Boreas's Rescue of Sarpedon (Iliad 5.627) (original) (raw)

Homer interrupted Diomedes's victories in Book 5 to describe a victory on the Trojan side. Sarpedon, son of Zeus, and Tlepolemus, son of Heracles, attack each other with deadly effect. Sarpedon's spear goes all the way through his foe's neck, while his own thigh was pierced by Tlepolemus's spear. Tlepolemus is left for dead, and Sarpedon dies too. "His soul left him," (Il.5.696). Parallels collected by Elton Barker leave no doubt.1 Homer had just killed off one of his best characters. Homer corrected himself in the next line. Sarpedon's lost breath was restored to him: "Immediately he breathed again, for the breath of Boreas caught him alive breathing on him" (Il.5.697-98). As Elton points out, Homer emphasized the restoration of Sarpedon's breath of life by three forms of-pn-"breath."2 Who better than the wind-god, the god of big breath, to give Sarpedon mouth-to-mouth resuscitation? Even if Sarpedon died, the breath of life, his psyche, was abundantly restored to him, from the immortal lips of Boreas. Sarpedon's resurrection is the third divine rescue of Book 5, but it differs from those of Diomedes and Aeneas. First, unlike them, he actually dies. Second, they were rescued by Olympian gods, Athena Aphrodite and Apollo. Unlike these gods, Sarpedon's preserver is not an Olympian. He is a nature god. Unlike these Olympians, Boreas does not take sides in the Trojan War. Does he just happen to be in the neighborhood and feel sorry for a dying warrior? The poet does not explain. In fact, Boreas's motive is personal, not partisan. Centuries after Homer, Apollonius of Rhodes provided a plausible motive: Heracles had murdered Boreas's two sons (Arg. 1.1298-1303).3 To confirm his revenge, Boreas resurrects Sarpedon, the slayer of Heracles' son. In the heroic world, nothing cements a friendship like a common enemy. His feud with Heracles motivated Boreas to join Hera's campaign of persecution. When the hero was returning to Argos after sacking Troy, Boreas blew him off course (Il. 15.26; 14.250-56). A common enemy induced the wind god both to ally with Hera and to save Sarpedon. Boreas has every reason to visit the battlefield. He naturally wants to gloat over the death of his enemy's son, who, had just boasted of his father's exploit of sacking Troy (Il. 4.640-42). A listener familiar with Boreas's Heracles's difficulty in returning home after tht war might anticipate some reference to Boreas at this point. But why did Homer kill Sarpedon in the first place? Elton Barker points out that major heroes, Greek and Trojan, almost die, but their psyche does not leave them. He suggests that the death and revival increase the prestige of Sarpedon and eventually that of Patroclus as Sarpedon's slayer. 1 Elton Barker, "The Iliad's big swoon: a case of innovation within the epic tradition?" Trends in Classics 3 (2011), 1-7. 2 Barker, 9. 3 See James J. Clauss, "A Mythological Thaumatrope in Apollonius Rhodius," Hermes 119 (1991), 484-88, for another nexus of Boreas, Heracles, and a man named Sarpedon. Boreas begat his sons, whom Heracles would one day murder, on the Sarpedonian Rock, named for the Thracian Sarpedon, murdered by Heracles.