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Deidameia is the princess of Scyros and King Lycomedes’s daughter; she’s also Achilles’s wife and mother to their son, Pyrrhus. Because Lycomedes is old and ailing, Deidameia runs the island, acting as its surrogate ruler. Beautiful, arrogant, and intelligent, Deidameia at first believes she’s in complete control of Scyros. The kingdom hosts many foster daughters, and unbeknownst to Lycomedes, Thetis sends Achilles to pose as one of those daughters. Thetis then convinces Deidameia, who knows Achilles’s true identity, to secretly marry and have sex with him, which leads to her pregnancy. When Achilles attempts to leave Scyros with Patroclus, Deidameia threatens to reveal the marriage, but Thetis forces her to keep quiet and to have her baby in exile; Thetis will then take the baby and raise it on her own. Heartbroken and jealous of Achilles’s love for Patroclus, Deidameia summons Patroclus to have sex with her, which he does; he notes that she seemed to want something more from him, which he was unable to provide. Deidameia is then sent into exile to have her child—her father is furious but can’t do anything to stop Thetis. Deidameia believed that she was in control of her kingdom, but this only leads to her downfall, which speaks to women’s powerlessness in the world of the novel.
Deidameia Quotes in The Song of Achilles
The The Song of Achilles quotes below are all either spoken by Deidameia or refer to Deidameia. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 13 Quotes
She slapped me. Her hand was small but carried surprising force. It turned my head to the side roughly. The skin stung, and my lip throbbed sharply where she had caught it with a ring. I had not been struck like this since I was a child. Boys were not usually slapped, but a father might do it co show contempt. Mine had. […]
She bared her teeth at me, as if daring me to strike her in return. When she saw I would not, her face twisted with triumph. "Coward. As craven as you are ugly. And half-moron besides, I hear. I do not understand it! It makes no sense chat he should- " She stopped abruptly, and the corner of her mouth tugged down, as if caught by a fisherman's hook. […] I could hear the sound of her breaths, drawn slowly, so I would not guess she was crying. knew the trick. I had done it myself.
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Chapter 15 Quotes
“That if you do not come to Troy, your godhead will wither in you, unused. Your strength will diminish. At best, you will be like Lycomedes here, moldering on a forgotten island with only daughters to succeed him. Scyros will be conquered soon by a nearby state; you know this as well as I. They will not kill him; why should they? He can live out his years in some corner eating the bread they soften for him, senile and alone. When he dies, people will say, who?”
The words filled the room, thinning the air until we could not breathe. Such a life was a horror.
But Odysseus' voice was relentless. “He is known now only because of how his story touches yours. If you go to Troy, your fame will be so great that a man will be written into eternal legend just for having passed a cup to you. You will be—”
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Chapter 20 Quotes
I listened to every word, imagining it was a story only. As if it were dark figures on an urn he spoke of instead of men […] I learned to sleep through the day so that I would not be tired when he returned; he always needed to talk then, to tell me down to the last detail about the faces and the wounds and the movements of men. And I wanted to be able to listen, to digest the bloody images, to paint them flat and unremarkable onto the vase of posterity. To release him from it and make him Achilles again.
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Deidameia Character Timeline in The Song of Achilles
The timeline below shows where the character Deidameia appears in The Song of Achilles. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 12
...Its guards, lounging around and playing with dice, reluctantly bring him to see the princess, Deidameia. Deidameia is pretty and arrogant, and she tells Patroclus that Scyros’s king, Lycomedes, is old...
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After dinner, Deidameia summons a group of women, their hair hidden and tied back. They begin to dance,...
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Deidameia begins to sob and shriek. She accuses the “heartless” Achilles of betraying her. She then...
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Defiant, Deidameia says that Achilles can’t leave, since Thetis married the two of them. At these words,...
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...More upset than Patroclus has ever seen him, Achilles says he didn’t want to marry Deidameia or sleep with her. Thetis said if he did, she’d tell Patroclus where she’d taken...
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They return to the palace on Scyros and run into Lycomedes, who tells Achilles that Deidameia is crying in her room and hopes Achilles will visit. Lycomedes asks Achilles to swear...
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...that this plan wasn’t related to his presence in Achilles’s life, and Achilles agrees that Deidameia was because of Patroclus, but the rest was the war.
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Chapter 13
...living as a woman, he’s confined. At night, they eat awkward dinners with Lycomedes and Deidameia, an attempt to maintain the cover story of Patroclus and Achilles’s marriage. Achilles is indifferent...
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...practice with his spears before returning to “womanhood.” One morning, a guard summons Patroclus on Deidameia’s behalf. He passes through the women’s quarters, which have no windows—Patroclus can’t imagine living there...
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Deidameia watches Patroclus carefully, ordering him not to speak. He’s not handsome, she says—he’s even hideous....
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Deidameia tells Patroclus that she hates him, but he pities her, remembering how awful indifference can...
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Deidameia begins crying again, but she asks Patroclus not to leave. He steps toward her, and...
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Patroclus feels resistance when he tries to enter Deidameia, and they’re both relieved when he finally does. He’s aroused, but drowsily; it’s different than...
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Chapter 14
Deidameia leaves Scyros to go into hiding—she’ll be gone until she has the baby and until...
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...agree to—refusing would be suspicious. The girls perform, Achilles among them. When Odysseus wonders where Deidameia is, Lycomedes responds that she’s visiting family. After the dance, Odysseus announces that he and...
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Chapter 15
...be a boy. He then says that Thetis will come to claim the child after Deidameia weans him. Lycomedes closes his eyes, and Patroclus knows that he’s thinking about everything his...
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