Hektor's deterioration becomes even more evident when he violates the heroic code of honor. He threatens to drag Patroklos' body back to Troy and throw it to the "dogs of the city" instead of allowing the Achaians to give it an honorable burial. Hektor's treatment of Patroklos' body, in turn, prompts Achilles to mutilate Hektor's body.
When Hektor puts on Achilles' armor, he becomes as erratic as Achilles in his quarrel with Agamemnon. Achilles' armor covers Hektor's true identity to a degree that it brings about Hektor's death.
The reader pities Hektor as he meets Achilles in the final duel, yet his deterioration, his lack of self-knowledge, and his self-delusion have brought him to this final reckoning with Achilles. Hektor fails to maintain a heroic balance when he overestimates his powers and refuses to retreat when necessary. As he meets Achilles, he stands deluded by a dream of invisibility. Physically and symbolically isolated outside his community, he is cut down by Achilles.
Hektor is a more complicated figure than most of the other characters in the Iliad. His responsibility to Troy, to his troops, to his family, and to the moral and heroic code, and his role as the instrument of Zeus set up tensions that no other character seems to experience. Hektor may appear to be a warrior with greater military prowess than most warriors, but he also seems to be an uncomplicated Homeric man. It is, therefore, Hektor's various interrelationships and his multiple responsibilities that bring out the various and often contradictory facets of his character.
