Table of Contents Title Page Copyright Page Dedication PREFACE The Things They Carried Chain of Command Terms of Engagement Enemy Lines Land of My Fathers In God We Trust Man Down No Hostages The Death of Hektor Everlasting Glory Acknowledgements NOTES SELECTED FURTHER READING INDEX ALSO BY CAROLINE ALEXANDER The Bounty The Endurance Mrs. Chippy’s Last Expedition Battle’s End The Way to Xanadu One Dry Season CAROLINE ALEXANDER VIKING Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. • Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd) • Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd) • Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi-110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England First published in 2009 by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Copyright © Caroline Alexander, 2009 All rights reserved Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint excerpts from The Iliad of Homer, translated by Richmond Lattimore. Copyright 1951 by the University of Chicago. Copyright renewed 1979 by Richmond Lattimore. Used by permission of the University of Chicago Press. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA Alexander, Caroline, 1956- The war that killed Achilles : the true story of Homer’s Iliad and the Trojan War / Caroline Alexander. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. eISBN : 978-1-10114885-3 1. Homer. Iliad. 2. War in literature. 3. Trojan War—Literature and the war. 4. Achilles (Greek mythology) I. Title. PA4037.A5955 2009 883’.01--dc22 2009020160 Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrightable materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. http://us.penguingroup.com