Trojan War

The **Trojan War** was one of the most important wars in the history of Ancient Greece. It happened between the Trojans and the Greeks. It is mostly known through the *Iliad,* an epic poem written by the Ancient Greek poet Homer.
 carrying the dead Achilles, protected by Hermes (on the left) and Athena (on the right). Side 1 from an Attic black-figure neck-amphora,  ~520-510 BC. The Louvre, Paris]]

In the middle 19th century scholars thought Troy and the war were mythical; that they never existed. However, Heinrich Schliemann discovered the site of ancient Troy, across the Aegean Sea on Asia Minor. The war may have taken place in the 12th century BC.

## Bronze Age and Troy 
The Bronze Age was the first era when humans are known to have made tools and weapons of metal.  Previously they used stone tools.  Beginning in about 3,300 B.C throughout the Middle East and parts of Asia, humans made many technical advances.  Bronze Age civilizations interconnected through trade, war, migration, and innovation.  However, the age ended quickly in the Bronze Age collapse after 1200 B.C., when many civilizations fell at once. 

One of the most well known ancient civilizations to fall was the city of Troy. Branching off of the Mycenaean civilization and located in Hisarlik, the northeast coast of Turkey, this ancient city dates back to over 2,700 years ago. Believed to be inhabited for almost 4,000 years beginning in 3,000 B.C., this civilization developed grand palaces by building on top of one city after another was destroyed. They were an important aspect of Greek culture that flowed over into literature, art, and other topics. Many of Homer’s works include the involvement of Greek gods and goddesses. The gods that are seen throughout Homer’s works are immortal and they hold a lot of power. They have the power to know just about everything and are the highest in authority without any other power above them. The greatest of the gods is the family in which Zeus is the father. Throughout the majority of Homer’s writings, Zeus is so supreme that he is used to represent the collective power of gods and Zeus is so commonly mentioned. This is why in the origin of the Trojan War, the gods go to Zeus for resolutions of conflict. Unlike some works of writing and some cultures, the gods throughout Homer’s work have no relation to religion but are rather their own separate thing.

## The Trojan horse 
The war went on for ten years swinging to one side and then the other. Some of the leading fighters were Achilles, Paris, and Hector. The Greeks won by building a big wooden horse, which we now call the Trojan Horse. Greek soldiers hid inside the horse, and others put the horse on the shore and left in their boats. The Trojans saw the horse and thought that the Greeks had given up and left. They thought the horse was a gift in their honour. They dragged the horse into Troy and celebrated their victory. When night fell, the Greeks hiding inside the horse opened the city gates and set fire to the houses. The Greeks who had left in their boats had just pretended to leave, to trick the Trojans.  They returned and won the war.  The trick was thought up by Odysseus, King of the small island of Ithaca.

## Allusions of the Trojan War 
There are many versions to the story of the Trojan War. Two of the most famous of these stories are Homer’s poetry about this war in his books, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Full of exaggerations, distortions, contradictions, and pure fictions, these two books do not give a clear indication whether or not the Trojan war actually occurred. Homer wrote these stories based on the oral tradition of storytelling. Oral tradition has a tendency to not contain precise memories and can morph into different claims based on different cultural influences and intentions. For example, the Iliad is shown to have many similar aspects to characters and wars originating from stories throughout the Hellenic world, like the duel between Lycian Sapedon and Rhodian. Secondly, tradition may be picked up by regions and people who have no relation to the event. The origin of how the Trojan War was started lies in Homer’s poem, the Iliad. 

Hiller, the author of *Two Trojan Wars? On the destructions of Troy VI and VII* reminds us that our trust in a historical Trojan War is rooted in Homer.  Homer is not a historian but, rather, a poet. Hiller also said that because Homer is a poet, part of his role in creating content is exaggerating for better effect, and therefore evidence in support of a Trojan War needs to be independent of Homer’s epic. It was extremely unlikely that a civilization would declare war and gather a fleet of hundreds of ships over a dispute of a woman, the original belief of the spark of conflict However, Bronze Age kings occasionally were willing to go to war over the abduction of one of their subjects, and even more so when that subject was a family member. Excavations were done. The first step in establishing the physical location of the war is to find a clearly identifiable location for the war. This has not been done, although, currently Hisarlik is seen as the most identifiable. Even so, Heinrich Schliemann favored other locations as the official site of Troy before settling on Hisarlik. Schliemann, perhaps the archaeologist most involved with the search of Troy, began excavations in Hisarlik in 1871. Because Troy is made of several settlements, another challenge was finding which of the layers were the most likely to match up with the war. Schliemann believed one of the earliest layers would have to be the site of Troy. Without much prior knowledge on excavation, Schliemann had his crew dig a trench through the site, which resulted in the destruction of several of the upper layers. 

The dwellings and what could be found on that level of the mound did not add up with Homer’s description with Troy, which then required excavation into the later layers. However, because Schliemann had destroyed most of the newer layers, there was only a little bit of the sixth settlement that survived, which does not provide for a large representation of the settlement. However, it was the sixth settlement that provided the best evidence of Troy’s existence. Pottery found on the site of Hisarlik showed that Troy VI most likely ended around the first  of the thirteenth century. This sets the date for the war around 1250 BC, if the war and Troy were to coincide. The date of 1250 is in very close proximity to the date given by Herodotus, a Greek historian and as well as given by other Classical Greek sources. This level also represented a peak period of the layers, once again supporting the idea that it truly was the site of the Trojan War. However, even with these pieces of evidence, the similar accounts between Homer’s Troy and Hisarlik are still generally slight and do not show any significant evidence. Another indication that the Trojan War may have occurred is that the excavation of Troy VI provided evidence that signified violent destruction. However, yet again there is no way to be certain whether the destruction was caused by humans or the environment, or both.

## Trojan War in Pop Culture 
Over the years, the story of the Trojan War has become an icon as an action-packed TV show like *Troy: Fall of a City* as well as a binge worthy fictional novel like *Daughter of Troy* by Dave Duncan. In order for creators to make these films and books portray as authentic, they add archeological information to aid the culture, history, clothing and supplies used to relate to the ancient civilization. Some examples include bronze blades and weapons which were artifacts introduced within the Bronze Age, a walled city to portray the structure of the ancient cities within Greece, and the incorporation of the references to the Greek gods and goddesses watching every action they make to show their cultural beliefs. The incorporation of archeological information within pop culture is very relevant and an important aspect to making any type of film, image or novel a success.

## Stories, books, movies 
These are stories, books, movies, etc., that are about the Trojan War, or tell parts of its story:
* the *Iliad* by Homer, does *not* tell the story of the Trojan War from the beginning, but only a part of the last year of the siege of Troy. Other parts of the war were told in a cycle of epic poems, which has only survived in fragments. Episodes from the war provided material for Greek tragedy and other works of Greek literature, and for Roman poets like Virgil and Ovid.  
* in the *Odyssey* by Homer, the main character Odysseus tells of the ten-year journey home after the Trojan War.
* the *Aeneid*, by Virgil, tells the story of Aeneas, who fled from Troy at the end of the war.
* *Troy*, is a movie about the Trojan War. The story was greatly changed in parts. It starred Brad Pitt, Eric Bana,and  Orlando Bloom.

## Further reading
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## References