ABSTRACT
The action in the Iliad takes place in a man's world against a backdrop of war, where the victors' spoils are women, cattle and gold. Achilles' emotions drive the structure of the Iliad. Since the publication in 1872 of the Darwin essay, The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals, it has been argued that emotions and their prototypical expressions are innate. Achilles' anger, initially directed against Agamemnon and later against Hector, is the structural element governing the Iliad's composition and action, since it is the anger that drives him to withdraw from combat and then to return, thus casting the fate of the Achaeans and the Trojans. Ajax is a dearly beloved comrade of Achilles. He forms part of the embassy sent by Agamemnon to Achilles' tent to try to convince the hero to return to battle, an occasion on which Ajax laments that Achilles seems indifferent to philotes, love for his comrades.
