The Iliad

Homer’s epic of the Trojan War, which opens with the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles and follows the fighting before the walls of Troy; in Samuel Butler’s prose translation.

Start reading24 books, about 153,000 words

Famous lines

• Sing, O goddess, the anger of Achilles son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans.

  Book IIn context

  • Anger

• Think not to match yourself against gods, for men that walk the earth cannot hold their own with the immortals.

  Iliad, V. 440–442 (tr. Samuel Butler); Apollo to DiomedesIn context

  • God

• Men come and go as leaves year by year upon the trees. Those of autumn the wind sheds upon the ground, but when spring returns the forest buds forth with fresh vines. Even so is it with the generations of mankind, the new spring up as the old are passing away.

  Book VIIn context

  • Life & Death
  • Nature

• Life and death are balanced as it were on the edge of a razor.

  Iliad, Book X, 173–174 (tr. Samuel Butler)In context

  • Life & Death

• There can be no covenants between men and lions, wolves and lambs can never be of one mind.

  Iliad, Book XXII, 262–263 (tr. Samuel Butler)In context

  • Enemies

Contents

1. Book I
2. Book II
3. Book III
4. Book IV
5. Book V
6. Book VI
7. Book VII
8. Book VIII
9. Book IX
10. Book X
11. Book XI
12. Book XII
13. Book XIII
14. Book XIV
15. Book XV
16. Book XVI
17. Book XVII
18. Book XVIII
19. Book XIX
20. Book XX
21. Book XXI
22. Book XXII
23. Book XXIII
24. Book XXIV