chapter i trojan war

8/6/2019 Chapter I Trojan War

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Ancient WarfareFrom the Iliad to the Battle of Cynoscephalae

1184 to 197 B.C.

Part of the RHS Classics ProgramBy Guy Earle



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Map of the Eastern MediterraneanChapter I

The Minoans and the Trojan War

Two thousand years before Christ, the ancient

Egyptians looked upon pyramids they had built many

lifetimes before, while in Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq)

Sumerian cities continued to flourish along the Tigris andEuphrates Rivers. The advent of writing and agriculture were

milestones in the evolution of human history, and brought

about tremendous prosperity within the Fertile Crescent and

the Nile Valley of Egypt. This was the Bronze Age, a period

of history from roughly 3,200 to 600 B.C., which lay between

the Stone and Iron Ages. While the pharaohs of The Middle

Kingdom were enjoying a period of relative stability, just

north of Egypt existed an advanced society with a flourishing

trade network and sophisticated culture—the Minions.

On the eastern side of the Mediterranean Sea, and

at the southern end of the smaller Aegean Sea, is the island

of Crete. During the Bronze Age it was home to a people

who later came to be called the Minoans, after the fabled

King Minos. The Minoans ruled over Crete and its

surrounding waters from approximately from 2700 to 1450

B.C., and were advanced in art and architecture. They had

such novelties as indoor plumbing and sewers two thousand

years before the Romans would ever carve their first

aqueduct or enjoy their sumptuous bath houses. Crete is the

fifth largest island in the Mediterranean behind Corsica,



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Cyprus, Sardina and the largest, Sicily, which straddles the

waterway between the toe of Italy and north Africa. Just

north of Crete are a group of about 220 islands, still known

today as the Cyclades, which progressively fell under Minoan

influence.

The Cyclades Islands in red.

The island of Crete measures 160 miles long and 38 wide,

and is fairly mountainous with a few good harbors. Since

Minoan times Crete has produced the staple of ancient

agriculture: grapes and olives. From such a geographic

position, the Minoans commanded a flourishing trade

network between Greece, Asia Minor, and the eastern

seaboard of the Mediterranean and all the way south to

Egypt. The Minoans, echoing Britain so many centuries later,

relied on their fleet for protection from foreign invaders. The

Minoan civilization, however, seems to have met its demise

not by man, but by nature.

Ruins of the palace of Knossos, Crete.

Around 1450 BC the island of Thera, located just 70

miles north of Crete, and now the popular tourist vacation

spot called Santorini, exploded with one of the most

powerful volcanic eruptions in mankind’s history. The

inhabitants of Thera did not know that the island was a

volcano, which exploded with the force of 50,000 Hiroshima

bombs, and expelled a column of ash and debris 23 miles up

into the sky, falling as far away as China. After the initial

explosion, the Aegean Sea rushed into the abyss created by

the cataclysmic eruption. A second explosion, fueled by the

millions of metric tons of water coming in contact with the

exposed molten bedrock of the seabed, caused a gigantic

tsunami to

explode outward

to the northeast

and southwest of

the island. While

some Greek cities

Expansion of tsunami waves.



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saw a mild tidal surge, other towns, such as those along the

western coast of Asia Minor1, saw waves hundreds of feet

tall. The effect was devastating to the Minoans—even cities

in Egypt felt the immense effects of the tsunami.

An aerial view of the island

of Thera (Santorini) today,

with the caldera of the

volcano (center).

Thera’s geography was perfect as a naval base, as it

had an almost rectangular harbor in the center of the island;

measuring 8 miles by 4 miles, and was naturally the

Minoan’s most important naval base. The structure of the

island has led some to believe that, given the advanced

nature of Minoan culture, the geography of the island, and

the climactic event of the eruption, that Thera was the origin

of the Atlantis myth. Nearby Minoan coastal towns, and the

Minoan navy, were all but destroyed in one crushing blow of

nature. Knossos, the capital of the Minoans, being higher up

in hills of central Crete, remained safe from the deadly

waters, however many coastal cities on the northern coast of

Crete were destroyed. Minoan civilization continued to

1 The western coast of Asia Minor was called Ionia, and is now partof modern day Turkey.

struggle for two centuries to recover after the tragic

eruption, but its fate was sealed that one horrific day. The

Mycenaean Greeks2

encroached upon the weakened Minoan

society, eventually destroying the remains of their once

proud civilization by B.C. 1200.

Questions and Reflection

1. What is the name of the sea between Greece and Ionia?

2. What are the two main islands of the Minoans discussed,

and what was their importance?3. What are the years that comprise the Bronze Age?

Reflection Essay

1. How do you believe Crete’s geographical position

impacted their ability to trade with other peoples?

2 Mycenae was the Achaean’s most powerful city-state, for whichtheir culture was named.



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The Trojan Horse is dragged into the city.

The Warriors of the Iliad

There is hardly anyone that has not heard of the

Trojan War, or the poet Homer and his works, the Iliad and

the Odyssey .

As the Minoan civilization was waning in the 13th

and

12th

centuries B.C., the Mycenaean Greeks were rising to

power. The Mycenaean Greek world was that of the Bronze

Age; bronze being a mixture of both copper and tin. More

durable than stone and able to hold an edge, Bronze Age

weapons would remain the metal of choice until the Iron

Age, however, they were still in use during the early

centuries of Iron Age. This was due to the fact that iron was

initially expensive and was more difficult to produce, due to

its higher smelting point than copper and tin.

The weapons of a Mycenaean soldier were his

shield, called a hoplon, with a single handle in the middle3

and perhaps straps, so it could be thrown on a warrior’s

back, bronze body armor, usually of single plate and

fastened along the shoulders and side. In addition, he would

have bronze greaves to protect the shins of his leg, and a

helmet with a tall, horse hair crest that would bob back and

forth in order to inspire terror. His spear would be his

primary weapon, with a sword for secondary use in case he

lost or broke the spear. Oddly enough, it is very common in

the Iliad to see heroes using rocks to smash the bones of

their opponent, with such violence that death is immediate.

It was custom in the Bronze Age that these weapons were

provided by the user, not by the city-state to which he had

his allegiance. Thus, many weapons ended up being passed

down from father to son over generations. This resulted in

two things: first, there was very little deviation of military

equipment over a period of centuries, and second, it was

normal for the victor to strip his fallen opponent of his armor

as a mark of personal glory.

As for a warrior’s hoplon, it was circular in shape,

and a massive 3 feet in diameter, weighing upwards of 30

pounds, thicker in the middle, and covered in hides or

bronze. It was curved in a parabola shape, which eased the

burden of carrying it for the soldier and afforded superior

protection due to its immense size. The hoplon was painted

with many diverse images, usually meant to inspire terror,

3The addition of a second handle, near the rim of the shield, is

called an Argive shield, and was developed in the 7th century B.C.in the city of Argos.



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such as a Gorgon.4

This was the equipment that the

Mycenaean soldier, called an Achaean by Homer, wore when

he went into battle. However, they were not technically

Greek; .the Greeks of classical antiquity were a blending of

the Mycenaeans and the people who eventually conquered

them, the Dorians. In effect, the warriors of the Iliad could

be considered proto-Greek.

Homeric warriors on Greek Pottery

However, there is a clear distinction that needs to be

made between the soldier of the Iliad 5 and the later period

of the 8th

to 5th

centuries. The time of the Iliad is known as

the Heroic Age, where soldiers fought for their king, and

individual combat was common. Sometimes two opposing

4Medusa was one of three Gorgons, depicted with bulging eyes,

and a swollen tongue in a grotesque gesture of death.5 Herodotus dates the fall of Troy to 1250 B.C., while modernradiocarbon dating places it at B.C. 1184.

armies would have the best warrior of each side fight in

single, man-to-man combat, with the result deciding the

outcome of the battle. It was the habit of warriors of that

age to excel in bravery and glory, not necessarily for the

glory of their city-state, but that of themselves and their

king.

Also, the language of the Iliad is heavy on metaphors

of nature to add descriptive narrative, since warriors in the

ancient world were farmers when not at war, and this was a

way for the listener to visualize battle. In fact, the Iliad was

not written down during the time of the war, but was

actually memorized and sung in verse—all 15,000 lines of it.

Nearly 500 years after the war, Homer wrote the account

that we have today. It is believed, due to the graphic account

of the battle wounds, that the original author ,or Homer,

was likely some kind of battlefield medic.


4. What is the composition of bronze?

5. What is the name of a Greek shield?

6. In the Heroic Age, to whom did a warrior owe his

allegiance?

7. What is the Homeric word for the Greeks?

Reflection Essay

2. How would reciting the war in verse form actually be abetter way to preserve it than a written account?

The Iliad and Chariot Warfare

While the 2004 movie Troy may be a decent

reflection of the Iliad , it shows very little of a weapon of war

often described by Homer: the chariot. The Achaean



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chariots typically had three or four horses, a driver, and a

warrior, who would dismount for battle. These were not the

typical movie chariot, which is usually bulky and of heavy

construction, but were light for both speed during combat

and running over enemies during battle.

A Homeric chariot and warrior

Homer and Vergil

As it was mentioned before, Homer was responsible

for putting the epic poem of the Iliad into a written account

at some point in the 9th

to 7th

centuries B.C.6, when the

Greek world was emerging from their Dark Age and into the

Classical Age7. The Iliad starts near the end of the Trojan

War, during a period when the mighty Greek warrior,

Achilles, has decided to no longer fight due to a quarrel with

the Achaean leader, High King Agamemnon. Fuming,

Achilles is content to stand by and watch the war from the

6 Following Herodotus’ dating method, we can assume that Homer

wrote the Iliad in B.C. 8407

The Mycenaean Age ended within a century after the fall of Troy,

when Greece was invaded by a people called the Dorians, whichushered in a Dark Age that lasted for 500 years.

sidelines. It’s only when Achilles’ beloved friend, Patroclus, is

killed in battle that his rage explodes in fury upon the

Trojans and he re-enters the war effort. The Iliad , however,

does not end with the sack of Troy, but with the burial of

Hector, chief defender of Troy. Other details of the war are

told by Odysseus in flashbacks within Homer’s other work,

the Odyssey, as he makes his 10 year journey home.

Roughly 1,200 years later, the story of Troy’s fall was

continued by the Roman author, Publius Vergilius Maro,

whom we call Vergil. His epic poem, called the Aeneid , was a

Roman attempt to combine elements of both the Iliad and

the Odyssey into one work, and fill in the gaps of the Trojan

War left by Homer. It was written to explain the origin of the

Roman people, who were—after all—Trojan refugees who

fled the city after the sack by the Achaeans. In fact, the

Roman word for Troy was Ilium, from which the Iliad gets its

name.

Heinrich Schliemann

It was generally assumed that the story of the Trojan

War was a work of fiction, until the archaeological site of

Troy itself was found in 1871 by Heinrich Schliemann. A

wealthy German businessman and amateur archaeologist,

Schliemann used geographical descriptions in the Iliad to

locate a hill in Turkey called Hisarlik and begin excavations.

Brutal by modern archaeological standards, the excavation

of Troy yielded multiple layers of the city’s construction

through nine different time periods.



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In the above picture, Troy VI (Homer’s Troy) is highlighted and expanded, showing the

acropolis and high walls. Recent archaeological evidence suggests a surrounding city in the

open plain surrounding the acropolis, which is consistent with the account in the Iliad

. Theplain continues to the shore beyond where the Achaean Greeks made their camp. In the

intervening centuries the bay has silted up to its present coastline.



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Schliemann could read the Iliad in the original Greek,

and was concerned with finding the riches of Troy as well as

uncovering the city’s history. Spotting the glint of gold one

afternoon, Schliemann dismissed his workers and found a

jewelry hoard buried in a section of the wall. Taking the

jewels, he dressed his wife, Sophie, in them and called her

his Helen. Archaeological excavations still continue on the

site to this day, as well as it being a tourist destination.

Sophie as Helen of Troy

The walls of Troy VI



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8. What was the role of the chariot in Homeric warfare?

9. Why did Vergil write the Aeneid ?

10. How many levels of Troy exist?

11. What year was Troy first excavated?

Reflection Essay

3. If Heinrich Schliemann was alive today, how would his

excavation of Troy be different than in 1871?

The Trojan War

As populations grew with the creation of cities in the

3rd

millennium B.C., and early societies became more

agrarian, warfare emerged in its more recognizable form.

The increased wealth and population, in connection with

trade with other early cities, prompted the rise of city-states;

cities that had their own armies, government and religion.

While some ancient city-states might have had a similar

culture, they were fiercely independent, especially those

found in Greece. To be a citizen of an ancient city-state

usually came with the requirement that you had to own

land, and therefore had something worth defending if an

enemy approached. Cities constructed walls around the

edges of their settlements for protection, first out of earth

and wood, and then with stone. Soldiers came at their king’s

command with shield, spear and helmet, to defend a city-

state’s population against aggressors, and later, to expand

the power of these early city-states. Farmers had

settlements near cities, where they sought refuge in time of

attack. To live without allegiance to a city-state, was to

invite danger and isolation. The ancient world was a very

empty place by modern standards, and it was only the power

of a city-state that could offer complete protection.

Regions of power in 1400 B.C.

As you can see from the map above, dated roughly

200 years before the Trojan War (and 100 years after the

eruption of Thera) , Egypt controlled the eastern coast of the

Mediterranean, up through modern day Israel and Lebanon,

while kingdoms existed in both Mesopotamia and central

Turkey. The Mycenaeans were on the verge of taking over

the Minoans, while in the northeast corner of the Aegean

Sea, on the northern coast of Ionia, was the powerful city-

state of Troy.

At the beginning of the Iliad we already find the

Achaeans at war with the Trojans and their allies. The story

begins in medias res (‘into the middle of things’) in the tenth

year of the ten-year war. In fact, the whole story of the Iliad

lasts but a couple weeks and is nothing more than a

momentary window into the course of the conflict. The king

of the most powerful Achaean city-state of Mycenae,



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Agamemnon, led—according to legend—1,000 ships filled

with 50,000 soldiers to the shores near Troy in order to

avenge the abduction of his brother’s wife, Helen. King

Menalaus of Sparta, who was Agamemnon’s brother,

wanted his wife back, who had run off with Prince Paris of

Troy. The backstory of Helen, Paris and her abduction is not

told in the Iliad , because it would already have been known

to the audience of the Heroic Age. The Iliad does, however,

focus on the key moment when Achilles’ wrath explodes and

the Trojans lose their key defender of the city, Hector.

Again, the Iliad is simply a brief, but important, glimpse into

the whole of the Trojan War. Here is a breakdown of the 24

books of the Iliad :

Book I: Explanation of Achilles’ wrath.

Book II: Achaeans assemble for battle.

Book III: Paris and Menalaus single combat.

Book IV: Breaking of battle true.Book V: Diomedes and the gods fight.

Book VI: Hector with his wife and son.

Book VII: Hector vs. Ajax; burial of the dead.

Book VIII: Zeus’ command; Trojans at the camp.

Book IX: Achilles rejects the offer to return.

Book X: Achaeans sneak into the Trojan camp.

Book XI: Achaeans attack falters.

Book XII: The Trojans counter-attack hard.

Book XIII: Poseidon helps the Achaeans; Hector

assaults the gates of the Achaean camp.

Book XIV: Hera seduces Zeus; counter-attack.

Book XV: Zeus is angry; Achaean ships burn.

Book XVI: Death of Sarpedon and Patroclus.

Book XVII: Battle over Patroclus’ body.

Book XVIII: Achilles’ despair.

Book XIX: Achilles decides to rejoin.

Book XX: Gods fight with men. Achilles’ slaughter

and battle with Aeneas.

Book XXI: Achilles fights; gods fight gods.

Book XXII: Death of Hector by Achilles

Book XXIII: Funeral for Patroclus

Book XXIV: Reconciliation of Achilles and Priam;

burial of Hector.

It might seem strange that the story of the Iliad

doesn’t end with the proverbial Death Star blowing up in the

final moment, but instead it is one of choice. Achilles is told

by his mother, Thetis, that he has to choose between nostos

(νόστος ‘homecoming’) and kleos ((κλέος ‘glory’). Achilles

chose glory over being able to come home, in his desire for

eternal fame. In Book XXIV the true importance of nostosand kleos is realized by Achilles. He is confronted with this

epiphany when King Priam of Troy sneaks into the Achaean

camp, specifically into Achilles’ tent, and begs to have

Hector’s body back.8

The aged King Priam asked for his own

son’s nostos and burial, and this realization brings both

Priam and Achilles to tears. It is under Achilles’ personal

promise of protection from all his fellow Achaeans that he

allows Priam to take his son back to Troy for a proper burial.

Funeral games and a peace accord were pledged for thirteen

days for Hector’s burial. It is in this mutual pause of the war

that Achilles buries his beloved comrade, Patroclus. In

essence, the story of the Iliad , the most well known epic

8 Previously, in Book XXII Achilles killed Hector and dragged hisbody back to the Achaean camp behind his chariot.



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poem of warfare in the history of the world, is about the

importance of family over one’s personal glory.

Role of the gods in the Iliad

The role of the gods and how they were seen to

the ancient Greeks is worth mentioning, especially in context

to the Iliad . When we see the Greek gods and goddesses in

movies or any other visual form, they are usually portrayed

in some manner to differentiate them from mortals; a larger

scale, glowing in a golden hue, or always surrounded by

clouds. This is done to show that they are, in fact, gods.

However, none of these visual qualities were employed by

the ancients. Gods were the same size as mortals, looked

like them, and acted like them; the only distinction was their

weapons or armor. In fact, gods and goddesses often

changed their shape to deceive mortals into thinking they

were dealing with a comrade, and not with a god who was

secretly seeking their demise.

As strange as it may sound, the ancients just knew

that the person they were looking at was actually an

immortal. However, even that realization might not turn

them aside in their mortal fury, as seen by Diomedes in Book

V and Patroclus in Book XVI. Gods and goddesses may have

been immortal, but they could still be wounded.

Ares prepared for battle.

Apollo and Artemis



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Below is a list of gods and goddesses from the Iliad ,

and the side that they supported during the war:

Trojan

Zeus

Apollo

Ares

Artemis

Leto

Aphrodite

Achaean

Hera Athena

Poseidon

Hephaestus9

After the Iliad

After the death of Hector, the war continued on.

Other allies came to Troy’s aide, including the fierce

Amazonian women, led by Queen Penthesilia. The great

queen was killed by Achilles in combat, but the moment he

removed her helmet he fell deeply in love with her. A fellow

Achaean, Thersites, mocked the dead queen, which enraged

Achilles to fury, and he slew his comrade on the spot.

Allied warriors also arrived from Aethiopia, led by

their king, Memnon, in order to help Troy, but ultimately he

too fell before Achilles. However, the prophecy came true,

and Paris, son of Priam (with the help of Apollo), killed the

great Achaean warrior by shooting him through his only

vulnerable spot—his heel. It was not by force of arms that

9 Hephaestus, at the behest of Thetis, makes Achilles a new set of armor. The god himself plays no direct combat role in the Iliad .

Troy lost, but by the cleverness of Odysseus, who devised

the trick of the hollow, wooden horse. Offered as a gift to

Poseidon before their supposed journey home, the Achaeans

left the offering on the shore and secretly sailed their ships

to a nearby island, and waited. That night, after a part of the

great wall of Troy had been torn down to bring the horse in,

and the citizens of this proud city were in a drunken slumber,

warriors came out of the horse, slew the guards and opened

the gates. The Achaeans, now waiting nearby, poured into

the city and pillaged the city with brutal ferocity. Troy

burned. Only a few shiploads escaped to find a new home,

the rest died in its fiery destruction.


12. Why would Troy’s geographical position help it become a

wealthy city?

13. Where is the irony in the Achaean victory?

14. Which god or goddess is the most physically involved in

the war, on each side ?

15. What was the significance for the ancients if your body

did not have a proper burial?

Reflection Essay

4. If you were given the choice like Achilles, would you

choose nostos or kleos, and why?

Achilles killing Queen Penthesilia

chapter i trojan war

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