Encyclopedia of Greek and Roman Mythology (Facts on File Library ...

Achilleid
Rumor spreads <strong>of</strong> the <strong>Greek</strong> leaders’ arrival.
Achilles is eager to see them <strong>and</strong> their arms.
The women are invited to join the banquet
along with the guests. Deidamia strives to
conceal Achilles, but he begins to give himself
away by his unmaidenlike demeanor. In order
to draw Achilles out Ulysses craftily speaks
<strong>of</strong> war <strong>and</strong> the ignoble choice <strong>of</strong> those who
remain behind.
The next day Tydeus brings forth the gifts.
The maidens, including Achilles, perform Bacchic
rites <strong>and</strong> dances, but Achilles st<strong>and</strong>s out
as unfeminine. Afterward, the women flock to
the Bacchic gifts <strong>and</strong> adornment, while Achilles
rushes to the weapons. Ulysses whispers to him
that he knows who he is <strong>and</strong> encourages him
to join the war; the trumpeter blows a blast on
the trumpet, <strong>and</strong> Achilles is revealed as a man.
Deidamia cries out, <strong>and</strong> Achilles addresses
Lycomedes, revealing his identity <strong>and</strong> his relation
with Deidamia, asking for her in marriage
<strong>and</strong> placing his gr<strong>and</strong>son at his feet. Lycomedes
is won over. That night, Deidamia laments that
their marriage is so soon to be over, that Achilles
departs for war <strong>and</strong> will soon forget about
her or take other women as his companions.
He promises her that he will stay true to her
<strong>and</strong> bring her back gifts from Troy. The poet
observes that Achilles’ words are destined to
remain unfulfilled.
Book 2 (fragmentary)
Achilles, splendid now in his arms, makes sacrifice
<strong>and</strong> addresses his mother, informing her
that he is joining the expedition against Troy.
Deidamia, holding her child Pyrrhus (see Neoptolemus),
follows his departure with her eyes.
Achilles is momentarily regretful as he gazes
toward her but is drawn back to his warlike spirit
by Ulysses, <strong>and</strong> he asks to hear the causes <strong>of</strong> the
war. Ulysses tells <strong>of</strong> the rape <strong>of</strong> Helen <strong>and</strong> whips
up Achilles into a bellicose rage by imagining
how it would be if someone similarly seized Deidamia.
Diomedes then asks Achilles to recount
his own upbringing. Achilles tells them how
Chiron raised him to be very tough <strong>and</strong> strong.
He was trained in running, hunting, warfare, <strong>and</strong>
other manly pursuits. He recalls all that he can,
then remarks that his mother knows the rest.
CoMMEntARy
With the Achilleid, Statius continues his daring
<strong>and</strong> highly original adaptation <strong>of</strong> the epic
tradition to unconventionally framed mythological
themes. In the Thebaid, Statius took
a mythological sequence—the Seven against
Thebes—with strong tragic associations <strong>and</strong>,
in adapting them to epic narrative, went out
<strong>of</strong> his way to intensify the presence <strong>of</strong> tragedy
<strong>and</strong> tragic paradigms within the space <strong>of</strong> epic.
Statius is a writer at once intensely <strong>and</strong> selfconsciously
traditional, <strong>and</strong> at the same time
audaciously original. In the present instance,
Statius writes the story <strong>of</strong> the hero Achilles—
a figure so famously <strong>and</strong> indelibly represented
by Homer in his Iliad that there would seem
to be no plausible area for improvement or
emulation. Statius points out, however, that
there is more to Achilles’ story than Homer
wrote about, <strong>and</strong> this “more” constitutes an
important justification for his epic. Statius
will fill in the interstices with episodes Homer
does not include, yet in such a way as to transform
our perception <strong>of</strong> the properly heroic
episodes that Homer does include <strong>and</strong> that
Statius now commits to rewriting (although,
in the event, the poem remained incomplete,
<strong>and</strong> Statius did not arrive at the Iliadic portion
<strong>of</strong> Achilles’ narrative). Provocatively,
Statius will write “the entire hero,” i.e., the
whole story <strong>of</strong> his life, instead <strong>of</strong> a mere distillation
<strong>of</strong> his heroic career. In making this
choice, Statius violates the epic convention,
spanning the period from Homer’s practice to
Horace’s precepts, <strong>of</strong> commencing epic narration
in medias res, i.e., starting in the midst <strong>of</strong>
an ongoing development rather than from the
very beginning.
Statius was exceptionally alert to questions
<strong>of</strong> beginning <strong>and</strong> ending, as, for example, the
beginning <strong>of</strong> his Thebaid demonstrates, <strong>and</strong> he
was thus equally aware <strong>of</strong> the consequences