The Death and Afterlife of Achilles

Introduction

Introduction The death and afterlife of Achilles would seem to have little to do with Homer: Achilles does not die in the Iliad, and the Homeric poem is decidedly reticent about any special afterlife for the hero. The other Homeric poem, the Odyssey, puts the hero squarely in Hades. The Homeric poems, however, developed within mythological traditions that included extensive material about Achilles. The Iliad is not just aware of this myth about Achilles but alludes to it through repeated and sophisticated references.Using extant evidence from various media (epic,lyric poetry , drama, iconography), we can reconstruct the pre-Homeric story of Achilles, which will permit a fuller understanding of its poetic role within the Iliad.1 Although one of this study’s primary concerns is establishing pre-Homeric myth, a wide range of material about the hero, no matter its nature or origin, is considered.Stories about Achilles invented at a relatively late date potentially employ themes that stem from very early conceptions of the hero’s life and death. Nonliterary phenomena, such as hero cult and material culture, are also of great value. The hero cult of Achilles provides a different yet highly relevant perspective on the mythological narrative about Achilles. Post-Homeric investigation of the hero’s supposed burial mound in the Troad, besides being fascinating in its own right, allows us to gauge the reception of epic portrayals of the hero in antiquity and beyond. The Iliad looks outside its own narrative boundaries toward previous and later events in the life of Achilles. It alludes directly to pre-Homeric myth about Achilles and also seems to reflect it indirectly, more so than is usually realized. By so doing, the Homeric poem is probably not alluding to a specific poem, like an “Achilleis” (a poem featuring Achilles), but rather playing off known mythological traditions about Achilles. To be sure, the Iliad also seems to suppress, reject, or be ignorant of some stories about Achilles. And it often is innovative in its treatment of Achilles.How the Iliad significantly engages with non-Homeric narrative , and how an ancient audience would comprehend the Homeric poem’s employment of tradition about Achilles, are issues that need to be explored. In Homeric studies the school of thought known as neoanalysis has been especially concerned with looking for Homeric reflections of extra-Homeric myth, especially the Iliad’s reflection of the death of Achilles. Neoanalysts look for evidence of irregularity in Homeric verse to argue for innovative use of traditional material by a single poet—a stance that melds the nit-picking techniques of the analysts, dominant in nineteenth-century German scholarship, with the romanticizing attitude of the unitarians, who celebrate the inventive genius of a master poet. In an earlier period neoanalyst activity would have been called Quellenforschung , or research into the sources of a literary work. For the pre-Homeric tradition of the Trojan War, neoanalysts have primarily used as a source the Epic Cycle, a collection of epic poems that embrace the whole of Greek mythological traditions, from theogonic beginnings to the Trojan War. This study often uses neoanalyst methodology as a starting point, but it aims to give more attention to the significance of the Iliad’s interaction with oral traditions. The tradition of the Trojan War is the fundamental background of the Homeric poems, and the Epic Cycle poems, though now lost, provide important information about it. Reconstruction of the Cyclic tradition, admittedly, is difficult and controversial, but it is also revealing. For example, early Greek art reflected material found in the Cycle (but not necessarily the specific Cycle poems themselves , or even epic traditions) much earlier and much more often than they re- flected Homeric themes. It is also apparent that the Iliad and Odyssey did not immediately dominate their tradition: post-Homeric evidence for the pre-Homeric tradition is not necessarily contaminated by Homeric influence, at least not at an early date.2 Using information about the Cycle available to us, we can begin to reconstruct the outlines of early Greek myth that an early Greek audience would have known when it heard the Homeric poems. In this way, we can most fully enjoy the evocation and reception of the Trojan War tradition that would have potentially occurred when Homeric poetry was performed. The Homeric poems used to be dated to the late eighth century, but that view has been increasingly challenged. Though great variance exists...