Who won the Trojan War and why?
- Who Won the Trojan War? The Trojan War was a great series of battles fought between the Greeks and the Trojans sometime in the Late Bronze Age (1200–c. 500 BC). According to the stories from Homer’s Iliad, it was the greatest war of its time that included a multitude of exemplary warriors and even a few meddling Greek gods.
What is the Trojan War in the Iliad?
Trojan War. The core of the Iliad (Books II – XXIII) describes a period of four days and two nights in the tenth year of the decade-long siege of Troy; the Odyssey describes the journey home of Odysseus, one of the war's heroes. Other parts of the war are described in a cycle of epic poems, which have survived through fragments.
What were some of the major battles in the Iliad?
During this time, there were some key notable battles: Paris vs. Menelaus: Menelaus was the better warrior, but Aphrodite came to the aid of Paris and spirited him away. Hektor vs. Ajax: This battle ended in a stalemate because the other warriors called an end to it as night approached.
How did Odysseus win the Battle of the Trojan Horse?
But in the Aeneid by Virgil, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks at the behest of Odysseus constructed a huge wooden horse and hid a select force of men inside, including Odysseus himself. The Greeks pretended to sail away, and the Trojans pulled the horse into their city as a victory trophy.
Who won the battle in the Iliad?
The Greek army entered the gates and destroyed the Trojans. The Greeks had finally won the war. It is estimated that the Iliad was written around the 8th century BC.
Who Won the Trojan War and how?
The Greeks won the Trojan War. According to the Roman epic poet Virgil, the Trojans were defeated after the Greeks left behind a large wooden horse and pretended to sail for home.
Who Won the Trojan War Achilles?
When the Iliad begins, the Trojan War has been going on for nine years. Achilles, the poem's protagonist, has led one battle after another. He has met with great success–in fact, he is undefeated in battle–but the war itself has reached a stalemate.
Who defeated Troy?
In legend, the city of Troy was besieged for 10 years and eventually conquered by a Greek army led by King Agamemnon.
Did Odysseus win Trojan War?
The Trojan Horse, at Odysseus's command, was built, then filled with Greeks. It was admitted to Troy despite warnings, and the forces crept out at night and let the rest of the army in, slaughtering the Trojans and razing the city. In short, Odysseus was instrumental in winning the Trojan War.
Why did Hector lose Achilles?
Later, with Apollo's help, Hector killed Patroclus, the best friend of the great Greek warrior Achilles, and stole his armor, which actually belonged to Achilles. Enraged by the death of his friend, Achilles reconciled with Agamemnon and joined the other Greeks in fighting against the Trojans in order to pursue Hector.
Who is the hero of the Iliad?
The prime example is Akhilleus, more commonly known as Achilles in the English tradition. This, the greatest hero of the Iliad, was the son of Thetis, a sea-goddess known for her far-reaching cosmic powers.
Who killed Agamemnon?
Clytemnestra, in Greek legend, a daughter of Leda and Tyndareus and wife of Agamemnon, commander of the Greek forces in the Trojan War. She took Aegisthus as her lover while Agamemnon was away at war. Upon his return, Clytemnestra and Aegisthus murdered Agamemnon.
What started the Trojan War?
According to the ancient Greek epic poet Homer, the Trojan War was caused by Paris, son of the Trojan king, and Helen, wife of the Greek king Menel...
Was the Trojan War real?
There has been much debate over historical evidence of the Trojan War. Archaeological finds in Turkey suggest that the city of Troy did exist but t...
Who won the Trojan War?
The Greeks won the Trojan War. According to the Roman epic poet Virgil, the Trojans were defeated after the Greeks left behind a large wooden horse...
What happened to Achilles in the Trojan War?
The death of Achilles, the greatest Greek warrior of the Trojan War, is not described in Homeric works. In Arctinus’s Aethiopis, Achilles is said t...
When was the Trojan War?
The Trojan War was a great series of battles fought between the Greeks and the Trojans sometime in the Late Bronze Age (1200–c. 500 BC). According to the stories from Homer’s Iliad, it was the greatest war of its time that included a multitude of exemplary warriors and even a few meddling Greek gods.
Why did the Trojan War happen?
Here is the story according to Greek tradition: The Trojan War came about for two main reasons: Zeus, the Kind of the gods, wanted to find a way to reduce the ever-increasing human population. However, before all that, there are stories that claim the entire thing came about as a result of the meddling Greek gods.
How Did the Trojan War Begin?
According to Homer, who lived a few centuries after the war had ended, the entire conflict began when Paris, a prince of Troy, met Helen, a queen of Sparta.
How Long Did the War Last?
It is said that the war raged on for 10 years at a stalemate. During this time, there were some key notable battles:
What did the Greeks do to the Trojans?
The Greeks, being unable to penetrate the walls of the city, found a way to have the Trojans invite them in, unknowingly. They built a huge wooden horse and disappeared within it. The Trojans, on finding the horse and seeing no Greeks, assumed the horse was a gift from the gods who had struck down all their enemies in the night. They brought the horse back within the city walls where the Greeks climbed out in the dark of night and burned down the city of Troy. Only a few Trojans escaped.
How many ships did Helen of Troy launch?
It’s unclear just how many men this army totaled but at some point, Helen, formerly “Helen of Sparta, and now “Helen of Troy” became known as the “face that launched a thousand ships.” That’s how many ships (approximately) the Greeks sailed to Troy. Homer says that “the men were as many as the leaves and flowers that come in springtime.”
Why did Hektor vs Ajax end in a stalemate?
Hektor vs. Ajax: This battle ended in a stalemate because the other warriors called an end to it as night approached.
What is the Trojan War?
The events of the Trojan War are found in many works of Greek literature and depicted in numerous works of Greek art. There is no single, authoritative text which tells the entire events of the war. Instead, the story is assembled from a variety of sources, some of which report contradictory versions of the events. The most important literary sources are the two epic poems traditionally credited to Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey, composed sometime between the 9th and 6th centuries BC. Each poem narrates only a part of the war. The Iliad covers a short period in the last year of the siege of Troy, while the Odyssey concerns Odysseus's return to his home island of Ithaca following the sack of Troy and contains several flashbacks to particular episodes in the war.
How long did the Achaeans besiege Troy?
The Achaeans besieged Troy for nine years. This part of the war is the least developed among surviving sources, which prefer to talk about events in the last year of the war. After the initial landing the army was gathered in its entirety again only in the tenth year. Thucydides deduces that this was due to lack of money. They raided the Trojan allies and spent time farming the Thracian peninsula. Troy was never completely besieged, thus it maintained communications with the interior of Asia Minor. Reinforcements continued to come until the very end. The Achaeans controlled only the entrance to the Dardanelles, and Troy and her allies controlled the shortest point at Abydos and Sestos and communicated with allies in Europe.
What happened after the withdrawal of Achilles?
After the withdrawal of Achilles, the Achaeans were initially successful. Both armies gathered in full for the first time since the landing. Menelaus and Paris fought a duel, which ended when Aphrodite snatched the beaten Paris from the field. With the truce broken, the armies began fighting again. Diomedes won great renown amongst the Achaeans, killing the Trojan hero Pandaros and nearly killing Aeneas, who was only saved by his mother, Aphrodite. With the assistance of Athena, Diomedes then wounded the gods Aphrodite and Ares. During the next days, however, the Trojans drove the Achaeans back to their camp and were stopped at the Achaean wall by Poseidon. The next day, though, with Zeus' help, the Trojans broke into the Achaean camp and were on the verge of setting fire to the Achaean ships. An earlier appeal to Achilles to return was rejected, but after Hector burned Protesilaus' ship, he allowed his relative and best friend Patroclus to go into battle wearing Achilles' armour and lead his army. Patroclus drove the Trojans all the way back to the walls of Troy, and was only prevented from storming the city by the intervention of Apollo. Patroclus was then killed by Hector, who took Achilles' armour from the body of Patroclus.
What movies were based on the Trojan War?
Films based on the Trojan War include Helen of Troy (1956) , The Trojan Horse (1961) and Troy (2004) . The war has also been featured in many books, television series, and other creative works.
How did Zeus become king?
According to Greek mythology, Zeus had become king of the gods by overthrowing his father Cronus; Cronus in turn had overthrown his father Uranus. Zeus was not faithful to his wife and sister Hera, and had many relationships from which many children were born. Since Zeus believed that there were too many people populating the earth, he envisioned Momus or Themis, who was to use the Trojan War as a means to depopulate the Earth, especially of his demigod descendants.
What game did Achilles and Ajax play?
At some point in the war Achilles and Ajax were playing a board game ( petteia ). They were absorbed in the game and oblivious to the surrounding battle. The Trojans attacked and reached the heroes, who were only saved by an intervention of Athena.
How long was the Iliad?
The core of the Iliad (Books II – XXIII) describes a period of four days and two nights in the tenth year of the decade-long siege of Troy; the Odyssey describes the journey home of Odysseus, one of the war's heroes. Other parts of the war are described in a cycle of epic poems, which have survived through fragments.
Who won the Trojan War?
The Greeks won the Trojan War. According to the Roman epic poet Virgil, the Trojans were defeated after the Greeks left behind a large wooden horse and pretended to sail for home. Unbeknown to the Trojans, the wooden horse was filled with Greek warriors. They sacked Troy after the Trojans brought the horse inside the city walls.
How did the Trojans defeat the Greeks?
According to the Roman epic poet Virgil, the Trojans were defeated after the Greeks left behind a large wooden horse and pretended to sail for home. Unbeknown to the Trojans, the wooden horse was filled with Greek warriors. They sacked Troy after the Trojans brought the horse inside the city walls.
What started the Trojan War?
According to the ancient Greek epic poet Homer, the Trojan War was caused by Paris, son of the Trojan king, and Helen, wife of the Greek king Menelaus, when they went off together to Troy. To get her back, Menelaus sought help from his brother Agamemnon, who assembled a Greek army to defeat Troy.
What happened when the Trojans brought the horse into their city?
When the Trojans brought the horse into their city, the hidden Greeks opened the gates to their comrades, who then sacked Troy, massacred its men, and carried off its women. This version was recorded centuries later; the extent to which it reflects actual historical events is not known. Trojan War.
Who was the Trojan king's son?
In the traditional accounts, Paris, son of the Trojan king, ran off with Helen, wife of Menelaus of Sparta, whose brother Agamemnon then led a Greek expedition against Troy. The ensuing war lasted 10 years, finally ending when the Greeks pretended to withdraw, leaving behind them a large wooden horse with a raiding party concealed inside. When the Trojans brought the horse into their city, the hidden Greeks opened the gates to their comrades, who then sacked Troy, massacred its men, and carried off its women. This version was recorded centuries later; the extent to which it reflects actual historical events is not known.
Who killed Achilles in the Trojan War?
In Arctinus’s Aethiopis, Achilles is said to have been killed by Paris of Troy. In the traditional accounts, Paris, son of the Trojan king, ran off with Helen, wife of Menelaus of Sparta, whose brother Agamemnon then led a Greek expedition ...
Who killed Penthesilea?
Achilles killing Penthesilea during the Trojan War, interior of an Attic cup, c. 460 bce; in the Museum of Antiquities, Munich.
What was the Trojan War?
The story of the Trojan War—the Bronze Age conflict between the kingdoms of Troy and Mycenaean Greece–straddles the history and mythology of ancient Greece and inspired the greatest writers of antiquity, from Homer, Herodotus and Sophocles to Virgil. Since the 19th-century rediscovery of the site of Troy in what is now western Turkey, archaeologists have uncovered increasing evidence of a kingdom that peaked and may have been destroyed around 1,180 B.C.—perhaps forming the basis for the tales recounted by Homer some 400 years later in the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey.”
When was the Trojan War epic written?
The Trojan War Epics. Little is known about the historical Homer. Historians date the completion of the “Iliad” to about 750 B.C., and the “Odyssey” to about 725. Both began within the oral tradition, and were first transcribed decades or centuries after their composition.
Why is Homer a blind poet?
Did you know? Some traditions portray Homer as a blind poet, because the name Homer sounds like a word for "blind" in some Greek dialects. In the “Odyssey,” a blind bard appears telling stories of the war, which some interpret as a cameo by the poem's author.
How long did the siege of Troy last?
The siege, punctuated by battles and skirmishes including the storied deaths of the Trojan prince Hector and the nearly-invincible Achilles, lasted more than 10 years until the morning the Greek armies retreated from their camp, leaving a large wooden horse outside the gates of Troy.
Where did Helen go after Menelaus' death?
Helen, whose two successive Trojan husbands were killed during the war, returned to Sparta to reign with Menelaus. After his death, some sources say she was exiled to the island of Rhodes, where a vengeful war widow had her hanged.
When was Troy destroyed?
Since the 19th-century rediscovery of the site of Troy in what is now western Turkey, archaeologists have uncovered increasing evidence of a kingdom that peaked and may have been destroyed around 1,180 B.C. —perhaps forming the basis for the tales recounted by Homer some 400 years later in the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey.”.
Who wrote the Aeneid?
In the first century B.C. the Roman poet Virgil composed the “Aeneid,” the third great classical epic inspired by the Trojan War. It follows a group of Trojans led by the hero Aeneas who leave their destroyed city to travel to Carthage before founding the city of Rome. Virgil’s aim was in part to give Rome’s first imperial dynasty an origin story as impressive as that of the Greeks.
Who was the Greek hero of the Trojan War?
It’s in this first battle that we’re introduced to the preeminent Greek heroes of the Trojan War: there was Teleimonian Aiax, also called Ajax, a giant, mighty warrior; Odysseus Laertes the king of Ithaca and later the protagonist of The Odyssey; and the fierce soldier called Diomedes, who receives the blessing of Athena and goes on to vanquish many Trojans. On the Trojan side was Aeneas, protagonist of the epic, The Aeneid, and mythical founder of the Roman race. Prince Hector is the powerhouse of the Trojan army until his untimely demise at the hands of Achilles.
What is the cause of the fight in Book I of the Iliad?
The cause of this fight was Agamemnon’s usurpation of Briseis, a beautiful maiden whom Achilles had won from the spoils of victory in battle. Agamemnon forces Achilles to forfeit her, and, as a result, Achilles refuses to continue fighting for him.
What does Agamemnon promise Achilles?
Agamemnon sends envoys to Achilles with his terms of apology. He promises to return Briseis to him and to ensure that he is enriched from the spoils of Troy. But Achilles declines the king’s proposal, and the Achaeans continue to suffer at the hands of Hector. It isn’t until Book XIV that the tides begin to turn. It’s at this time that Hera plays a trick on Zeus. She channels the charms of Aphrodite to distract Zeus from the events of the Trojan War. Then she seduces him, and, afterward, Zeus falls asleep.
What did Menelaus do to Helen?
Menelaus went into a rage. He declared victory and demanded that Helen be handed over. But before the Trojans could acquiesce to his will, there would be an attempt on the Spartan king’s life. This would set off the first major battle of the Trojan War.
Why did Achilles refuse to participate in the Trojan War?
The struggles of the Greeks are only exacerbated by troubles within their own ranks, particularly those generated by Achilles — a Greek prince of Peleus, who is unmatched on the battlefield. Because of a disagreement with Agamemnon, Achilles refuses to participate in the early battles of the Trojan War. It isn’t until a special friend of his, a certain Patroclus, is killed in battle that Achilles resolves to enter the conflict.
What did Athena do to help the Trojans?
They wanted to see Priam’s city destroyed, and so Athena resolved to interfere in the unfolding events before the Trojans could turn Helen over and allow the conflict to dissolve. So Athena descended onto the battlefield in the form of a Trojan soldier and approached an archer among their ranks called Pandaros. She convinced him to shoot an arrow at Menelaus and strike him dead to recover the honor of Troy.
Where did Achilles meet Hector?
Achilles then takes to the battlefield with his new armor. He meets Hector outside the walls of Troy, where the gods had been making a last minute deliberation on the Trojan prince’s fate.
Who warned the Trojans?
While questioning Sinon, the Trojan priest Laocoön guesses the plot and warns the Trojans, in Virgil's famous line Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes ("I fear Greeks, even those bearing gifts"), Danai ( acc Danaos) or Danaans (Homer's name for the Greeks) being the ones who had built the Trojan Horse.
How many warriors were in the Trojan Horse's womb?
Thirty of the Achaeans' best warriors hid in the Trojan horse's womb and two spies in its mouth. Other sources give different numbers: The Bibliotheca 50; Tzetzes 23; and Quintus Smyrnaeus gives the names of 30, but says there were more. In late tradition the number was standardized at 40. Their names follow:
What does Laocoön say in Book 2?
Book II includes Laocoön saying: " Equo ne credite, Teucri. Quidquid id est, timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. " ("Do not trust the horse, Trojans! Whatever it is, I fear the Danaans [Greeks], even those bearing gifts.")
What is the oldest known depiction of the Trojan Horse?
The earliest known depiction of the Trojan Horse, on a bronze fibula (ca. 700 BC), note the wheels and the square openings on the horse's side. The Mykonos vase (750 to 650 BC), with one of the earliest known renditions of the Trojan Horse, (note the depiction of the faces of hidden warriors shown on the horse's side)
What was the Trojan horse used for?
The Trojan Horse was the wooden horse used by the Greeks, during the Trojan War, to enter the city of Troy and win the war. There is no Trojan Horse in Homer's Iliad, with the poem ending before the war is concluded. But in the Aeneid by Virgil, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks at the behest of Odysseus constructed a huge wooden horse ...
What did Epeius make with Athena's help?
But come now, change thy theme, and sing of the building of the horse of wood, which Epeius made with Athena 's help, the horse which once Odysseus led up into the citadel as a thing of guile, when he had filled it with the men who sacked Ilios.
What is the horse called in the Odyssey?
As Odysseus was the chief architect of the Trojan Horse, it is also referred to in Homer 's Odyssey. In the Greek tradition, the horse is called the "wooden horse" ...
How Did The Trojan War Begin?
Here Is The Story According to Greek Tradition
Who Took Part in The Trojan War
The Trojan Army and Defenses
How Long Did The War Last?
Who Won The Trojan War?
- The Greeks, being unable to penetrate the walls of the city, found a way to have the Trojans invite them in, unknowingly. They built a huge wooden horse and disappeared within it. The Trojans, on finding the horse and seeing no Greeks, assumed the horse was a gift from the gods who had struck down all their enemies in the night. They brought the ho...
Overview
Legend
Traditionally, the Trojan War arose from a sequence of events beginning with a quarrel between the goddesses Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite. Eris, the goddess of discord, was not invited to the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, and so arrived bearing a gift: a golden apple, inscribed "for the fairest". Each of the goddesses claimed to be the "fairest", and the rightful owner of the apple. They submitted the judgment to a shepherd they encountered tending his flock. Each of the god…
Sources
Dates of the Trojan War
Historical basis
In popular culture
Further reading
External links