Homer, Iliad

But when Patroclus had cut off the foremost battalions, he hemmed them [395] back again towards the ships and would not suffer them for all their eagerness to set foot in the city, but in the mid-space between the ships and the river and the high wall he rushed among them and slew them, and got him vengeance for many a slain comrade. There verily he first smote Pronous with a cast of his bright spear, [400] upon the breast where it was left bare beside the shield, and loosed his limbs; and he feIl with a thud. Next upon Thestor, son of Enops, he rushed. Crouching he sat in his polished car, for his wits were distraught with terror, and the reins had slipped from his hands, but Patroclus drew nigh to him, and smote him [405] upon the right jaw with his spear, and drave it through his teeth; and he laid hold of the spear and dragged him over the chariot-rim, as when a man sitting upon a jutting rock draggeth to land a sacred fish from out the sea, with line and gleaming hook of bronze; even so on the bright spear dragged he him agape from out the car, [410] and cast him down upon his face; and life left him as he fell. Then as Erylaus rushed upon him, he smote him full upon the head with a stone, and his head was wholly cloven asunder within the heavy helmet; and he fell headlong upon the earth, and death, that slayeth the spirit, was shed about him. [415] Thereafter Erymas and Amphoterus, and Epaltes, and Tlepolemus, son of Damastor, and Echius and Pyris, and Ipheus and Evippus, and Polymelus, son of Argeas, all these one after another he brought down to the bounteous earth. But when Sarpedon saw his comrades, that wear the tunic ungirt, [420] being laid low beneath the hands of Patroclus, son of Menoetius, he called aloud, upbraiding the godlike Lycians: “Shame, ye Lycians, whither do ye flee? Now be ye swift to fight; for I myself will meet this man, that I may know who he is that prevaileth here, and verily hath wrought the Trojans much mischief, [425] seeing he hath loosed the knees of many men and goodly.” He spake, and leapt in his armour from his chariot to the ground. And Patroclus, over against him, when he beheld him, sprang from his chariot. And as vultures crooked of talon and curved of beak fight with loud cries upom a high rock, [430] even so with cries rushed they one against the other. And the son of crooked-counselling Cronos took pity when he saw them, and spake to Hera, his sister and his wife:“Ah, woe is me, for that it is fated that Sarpedon, dearest of men to me, be slain by Patroclus, son of Menoetius! [435] And in twofold wise is my heart divided in counsel as I ponder in my thought whether I shall snatch him up while yet he liveth and set him afar from the tearful war in the rich land of Lycia, or whether I shall slay him now beneath the hands of the son of Menoetius.”