The Death and Afterlife of Achilles

5 The Death of Achilles in the Iliad

c h a p t e r 5 The Death of Achilles in the Iliad We have established how the death of Achilles could have been narrated in preHomeric myth (chapter ), examined direct references to the death of Achilles in the Iliad (chapter ), and considered the nature of intertextuality in the Archaic Age (chapter ). Now it is time to examine possible reflections of the fabula of the death of Achilles in the Iliad, as effected through“motif transference.”This chapter evaluates neoanalyst arguments for motif transference, and the next chapter argues that the Iliad’s intertextual employment of the death of Achilles fabula is more systematic than has been realized. Though my analysis is grounded on the previous work of neoanalysts, I disagree with their view that Patroklos reflects Antilochos. This assumption lies at the heart of what I have called the “vengeance theory.” In the vengeance theory, Achilles’ revenge on Hektor for his slaying of Patroklos is thought to be modeled on Achilles’ supposed vengeance on Memnon for the slaying of Antilochos. Yet there is little evidence that Antilochos was central to myth about Achilles and Memnon, or that Patroklos is modeled on Antilochos.1 It is true that the death of Antilochos was commonly part of myth about Memnon,as was indicated in chapter  (motif B). But the focus of the episode seems to have been on Antilochos’s rescue of his father Nestor from Memnon. It is for this reason that Antilochos’s death became renowned in antiquity; there is no evidence that it was the motivation for Achilles to fight Memnon, or that Achilles had previously avoided the Aithiopian king. Several passages in the Iliad indicate that Achilles was fond of Antilochos,but there is no suggestion that Antilochos is the model for Patroklos.2 In the following discussion of the merits of the neoanalyst proposals for motif correspondence, I list motifs, as they occur in the Iliad, that neoanalysts commonly believe were transferred from the story of the death of Achilles. Identification of their correspondence to the fabula of the death of Achilles is made through the lettering system I employed in chapter . Book  Achilles withdraws from battle after a quarrel with Agamemnon (~A). The refusal of Achilles to fight in the first book of the Iliad is thought to correspond to a supposed withdrawal by Achilles (following a prediction by Thetis) in the fabula of the death of Achilles. The neoanalyst “vengeance theory” requires a withdrawal of Achilles so that the death of Antilochos can be construed as Achilles’ motive for reentering battle. In Schadewaldt’s reconstructed “Memnonis ,”for example,Achilles withdraws from battle because of a prediction from his mother.3 The comparison between the Iliadic withdrawal of Achilles and an alleged withdrawal in the death of Achilles fabula is problematic for several reasons.First, the motif of withdrawal seems to be a typical one, and thus priority would be difficult to establish between two instances of it (chapter ). Second, Achilles’ withdrawal in the Iliad and the supposed withdrawal in the death of Achilles fabula do not correspond well. One withdrawal results from anger arising in a quarrel ; the other is supposed to result from a prophecy about the future. In the Iliad, Nestor and subsequently Patroklos suggest prophecy instead of anger as a motive for Achilles’ withdrawal, as we saw in chapter , but Achilles’ angry denial underscores that the two motives are very different, and it is difficult to see how one situation could inspire the other.4 Schadewaldt’s graph (:) of corresponding motifs between the Iliad and the “Memnonis” connects the scene of his “Memnonis ” in which Achilles withdraws to book  of the Iliad with a dotted line, apparently a hesitant version of the usual line of dashes. Schoeck (:, ) provides the clearest expression of the correspondence, but not without some embarrassment (“allerdings aus einem völlig andern Grunde”). Third, and most important, it is not at all clear that Achilles did withdraw from battle in the fabula of the death of Achilles. Although the summary of the Aithiopis by Proklos seems to indicate that Thetis gave a prediction to Achilles (see motif A of the fabula), it says nothing of a withdrawal. There is no positive evidence that Achilles withdrew from battle in the death of Achilles fabula. The argument that he did suffers from the circular logic that is sometimes present in the thought of neoanalysts.It is methodologically unsound to reconstruct a withdrawal in the death...