Trojan War Research Paper

In Greek legend, the Trojan war was fought between the Greeks (spartans) and the city of Troy. The direct cause of this war was the beauty of the Helen of Troy, daughter of Zeus and Queen of Sparta. Helen was much sought after by all the men of Troy, so when she finally took a husband, the King of Sparta made all men swear they would respect and accept her choice and defend her if anyone tried to separate her or remove her from this man. The ten year conflict known as the Trojan war, was started when three goddesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite asked the Trojan prince, Paris, to choose the most beautiful of the three goddesses. Each goddess tried in their own way to influence the prince and eventually he chose Aphrodite, due the promise she

Both stories began with oral tradition and were first transcribed decades or centuries before their composition. The Greeks suspect the war to have happened some time in the 13th century BCE. However, the war was also the subject of a long oral tradition prior to Homer’s work, and this, combined with other sources, give us a more complete picture of what the Greeks thought of as the Trojan War. In the 13th century, the Mycenaean Greeks had colonised the Greek mainland and Crete, and were beginning to make attacks on Anatolia. Philologist, Joachim Latacz identifies the “Achaioi” (Acheans) of the Illiad with the inhabitants of Ahhiyawa, their capital was Mycenae. He infers that the oral history of the Iliad as it is preserved is probably based on acts of aggression performed by the Ahhiyawans against the Trojan city of Wilusa in the 13th century. This is historical evidence of a trojan war like conflict between Greek and Trojan forces, which could be an origin or influence on the

Homer describes a location, presumably in the Bronze Age, with a city. This city was near Mount Ida in northwest Turkey. Such a city did exist, at the mound of Hisarlık. Homer describes that the location was very windy, which Hisarlık almost always is, and several other geographical features also match; so it appears, therefore, that Homer describes an actual place, these facts do not prove the story to be true but provide insight into what similar places or events may have inspired the story. The epic catalogue in book 2 of Homers Iliad, “Catalogue Of Ships” lists the contingents of the Achaean army that sailed to Troy. The catalogue mentions a variety of cities, some of which, including Athens, were populated both in the Bronze Age and in Homer’s time, other cities, like Pylos, had not been rebuilt after the Bronze age. This evidence suggests that names of no longer existing places were recalled from an older time, this is because it is unlikely that homer would have been able to write an accurate and diverse list of important bronze age cities that were, in his time, nothing but rubble, and in many cases nameless. Additionally, the cities listed in the Catalogue are given in geographical groups, revealing a sound knowledge of Agean topography. Some of the evidence is muddled and locating the Bronze Age palace of Sparta, traditional home to