In the midst of them all Achilles put on his armour; he gnashed his teeth, his eyes gleamed like fire, for his grief was greater than he could bear.

Thus, then, full of fury against the Trojans, did he don the gift of the god, the armour that Vulcan had made him.
First he put on the goodly greaves fitted with ancle-clasps, and next he did on the breastplate about his chest.

He slung the silver-studded sword of bronze about his shoulders, and then took up the shield so great and strong that shone afar with a splendour as of the moon.

As the light seen by sailors from out at sea, when men have lit a fire in their homestead high up among the mountains, but the sailors are carried out to sea by wind and storm far from the haven where they would be--even so did the gleam of Achilles' wondrous shield strike up into the heavens.

He lifted the redoubtable helmet, and set it upon his head, from whence it shone like a star, and the golden plumes which Vulcan had set thick about the ridge of the helmet, waved all around it.