Classical Mythology

(^446) THE GREEK SAGAS: GREEK LOCAL LEGENDS
of Diomedes of bronze, Diomedes had the better of the exchange, as Homer says
(Iliad 6. 234-236):
f
Zeus took away Glaucus' wits, for he exchanged golden armor with Diomedes
for bronze, armor worth a hundred oxen for that worth nine.
Glaucus eventually was killed by Ajax (son of Telamon) in the fight over the
corpse of Achilles.
Sarpedon was the son of Zeus and the Lycian princess Laodamia, daughter
of Bellerophon. Zeus foresaw Sarpedon's death but could not change his des-
tiny (moira) without upsetting the established order. He therefore had to be con-
tent with raining drops of blood on the earth to honor his son before the catas-
trophe and saving his body after it. Here is Homer's description of the scene
(Iliad 16. 676-683) after Sarpedon has been killed by Patroclus and Zeus has in-
structed Apollo to save his body:
t
Thus [Zeus] spoke, and Apollo did not disobey his father. He went down from the
peaks of Ida into the terrible din of battle and straightway lifted godlike Sarpedon
out of the way of the missiles and carried him far off. He washed him in the flow-
ing waters of the river and anointed him with ambrosia and clothed him with im-
mortal garments. And he sent him to be carried by two swift escorts, the twins
Sleep and Death, who quickly set him down in the fertile land of broad Lycia.
After Hector, Sarpedon is the most noble of the heroes on the Trojan side.
In Book 12 of the Iliad, when the Trojans are attacking the wall of the Greek
camp, he addresses Glaucus in words expressing heroic arete ("excellence") and
nobility as memorable as those of Achilles in Book 9 (translated on pp. 459^160).
Unlike Achilles, he speaks as the leader of a community (Iliad 12. 310-328):
f
Glaucus, why are we specially honored in Lycia with seats of honor, with meat
and more cups of wine, and all people look upon us like gods, and we have
been allotted a great domain beside the banks of the Xanthus, fine for the plant-
ing of vineyards and for grain-bearing tillage? Therefore now must we stand in
the front rank of the Lycians and face the raging battle, so that one of the well-
armored Lycians may say: "Indeed not without glory do our kings rule over Ly-
cia and eat the fat lambs and drink choice honey-sweet wine. Noble also is their
strength, since they fight among the leaders of the Lycians." My friend, if we
were to avoid this war and were to live out our lives ever ageless and death-
less, then neither would I myself fight among the leaders nor would I station
you in the battle that destroys men. Now, as it is, let us go, for ten thousand
death-bringing fates are close upon us.
RHESUS
Other allied contingents who appeared at Troy were those of the Amazons and
the Ethiopians (p. 471), and the Thracians led by Rhesus. Their arrival coincided