The War At Troy

by Lindsay Clarke

When he saw that he was outnumbered, Odysseus came up with an alternative plan. Very well, he suggested, rather than risk everything on a single throw while Troy was at her strongest, it would be wise to establish a secure bridgehead as close as possible to the city. The small island of Tenedos, rising from the sea off the Trojan coast, was perfect for their needs. From there they could either mount a direct assault on Priam’s capital if it seemed likely to succeed, or they could blockade the mouth of the Hellespont and launch raids against Thrace to the north and southwards against the coastal strongholds of his other allies.

  Everyone saw the sense of this and the plan was agreed.

  By the time the fleet arrived near Tenedos, Agamemnon had decided to position most of his ships where they could hold an advance of the Trojan warships while the island was taken by a smaller force. He called a council aboard his flagship and was about to announce his decision to put Diomedes in command of the invasion, when Achilles demanded the honour of leading this first strike himself.

  The day was sultry and close. There had been a delay in starting the council while the others had waited impatiently for Achilles to appear. The mood was now fraught with nervous anticipation.

  Agamemnon hesitated. He had no wish to enter into open conflict with this volatile young man, but neither was he willing to trust the success of his first, crucial assault to a warrior who had yet to fight a full-scale battle. Before he could pick his words, Achilles narrowed his eyes. ‘Calchas has warned you that this war can not be won without my help. If the gods are looking to me to seal the victory, they will favour me as I lead the first attack.’ He spoke as though the full force of oracular authority lay behind his declaration, leaving no room for debate or contradiction.

  News of the omen about the seventh son of Peleus had spread quickly throughout the ranks, and Achilles already commanded the affection of the troops as well as their respect. His Myrmidons had always been prepared to lay down their lives for him, but so were many others now, and he was known among the common soldiers as the luck of the force. Well aware of it, Agamemnon had already bitten back his tongue on a number of occasions when the youth had spoken with arrogant presumption, but this time he was not prepared to yield.

  ‘We commend your ardour, son of Peleus, and are grateful for your offer,’ -- he glanced down at the chart of Tenedos on the table before him -- ‘but our trust is in the experience of Diomedes, the veteran of Thebes. When you have proved yourself in battle as thoroughly as he, we will be glad to give you a command.’

  Agamemnon cleared his throat and was about to progress the attention of the council to a discussion of tactics for the assault when Achilles said, ‘The High King must think again.’

  Agamemnon visibly swallowed his rage. ‘Did I not make myself clear?’

  Achilles rose from his seat. ‘Quite clear enough. The insult you have just given me was quite as clear as the first I had to suffer at your hands.’

  Agamemnon looked up in impatient bewilderment.

  Anxiously old Nestor sought to intervene. ‘Calm yourself, Achilles,’ he said quietly. ‘I feel sure that no insult was intended.’

  ‘No,’ Agamemnon growled, holding up a clenched hand so that the gold shone on the lion-seal of his ring, ‘let’s have this thing out once and for all. I shall be most interested to hear how the son of Peleus thinks I have insulted him.’

  Achilles brought his fist down on the table. ‘It’s been clear to me from the first that you recruited me to this campaign only as a mere afterthought. Had Calchas not made it plain that Troy would never fall without my aid, you would have been content to leave me on Skyros and keep all the glory for yourself. Is that not so?’

  Irritably Agamemnon said, ‘If your fame had been greater we might have thought of you sooner.’

  Achilles’ nostrils flared. He was deciding whether to release his pent-up fury or to turn on his heel and walk away for ever, when Odysseus spoke. ‘Achilles my friend, you’re wrong to believe that the High King slighted you. Had I been quicker to come from Ithaca, you would have been called sooner to the cause. Such things are ruled by the gods, but if there is a fault here, it is mine.’

  ‘And today?’ Achilles demanded, barely mollified by the generous apology. ‘Have I not seen my courage thrown back in my teeth?’

  ‘No one doubts your courage,’ Odysseus answered, ‘but you ask a great deal.’

  Menelaus shifted uneasily in his chair, sweating a little in the heat. ‘My brother seeks only to secure the success of the landing.’

  ‘Then am I to understand that the sons of Atreus question my prowess?’

  Nestor smiled at him. ‘No more than I do, and that is not at all. But there will be many opportunities for you to demonstrate your skill at arms, young man.’

  ‘You are old, sir,’ Achilles answered, ‘and I respect your wisdom. But were you not once as young as I am and as impatient for fame?’

  ‘It’s your impatience that worries me,’ Agamemnon scowled. ‘I will not court disaster merely to feed your ambitions.’

  Again Achilles bristled. Again Odysseus was about to intervene, but it was Idomeneus who spoke first. It had been one thing for the King of Crete to gain formal acknowledgement as joint-commander of the enterprise, but it had been quite another to make his authority felt in a council that had assembled around Agamemnon and evidently owed him its allegiance. His position was weakened also by the fact that he had brought twenty less ships from Crete than the hundred he had promised. But having observed this dispute with cool detachment, the suave Cretan now saw his first clear opportunity to assert himself. ‘There is a way we might resolve this matter to everyone’s satisfaction while at the same time advancing our business here today’. Gratified to sense that he had secured the full attention of everyone present, he kept them waiting a few moments longer than necessary. ‘I agree with my royal cousin of Mycenae that Diomedes is the right man to lead this force. The conqueror of Thebes will surely make short work of Tenedos.’ Achilles stiffened but Idomeneus smiled and raised a restraining hand. ‘Be patient with me, friend.’ When Achilles settled in his chair again, Idomeneus looked round at the others. ‘Priam has, of course, anticipated our plans to seize the island, and has taken steps to fortify it. He knows that the only harbour large enough for the number of ships we will need is here.’ He pointed to the place on the chart. ‘One of my spies reliably reports that a number of large rocks have been placed on the cliffs above the harbour. In the event of attack, they will be rolled down, causing massive damage both to ships and men as they come ashore.’ Agamemnon was about to demand why he had not been told this before, but Idomeneus spoke over him. ‘This is my suggestion. Let Diomedes command the main assault on the harbour, but give Achilles command of a smaller force that will swim ashore under the cover of darkness, making for this cove here. From there he can storm the cliff positions from the rear. If he times his assault correctly, and conducts it with sufficient ardour, he will prevent the release of the rocks and allow the main force to come ashore unmolested.' His black eyes smiled across at Achilles. ‘There is great honour to be won from such a perilous task. And this way the two commanders will act together -- as Agamemnon and I act together, to mutual advantage and for the good of all.’

  Odysseus and Nestor immediately commended the merits of the plan. When Diomedes declared that he had no objection to sharing that part of his command, Agamemnon gave the scheme his general approval so long as the details could be worked out to his satisfaction. But though the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles had been contained, it had not been resolved, and Odysseus came away from the council privately convinced that, whatever the oracles promised, the hostility between the High King and the dangerous young man he had brought out of Skyros might one day prove disastrous for the whole campaign.

  Whenever Odysseus spoke about Achilles in later years he would always claim that there was a mystery about the youth that baffled understanding, for though his pride was impossible, his m
urderous efficiency as a warrior was matched by a degree of tenderness such as Odysseus had observed in no other man. In some respects, he suggested once, Achilles had more in common with Helen than with anyone else he knew. They had both grown up loving wild things in wild places -- Achilles at Cheiron’s school in the mountains, Helen in the wilderness groves of Artemis -- and both had a certain feral quality about them, by which I think he meant an almost amoral air of innocence that was capable of ruthless action. It’s true also that both of them had been injured by the human world at a crucial moment of their development and their destinies were shaped for ever by those wounds. Above all, however, they seemed kindred in the knowledge that though their bodies were mortal, their spirits were not, and everything about them seemed touched by immortal fire.

  ‘Mother,’ Achilles had said at last as he and Thetis parted, ‘I was born to die soon, but Olympian Zeus owes me some honour for it.’ And so he had come to the war, convinced that he would never return, and driven by so urgent an appetite for his destiny that he would let nothing stand in the way of his honour. Out of forces that once threatened to tear him apart -- the bitter strife between his mother and his father, between the old religion and the new, between the claims of his peaceful life on Skyros and his need for glory -- Achilles had forged himself into a weapon of war, and his whole being gleamed with warlike purpose.

  This then was the young man entrusted with the leadership of the surprise assault on Tenedos, and his bristling new resolve to prove himself something more than a man among men generated such a degree of impetus that his small band of Myrmidons crashed into the rear of the Trojan defenders with terrifying ferocity. The cliff heights were taken with few losses, a signal was sent to Diomedes telling him to bring his ships ashore, and the raiding party advanced so far ahead of the main force that it was Achilles himself who thrust his spear through the breast of King Tenes, the commander of the island force, and then killed the man’s father with a savage blow to the head.

  Thereafter resistance quickly collapsed. Splashed with blood that was none of his own, his bright hair gleaming in the dawn light, Achilles stood among his cheering men, waiting for Diomedes to join him in the citadel. However soon his death might come, he felt certain now that his name at least would never die.

  Once the bridgehead on Tenedos was established, Agamemnon decided to send ambassadors to Troy offering terms for the withdrawal of his forces. Menelaus, Odysseus and Palamedes were chosen to present demands which -- it was clear to all of them before they set out -- Priam must find unacceptable. The true purpose of the mission was to discover just how united the Trojans were behind their outward show of defiance, and with that intention in mind, Agamemnon’s herald Talthybius had arranged for the envoys to be lodged in the house of Antenor while in the city.

  They found the king’s chief counsellor cagey and reserved at first, and far from at ease with the knowledge that he was responsible for their safety in a city filled with their enemies. Over a few goblets of wine, however, and at the subtle prompting of Palamedes, it was natural enough for Menelaus and Antenor to share some hard feelings about Paris, the man whom each saw as the destroyer of his happiness. Meanwhile, Odysseus worked his wry charm on Antenor’s wife Theano, who needed little encouragement to express her undying hatred for the man who had killed her child and now threatened ruin on Troy.

  For the first time the Argives began to gather a picture of the way events had unfolded in the city since Paris had left Sparta with his prize. They learned that Aeneas had lent his support to Paris during the flight from Sparta only because they were sworn friends committed to each other’s aid, and not because he approved in any way of Paris’s treacherous behaviour. He and his father Anchises had soon made it plain that the High King must not look to Dardania for help when the hosts of Argos came battering at his gates. According to Antenor, Priam had tried to make light of this rift with his cousin, saying that until his son returned, and he had heard the whole story directly from his lips, he would reserve judgement on the matter. Privately, however, the king’s mind was already bent on war. He had known that it must come sooner or later, and was as ready for it as he would ever be. Antenor even remarked on a certain gleefulness in Priam’s usually grave features when he considered the scale of the insult that his son had given to Argive pride.

  But Priam had been forced to wait for several months before the Aphrodite returned to Troy, for Paris and Helen had sailed as far east as Cyprus in the hope of eluding all pursuit. Menelaus winced to learn that his wife and her lover had indeed been concealed on the island while he was there, and had sailed southwards into Egypt shortly after his departure. The weather was good at that time and the seas calm, so after making his devotions at the birthplace of Aphrodite, Paris had turned their flight into a prolonged voyage of love. He had calculated that a delay in his return would allow time for his father and brothers to accept what had been done and come to terms with it. Perhaps it might also whet the appetite of the Trojans for the fabled beauty of his abducted lover.

  In that last respect, his calculations had certainly hit the mark, for as soon as the Aphrodite was seen approaching the city, a large crowd began to gather along the road from the harbour to the Scaean Gate, while yet others lined the streets. To further heighten the excitement and the air of mystery, Paris arranged for Helen and Aethra to be carried in curtained litters, so that they could pass from the ship to the palace without being exposed to the mobs coarse stare. They would have heard a few bawdy jeers from the back of the crowd, but they must also have sensed how the rich procession of retainers, slaves, animals and trophies was received for the most part with an exhilarated awe intensified by further expectation. Behind those gauzy curtains lay Helen of Sparta, who had now become, to the city’s undying glory, Helen of Troy. It was as though a goddess had descended among them, one whose mystery must not be profaned. And Paris, the people’s own prince -- the bull-boy from the pastures of Mount Ida -- could be seen riding proudly beside her litter. Who could argue when a beggar shouted that the age of wonders was come again upon the earth?

  Antenor told how Helen’s face had still been veiled when Paris finally brought his lady before the full assembly of Priam’s family and counsellors in the great hall of the palace. 'It was a little like watching a sculptor presenting his master work,’ he commented drily, aware of the pain on the face of Menelaus, whose sensitive imagination made him feel all the more a cuckold with each new fact he learned. ‘We had waited for so long to see her that the entire hall was agog. And yes, I have to admit that Helen is a woman of astonishing beauty -- though whether any woman is worth putting an army at risk is, in my opinion, quite another matter.’

  ‘Or a city,’ Palamedes said.

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘Yet we are all reasonable men. Our enmity is with Paris not with Troy. It would be a great tragedy if thousands were to die for one man’s selfish folly. Don’t you agree?’

  Aware that he was answering other questions than the one that had been put to him, Antenor said, ‘Believe me, if my wife and I could see a way of avoiding war by delivering him over to you, Paris would return with you in chains this very night. But the High King is as smitten with Helen’s beauty as he is indulgent of his son. And the war party on his council is stronger than those of us who would prefer a peaceful solution. So do not expect Priam to look with favour on any demands for Helen’s return.’

  When the Argive envoys presented themselves before Priam the following day, they found the atmosphere in the great hall even more openly hostile than they had expected. Paris himself was absent from the council, and Antenor did what he could to ensure a fair hearing for Agamemnon’s ambassadors, but he could not prevent the gasps and jeers of outrage with which Deiphobus and Antiphus greeted their catalogue of demands. These included the immediate return of Helen, the surrender of Paris to answer charges of murder and abduction, the compensation of Menelaus for the injury he had received, the compensation of Ag
amemnon and Idomeneus and all the princes under their command for the massive expense to which they had been driven by Paris’s actions, the establishing of well-defended Argive settlements in strategic locations on the Asian mainland, and free, unrestricted access to the Hellespont, the Black Sea and all the major trade routes with the east and north.

  The monetary demands alone would have been sufficient to ruin Priam many times over, but the King of Troy heard Odysseus out, stony-faced, before silencing his noisier sons with a raised hand, and giving his response.

  ‘As to the first point, we are hardly to blame if our royal cousin of Sparta failed to satisfy his wife. Unlike my sister Hesione, who has languished in captivity on Salamis for many years, the Lady Helen is here in Troy of her own free will. If it was her wish to leave, I would regard it as beneath my dignity to keep her here. Let the princes of Argos learn a simple lesson of courtesy in that respect.’ Aware of the angry flush across the scarred face of Menelaus, he drew in his breath. ‘As to your other demands, we have long been aware that the High King at Mycenae covets our wealth and power. And why should he not when his own domain is a mere hovel by comparison? Our message to him is also simple. Nothing awaits him in Troy but ruin and humiliation. Let him clear our waters of the infestation of his ships and take his pack of Argives home before all their wives find husbands better suited to their taste.’

  Remembering the last time he had stood before Priam in this hall and the amicable manner in which they had parted, Menelaus found it hard to contain his fury. ‘I see that your son lacks the courage to look me in the eye,’ he said. ‘If all your followers are as brave, King Priam, look to have your women raped, your city burned and pillaged, and your line extinguished. I will have my wife again. And you -- you will rue the day that Paris shuddered from your loins.’

  Odysseus put a restraining hand to his friend’s arm, and then he turned to face Priam with a cool, disdainful stare. ‘We will deliver your message to our king,’ he said. ‘Look to have his answer soon.’