Hector
3 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Hector. All 3 are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
the hero of the Trojan army. He was the son of King Priam and Hecuba. His wife was Andromache, the daughter of the king of Thebes. While Achilles, the Greek, was sulking in his tent, refusing to fight, Hector slew Archilles' dearest friend, Patroclus. This aroused Achilles, who presented himself at the head of his men and rushed into the thick of the fray. Achilles slew Hector with his own hand, tied him by the feet to the tail of his chariot, and dragged him around the walls of Troy. In his grief the aged King Priam went in person to the Grecian camp and begged the boon of his son's body. This he received and took back to the beleaguered city, where Hector was buried with great pomp. Our account of Hector is derived from Homer's Iliad. Homer writes as a Greek, yet the valor and manly qualities of the Trojan Hector arouse the poet's admiration. See Achilles ; Troy
1000 Classical Characters (1900)
Son of King Priam and Hecuba . He was the most valiant of all the Trojan chiefs who fought against the Greeks. He married Andromache, the daughter of Eetion, Astyanax being their son. Hector was made chief of the Trojan forces when Troy was besieged by the Greeks, and it is said that thirty-one of the most valiant Greek chiefs were killed by him, but when he met Achilles he fled. Achilles pursued him, and Hector was killed, and his body dragged in triumph at the chariot wheels of the conqueror.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
the Hecuba, the bravest of the Trojans, whose forces he commanded. His wife His exploits are was Andromache. celebrated in the "Iliad." Having slain Patroclus, the friend of Achilles, the latter sought revenge, and Hector was slain by him. The body of Hector was dragged at the chariot wheels of the conqueror; but afterward it was delivered to Priam for a ransom, who gave it a solemn burial.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Hector is a character in the Iliad, and the three accounts above still describe him accurately; the story has not moved because the poem has not. One detail has been tightened by scholars: Aiton's 1910 claim that Achilles dragged the body "around the walls of Troy" is not in Homer, who has the corpse hauled back to the Greek ships and later around Patroclus's tomb — the circuit of the walls belongs to later tradition, including Virgil. What has changed is the setting rather than the man: excavation at Hisarlik after these entries, especially Carl Blegen's work in the 1930s and Manfred Korfmann's from 1988, revealed a substantial fortified Bronze Age city with a large lower town, and Hittite records of a western kingdom called Wilusa have made a historical Troy far more discussable than it was in 1921. The site was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1998.
Written for this edition, 2026.