One of the most horrific instances of violence in the Iliad is, surprisingly, not actually a fight.
Indeed, this moment of brutalism has epitomised the Homeric warrior’s individualistic arrogance and self-pride down to the classics of Latin literature. The motif that Vergil resorts to when depicting one of Aeneas’ most brutal, anti-Roman actions is deliberately rooted in an allusion to Iliad 23.
In Aeneid 10.517–20, inflamed by the death of Pallas, Aeneas takes alive four “young” prisoners of war from Sulmo to slaughter (immolet) “as victims, sacrifices in honour of the dead” (inferias) for the shades of Pallas. He vows to “pour a stream of captives’ blood upon a flaming pyre”.
Any Roman reader would have understood the allusion to Homer’s world of individualistic, retributory violence, anathema to the Augustan ideal of communal conquering for the greater good of Rome. More specifically, closer readers would also have recognised the linguistic resonances to Achilles’ slaughter of twelve Trojan captives in retribution for Patroclus’ death, which culminates in Iliad 23.170–183. What meaning lies behind this retributory slaughter, beyond the focus on Achilles’ fury and characterisation? How can we learn more about it? Throughout this paper, I aim to point out that this act is not just retribution, but specifically ritual retribution, and that this interpretation lies deeply rooted in the very specific context of Homeric Crete.
This slaughter by Achilles is a unique act of warfare reserved for his equally unique Patroclus — nowhere else in the Iliad does Achilles save someone’s life to later slaughter them (Polyxena and Troilus are extra-Homeric): he usually kills them (those captured, like Lycaon, are sold as slaves). This brutality of sacrificing a prisoner for a dead hero latches almost exclusively onto Achilles — at his own funeral, the Greeks sacrifice Polyxena by decapitating her (a detail which will have an interesting resonance later on).
But this all focuses on Achilles. Are we being too narrow-minded? Is this action part of a broader practice in the (a?) Homeric world. If so, what more can we learn about Achilles’ actions?
In today’s world, the motives behind human sacrifice are in many ways incomprehensible. Although many take from it the extent of Achilles’ care for Patroclus, there is still much debate concerning the morality of Achilles’ actions and Homeric war (for example nicely discussed in Zanker’s The Heart of Achilles: Characterisation and Personal Ethics in the Iliad). Many of these arguments, however, are often influenced by the norms of the era and veer into the generalising territory of morals. Divorced from the Homeric context, they run the risk of imposing anachronistic implications. One take is that Achilles’ sacrifice establishes a “ritual order over” death. Beyond asking what that means in the Homeric world, how can we ascertain that the ancient audience understood it like that?
The flaw with many of these interpretations is that they often neglect the contemporary evidence — much of which exists today as archaeology. So why not turn to the contemporary material record in the Homeric world? Justifiably, many are often hesitant to use this archaeological approach because the customs of the Homeric world appear to be an amalgamation of many eras and places. Much archaeological evidence that has been discussed relates to sacrifices and hero graves, alongside some geometric Attic pottery. They are right to focus on funerary culture — but most of this comes from Greece (Eretria) or the Levant (Cyprus). Are they looking in the right place? Although the scarcity of “human sacrifices” limits our choices, there is some intriguing archaeological evidence in ancient Crete, which I had the luck to interact with on the summer school “The Lost World of Ancient Crete” with Dr Artemis Karnava, Dr Kostas Vlassopoulos and Dr Melina Tamakis, which sheds a fascinating light and alternative lens on the problem.
There is a remarkably similar ritual in at the Orthi Petra necropolis at Eleutherna in Crete that could help us interpret the origins and nature of the ritual behind Achilles’ sacrifice of the twelve Trojan Youths in Iliad 23. Most interestingly, however, the surrounding passages of that episode, especially the construction of the funerary pyre, exhibit a surprising number of references to Crete. Could this be a rare case of a form of direct influence of funerary customs between archaeology and literature?
The questions I want to explore, therefore, centre around what an interdisciplinary reading can tell us about Achilles’ sacrifice. First, I will contextualise the characterisation of Crete in Homer because it justifies why we can validly combine archaeology and history to inform our reading of the literature (and it’s a fascinating topic anyways). Narrowing down, I will analyse the scene and discuss its function in the wider context of Iliad 23. This will raise questions regarding whether Achilles’ sacrifice is part of a broader ritual, and what its nature is: is it a usual execution, ritual retribution, or “human sacrifice”? This is where archaeology and Crete help us — by re-reading Achilles’ sacrifice in the context of the very similar case of “human sacrifice” at Funerary Pyre ΛΛ/90–91 in Eleutherna, I will argue that behind Achilles’ motive of revengeful retribution lies the more general ritual of human sacrifice. This challenges the usual emphasis on the implications of vengeance and suggests a move more towards a stronger apotropaic and proprietary function.
Much of this has been done before — but less often connecting all the dots; I aim to draw awareness to this and the benefits of this approach. But I also want to add a new perspective and more solidly ground it in Crete. In the second part of this paper, I will focus on a nearby passage in Iliad 23 that foregrounds Cretans’ central role in constructing Patroclus’ funerary pyre, which is often explained away by environmental determinism. Instead, by placing it in the context of other emic and etic depictions of Cretan warfare identity, I will argue that the ritual of preparing the funerary pyre belongs to a much broader repertoire of Cretan customs and needs to be read in that way to understand it fully. Thereby, this supports the vital role of Crete in the rituals of Iliad 23. Ultimately, I will argue that Crete is surprisingly and fundamentally linked to and informs many rituals in Iliad 23. My discussions with the excavators have also given me some interesting observations about modern Cretans’ relations to these rituals. This discussion around “human sacrifice” in Crete is inextricably interwoven with modern politics, Crete’s view of itself, and Cretans unwillingness to accept the “brutality” of “human sacrifice” in a Minoan culture typically defined by its peacefulness and prosperity. This informs how (and how much) we can convincingly make such arguments and our own limitations in certain interpretations.
What I hope ultimately to highlight, therefore, is the usefulness and fun of reading literature, archaeology, and history in combination to extrapolate a more accurate and fuller understanding in Classics. Moreover, I aim to raise awareness of and push against the lack of modules related to archaeology, art, and architecture in Durham’s Classics Department. This lack is a great blow to an otherwise stellar department — most UK Classics departments allow students to study such courses in combination with literature ones. This is one of the agenda that the Classics Society has been pushing this year, especially with the academic talk series. Hopefully, the department follows suit and facilitates the learning of such areas to enhance our experience in a more well-rounded way.
Part 1: Between “hospitable” and “many-citied”: a brief overview of Crete (and its modern-day allure) in Homer and the case for reading literature and archaeology together
Speculations about Crete’s importance as a locus of the fantastical in Homer’s Odyssey abound. All of Odysseus’ famous four “lying tales” between Odyssey 13 and 19, which he says to Athena (13.256–286), Eumaios the swineherd (14.192–352), the suitors (17.419–444) and finally Penelope (19.165–303) to disguise his real identity, locate his homeland in Crete. Often, the underlying factors between these strange depictions are Crete’s antiquity, unique customs, and trade networks. This consistency has led some scholars, such as Stephanie and Martin West, to argue that an earlier “Cretan” Odyssey predated our current one. Why? Part of the reason, as Christy Constantakopoulou argues in her wonderful book Dance of the Islands, is due to Crete’s nature as an island and the practical and imaginative baggage that comes with that. Crete’s status as an island carries connotations of insularity and isolation, which in turn creates a ripe imaginary ground where fantastical and utopic creatures can form. But Crete is also a very unique island in that it simultaneously contains historical data. The fact that Crete was already so old and had the remnants of a lost civilisation gave later Greeks and Homer the opportunity to do history for the first time. In other words, they used Minoan Crete an analytical tool to explain the origins of more recent phenomena.
In many ways, therefore, as a literary tool, Crete in Homer serves as a reference point for Ithaca, whether it be an anti-Ithaka or a mirror image or portal. Arguably, this conceptual comparandum is reflective to some degree of the historical processes on the ground. This (hopefully) gives validity when we compare the rituals and material record in the Homeric account with certain Cretan customs between Iliad 23 and the funerary pyre at Eleutherna.
There is one more fundamental aspect to take into account for Crete for my argument. In many ways, Crete is a land of contradictions. Returning to Constantakopoulou’s island focus, Crete is also not like an island: its huge size and towering mountains render it more like the mainland, and its inhabitants usually lived in the mountains. This historical duality, or ambiguity, is reflected throughout Odysseus’ literal characterisation of Crete, especially as a topos for trade and connectivity. The topos of Crete as an optimal place for traders and explorers keeps cropping up: it is a place where the “wind and helmsman guided the ships” or they “run on easily as if downstream”, always facilitating connectivity (Od. 14.244–65). On the other hand, Crete as a nourisher of trade also gains the implications of piracy, marauders and plunderers. In that same passage, Odysseus’ men leave aside their peaceful trading and turn to piracy: they “waste the fair fields of the men of Egypt”, carrying off the women and children, killing the men. Odysseus’ men are also mercenaries looking for money. Odysseus does not command them to come, but rather they come of their own accord to this opportunity for wealth: this is brought out in the emphasis on the rapidity and lack of orders with which Odysseus’ companions gather: “the host gathered speedily”. Likewise, Odysseus “gave them many victims” — ostentatiously to sacrifice to the gods, but the underlying reason may be to ingratiate themselves to him in a bid to gain their loyalty for his raid. This example nicely shows the ambivalent nature of Crete in Homer: it garners a reputation for resourcefulness and piratical activity alongside prosperous and peaceful trade. Literature and history map onto each other; what about the archaeology?
Linking geography and the Apologoi, many have argued that the topography of Aeolus’ island at the beginning of Odyssey 10 corresponds neatly with the island of Imeri Gramvousa in the far west of Crete. Still today, its cliffs soar high over the rough sea and shimmer of bronze in the setting sun. This is not restricted to geographical markers — the ancient site of Gortyn has a temple of Apollo Pythios; whether or not there is a contemporary correlation between this temple of the Homeric Hymn to Apollo, where Apollo sails with Cretan merchants, it still shows Crete held the fascination of the Homeric audience as the land of the old. As we shall see, Crete is both in many ways an anti-Ithaka (Idomeneus’ nostos is famously easy), but also similar in its resourcefulness.
In the Iliad, Crete is first mentioned in the Catalogue of Ships, listing her two leading heroes: Idomeneus and Meriones. The very reason they became involved in the Trojan war highlights Crete’s prosperity, strength, and trade connections during the Minoan and Mycenaean Ages. Beyond the fact that Idomeneus keeps the epithet “famed for his spear”, Homer names Crete “hundred-citied” (ἑκατόμπολιν; 2.649, cf. ninety in Od. 19.174) and “well-peopled”. Likewise, he singles out the great number of aid from the Cretans: they send “eighty black ships” (652). Many characters also deliberately go into a lot of depth about Crete when we would not expect them to. When Priam asks whom a certain warrior is from Troy’s walls in Iliad 3, Helen names Ajax but then, of her own accord, singles out the man beside him, Idomeneus, and reminisces for four lines on his presences for trade and alliances as a guest at Sparta (3.275–9) — highlighting Crete’s wide trade connections. Such instances refract Crete’s cultural influence, connectivity and trade with the Homeric world. Many are in the form of indirect allusions and vestiges, but we corroborate a broader practice.
What we have in the Homeric poems when discussing Crete, therefore, is a culture dedicated to connectivity throughout the Aegean world, especially in trade and political alliances. This reflects and provided fertile grounds for the sharing of customs. On the one hand, our perception of Crete is often rooted in the peaceful trade, prosperity, and honour of the Minoan world. Yet what is fascinating about Homeric Crete is its ambivalence: on the other hand, Crete’s warrior is like “the companion of Enyalios Ares”. This pattern is precisely what we find in Achilles’ slaughter of the Trojan heroes: both within the passage and from the surrounding text of Iliad 23, the brutal action is countered by a highly Cretan emphasis on skill and ritual. This aligns neatly with the archaeology at Eleutherna. Let’s see how this plays out in Homer’s account.
Part 2: The Iliadic text: Sacrificing Trojan Youths — idiosyncratic cruelty? Ritual, characterisation, intertextuality, and the Homeric world
Before we discuss how archaeology compares with the Homeric account of the slaughter of the twelve Trojans by Achilles, we must examine what we can extrapolate from the actual passages in their immediate context and the broader Homeric text. On the one hand, the passages corroborate the existence of some form of human sacrifice, potentially a revenge killing of a prisoner of war. But looking closer at the context of the passages and specific details within the text reveals a surprisingly link to Crete in ritual, and suggests another explanation behind the nature of this “sacrifice”. Was Homer influenced by this specific ritual in Crete?
Homer leaves us in suspense when he depicts Achilles, in the middle of his godlike wrath, taking twelve “young” prisoners “alive” from the Xanthus (Iliad 21.26–33):
ὃ δ᾽ ἐπεὶ κάμε χεῖρας ἐναίρων,
ζωοὺς ἐκ ποταμοῖο δυώδεκα λέξατο κούρους
ποινὴν Πατρόκλοιο Μενοιτιάδαο θανόντος:
τοὺς ἐξῆγε θύραζε τεθηπότας ἠΰτε νεβρούς,
δῆσε δ᾽ ὀπίσσω χεῖρας ἐϋτμήτοισιν ἱμᾶσι,
τοὺς αὐτοὶ φορέεσκον ἐπὶ στρεπτοῖσι χιτῶσι,
δῶκε δ᾽ ἑταίροισιν κατάγειν κοίλας ἐπὶ νῆας.
αὐτὰρ ὃ ἂψ ἐπόρουσε δαϊζέμεναι μενεαίνων.And when his hands became tired of slaughtering,
he picked out twelve young men, alive, from the river
as a requital for the now dead Patroclus son of Menoitius:
them he led them out and forward, disoriented like fawns,
and tied their hands behind them with well-wrought ropes,
which they used to wear around their malleable tunics.
He gave them to his comrades to take down to the hollow ships.
But he immediately marched back, desiring to slaughter.
(My translations)
The ironic turn of fate of these Trojan heroes is encapsulated by Homer’s analeptic comment that the same ropes which once tied their tunics now tie their hands in slavery. The next mention again looks forward to the slaughter in the future, keeping us in suspense: in lliad 23.23–24, Achilles prays to Patroclus’ corpse and vows that he has brought the body of Hector (ἐρύσας, completed in the aorist) and would slaughter by decapitation (ἀποδειροτομήσειν, a promise in the future) the twelve Trojan sons:
τοῖσι δὲ Πηλεΐδης ἁδινοῦ ἐξῆρχε γόοιο
χεῖρας ἐπ᾽ ἀνδροφόνους θέμενος στήθεσσιν ἑταίρου:
“χαῖρέ μοι ὦ Πάτροκλε καὶ εἰν Ἀΐδαο δόμοισι:
πάντα γὰρ ἤδη τοι τελέω τὰ πάροιθεν ὑπέστην
Ἕκτορα δεῦρ᾽ ἐρύσας δώσειν κυσὶν ὠμὰ δάσασθαι,
δώδεκα δὲ προπάροιθε πυρῆς ἀποδειροτομήσειν
Τρώων ἀγλαὰ τέκνα σέθεν κταμένοιο χολωθείς.” (Il. 23.17–24.)And among them, the son of Peleus led the shrill lamentation
Throwing his man-slaughtering hands upon the chest of his comrade:
“Greetings, my own Patroclus, even in the house of Hades:
For I have brought to pass everything which I once promised —
Hector, dragged here, I will give to the dogs to eat raw;
Twelve glorious sons of the Trojans I will murder and decapitate
in front of the pyre —
I will do that, furious at your death.”
“Because of my anger at your death” — the uniting strand throughout these scenes is Achilles’ anger, the final three words. It is only until Iliad 23.175–183 that Homer, after a long description of the sacrifices around Patroclus’ pyre, describes the scene in real-time — yet he chooses to reveal only minimal detail, without significant pathos:
ἐν δ᾽ ἐτίθει μέλιτος καὶ ἀλείφατος ἀμφιφορῆας
πρὸς λέχεα κλίνων: πίσυρας δ᾽ ἐριαύχενας ἵππους
ἐσσυμένως ἐνέβαλλε πυρῇ μεγάλα στεναχίζων.
ἐννέα τῷ γε ἄνακτι τραπεζῆες κύνες ἦσαν,
καὶ μὲν τῶν ἐνέβαλλε πυρῇ δύο δειροτομήσας,
δώδεκα δὲ Τρώων μεγαθύμων υἱέας ἐσθλοὺς
χαλκῷ δηϊόων: κακὰ δὲ φρεσὶ μήδετο ἔργα:
ἐν δὲ πυρὸς μένος ἧκε σιδήρεον ὄφρα νέμοιτο.
ᾤμωξέν τ᾽ ἄρ᾽ ἔπειτα, φίλον δ᾽ ὀνόμηνεν ἑταῖρον:
‘χαῖρέ μοι ὦ Πάτροκλε καὶ εἰν Ἀΐδαο δόμοισι:
πάντα γὰρ ἤδη τοι τελέω τὰ πάροιθεν ὑπέστην,
δώδεκα μὲν Τρώων μεγαθύμων υἱέας ἐσθλοὺς
τοὺς ἅμα σοὶ πάντας πῦρ ἐσθίει: Ἕκτορα δ᾽ οὔ τι
δώσω Πριαμίδην πυρὶ δαπτέμεν, ἀλλὰ κύνεσσιν.’And on the pyre he placed two-handled jars of honey and oil
leaning against the bier: then he threw four mighty-necked horses
furiously onto the pyre, groaning gargantuanly.
The king Achilles had nine dinner-table hounds —
He cut the throat of two of them and threw them on the pyre,
along with twelve noble sons of the great-hearted Trojans
decapitated with his sword: and these cruel deeds he wrought in his heart:
and on that he set the iron strength of fire so that it would spread outwards.
And then he groaned, and he called his dear friend by name:
“Greetings Patroclus, my own even in the house of Hades:
For now indeed I am completing all the things I promised before,
Twelve noble sons of the great-hearted Trojans,
All those men with you the fire consumes: but Hector the son of Priam,
That man I will not give to the fire to feast on, but to the dogs.”
Precisely why Homer, having built up to this slaughter since Book 18 when Achilles vows to kill them, is silent on their suffering, plays into the ritualistic nature of this murder and will be discussed below. These are not the final words of Achilles to Patroclus — in Iliad 24 he again calls on Patroclus not to be angry at Achilles when he relinquishes Hector’s body to Priam. But it is here that the ring composition of the allusions to the death of the Trojans is fulfilled. The final mention of these twelve youths occurs later at Il. 23.909–910. It comes in as an awkward, jutting reminder of the deed, whose insertion almost as a parenthetical aside brings its horror: the dirty plain “clogged with slimy dung”, on which Ajax slipped in the “rapid race”, was besides “Patroclus’ pyre, where recently the slaughtered victims fed the fire”.
What we see here, therefore, is the unbridled hatred of Achilles, both from Homer’s perspective and Achilles’. But in many ways, we are told and hear about it much more than we see it. Homer is unusually silent on the suffering — why does he not deploy his usual art of enargeia to depict the suffering? How do we reconcile this? Does this absence affect how and what Homer is trying to convey in Achilles’ slaughter — does it convey more about Achilles’ love for Patroclus or his own wounded pride, or is it potentially another reason we are missing? And what can this answer tell us about the motives and nature of Achilles’ slaughter?
Homer does pass narratorial judgement on Achilles’ actions. In a rare example of extending his moral evaluation as the impartial narrator, at Il. 23.176, the dramatic real-time description of Achilles’ slaughtering the victims, Homer comments and qualifies Achilles’ machinations as “terrible/cruel deeds” (κακὰ δὲ φρεσὶ μήδετο ἔργα). This zooming in onto κακὰ pinpoints the general, totally negative connotation of this human slaughter. Yet this generic word in a selected scene is perhaps paradoxical. Indeed, Homer omits any sentiment of Achilles’ compassion for Patroclus or sympathy for the Trojan youths. Instead, he exclusively foregrounds Achilles’ retribution, and the consciousness of and lust for the cruelty that goes into it (“he devised”). Zanker has argued that this reflects Achilles’ and the Trojans’ minds more than Homer’s comment — it nevertheless focuses on satiating Achilles’ anger.
This anger as the reason behind Achilles’ slaughter is developed when the protagonist explains his own motives. Again, they focus on his anger, but explain it more specifically with Patroclus’ death. Freshly furious following Patroclus’ death, Achilles vows to slaughter the Trojan youths “because I am furious at your murder”(σέθεν κταμένοιο χολωθείς, 18.336–7). The motive of anger is clear in the meaning of χολωθείς — but its participle form also may function causally and link his anger specifically with Patroclus’ death. This suggests Achilles’ reason for the sacrifice is to seek vengeance for the killing of his friend. This motive is repeated at Il. 23.24, just before he embarks on the ritual. However, when Achilles actually captures the Trojans, Homer states he takes them as a ποινὴν for Patroclus (21.28). There is debate as to what ποινὴν means. Most agree it is “blood-payment”, thus signifying in its strongest form a revengeful act of retribution against the Trojans. Again the included participle θανόντος to describe Patroclus may causally be the root of Achilles’ anger. All in all, Achilles’ sacrifice seems pretty clearly, both from Homer’s and Achilles’ accounts, to be attributed to revengeful retribution.
Important to note is that this is purely Achilles’ characterisation. Patroclus’ ghost never tells Achilles to sacrifice humans to him: at Il. 23.69–92, in order to remedy his inability to enter the gates of death, he only asks Achilles to bury him (23.71). Therefore, the motive seems to focus on “revenge”, as Richardson argues in his canonical commentary (187, 1993).
But there are some discrepancies, some unusualnesses in these descriptions that this interpretation does not, and cannot, account for. This interpretation does give us motives directly from protagonist and narrator — but such motives are scarce and unelaborated. Moreover, this interpretation is slightly one dimensional — it assumes the immediate words in the text are the underlying cause, without analysing the frequency of occurrences, Homer’s holistic technique, and more importantly, absences. Homer is notably silent on the suffering of the sacrificed humans — and in contrast to loud sounds surrounding the text. Achilles’ anger may be the right reason in the story, but it is the overarching purpose of this passage, characterisation and plot? Should we be thinking of this scene in a different way?
Homer does not give us many narratorial judgements as to the morals of Achilles’ actions. Maybe the reason Homer is silent is precisely because he expects us to recognise this ritual and its unique moral import. This expectation to understand these rituals is corroborated by other rituals the Myrmidons undergo in Iliad 23 that differ from similar funerary rituals and for which Homer does not explain why. Most prominently, they engage in “funeral feasting” (τάφον μενοεικέα δαίνυ) before the burial itself (23.29, 160f). Usually, this occurs after the ritual lamentation and burial, as in Hector’s death (Il. 24.801–4) or Clytemnestra’s (Od. 3.309–10). Richardson (Iliad: A Commentary Vol VI) takes the narratological approach and argues that placing the scene after the funeral would “interrupt” the funeral games ensuing immediately after. Yet Homer gives us little indication why this is so. The silence concerning the sacrifice of the Trojans, moreover, is also very literal: Homer both unusually emphasises the “bellowing”, “bleating”, and “groaning” of the sacrificial victims at Patroclus’ tomb (23.30–31, 172), and makes the twelve Trojans say nothing. Maybe these absences highlight his expectation of us knowing. Perhaps they are simply vestiges without meaning, or operate on a different level.
But focusing beyond the actual activities to the language surrounding this unusually ritualistic scene gives us a breakthrough. Let’s reconsider the one occurrence where Homer explicitly names the nature of Achilles’ sacrifice. He calls it a “blood-requital” (ποινὴν, 21.28). Above, we interpreted it as being an example of revengeful retribution for Achilles’ individual anger at Patroclus’ death. But the case of ποινὴν is a revealing case that might provide a break forward. As Beeke’s Etymological Dictionary of Ancient Greek indicates (1217–18), ποινὴν also appears in the Odyssey 1.377 and 380 as the negative, νη-ποινος. Telemachus calls the suitors νη-ποινοι: you are foolish, he says, if you believe “the livelihood of one man being destroyed is not without atonement” (ἀνδρὸς ἑνὸς βίοτον νήποινον ὀλέσθαι). Telemachus uses this word specifically to imply that they are not taking care to prevent or avert retribution by the gods at their hubris. This link to the gods, or at least fate, is also demonstrated in the context. First, he defines the retributory consequences of being νηποινος and highlights that at the root of this retribution lies divine anger and punishment. He threatens to invoke Zeus to punish them so he may “haply…grant that deeds of requital may be wrought” (1.279). This is the consequence when propitiatory sacrifices or atonement are not done by the suitors, but instead sought for — the positive form of ποινη, therefore, involves acting to avert this divine punishment. In this light, Telemachus calls the suitors “unavenged” by the gods for destroying his home (νήποινοί κεν ἔπειτα δόμων ἔντοσθεν ὄλοισθε). Therefore, the word that Homer uses to describe the reason for Achilles’ slaughter of the Trojan youths holds an apotropaic meaning to avert the gods’ wrath, or in Achilles’ case, the spirit of Patroclus. This meaning also appears elsewhere in the Odyssey: repeated at 2.142–5 and 18.280 by Penelope, the link to avoiding the gods’ punishment is most explicit when Eumaios describes the suitors’ reckless actions and contrasts them to his request for Odysseus to be kind to him or fear Zeus’ avenging spirit (14.377, 417). Therefore, this ritual ποινὴ acquires the sense of retributory punishment to propitiate or prevent a calamity sent from heaven. The focus is on the atonement of the gods or a spirit regarding mortals’ fates — it is retributory in an apotropaic sense, alongside revenge.
This nuance is played out in the other rituals, like Achilles’ threefold encircling around Patroclus’ body (23.13), which alludes back to his dragging Hector’s body thrice around Troy’s walls. That this motif of circling the dead three times appears again at Achilles’ death (Od. 24.68–70), suggests that it has some ritualistic meaning involved with being emotionally bound or enchained to the dead. It also, however, has both a religious and apotropaic sense. Nagy has argued that the thrice-encircling acts as a sign (sema, note the play with “tomb” sema) enables Patroclus’ transformation into a hero cult (169–274, 2013; cf. Damon and Pieper Eris vs. Aemulatio: Valuing Competition in Classical Antiquity, 65ff). It has a specifically apotropaic function because it prevents those close to Patroclus from fall into excessive grief, a sort of symbolic death, and instead to reintegrate into society — in some ways it appeases the chthonic gods. Likewise, some sort of religious ritual is the underlying context for Achilles’ sudden decision to dedicate his lock of hair, promised to the river god Spercheus, to Patroclus’ body (23.144–51). This is again linked to apotropaically preventing divine anger against the dead: Achilles has to give it to Patroclus to allow him to pass through the Gates of Hades more easily and to prevent the ghosts impeding him. The rituals surrounding the funerary ritual in Iliad 23, therefore, appear to have some link with religion to a specifically apotropaic end — to prevent divine fury. This interpretation has often been overlooked by scholarship, and, as we’ll see with the comparison with archaeology below, is a productive way of thinking about Achilles’ ritual. It moreover fits Walter Burkert’s argument that the broader funeral games in Iliad 23 are a reenactment (mimesis) of violence in a ritualistic context to mitigate the dead (106, 1985). How does this system work alongside and negotiate with the retribution killing of a friend? Is it an older version reworked by Homer?
This is where the archaeology of Crete can inform these linguistic semantics. There is an increasing number of contemporary cases of human sacrifice in Crete, and many seem to be related to propitiatory sacrifice to prevent the gods from harming the inhabitants. To conclude this section, although occasionally he and Achilles mention the motives behind Achilles’ sacrifice, Homer might be unusually silent on these rituals because they formed part of the audience’s knowledge. The nature of this sacrifice might not have been as spearheaded towards Achilles’ revenge as we get in the text, but underlying it is a more long-term, preventative function focused on appeasing the gods and establishing heroisation for Patroclus. This interpretation is particularly interesting because it implies that Homer is interacting with and crafting an older or alternative ritual function. How does Homer negotiate with this older version for his current purposes? Is Homer taking a previous ritual and contemporising it with literary aims for a newer audience? Or has he lost its meaning and is therefore quiet about it?
These are all options in which the intratextual analysis can only get us so far. It is here, by comparing it with the archaeology that I had the chance to experience on the Crete Summer School, that we can provide some insights. As we will see in Part 2, a comparison of the surrounding text of the funerary ritual in Iliad 23 brings out surprisingly strong links to Crete. These point towards the funerary pyre ritual as being a ritual contemporary, perhaps originating in Crete — and relating to the controversial subject of “human sacrifice”. As above, it questions the interpretation of “human sacrifice” as a ritual focused on retributory revenge against a prisoner of war and suggests instead a potential shift more towards apotropaic function in preventing death and encouraging memorialisation.
Returning, then, to Iliad 2, let’s fly with Homer’s bird’s-eye view back to “hundred-citied Crete” and see what lies behind (or rather outside) the “well-built cities”.
Part 3: “Apotropaic Human Sacrifice” behind a “Ritual Retribution” — the mysterious case of Funerary Pyre ΛΛ/90–91 in the Orthia Petra Cemetery, Eleutherna: Intersections between the archaeology and Homer, and the origins of Achilles’ ritual
Eleutherna has a long and fascinating history.
Inhabited back to Minoan times, archaeologists have found evidence that Eleutherna was continuously inhabited from the 10th-9th century BCE all the way to the Byzantine era in the 14th century AD.
This continuity is best epitomised in the fascinating necropolis of Orthi Petra (“Rectangular Rock”) perched on a ridge there. It is unique because it contains all main types of burials in the Greek world: from inhumation and cremation to pithoi, steles, and even little houses. It has given us invaluable information from women in society and Crete’s trade links to a diachronic and cross-cultural (cf. Phoenician burials at Eleutherna) perspective on burial customs. And it will likely continue to yield fascinating details: only 15% of the site has been excavated since 1985.
But the most interesting aspect of the site for a Homerist is further up the hill, at the Archaeological Museum at Eleutherna.
Beyond the influence Homer held in the burial choices of the Geometric age (e.g. Lefkandi; and as we shall see below), Homer is still very much alive in the imagination of Cretans today, in how they conceive their past. Only 3 years old, the museum has the subtitle or nickname “Homer in Crete”. Approaching Crete through this lens, the museum’s exhibitions aim to emphasise that Crete’s “most important” period from 900BCE-end of the 6th century was “directly associated with the dawn of Greek civilization and Homer” and stressing Eleutherna’s “unique status as a place where many Homeric truths are verified”. The many objects on display from Eleutherna’s trade links with Egypt and the Near East to the aspects of the Homeric diet give historical hints of Odysseus’ wanderings and more. From this, the museum brochure (written by Prof. Nikolaos Stampolidis) argues that:
“For these reasons, the current display focuses on Homer. This is the backbone, the thread that connects everything. Crete can now stand firmly on two feet: the Minoan civilization and Homer. These are its strong points in its history.”
But it is the very last display in the museum that is potentially the most interesting for Homer’s world (beyond the fascinating burial of the four women “priestesses”). It depicts the burial of a warrior and ritualistic human slaughter very similar to our Homeric text: Funerary Pyre ΛΛ/90–91.
Part of the reason we can make links with Homeric ritual is that it is so well-preserved. The museum has reconstructed the pyre to give us a synoptic, phenomenological sense of what it was like. There are two elements. First, there is a funerary pyre of a young male; osteological analysis suggests he was around 30. The weapons he was buried with suggest he was a soldier and gives valuable insights into the military virtue of aristocratic society in the Geometric age Crete. This man was also cremated with another person beside him, posited to be their “companion”. Their deaths date to 720–700BCE — coinciding with, or slightly earlier than, the time Homer was likely writing the epics. Could this be material evidence of the relationships between leaders and their “attendants”, such as Achilles and Patroclus or Idomeneus and Meriones, in Iliad? Perhaps — we cannot yet determine whether the “companion” was male or female.
The most interesting and unusual element is not on the pyre, but rather a body near it. This man also seems to be around 30–40 years old and well-built — likely a fighter. But the final shape of his body raises questions as to his treatment. His body is contorted in a very strange position. His spine is arched backwards to an extreme degree, in a crescent shape. This can be explained by the fact that he was tied by his elbows and knees behind his back. He does not appear to have suffered any physical skeletal harm before or during the sacrifice. Unlike the companions, his bones are not charred and he has no grave offerings with him: he was not burnt during the ritual. These details have made scholars like Stampolidis, the director archaeologist of Eleutherna, argue that he was a prisoner of war being slaughtered in front of the pyre. Immediately, we get the same general details of Achilles’ sacrifice of the Trojan youths: a sacrifice of tied captives at the pyre of a dead warrior.
Questions have been raised regarding the contemporaneity of the decapitated man and the funerary pyre. Could this instead be a ritual where later generations sacrificed an offering to hero cults in front of the Mycenaean tombs, such as at Mycenae or Dendra? The fact that we have no other human sacrifices at such tombs, that this body was excavated in the same archaeological context, and that the burnt parts of the bones of this man are charred from the same fire on the funerary pyre, suggest that they are contemporary and linked to the same ritual.
The question, then, is what sort of killing is this and what is its function? Is it a typical execution, a revengeful retributory killing, a propitiatory sacrifice, or a brutal human sacrifice, apotropaic or otherwise? As the signpost at the museum says, it is difficult to determine which one precisely it is because the methods and reasons behind them are so similar and difficult to discern in the present state of the evidence. Is the lack of the accompanying material and animal remains at the tomb, which often allows us to decipher the type of murder, evidence of a simple typical execution or rather lost evidence? If it was propitiatory, was it preventative (apotropaic) or demanding in its function? How can we securely find that a revengeful retribution was the cause, with the lack of the context before the sacrifice?
However, as Edwards has argued (186, 1991), the most certain common denominator underlying this killing is a human sacrifice. What type of human sacrifice is it? The key to this interpretation lies with the fact of decapitation — the man here has been decapitated and his head has been thrown away from the corpse (and is absent today). The signpost argues that the deliberate removal of the man’s head and its throwing away suggests that this human sacrifice is specifically inspired by a retributory, revengeful motive. Unfortunately, due to the lack of access of the necessary scholarship online or in my library, I cannot look further into Stampolidis’ works explaining why the decapitation most likely implies retributory revenge.
What is interesting, however, is that decapitation is common to all our types of human sacrifice discussed in this paper: here, with Achilles’ sacrifice, and with other sacrifices found in Crete. This does two things in relation to our Iliad 23 passage of Achilles’ sacrifice. First, it corroborates its authenticity by providing archaeological precedence, contributing to the “Homeric Question” debate. With the similarities in material remains, rituals, and date, it seems that there was some sort of sharing between the Homeric ritual and the one at Eleutherna. One consequential question is directionality: is Homer reappropriating an ancient Cretan custom or are the Cretans taking this sacrifice from their knowledge of the Homeric epics. Such chicken and egg questions are difficult to answer, but the fact that this pyre is the earliest cremation found at Eleutherna (so far), and that Homer and this funeral are relatively contemporary, might suggest the Cretans are borrowing this older Homeric custom. What this safely shows, however, is that this Homeric ritual was not “invented”, but was produced in the context of similar rituals dating from the 8th century BCE. This goes against the often harsh criticism of the “historicity” of the Homeric text. It is an example in the growing list of situations that show the Homeric epics were not crafted in a vacuum but reproduced the world around them, which we can only glimpse as vestiges today.
Second, it helps reinterpret the human sacrifice scene in Iliad 23, the ritualistic elements behind it, and the reasons behind it. This focus on decapitation brings out certain aspects in the Homeric account that are often overlooked. Homer describes the mode of sacrificing the youthful Trojans as “δειροτομήσας”, i.e. “by cutting (tamno), or slashing, the throat”. This emphasis on the throat and head stands out from the mode of sacrifice used to kill other sacrifices on the pyre and during the earlier funerary feast: there the neutral σφαζόμενοι (slaying, 23.31) is used. Further, as Margo Kitts has pointed out, cutting a victim’s throat in Homer is often associated with making oaths (13–14, 2008). There is evidently emphasis on the future in Achilles’ slaughter and a religious aspect; as we have seen before, potentially in the form of memorialisation and heroisation. What about here?
Part of the answer lies in the context of similar excavations of “human sacrifice” in Crete. It is insightful to note the backstory of these excavations, and how modern Cretans have reacted to this ritual of human sacrifice, and how its “barbarity” clashes with traditionally peaceful Minoan culture. Evans and other archaeologists have always posited the idea that Crete was a pacific society occupied with prosperous trade; derived both from the literature concerning Minos as in Thucydides, but also in the wonderous frescoes that Evans found at Knossos depicting festivities, religious rituals, and agricultural prosperity — most importantly, no scenes of battle or war (although there are certain frescoes weapons like 8-shaped shields). This has set the idea of a pacific and advanced society deep in today’s Cretans minds.
To be confronted, then, by a native Greek archaeologist and later director of the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Yannis Sakellarakis, telling them around 1981 that their ancestral Minoan society potentially engaged in apotropaic barbaric human sacrifice, sent big shock waves. He had found at Anemospilia-Acharnes, a 1700BCE Minoan temple site on Mt Juktas, three skeletons in fascinating configurations. One, a woman’s, was set in the corner of the Western Room. Some have conjectured this is a priestess. The second was of a man who coves his face with his hands, by a base. The other was an 18-year-old boy on a raised platform. Mirroring the contorted shape of the Eleutherna victim, his legs and torso were tied so that he lay in a foetal position. What suggested a human sacrifice was an impressively decorated “dagger” that was found amongst his bones. Given that part of the building seemed destroyed by an earthquake, Sakellarakis hypothesised that the body was sacrificed on an altar to prevent, apotropaically, the earthquake (was the second man caught in the process, shielding his face?). This brutality, however, faced huge backlash and was something modern Cretans would not accept. The resistance from the Cretans (and Greece) was strong — so strong, indeed, that he was kicked out of his position at the University of Athens.
Yet different nations engender different reactions over time. Around the same time (1979), another excavator, Peter Warren from the British School, found another case potentially corroborating human sacrifice at Myrtos Fournos Korifi. A male skull was found alone by a hearth feature dedicated to ancestors worship. Perhaps since he was English, he found less resistance. Most recently in 2017, however, Maria Vlazaki-Andreadaki (Secretary-General of the Ministry of Culture and Sports) excavated another example of human sacrifice in the skull of a young woman from the 13th century BCE, again in relation to an earthquake and chthonic deities, at the Mycenaean palace of Kydonia, modern Chania. (Indeed she is giving an annual BSA lecture about it, Sacrificial rituals in the Mycenaean palatial centre of Kydonia (Khania, Crete), at Senate House on 3 October 2019). As more cases crop up, what this tells us is that there seems to have been a wider use of human sacrifice to appease the gods. In the first and final cases, it is to avert destruction: at Kydonia, the “maiden” seems to be slaughtered right after the seismic earthquake shock and before the fire and collapse of the building. We have similar cases of such sacrifices to restore favour with the divine, most famously Iphigeneia. In the middle case, it appears to be specifically for ancestor worship, potentially a product of heroisation. These, however, have faced severe resistance from Greeks, including scholars, of “insulting” their “superior” race. The language that such excavators often have to use is remarkable — it’s always negative and apologetic: “We cannot avoid mentioning human sacrifice in Minoan Crete”. Nevertheless, she strongly argues such sacrifices are “not…ferocious and ruthless slaughters”, as Achilles is often held to be. This specifically Cretan or neo-Minoan mindset has prevented us from dealing with such links earnestly, in a productive manner. Moreover, it has slowed down noting the comparison with the ritual in Iliad 23 by Achilles and what we can learn from this.
Now, to put all the pieces of the puzzle together.
As we have seen, the process of decapitation is common to all the sacrifices (Achilles’, the Eleutherna man’s, and the other three examples). Whether or not this has a specific symbolic meaning, there, therefore, appears to be some connection between these rituals. Moreover, the last four examples of this very specific and rare form of sacrifice are found in Crete, suggesting a potential cultural sharing between literature and archaeology. This ground is fundamental for deciphering the meaning and nature of the ritual. The Iliad 23 passage has often been attributed to Achilles’ “anger” (χολωθείς) or, more technically, as a “blood-requital” (ποινὴν). This is iterated by both protagonist and narrator. But, as we have seen, there are certain incongruities in the surrounding context that are not explained by these reasons, namely Homer’s silence at explaining the unusualness of this human sacrifice, the ritualistic nature of each activity, and the potential backdrop or link to religion, that challenge a simple interpretation solely prioritising Achilles’ revengeful anger. This connection with the rituals in Crete arguably justifies re-reading the motivation for Achilles’ sacrifice in Iliad 23 in line with the apotropaic and memorialising functions of these other sacrifices. These Cretan rituals all take place at altars, but for different reasons. The two that reflect an apotropaic function of preventing the gods from harming mortals draws out the subtle apotropaic function behind Achilles’ sacrifices in transporting Patroclus’ dead soul to the underworld without the gods’ harms. On the other hand, the human sacrifice for an ancestrial cult at Myrtos Fournos Korifi may reflect Achilles’ concern with the future and cultic memorisation of his comrade, using the human sacrifice to trigger symbolically the process of heroisation. This last reason seems to be a function in the Eleutherna case, which mirrors remarkably accurately Achilles’ perhaps not so “vengeful” slaughter.
Comparing the triad of archaeology, history, and literature, therefore, opens up a whole array of new possibilities for reinterpreting scenes that are traditionally read in isolation. I hope that I have shown that we can gain a lot more from such readings.
Before we end this section, however, we must question the validity of this method: how useful and secure is studying the correspondences between excavations and ancient texts? How exclusive is it and does it matter if they don’t correspondence perfectly (and to what extent)? One detail in the archaeology I have not mentioned is that the ashes of the two people were put in separate urns, unlike Achilles and Patroclus’ mixed ashes (Od. 24.77). This goes against the Homeric text then, if we interpret the two people burnt on the pyre as “companions” in the Achilles-Patroclus dynamic. This detail, however, does not exclude the similarities in other elements. Further, Achilles deliberately lets the fire consume the Trojan princes (Il. 23.177 “on that he set the iron strength of fire so that it would spread outwards”); the Eleutherna man is only slightly charred. Achilles sacrifices a large number of sacrificial beasts, four horses, and two hounds around the corpse (Il. 23.166–73). Far fewer animal remains were found at the Eleutherna case. How much can we read between the two cases and disciplines, with these limitations in comparison? Although this process comes packaged with issues of anachronisms, lack of information, and overenthusiastic archaeologists, it opens new veins and gets us thinking in other potentially more correct ways. In a recent JHS article, Kotsonas argued that the Cretans were well-acquainted with the Homeric world and its references to Crete by noting the existence of some unique arms that are only attributed to Meriones in the Iliad in a tomb at Knossos. He suggests that these later Cretans were imitating Meriones from the Iliad. The question is how this transaction operates in the other direction: how well-acquainted was Homer with the Cretan culture and funerary customs? We may never know.
The extent to which the argument that this is an exclusively Cretan ritual of human sacrifice, moreover, or is a more universal one, is debatable. In his so-called “Scythian” book, Herodotus records the unique sacrifices that the Scythians make to Ares (Histories 4.62). Instead of sacrificing beasts as they do for the other gods, they set an iron scimitar of an image of Ares and sacrifice humans to it. This human sacrifice is remarkably similar to the case at Eleutherna: they sacrifice one man of the “prisoners of war they take alive” by pouring wine on the men’s heads and cutting their throats over a vessel and pouring the blood on the pyre. Moreover, they then cut off the right arms and hands of the slain men (mirroring the Eleutherna man’s missing head), throwing them away from the body. Even more similar to the Eleutherna case, Herodotus notes, at 4.71, that at the burial of their kings the Scythians sacrifice one of the king’s concubines, his cook, groom, square, and messenger and bury then with him. Herodotus’ Thracians demonstrate similar rituals.
There is undoubtedly some sort of cross-cultural understanding of the significance of avenging an enemy for a dear one through exchange of life (anthropological studies have demonstrated this). Perhaps there is some intrinsic, cross-cultural meaning in the delimbing of prisoners. Or was Herodotus, simply not knowing for a fact, drawing on past precedence and influenced by this very description from the Iliad or Cretan custom? Today, at least, the Scythian version has certainly persisted: a recent British Museum article traced many of the Dothraki’s rituals in Game of Thrones to the Scythians’ (The Dothraki and the Scythians — a game of clones?).
Nevertheless, we must bear in mind the differences as well. The Scythians sacrifice for a god. In the Iliad and at Eleutherna, it is uniquely for a dead hero. In the sacrifices for the king’s burial, they are strangled, not decapitated. But what puts the link between this Scythian ritual and the one in Iliad into doubt comes in Herodotus’ very next section. This ritual seems to belong to a broader Scythian culture of bodily mutilation in relation to warfare, not solely reserved for the funeral pyre for a dead warrior. Discussing the Scythians’ war customs in 4.64, Herodotus generalises that they “drink the blood of the first man they overthrow”. Likewise, he carries the head of all whom he has slain to the king — not to avenge anyone, but to “receive a share of the booty”. In general, there is a lot of decapitating in Herodotus’ account of Scythian customs — a full five examples. Therefore, in Herodotus’ account at least, the Scythian ritual of human sacrifice of a prisoner, at first glance bearing many similarities, might rather belong to a different context of warfare. The Eleutherna example, instead, bears remarkable ritualistic and contextual similarities, reserved for the burial of a dead warrior hero.
Reading literature in isolation can only take us so far. Perhaps, only to the actual sacrifice.
Comparing with archaeology and history, however, opens us up to a whole range of exciting new ideas.
Maybe its time to sacrifice our obsession with Achilles’ brutality. Or maybe not — as we’ll see in Part 2.
Thus, we have established a link between the ritual in the Homeric text and the archaeology at Eleutherna. But we can actually gain more useful details about Achilles’ rituals by analysing the broader links to Crete in that passage. To these ends, in Part 2 I will analyse a nearby passage in Iliad 23, which leads up to Patroclus’ pyre, that demonstrates remarkable Cretan links. I will argue that this link in the physical construction of the pyre supports the Cretan links in Achilles’ ritualistic demonstration of grief and the Eleutherna Funerary Pyre ΛΛ/90–91. By analysing both examples of Achilles’ funerary sacrifice and Meriones’ helping construct the funerary pyre, we can also learn about Cretan warfare identity and how this factors into Achilles’ sacrifice. I will challenge the typical interpretation of reading the scene in relation to Crete’s mountainous territory, which relies on environmental determinism, and instead argue that it needs to be read and belongs to a much broader repertoire of identities defining Cretan warfare. This will hopefully demonstrate further the benefits of reading things interdisciplinarily — this time between literature and history, complementing the literature and archaeology earlier.
Dedicated to the “Lost World of Ancient Crete” summer school students and staff, especially to Victoria, Melina, Artemis, and Costas for lecturing on the sites we visited relevant to this paper! Thank you for making it such a stimulating experience and for inspiring me to write this — this definitely could not be done without it. On that note, I would sincerely and enthusiastically suggest that everyone apply for this memorable summer school under the sun of Rethymno!
A newspaper article written close to when the Eleutherna excavations were actually made can be found at: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-01-13-mn-222-story.html. Talks have been previously given on this same topic, one of which can be found here, by the University of Melbourne.
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