Greatest warrior of the Greek forces at Troy, whose wrath and grief drive the plot of Homer's Iliad. Son of the mortal king Peleus and the sea-goddess Thetis.
Achilles is the central figure of Homer's Iliad, called simply "the best of the Achaeans" for his unmatched skill and speed in battle. He led the Myrmidons of Phthia to Troy, but the epic's plot turns on his anger, not his fighting: when Agamemnon seizes his war-prize Briseis, Achilles withdraws from the war entirely, and the Greeks suffer for it.
The Wrath and the Loss
Achilles refuses to fight even as the Trojans push the Greeks back to their ships. He relents only far enough to let his close companion Patroclus wear his armor and lead the Myrmidons into battle. When Hector kills Patroclus, Achilles' grief overtakes his anger at Agamemnon, and he returns to the field to kill Hector in single combat, dragging his body behind his chariot in a rage that the poem treats as excessive even by heroic standards.
Choice and Mortality
The Iliad frames Achilles around a foretold choice: a long, obscure life at home, or a short life crowned with undying fame at Troy. He chooses glory, and the poem's tragedy is that he knows the cost in advance. The Iliad itself ends before his death; later tradition (outside Homer) has him killed by Paris, with the god Apollo's aid, and later still gives him a single vulnerable spot at the heel.
Parentage
Mortal parent: Peleus, king of the Myrmidons of Phthia
His mother, the sea-nymph/goddess Thetis, tried to make him invulnerable; later tradition (not Homer) locates his one weak point at the heel.
Key Deeds
•Led the Myrmidon contingent to Troy
•Withdrew from battle after Agamemnon seized Briseis
•Killed Hector in single combat to avenge Patroclus
•Dragged Hector's body behind his chariot around Troy's walls
•Relented and returned Hector's body to Priam
Fate
The Iliad ends before his death. Later tradition (not Homer) has him killed at Troy by Paris, with Apollo's help; the story of a single vulnerable heel is a still later addition to the myth.
