8.3 The Trojan Heroes: Hector, Paris, and Aeneas

Hector and Paris

Hector: Trojan Hero and Defender

Hector was the greatest warrior on the Trojan side of the war and the eldest son of King Priam and Queen Hecuba. Where other heroes fought for personal glory, Hector fought to protect his city and his family. That distinction matters because it makes him one of the most sympathetic figures in the entire Iliad.

• Married to Andromache, with whom he has a young son, Astyanax. One of the most famous scenes in the Iliad is Hector's farewell to them at the Scaean Gates, where Astyanax cries at the sight of his father's plumed helmet. The scene humanizes Hector in a way few other warriors get.
• He serves as Troy's military commander and leads its forces in several major engagements, including the assault on the Greek ships.
• Hector kills Patroclus, Achilles' closest companion, which draws Achilles back into the fighting after his long withdrawal.
• His final stand comes in single combat against Achilles outside Troy's walls. Athena tricks Hector by disguising herself as his brother Deiphobus, making him believe he has an ally. When the deception is revealed, Hector faces Achilles alone and is killed.
• After killing him, Achilles drags Hector's body behind his chariot around the walls of Troy. The Iliad ends not with the fall of Troy but with King Priam ransoming Hector's body and the Trojans holding his funeral, a choice that underscores Hector's central importance to the poem.

Homer portrays Hector as a tragic hero who embodies duty and honor. He knows Troy is likely doomed, yet he fights anyway because his sense of obligation demands it.

Paris: The Catalyst of Conflict

Paris (also called Alexander) was Hector's younger brother and the person most directly responsible for starting the Trojan War. Before his birth, Hecuba dreamed she gave birth to a flaming torch that would destroy Troy. Because of this prophecy, the infant Paris was exposed on Mount Ida, but a shepherd found and raised him.

• While still living as a shepherd, Paris was chosen by Zeus to judge a beauty contest among three goddesses: Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite. This event is known as the Judgment of Paris.
• Each goddess offered a bribe. Hera promised power and kingship, Athena offered wisdom and victory in war, and Aphrodite promised the most beautiful woman in the world.
• Paris chose Aphrodite. The "most beautiful woman" turned out to be Helen, already married to King Menelaus of Sparta.
• Paris traveled to Sparta, was received as a guest, and then either abducted or eloped with Helen, depending on the source. Either way, this violation of guest-friendship (xenia) outraged the Greek world and triggered the war.
• In battle, Paris was a skilled archer but generally avoided close combat. The Iliad contrasts him sharply with Hector: where Hector charges into the front lines, Paris hangs back and is repeatedly scolded for it, even by Helen herself.
• Despite his reputation as the lesser warrior, Paris delivers one of the war's most consequential kills. He shoots Achilles with an arrow guided by Apollo, striking the hero's vulnerable heel. Paris himself is later killed by an arrow from the Greek archer Philoctetes, who wields the bow of Heracles.

Paris is less a traditional hero and more a figure of fate. His choices set the entire war in motion, and the gods use him as an instrument throughout.

Aeneas

Aeneas: Trojan Survivor and Roman Progenitor

Aeneas occupies a unique position: he's a significant warrior in the Greek tradition of the Trojan War, but he becomes the central hero of Roman mythology. He is the son of the mortal prince Anchises and the goddess Venus (Aphrodite in Greek sources), which gives him divine parentage and, crucially, divine protection throughout the war.

• During the fighting at Troy, Aeneas is one of the Trojans' best fighters after Hector. In the Iliad, he faces Diomedes and even Achilles but is rescued by the gods each time. Poseidon himself saves Aeneas from Achilles, noting that Aeneas is fated to survive.
• When Troy falls, Aeneas escapes the burning city in one of mythology's most iconic images: carrying his elderly father Anchises on his back while leading his young son Ascanius (also called Iulus) by the hand. His wife Creusa is lost during the escape.
• He then embarks on a long voyage across the Mediterranean, facing storms, hostile lands, and a doomed love affair with Dido, queen of Carthage, before finally reaching Italy.
• In Italy, Aeneas fights a war against local peoples, marries Lavinia (daughter of King Latinus), and founds the settlement of Lavinium. His descendants would go on to establish Alba Longa, the city where Romulus and Remus were eventually born.

Aeneas's Legacy and Divine Connections

Virgil's epic poem the Aeneid (written in the late 1st century BCE) is the primary source for Aeneas's post-Troy story. It was modeled on Homer's epics but served a distinctly Roman purpose.

• Aeneas's defining virtue is pietas, a Roman concept that encompasses duty to the gods, to family, and to one's people. This is different from the Greek heroic ideal of personal glory (kleos). Where Achilles chooses a short, glorious life, Aeneas repeatedly sacrifices what he wants for what fate and duty require.
• Through his son Ascanius/Iulus, Aeneas was considered the ancestor of Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome. This gave Rome a mythological origin stretching back to Troy and to the goddess Venus herself.
• The Julio-Claudian dynasty (including Julius Caesar and Augustus) claimed direct descent from Aeneas through the family name Iulius, traced back to Iulus. Virgil wrote the Aeneid during Augustus's reign, and the poem functions partly as political legitimization, linking Augustus's rule to divine destiny.
• Aeneas's story also bridged Greek and Roman mythological traditions. By making a Trojan the ancestor of Rome, the Romans positioned themselves as inheritors of an ancient and noble lineage while remaining distinct from the Greeks who had destroyed Troy.

Aeneas's journey from the ashes of Troy to the shores of Italy symbolized Roman ideals of endurance, piety, and the belief that Rome's greatness was fated by the gods.