Achiles’ Shield as an Element of Contradistinction in the Iliad
The Iliad is an epic of death. It is a tale of conflict, battle, agony, and horrific mutilation. Honor and glory are attained through warfare. The great shield of Achiles stands out in this context because it depicts the glories of an orderly, functioning, productive civilization. This depiction of life stands in stark contrast to the scenes of death that constitute a large portion of the narrative. An examination of the shield of Achiles in Homer’s Iliad reveals many ideas in conflict: love and honor, the pleasures of life versus a heroic death, free will and destiny. By viewing the shield as an element of contradistinction—that is to define it on the basis of contrast—one can see that the shield symbollicaly unifies the entire poem. Achiles’ shield is the mechanism through which the poet presents a tool of warfare as a reflection of civilization; explores the concept, structure, and nature of the universe; and examines the role of art in society.
I. A Reflection of Civlization on a Tool of Warfare
In the epic tradtion, the arming of wariors for batle holds particular significance. The description of a warior’s armor tels much about the individual character of the warior and about the values of the society of which he is part. The Iliad contains many such arming scenes which take the simple description of armor and transform it into a more expansive and iluminating portrait of ancient Greek mentality.
When compared with one another, these descriptions of armor reveal some basic distinctions that make the shield of Achiles of utmost importance.
As noted by Atchity in Homer’s Iliad: The Shield of Memory, the armor of Paris is described in book thre...
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...contradictions. Art is the medium through which humans explore life’s great questions and test its boundaries. Armed with the belief that ordered civlization will prevail, the artist—poet, metalworker, painter, actor—is free to enter into the batlle of ideals.
Works Cited
Atchity, Kenneth John. Homer’s Iliad: The Shield of Memory. Carbondale, IL: Southern Ilinois Univ., 1978.
Becker, Andrew Sprague. The Shield of Achiles and the Poetics of Ekphrasis. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Litlefield, 1995.
Duethorn, Guenter A. Achiles’ Shield and the Structure of the Iliad. Amherst, MA: Amherst Colege, 1962.
Edwards, Mark W. The Iliad: A Commentary. Vol. V: books 17–20. G.S. Kirk gen. ed. Cambridge, MA: 1995.
Homer. The Iliad. Trans. Richmond Latimore. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago, 1961. Keats, John. “Ode to a Grecian Urn.” 4 Oct. 2003 < htp://www.poets.org/poems/>.
Rengakos, Antonios. Homertext und die Hellenistichen Dichter. Hermes. Einzelschriften, Heft 64. Stuttgart, F. Steiner, 1993.
Goldwyn, Adam J. "A Literary History of the Trojan War from Antiquity to the Middle Ages." Order No. 3426747 City University of New York, 2010. Ann Arbor: ProQuest. Web. 13 ‘May 2014.
The opening of Vergil’s The Aeneid begin with the words “I sing of warfare and a man at war” (Vergil 1.1) which signal two important themes of the epic: warfare and the struggles of one man (Boyle). The epic revolves around a Trojan named Aeneas, who follows his destiny to found the city of Lavinium, a precedent to Rome, where his descendants continued to rule until the birth of Romulus. Vergil adapts the Homeric epic and structure to make social commentary on Roman life under Augustus. Like Homer, Vergil uses a shield as an ekphrasis to show a shift in primal to civilized state and the future history of Rome (Boyle). Vergil demonstrates how the Roman values of virtus, iustitita and pietas have prevailed over the barbaric and uncivilized enemies of Rome in the episodes on the shield (Boyle). While Rome became a great empire through warfare, Vergil seems to advocate peace rather than more bloodshed and warn that while peace may have been achieved, it is not a permanent state. Achilles’ shield has festivals and a wedding taking place, but a murder occurs during a seemingly peaceful time (Homer 18. 490-508) similar to the bloodshed and eventual peace on Aeneas’ shield (Vergil 7.746). Vergil uses Aeneas’ shield like Homer as an allegoric symbol to stress that even during peacetime there is violence, link history and myth together and ultimately reveal that no one person or city can escape that fate.
Schein, Seth L. The Mortal Hero: An Introduction to Homer's Iliad. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
Homer devotes the final passages of Book 18 of The Iliad to the description of the shield of Achilles. Only a quarter of the description concerns warfare, the essential grist of the epic. Instead, the bulk of the description presents a peaceful society and rural idylls, a curious choice for the most ferocious warrior of the Greeks, and an odd thing for both armies to fear. A narrative emerges from the scenes of the shield, and it is this that fits Achilles and repulses everyone else.
Tobacco plantation formed an essential component of Pre-Civil War African-American slavery. During the early colonial period in the United States, plantation constituted as the highest percentage of economic activity. The economic growth of American colonies relied on the export of cash crops such as rice, indigo etc. However, out of all cash crops, tobacco became the most popular one due to its use for pipes, cigars, and snuff. Due to this growing demand for tobacco in Europe, Early American settlers discontinued all other economic activities and started tobacco cultivation. As a result, tobacco became the principal and dominant cash crop of Southern colonies such as Virginia, Chesapeake, and Maryland. Now growing tobacco was very labor- intensive, as it required a large amount of work force. For the plantation and processing of tobacco, thousands of indentured servants and slaves worked at farms. An example of American tobacco plantation is shown in document seven, “Illustration of Slaves Cultivating Tobacco, 1738.” As tobacco plantation grew in importance in the southern economy, the demand for more workers grew as well. This increase in labor demand, and the desire of money making urged early American settlers to seek free labor. In short, tobacco plantation became the key step to promote the need of free permanent labor, and to raise the Question of slavery.
Homer’s Iliad is one of the oldest surviving Greek works. The story allows readers to see into the minds of a civilization that lived over two thousand years ago. The conflict in Homer’s Iliad between the power of a warrior and political power creates the basis of the story and shows how Greek society was evolving from a tribal society, power to the strongest fighter, into a more civilized society, power to the highest political office. By analyzing what warrior power is as portrayed by Achilles, then the power Agamemnon holds through his political station, and comparing the two ideals against each other, it is possible to see exactly how Homer developed both of these characters as a reflection of the changing Greek culture.
Achilles’ shield isn’t just a shield made of bronze, it’s more than that. This shield is made up of many aspects of Homer’s Iliad such as the growing conflict between the Trojans and the Greeks, the values of the fictional homeric society and the actual archaic society, and the sacrifice that Achilles has to make. The scenes represented on Achilles’ shield reflect back on the central plot of The Iliad because the relationship between the images allow for both replication and opposition of Archaic and Homeric society. The shield is important because it introduces the reader to look into the lives of archaic and Homeric people and aids the reader in understanding the plot of the epic poem as well. Achilles shield, remarkable as it is, shows the
The subject of Homer’s epic poem, the Iliad, is very clearly stated--it is “the rage of Peleus’ son Achilles.” The reader remains continually aware of the extent of Achilles’ rage, yet is never told the reason why Achilles remains angry and unreconciled. There is no definitive answer to this question. Achilles is not a static character. He is constantly changing; thus the question of why he remains angry solicits different answers at various stages throughout the poem. To find an answer, the reader must carefully examine Achilles’ ever-changing dilemma involving the concepts of mortality and honor. At its simplest, Achilles’ dilemma is that if he goes to war, he will die. But he will die with glory.
Schein, Seth L. The Mortal Hero: An Introduction to Homer's Iliad. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
“Then the screaming and shouts of triumph rose up together, of men killing and men killed, and the ground ran blood.” From first examination the Iliad seems to be an epic founded on an idealized form of glory, the kind that young boys think about when they want to join the army. A place full of heroism and manliness where glory can be achieved with a few strokes of a sword and then you go home and everything is just lovely. Many people view the Iliad this way, based on it’s many vivid battle descriptions and apparent lack of remorse for the deaths that occur. This, however, is not how war is presented in the Iliad. Homer presents a very practical outlook on war countering the attainment of the glory with the reality of its price and the destruction it causes. He successfully does this by showing the value of the lives of each person that dies and, in a sense, mourning their passing, describing the terror and ugliness of war, and, through the characters of Achilleus and Hector, displaying the high price of glory.
Rengakos, Antonios. Homertext und die Hellenistichen Dichter. Hermes. Einzelschriften, Heft 64. Stuttgart, F. Steiner, 1993.
Lattimore, Richard. Introduction. The Iliad of Homer. New York: University of Chicago Press. 1961. 7–55.
Throughout the Iliad the warriors' dream of peace is projected over and over again in elaborate similes developed against a background of violence and death. Homer is able to balance the celebration of war's tragic, heroic values with scenes of battle and those creative values of civilized life that war destroys. The shield of Achilles symbolically represents the two poles of human condition, war and peace, with their corresponding aspects of human nature, the destructive and creative, which are implicit in every situation and statement of the poem and are put before us in something approaching abstract form; its emblem is an image of human life as a whole.
Other benefits aligned with paid time off is sick leave awarded in 4 hour increments per pay period with no limit on accruals. Employees may use this time to attend medical appointments for themselves and dependents. The sick leave bank is also used for bereavement (up to 5 days) and funeral (up to 3 days) time off when unfortunate deaths occur.