`So saying, he poised his long-shadowing spear and hurled it.' The start of the `Dual between Achilles and Hector' in Homer's Iliad. This essay shows the large mythical content of this segment in the poem. The poem is of the Trojan War, and this particular piece takes place at the end of the eleven-year war.

One of the Greek warriors was a man named Achilles, famed for being immortal aside from a tendon in his heel. In the story, he is pictured as a handsome, godly, bronzed, and oiled up warrior. He is fighting Hector for revenge reasons, since Hector killed his best friend, Patroclus. Achilles is often shown as an ultimate, strong warrior, since he is often called `god-like' and has great armour including a `four-horned helmet' and an `exquisite shield'. The `god-like' part is mythical because he wasn't actually a god or immortal, just strong...