Diomedes rejoiced and planted his spear in the ground. Bellerophon had been guest-friend of his grandfather Oeneus; they entertained each other twenty days and exchanged gifts — Oeneus a belt bright with scarlet, Bellerophon a golden two-handled cup Diomedes still had at home. Tydeus he did not remember, for he left him small when the Achaeans were destroyed at Thebes. Therefore they were guest-friends: let them avoid each other in battle, since there were many Trojans for Diomedes and many Achaeans for Glaucus to kill. Let them exchange armor so others would know they claimed guest-friendship from their fathers’ time.
They leapt from their chariots, clasped hands, and exchanged armor. Zeus took Glaucus’s wits away, for he traded golden armor worth one hundred oxen for Diomedes’s bronze worth nine.
Hector came through the Scaean gates. Trojan wives and daughters ran to him, asking after children, brothers, kin, and husbands. He told them all to pray. At Priam’s house Hecuba met him, took his hand, and offered wine for libation and strength.
Hector refused wine lest it weaken him, and he would not pray to Zeus with hands unwashed from blood and filth. He repeated Helenus’s charge: Hecuba must take the finest robe to Athena’s temple and vow twelve heifers if the goddess would pity the city, wives, and little children and keep Diomedes away.