BMCR 2009.07.67: Maciver on Burgess, The Death and Afterlife of Achilles

Jonathan S. Burgess, The Death and Afterlife of Achilles.  Baltimore:
Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009.  Pp. xii, 184.  ISBN
9780801890291.  $45.00.

Reviewed by Calum Maciver, Zurich University
([email protected])
Word count:  1996 words
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Jonathan Burgess is an established authority on the Homeric and Cyclic
epics and the tradition of the Trojan war.[[1]] His latest study, The
Death and Afterlife of Achilles, by no means lessens this reputation.
In this slim monograph, Burgess collects and builds upon his 2001 major
work, and more recent studies focused on the figure of Achilles.[[2]]
Burgess's basic aim is simple and clearly stated: he seeks to
reconstruct the various stages of Achilles' life, and especially his
death and afterlife, from material within the Homeric poems and the
Epic Cycle, and from extra-literary material. With that established, he
examines how the Iliad engages with non-Homeric narrative, and proposes
that the Iliad specifically alludes to the traditional fabula of
Achilles' death by means of motive transference, and suggests that an
early ancient audience familiar with the Achilles fabula would
recognise such an allusion.

The author makes it clear from the very start of his book, and
throughout, that he is interested in pre-Homeric mythological
traditions about Achilles and their presence in the Iliad. While he
acknowledges that he uses what can be termed a neoanalysist
methodology, Burgess is not interested in textual relations. 'The
assumption that a few epics influenced one another at an early date in
the Archaic age is anachronistic and the textualized approach to epic
affiliation must give way to a more mythological one' [p.4]. Burgess is
interested rather in interactions between (oral) narrative traditions:
he makes no assumption of a historical master poet called "Homer" [pp.
3 and 58], and does not think in terms of acute textual borrowings. He
works within a much broader framework.

Despite the book's relatively short size, Burgess covers much ground.
His discussion ranges from assessment of evidence from Greek vase
paintings in an attempt to reconstruct extra-Homeric mythological
narratives about Achilles, to discussion of intertextuality in oral
epic, to presentation of the archaeological evidence for the physical
location of the tumulus of Achilles. He will not convince everyone with
his argumentation, especially in his conception (and use) of
neoanalysis and the role of the ancient audience, but his conclusions
are presented throughout in a balanced, judicious manner.

Burgess begins his study, in the first chapter, by sifting the evidence
for Achilles' early life. A unified account of Achilles' life story
most likely existed in early archaic times, but lack of archaic
evidence excludes a definite, detailed reconstruction of a pre-Homeric
version of his early life. Instead, the author summarises the various
tales that survive in literary and iconographical material down to the
Roman imperial period. He focuses in particular on the mortality of
Achilles and Thetis' concern over his fate (which he describes as 'the
thematic engine that generates the stories about his early life'
[p.9]). Burgess suggests that the myth concerning Achilles' heel, not
attested until the early Roman empire in Statius, can be traced back to
earlier Greek traditions and representations. He relates that all the
stories concerning Achilles' early life involve the attempts of Thetis,
who is somehow conscious of Achilles' destiny, to prevent such a fate.

The second chapter briefly establishes the order of events which lead
up to the pre-Homeric story of Achilles' death. Burgess sets out, in
order, a key set of motifs which make up the fabula of the death of
Achilles, based on evidence from art and literature. These are listed
with brief descriptions and depictions from art, with only brief
analyses. Burgess refers throughout the rest of the book to this
sequence which he constructs and labels here.

The Iliad's references to the death of Achilles are examined in detail
in the third chapter. Burgess outlines how Achilles' death is referred
to and conceived of in the Iliad, and then discusses the effect for the
poem of this thematic use of Achilles' destiny. Burgess shows that
Achilles receives a very clear, although occasional, picture of his
coming fate (slayers, location, and weapon) from his mother and other
characters in the poem. Burgess argues that the limited and allusive
references to Achilles' fate imply that the ancient audience would have
been fully aware of the traditional story of Achilles' death: the poem
merely circles around the story. Burgess argues at length about the
apparent "choice" of Achilles. For Burgess, there is no such choice:
Achilles is more likely being untruthful in book 9, since the Iliad
'elsewhere portrays the fate of Achilles as long decided' [p.50]. This
is not an original point, but Burgess does usefully proceed at length
to back up his view with analysis of the relevant passages. The poem
provides 'an illusion of uncertainty' [p.55] in the face of the
certainty of Achilles' fate, which goes to strengthen the depth of
Achilles' characterization.

Intertextuality and oral epic is the subject of the fourth chapter, and
is easily the most stimulating and well-argued section of the book.
Burgess follows Nagy in seeing poetic performance traditions
interacting with other, still-evolving, poetic traditions.[[3]] Burgess
signals the usefulness of traditional neoanalysis, and focuses on the
central concept of motif transference. Burgess merges oral neoanalysis
with his own understanding of intertextuality. Whereas previously
scholars have tended to seek specific Cyclic epics as the origin of
motifs transferred into a Homeric setting, Burgess cogently proves that
it makes more sense 'to view oral mythological traditions as the
primary or source material' [p.60]. Classic neoanalysis is the preserve
of the scholar who identifies motif transference (taken from a textual
setting), whereas in Burgess's account an ancient, mythologically
informed audience would recognise instances of this phenomenon from
other oral contexts. In Burgess's view, certain wording was typically
employed in many different oral poems to describe a particular
situation. When such phraseology was used out of context, by
transference, it could then function as an allusion to the story in
which the same wording was originally used. The author then presents an
illuminating discussion of what he terms "Trojan War motif
transference" [p.65], in which he argues that events outside the
timescale of the Iliadic narrative are alluded to by means of motif
transference. Despite the convincing nature of his arguments, Burgess
is perhaps too adventurous in terms of his notion of
audience-reception: how "signalled" would these allusions be for an
ancient audience, that is, how clear would an allusion be to a specific
context from another mythological narrative as opposed to, say,
multiple narratives? Of course each reception would depend on the
capabilities of each audience, but given the lack of a master-poet in
Burgess's conception, a word other than allusion should perhaps be
used. One could also ask at what stage exactly in the Homeric poem's
evolution did these allusions become concretely allusions, but this
point is not especially relevant given Burgess's stated methodology and
assumptions.

On the basis of the theory marked out in the fourth chapter, in chapter
five Burgess proceeds to examine the effects of motif transference in
the references to Achilles' death in the Iliad. At the beginning of the
chapter, Burgess is quick to rule out the commonly held assumption
among neoanalysists that Patroklos reflects Antilochos. Burgess is
extremely hostile to this 'vengeance theory', as he terms it (namely,
that Achilles' avenging of Patroclos by slaying Hector is modelled on
Achilles' avenging of Antilochos by slaying Memnon), and, in this
reviewer's opinion at least, expertly illustrates its flaws, showing
that there is little evidence to support the view that Antilochos was a
central part of the myth about Achilles and Memnon, and that he was
unlikely to have been the model for Patroklos. In the rest of the
chapter, Burgess lists motifs in the Iliad commonly supposed to have
been transferred from the story of Achilles' death, weighing up the
possibilities of correspondence. Burgess is convincing in each of the
examples which he adduces.

In chapter six, Burgess proceeds to arrange into sequence the
transferred motifs by which the Iliad alludes to the story of the death
of Achilles. Extended narrative patterns emerge in the transferred
motifs concerning Achilles' death, if we ditch the vengeance theory and
what Burgess calls 'the strained neoanalysist association between
Antilochos and Patroklos's [p.93]. Burgess finds two sequences that
interrelate to foreshadow the death of Achilles fabula in its entirety
(set out in a table [p.95]). The first sequence Burgess terms "the
Patroklos sequence", which contains most of the motifs of the fabula,
since Patroklos's death prefigures Achilles' death. These motifs are
listed in connection to the events of books 16 and 17. Then in books 18
to 24 the Achilles sequence takes over, in which (book 18) Thetis and
the Nereids mourn a prostrate Achilles (a motif transferred from their
mourning of the dead Achilles), Thetis tells Achilles he will die after
killing Hektor (as she will warn him after Memnon's death), and in book
22 Achilles kills Hektor (transferred from his killing of Memnon) and
then considers attacking Troy (an allusion to his actual attack on Troy
after the death of Memnon). The Patroklos sequence then resumes, with
his funeral and games foreshadowing similar fates for Achilles. The
sequence Burgess constructs is ingenious, and it is not impossible to
imagine that a mythologically informed ancient audience would have
recognised this patterning of transferred motifs as sequential
allusions to the extra-narrative death of Achilles.

The final two chapters are complementary: chapter seven explores the
burial and afterlife of Achilles, in which, principally, Burgess argues
against the common view that there exist apparent contradictions in the
accounts in the Odyssey and Aithiopis. For example, the presence of
Achilles in Hades in Odyssey 24 and the other tradition of Achilles in
a paradisiacal location are not contradictory for Burgess: he suggests
that 'in Greek thought there was not an exclusive opposition between
Hades and paradise but rather a continuum of afterlife locations'
[p.109]. He acknowledges that some of his conclusions cannot be proved,
but they are persuasive nonetheless. The last chapter moves away from
neoanalysis to examination of the actual geographical locations
associated with Achilles' tumulus and the religious activity connected
with his translation. Burgess discusses the cult worship of Achilles in
the Black Sea area, and presents and examines the historical tradition
associated with Achilles down to the Roman times and the various
archaeological attempts to locate his tomb in the Troad. While this
final chapter is of considerable interest, and gives an interesting
perspective from different media on the death and afterlife of
Achilles, it does not quite fit in with the main thrust of the rest of
Burgess's study.

This is a fascinating book, and one worth reading from cover to cover.
Burgess's discussion of the evidence is almost always convincing, and
his argumentation is logical and cogent throughout. He exhibits an
extraordinary depth of understanding of the nature of ancient epic
traditions, and many of his ideas are original and innovative. He
presents complex information with clarity, and always explains all
terminology and the theories of other schools of thought on the various
topics. The notes accompanying the main text are kept to a minimum but
Burgess never leaves any doubt about his breadth of research into the
topic. Altogether, this is a highly commendable work.

The book is handsomely produced, and the illustrations are clear and
well-presented. I did, however, find some typos and questionable points
of style:

p.18: 'he makes no mention his death'; 'when Achilles' recalls the
rescue'; p.28: 'the polarity of Achilles and [?] to Memnon was
recognized'; p.43: 'pre-Homeric story of Achilles death'; p.79:
'Patroklos is acting like Achilles will do'; 'Patroklos of the Iliad'
(italicise).


Contents:


Introduction 1
1. The Early Life of Achilles 8
2. The Death of Achilles 27
3. The Destiny of Achilles in the Iliad 43
4. Intertextuality and Oral Epic 56
5. The Death of Achilles in the Iliad 72
6. Motif Sequences in the Iliad 93
7. Burial and Afterlife of Achilles 98
8. Tomb and Cult of Achilles 111
Conclusion 132
Appendix: The fabula of the Death of Achilles 135
Notes 137
References 159
Index 177
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Notes:


1.   See especially J.S. Burgess, The Tradition of the Trojan War in
Homer and the Epic Cycle, Baltimore 2001.

2.   Among several other studies, J.S. Burgess, 'Untrustworthy Apollo
and the Destiny of Achilles: Iliad 24.55-63', HSCP 2004, 102:21-40.

3.   G. Nagy, Greek Mythology and Poetics, Ithaca 1990, esp. pp. 70-9.