These lines spoken by Hector (when he proposes to duel a member of the Achaeans) brings to mind (along with the fate of his own body in Book 24) the exchange of armor between Glaukos and Diomedes in the preceding book. In fact, the first half of book seven seems generally rather preoccupied with armor: people putting it on, people taking it off, its appearance in Nestor’s story, its appearance in these lines…. 7.76-86 (Lattimore):
“Behold the terms that I make, let Zeus be witness upon them.
If we the thin edge of bronze he takes my life, then
Let him strip my armor and carry it back to the hollow ships,
But give my body to be taken home again, so that the Trojans
And the wives of the Trojans may give me in death my rite of burning.
But if I take his life, and Apollo grants me the glory,
I will strip his armor and carry it to sacred Ilion
and hang it in front of the temple of far-striking Apollo,
But his corpse I will give back among the strong-benched vessels
So that the flowing haired Achaens may give him due burial
And heap up a mound upon him beside the broad passage of Helle.”
This passage also looks forward to the end of Book 7, with its gathering of the corpses and heaping up of a grave mound.
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