Deaths in the Iliad - 5

Book 5

Diomedes (A) kills Phegeus (T) (spear in the chest) (5.19)

The sons of Dares first the combat sought,
A wealthy priest, but rich without a fault;
In Vulcan’s fane the father’s days were led,
The sons to toils of glorious battle bred;
These singled from their troops the fight maintain,
These, from their steeds, Tydides on the plain.
Fierce for renown the brother-chiefs draw near,
And first bold Phegeus cast his sounding spear,
Which o’er the warrior’s shoulder took its course,
And spent in empty air its erring force.
Not so, Tydides, flew thy lance in vain,
But pierced his breast, and stretch’d him on the plain.
Seized with unusual fear, Idæus fled,
Left the rich chariot, and his brother dead.
And had not Vulcan lent celestial aid,
He too had sunk to death’s eternal shade;
But in a smoky cloud the god of fire
Preserved the son, in pity to the sire.
The steeds and chariot, to the navy led,
Increased the spoils of gallant Diomed.

Agamemnon (A) kills Odius (T) (spear in the back) (5.42)

Meantime, the Greeks the Trojan race pursue,
And some bold chieftain every leader slew:
First Odius falls, and bites the bloody sand,
His death ennobled by Atrides’ hand:
As he to flight his wheeling car address’d,
The speedy javelin drove from back to breast.
In dust the mighty Halizonian lay,
His arms resound, the spirit wings its way.

Idomeneus (A) kills Phaestus (spear in the shoulder) (5.48)

Thy fate was next, O Phæstus! doom’d to feel
The great Idomeneus’ protended steel;
Whom Borus sent (his son and only joy)
From fruitful Tarne to the fields of Troy.
The Cretan javelin reach’d him from afar,
And pierced his shoulder as he mounts his car;
Back from the car he tumbles to the ground,
And everlasting shades his eyes surround.

Menelaus (A) kills Scamandrius (spear in the back) (5.54)

Then died Scamandrius, expert in the chase,
In woods and wilds to wound the savage race;
Diana taught him all her sylvan arts,
To bend the bow, and aim unerring darts:
But vainly here Diana’s arts he tries,
The fatal lance arrests him as he flies;
From Menelaus’ arm the weapon sent,
Through his broad back and heaving bosom went:
Down sinks the warrior with a thundering sound,
His brazen armour rings against the ground.

Meriones (A) kills Phereclus (T) (spear in the buttock) (5.66)

Next artful Phereclus untimely fell;
Bold Merion sent him to the realms of hell.
Thy father’s skill, O Phereclus! was thine,
The graceful fabric and the fair design;
For loved by Pallas, Pallas did impart
To him the shipwright’s and the builder’s art.
Beneath his hand the fleet of Paris rose,
The fatal cause of all his country’s woes;
But he, the mystic will of heaven unknown,
Nor saw his country’s peril, nor his own.
The hapless artist, while confused he fled,
The spear of Merion mingled with the dead.
Through his right hip, with forceful fury cast,
Between the bladder and the bone it pass’d;
Prone on his knees he falls with fruitless cries,
And death in lasting slumber seals his eyes.

Meges (A) kills Pedaeus (A) (spear in the neck) (5.78)

From Meges’ force the swift Pedaeus fled,
Antenor’s offspring from a foreign bed,
Whose generous spouse, Theanor, heavenly fair,
Nursed the young stranger with a mother’s care.
How vain those cares! when Meges in the rear
Full in his nape infix’d the fatal spear;
Swift through his crackling jaws the weapon glides,
And the cold tongue and grinning teeth divides.

Eurypylus (A) kills Hypsenor (T) (arm cut off) (5.86)

Then died Hypsenor, generous and divine,
Sprung from the brave Dolopion’s mighty line,
Who near adored Scamander made abode,
Priest of the stream, and honoured as a god.
On him, amidst the flying numbers found,
Eurypylus inflicts a deadly wound;
On his broad shoulders fell the forceful brand,
Thence glancing downwards, lopp’d his holy hand,
Which stain’d with sacred blood the blushing sand.
Down sunk the priest: the purple hand of death
Closed his dim eye, and fate suppress’d his breath.

Diomedes (A) kills Astynous (T) (spear in the chest) (5.164)

Diomedes (A) kills Hypeiron (T) (sword in the collar bone) (5.165)

Diomedes (A) kills Abas (T) (5.170)

Diomedes (A) kills Polyidus (T) (5.170)

With that, the blue-eyed virgin wing’d her flight;
The hero rush’d impetuous to the fight;
With tenfold ardour now invades the plain,
Wild with delay, and more enraged by pain.
As on the fleecy flocks when hunger calls,
Amidst the field a brindled lion falls;
If chance some shepherd with a distant dart
The savage wound, he rouses at the smart,
He foams, he roars; the shepherd dares not stay,
But trembling leaves the scattering flocks a prey;
Heaps fall on heaps; he bathes with blood the ground,
Then leaps victorious o’er the lofty mound.
Not with less fury stern Tydides flew;
And two brave leaders at an instant slew;
Astynous breathless fell, and by his side,
His people’s pastor, good Hypenor, died;
Astynous’ breast the deadly lance receives,
Hypenor’s shoulder his broad falchion cleaves.
Those slain he left, and sprung with noble rage
Abas and Polyidus to engage;
Sons of Eurydamus, who, wise and old,
Could fate foresee, and mystic dreams unfold;
The youths return’d not from the doubtful plain,
And the sad father tried his arts in vain;
No mystic dream could make their fates appear,
Though now determined by Tydides’ spear.

Diomedes (A) kills Xanthus (T) (5.174)

Diomedes (A) kills Thoon (T) (5.174)

Young Xanthus next, and Thoon felt his rage;
The joy and hope of Phaenops’ feeble age:
Vast was his wealth, and these the only heirs
Of all his labours and a life of cares.
Cold death o’ertakes them in their blooming years,
And leaves the father unavailing tears:
To strangers now descends his heapy store,
The race forgotten, and the name no more.

Diomedes (A) kills Echemmon (T) (5.182)

Diomedes (A) kills Chromius (T) (5.182)

Two sons of Priam in one chariot ride,
Glittering in arms, and combat side by side.
As when the lordly lion seeks his food
Where grazing heifers range the lonely wood,
He leaps amidst them with a furious bound,
Bends their strong necks, and tears them to the ground:
So from their seats the brother chiefs are torn,
Their steeds and chariot to the navy borne.

Diomedes (A) kills Pandarus (T) (spear in the nose) (5.346)

Diomedes (A) wounds Aeneas (T) with a rock (5.359)

...

Agamemnon (A) kills Deicoon (T), spear in the stomach (5.630)

These words he seconds with his flying lance,
To meet whose point was strong Deicoon’s chance:
Æneas’ friend, and in his native place
Honour’d and loved like Priam’s royal race:
Long had he fought the foremost in the field,
But now the monarch’s lance transpierced his shield:
His shield too weak the furious dart to stay,
Through his broad belt the weapon forced its way:
The grisly wound dismiss’d his soul to hell,
His arms around him rattled as he fell.

Aeneas (T) kills Crethon (A)

Aeneas (T) kills Orsilochus (A)

Then fierce Æneas, brandishing his blade,
In dust Orsilochus and Crethon laid,
Whose sire Diocleus, wealthy, brave and great,
In well-built Pheræ held his lofty seat:[152]
Sprung from Alpheus’ plenteous stream, that yields
Increase of harvests to the Pylian fields.
He got Orsilochus, Diocleus he,
And these descended in the third degree.
Too early expert in the martial toil,
In sable ships they left their native soil,
To avenge Atrides: now, untimely slain,
They fell with glory on the Phrygian plain.
So two young mountain lions, nursed with blood
In deep recesses of the gloomy wood,
Rush fearless to the plains, and uncontroll’d
Depopulate the stalls and waste the fold:
Till pierced at distance from their native den,
O’erpowered they fall beneath the force of men.
Prostrate on earth their beauteous bodies lay,
Like mountain firs, as tall and straight as they.
Great Menelaus views with pitying eyes,
Lifts his bright lance, and at the victor flies;
Mars urged him on; yet, ruthless in his hate,
The god but urged him to provoke his fate.
He thus advancing, Nestor’s valiant son
Shakes for his danger, and neglects his own;
Struck with the thought, should Helen’s lord be slain,
And all his country’s glorious labours vain.
Already met, the threatening heroes stand;
The spears already tremble in their hand:
In rush’d Antilochus, his aid to bring,
And fall or conquer by the Spartan king.
These seen, the Dardan backward turn’d his course,
Brave as he was, and shunn’d unequal force.
The breathless bodies to the Greeks they drew,
Then mix in combat, and their toils renew.

Menelaus (A) kills Pylaemenes (T), spear in the collar bone (5.675)

First, Pylæmenes, great in battle, bled,
Who sheathed in brass the Paphlagonians led.
Atrides mark’d him where sublime he stood;
Fix’d in his throat the javelin drank his blood.

Antilochus (A) kills Mydon (T), sword in the head, stomped by his horses (5.680)

The faithful Mydon, as he turn’d from fight
His flying coursers, sunk to endless night;
A broken rock by Nestor’s son was thrown:
His bended arm received the falling stone;
From his numb’d hand the ivory-studded reins,
Dropp’d in the dust, are trail’d along the plains:
Meanwhile his temples feel a deadly wound;
He groans in death, and ponderous sinks to ground:
Deep drove his helmet in the sands, and there
The head stood fix’d, the quivering legs in air,
Till trampled flat beneath the coursers’ feet:
The youthful victor mounts his empty seat,
And bears the prize in triumph to the fleet.

Hector (T) kills Menesthes (A) (5.714)

Hector (T) kills Anchialus (A) (5.714)

Telamonian Ajax kills Amphius (T), spear in the gut (5.717)

Sarpedon (T) kills Tlepolemus (A), spear in the neck (5.764)

Tlepolemus (A) wounds Sarpedon (T) spear in the thigh (5.764)

Odysseus (A) kills Coeranus (T) (5.783)

Odysseus (A) kills Alastor (T) (5.783)

Odysseus (A) kills Chromius (T) (5.783)

Odysseus (A) kills Alcandrus (T) (5.784)

Odysseus (A) kills Halius (T) (5.784)

Odysseus (A) kills Noemon (T) (5.784)

Odysseus (A) kills Prytanis (T) (5.784)

Hector (T) kills Teuthras (A) (5.811)

Hector (T) kills Orestes (A) (5.811)

Hector (T) kills Trechus (A) (5.812)

Hector (T) kills Oenomaus (A) (5.812)

Hector (T) kills Helenus (A) (5.813)

Hector (T) kills Oresbius (A) (5.813)

Ares kills Periphas (A) (5.970)

Diomedes wounds Ares in the gut (5.980)