Book 1
The quarrel
The poem opens with a plague. Apollo is shooting his arrows into the Greek camp because Agamemnon, the commander, has refused to ransom the captured daughter of one of Apollo's priests. Achilles calls a council and pushes Agamemnon into giving the girl back. Agamemnon, furious, takes Achilles's prize-woman Briseis instead. Achilles draws his sword to kill him; Athena appears and stops his hand. Briseis is led from his tent. Achilles withdraws from the war and goes alone to the shore, where he prays to his mother Thetis to ask Zeus to make the Greeks lose without him. Zeus, reluctantly, agrees.
Book 2
The catalogue of ships
Zeus sends Agamemnon a dream telling him today is the day he will take Troy. Agamemnon, to test the army's resolve, announces instead that the war is lost and they should sail home — assuming the men will refuse and rally. The men, exhausted, run for the ships. Odysseus stops them with a speech and beats one rebellious soldier, Thersites, with a staff. The army reassembles. The book then breaks into the famous Catalogue of Ships: a long roll-call of the Greek contingents, naming the captains, the cities, the number of ships from each — a piece of poetry that doubles as a map of Bronze Age Greece.
Book 3
Paris vs. Menelaus
The two armies meet on the plain. Paris steps out as the Trojan champion until he sees Menelaus, the husband he wronged, and shrinks back into the ranks. Hector rebukes him. Paris, ashamed, offers to settle the war in single combat — winner takes Helen and the treasure. Both sides agree. The kings swear oaths. Paris and Menelaus fight; Menelaus has the better of it; just as he is about to kill Paris, Aphrodite snatches Paris off the field in a mist and deposits him in his bedroom. Menelaus searches the field, furious. Meanwhile Helen, on the wall of Troy, names the Greek champions below for King Priam — one of the poem's most famous scenes.
Book 4
The truce broken
On Olympus the gods argue about whether to honor the duel's result. Hera demands Troy's destruction; Zeus, exasperated, gives in. Athena descends to the field disguised as a Trojan and persuades the archer Pandarus to shoot at Menelaus. The arrow grazes him. The Greeks see the truce broken. The full battle begins. The book is mostly the marshalling of the lines and a sequence of named killings — Homer's first sustained passage of his trademark style: each man named, his city, his father, the small particular detail, the spear-point.
Book 5
Diomedes's day
Book 5 is the aristeia — the day of glory — of Diomedes. Athena fills him with battle-fury and gives him the temporary ability to see which of the figures on the field are gods. He kills Trojan after Trojan, then wounds Aphrodite in the wrist when she tries to rescue her son Aeneas — the goddess flees back to Olympus to weep on her mother's lap. Later in the day Diomedes, with Athena driving the chariot beside him, wounds the war-god Ares in the belly. Ares roars, withdraws to Olympus, and complains. He gets little sympathy. Diomedes is the only Iliadic hero to draw blood from Olympians and live.
Book 6
Hector and Andromache
The fighting slackens. Hector goes back into Troy, ostensibly to organize a sacrifice to Athena, in fact to see his family. He finds his mother, refuses wine, asks the Trojan women to pray to Athena. He goes to Paris and Helen, finds them in their bedroom, rebukes them, takes Paris with him back to the field. Then he goes to find Andromache. She is on the wall, with the baby Astyanax in a nurse's arms. The conversation that follows is the poem's most famous domestic scene: she begs him not to go out; he says he must; she names her dead family; he kisses the baby (who flinches at the helmet, and Hector laughs and takes it off); he prays for the boy's future; he goes back out to die.
Book 7
Hector vs. Ajax
Hector challenges any Greek champion to single combat. Lots are drawn; Ajax wins. The two giants fight to a stalemate — neither can pierce the other's armor, and night falls. They exchange gifts and part. That evening the Greeks debate. Nestor proposes building a wall around the camp to protect the ships. Agamemnon agrees. They build it overnight. On Olympus the gods watch and complain — Poseidon especially, that the Greeks have not sacrificed properly for the work. Zeus, half-amused, promises Poseidon will be allowed to sweep the wall away when the Greeks have gone home.
Book 8
Pushed to the wall
Zeus forbids the gods from interfering in today's fighting and sits on Mount Ida to watch. He weighs the fates of both armies on golden scales; the Greeks' fate sinks. The day goes badly for them. Hector kills champion after champion. The Greeks are pushed back from the field, behind the wall, almost to the ships. Night falls only because Zeus stops the day. Hector, exultant, has the Trojan army camp on the plain rather than retreating into the city, fires lit, ready to attack at dawn. The Greeks, behind their wall, are looking at total disaster.
Book 9
The embassy to Achilles
Agamemnon, finally desperate, agrees to send an embassy to Achilles. Three men go: Odysseus the strategist, Phoenix the old tutor, and Ajax the bulwark. Their offer is enormous — Briseis returned untouched, twenty more women, gold beyond counting, seven cities, Agamemnon's own daughter in marriage, all if Achilles will return to the war. Each man speaks in turn. Odysseus argues from policy; Phoenix from love; Ajax, plainly, from comradeship. Achilles, sitting in his tent with Patroclus, listens to all three. He refuses Odysseus, he refuses Phoenix gently, he refuses even Ajax. He will not fight until the Trojans reach his own ships. The embassy fails. The Greeks return to camp in the dark.
Book 10
The night raid
Neither side can sleep. The Greeks send out Diomedes and Odysseus, alone, on a night reconnaissance into the Trojan camp. The Trojans, simultaneously, send out a young warrior named Dolon, alone, to spy on the Greeks. Dolon and the Greeks meet in the dark; the Greeks catch him, interrogate him, and kill him. Then Diomedes and Odysseus push deeper into the Trojan line, find the camp of Rhesus — a Thracian king newly arrived at Troy with magnificent white horses — kill twelve of his sleeping men and Rhesus himself, and steal the horses. They return to the Greek camp before dawn. The book is sometimes considered an interpolation; the rest of the Iliad never refers to it again.
Book 11
Agamemnon's day
Day breaks. Battle resumes. Agamemnon, despite his earlier weakness, has his aristeia — his day of glory. He kills Trojan after Trojan in the morning, driving the line forward. Then he is wounded in the arm and has to leave the field. Diomedes is wounded next, by an arrow from Paris. Odysseus is wounded. The Greek captains fall one by one. Only Ajax remains in the line, holding it almost alone. Achilles, watching from his ship, sees an old healer go past with a wounded man on his chariot and sends Patroclus to the medical tent to find out who. The chain that ends with Patroclus's death is set in motion.
Book 12
The wall breached
The fighting reaches the Greek wall. The Trojans dismount and attack on foot. An eagle flies overhead carrying a snake; the snake bites the eagle, which drops it. The seer Polydamas reads this as an omen against the attack — the Trojans, like the eagle, will not be able to hold what they have caught. Hector dismisses the omen with the famous line: "the only good omen is to fight for your country." The attack continues. The wall is breached at multiple points. Hector lifts a stone two ordinary men could not have moved and smashes through the gate. The Trojans pour into the Greek camp. The ships are next.
Book 13
Battle at the ships
Zeus, his promise to Thetis kept, looks away from the field for a moment. Poseidon, who has been watching, takes the chance. He goes to the Greek camp in the disguise of an old soldier, walks the line, and fills the men with new fight. The battle inside the camp swings. The Greeks rally. Idomeneus, Meriones, the two Ajaxes — many smaller heroes get their day in this book. The killing is the densest in the poem so far: each man named, his city, his small story, the spear-point. Hector pushes; the Greeks hold; the line moves only feet at a time. The book ends with the fight still in the balance.
Book 14
Hera deceives Zeus
Hera decides to take Zeus out of the picture. She dresses with great care, anoints herself with ambrosial oil, borrows Aphrodite's magical belt of desire (under false pretenses), and goes to find her husband on Mount Ida. Zeus sees her, is overwhelmed, recites the (long, comic) list of the goddesses he has slept with — none of whom matched his desire for her right now — and sleeps with her on a golden cloud. While he sleeps Hera signals Poseidon, who pushes the Greeks forward openly. Hector is wounded by Ajax with a thrown rock. The Greeks regain the wall. Then Zeus wakes up.
Book 15
Hector at the ships
Zeus, furious, dispatches Iris and Apollo. Iris orders Poseidon off the field; he obeys, sulking. Apollo finds the wounded Hector, fills him with new strength, and leads him back to the front. The Greek line breaks. The Trojans pour forward again. Apollo himself walks ahead of Hector kicking down the Greek wall like a child kicking sandcastles. Hector reaches the first Greek ships and calls for fire. Ajax, alone, stands on the prow of one ship with a long pike, holding the Trojans off. The book ends with the ships beginning to burn.
Book 16
The death of Patroclus
Patroclus runs to Achilles in tears. The ships are burning, his friends are dying, and Achilles is sitting in his tent. He asks if Achilles is the man he thought he was. He asks for Achilles's armor — let me wear it, he says, lead the Myrmidons, scare the Trojans back from the ships at least. Achilles agrees. The condition: drive them back from the ships, do not pursue them across the plain. Patroclus arms in Achilles's armor, leads the Myrmidons out, drives the Trojans back from the ships in panic. Then he disobeys. He pursues. He kills Sarpedon, son of Zeus. He reaches the walls of Troy. Apollo stuns him, and Hector kills him.
Book 17
The fight over Patroclus
Hector strips Achilles's armor from Patroclus's body and puts it on, transformed by it. He tries to drag the body itself away. Menelaus, then Ajax, fight to hold it. The afternoon turns into a long brutal struggle over the corpse — every Greek captain who can still walk comes up to defend it; the Trojans, scenting victory, hurl themselves at it; the corpse is dragged a few feet one way, then back. Antilochus, the son of Nestor, finally runs to the Greek camp to tell Achilles. Achilles, in his tent, has not yet heard. The book closes on the body still in the Greeks' hands, and the runner crossing the plain.
Book 18
The shield of Achilles
Achilles, hearing the news, throws himself on the ground and pours dust on his head. His scream is so terrible his mother hears it from under the sea and rises with all her sister-nymphs to comfort him. He tells her he has to kill Hector; she tells him he will die soon after; he says he does not care. Iris arrives with a message — go to the wall, show yourself, even unarmed, to give the Greeks the courage to bring back the body. Achilles goes. He stands on the wall; his cry breaks across the plain; the Trojans recoil. The body is recovered. That night Thetis goes to Hephaestus's forge on Olympus, and the smith-god begins making Achilles new armor — including the great shield, which Homer describes for over a hundred lines, an entire world engraved on it.
Book 19
The reconciliation
Dawn. Thetis brings Achilles the new armor. Achilles calls the army into council, and there, in front of everyone, formally renounces his wrath against Agamemnon. Agamemnon makes his own awkward speech of restitution, blaming a god for the original quarrel. The accepted gifts are brought. Achilles is impatient — he wants to go to battle now, without waiting to eat. Odysseus quietly insists the men eat first. Achilles agrees but eats nothing himself; Athena fills him secretly with nectar. Then the arming. Achilles puts on the armor; it fits like a god's. He climbs into his chariot. His horse Xanthus, gifted with speech for one moment by Hera, prophesies his death. Achilles tells the horse he already knows.
Book 20
The gods on the field
Zeus, watching Achilles return, calls the Olympians together and releases them: take any side you want today. The gods scatter to the field. Athena, Hera, Poseidon for the Greeks; Apollo, Aphrodite, Ares for the Trojans. The level of divine intervention reaches its peak. Achilles, on the plain, finds Aeneas first. Aeneas, son of Aphrodite, is the only Trojan besides Hector who could plausibly fight Achilles; the two exchange the Iliadic ritual of trading lineages before combat. They fight. Aeneas would be killed, but Poseidon — though pro-Greek — saves him from the field, recognizing Aeneas is fated to survive Troy. Achilles continues across the plain killing Trojans by the dozen, looking for Hector.
Book 21
Achilles vs. the river
Achilles drives the Trojans across the plain and into the river Scamander, killing so many men that the river itself starts choking. The river-god rises out of the water and confronts him: enough, no more bodies in my channel. Achilles refuses. The river attacks him bodily — water rising over his head, currents catching his shield. He nearly drowns. Hephaestus, sent by Hera, comes down from Olympus and sets the plain on fire to dry the river out. The river yields. The fight on the plain becomes a fight among the gods themselves, a comedy of bickering immortals — Athena knocking Ares down, Hera boxing Artemis's ears. Achilles continues toward Troy.
Book 22
Hector dies
Achilles is back at the walls of Troy. The Trojans have all fled inside except Hector, who waits outside the gates against his parents' pleading. He sees Achilles approaching, with the new armor flashing, and his nerve breaks. He runs. Achilles pursues. They run three times around the walls of Troy, in front of the watching gods and the watching Trojans, until Athena, in disguise, tricks Hector into stopping. Hector and Achilles throw spears. Achilles kills him with a thrust through the throat — through the one gap in the armor, the armor that Hector took from Patroclus's body, that Achilles knows by heart. Hector, dying, predicts Achilles's own death. Achilles strips the body, ties it to his chariot, and drags it around the walls of Troy in front of Hector's family.
Book 23
Funeral games
Patroclus is finally given his funeral. The pyre is built; Achilles sacrifices twelve Trojan prisoners on it, and dogs and horses, and his own hair. The body burns through the night. In the morning the bones are gathered into a golden urn. Then Achilles holds the funeral games. The book is taken up by them: a chariot race, a boxing match, a wrestling match between Ajax and Odysseus, a foot-race, an archery contest, a spear-throw. Each event is described carefully, with disputes and prizes. The mood is unusual for the Iliad — almost festive, almost forgiving. After twenty-two books of war the men play games. Hector's body still lies in the dust.
Book 24
Priam in the tent
Twelve days have passed. Achilles is still dragging Hector's body around Patroclus's tomb each morning, and the gods cannot bear it. They debate; Apollo argues for ransom; Zeus agrees. He sends Iris to Priam with the order to go to Achilles's tent at night, alone, with treasure, and ask. Hermes, in disguise, walks the old king through the Greek camp. Priam reaches Achilles's tent and, without warning, kneels and kisses his hand — the hand, Homer notes, that has killed so many of his sons. Think of your father, he says. I am that man. The two of them weep — for Priam's sons, for Achilles's father, for Patroclus, for everyone. They share a meal. They look at each other and admire each other. Achilles gives the body back. The poem ends with Hector's funeral.