behind his chariot all over the place. Even minor characters are obsessed with mutilating each other’s dead bodies.

Hector is also bad

Achilles comes across as a jerk in the Iliad, and a lot of people feel that Hector is the good guy. However, Hector’s wife pleads with him to follow basic strategy and use the walls and other advantages to win the war. However, Hector tells her he would rather she get captured into sexual slavery than for him to appear to be a pussy ass bitch in front of his friends and not go out and fight Achilles man to man. Would a good guy do that? I think not.

Unequal Society

This is no well regulated militia. Agamemnon is nominally in charge, but really the army functions as a gaggle of bickering school boys. The way decision making works is that whoever can goad the group into making the most macho, headstrong, aggressive mistake carries the day and sends the troops headlong into their doom. You hear a lot about the heroes and leaders, and not much about the grunts doing to work

Conclusion

There is no conclusion. This isn’t a school paper. I’m doing this for fun. You’re reading it for free. You get what you pay for.