Hector

Family: Troy · Role: prince · First appears: Troilus and Cressida · Act I, Scene II

Hector is a Trojan prince, the son of Priam, sibling to Troilus, Cassandra, Paris, and Polyxena, and kin to Ajax, who is also named his cousin. After Ajax struck him down in battle, Hector remained fasting and awake from anger and shame. At Troy, Aeneas announced that Hector would challenge a Greek lover, while Agamemnon and Nestor prepared to answer if no other Greek would, and Ulysses proposed sending Ajax against him rather than Achilles.

Hector supported Troilus and Paris in keeping Helen, though he acknowledged that justice called for her return: “Yet, ne’ertheless, My spritely brethren, I propend to you In resolution to keep Helen still;” He sent a challenge among the Greek nobles, then agreed to meet Achilles after Achilles used Thersites to arrange Hector’s unarmed visit to the Greek camp. Though Hector and Ajax were enemies in battle, Hector also identified Ajax as kin; with Achilles, he agreed, “Tomorrow do I meet thee, fell as death; Tonight all friends.”

On the morning of the final battle, Hector rejected Priam’s prohibition and went out to fight the Greeks, while his wife Andromache and mother had suffered visions of what might come. Achilles sought him, decreed that Hector must die, and killed him after Hector was disarmed. Achilles ordered his body tied to his horse and dragged across the field; at Troy, Troilus announced, “He’s dead, and at the murderer’s horse’s tail, In beastly sort, dragg’d through the shameful field.”