Achilles (redirected from Achillies)

Achilles (əkĭl`ēz), in Greek mythology, foremost Greek hero of the Trojan War, son of Peleus and Thetis. He was a formidable warrior, possessing fierce and uncontrollable anger. Thetis, knowing that Achilles was fated to die at Troy, disguised him as a girl and hid him among the women at the court of King Lycomedes of Skyros. He was discovered there by Odysseus, who persuaded him to go to Troy. One of Lycomedes' daughters, Deidamia, bore Achilles a son, Neoptolemus. According to Homer, Achilles came to Troy leading the 50 ships of the Myrmidons. In the last year of the siege, when Agamemnon stole the captive princess Briseis from him, Achilles angrily withdrew and took his troops from the war. Later he allowed his friend and lover Patroclus to borrow his armor and lead the Myrmidons to aid the retreating Greeks. When Hector killed Patroclus, Achilles was filled with grief and rage and returned to the battle, routed the Trojans, and killed Hector, viciously dragging his body back to the Greek camp. Achilles died of a wound inflicted by Paris. According to one legend, Thetis attempted to make Achilles immortal by bathing him in the river Styx, but the heel by which she held him remained vulnerable, and Paris inflicted a fatal wound in that heel. Other legends state that Achilles was struck from behind and killed by Paris when he went to visit Priam's daughter Polyxena, with whom he had fallen in love. Achilles, the object of widespread hero worship, is the main character of Homer's epic The Iliad.

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Achilles

In Greek mythology, the bravest and strongest of the Greek warriors in the Trojan War. Because his mother dipped him into the River Styx, he was invulnerable except at the heel by which she held him. During the war against Troy Achilles took 12 nearby cities, but after a quarrel with Agamemnon he refused further service. He allowed his beloved cousin Patroclus to fight in his armor, and when Hector slew Patroclus, Achilles returned to battle, killed Hector, and dragged his body around the walls of Troy. Homer mentions Achilles' funeral but not the circumstances of his death; the later poet Arctinus relates that Paris killed Achilles with an arrow guided by Apollo.

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Achilles [ə′kil·ēz]

(astronomy)

An asteroid; member of the group known as the Trojan planets.

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Achilles

foremost Greek hero of Trojan War; brave and formidable warrior. [Gk. Hist.: NCE, 12]

See : Bravery

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Achilles

disguised as a woman to avoid conscription. [Gk. Legend: Brewer Handbook, 642 (Lycomedes)]

See : Disguise

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Achilles

Greek hero without whom Troy could not have been taken. [Gk. Lit.: Iliad]

See : Heroism

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Achilles

avenges Patroclus’s death by brutally killing Hector. [Gk. Lit.: Iliad]

See : Vengeance

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Achilles

warrior vulnerable only in his heel. [Gk. Myth.: Zimmerman, 4]

See : Vulnerability