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The Iliad and the Odyssey


kmt_sesh

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Okay, this is my new favourite thread. :)

What do you mean Agamemnon didn't exist?

Achilles, Ajax, Hector, Paris... Hell, even Helen herself could've been fictional.

Wait, I'm selling my Jeep for a trip to Chicago. Do you have an extra couch?

Edited by Likely Guy
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...but I want to talk about the Cypris, the Aethiopis, the Little Iliad, the Iliou Persis, the Nostoi and the Telegony! Why you got restrict it to just the Iliad and the Odyssey?

--Jaylemurph

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Keep it simple.

ETA: Lesbos.

Edited by Likely Guy
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Keep it simple.

ETA: Lesbos.

I wait in the shadows for years for people to make a Lesbos comment, my how rare they are.

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Who was this Homer? How do we know he wrote the O and I and didn't just buy it from a passing Phoenician? :huh:

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Who was this Homer? How do we know he wrote the O and I and didn't just buy it from a passing Phoenician? :huh:

There you have a very valid point, because among others we don't know a bit of Mr. Homer (or Kyrios Homeros, if you prefer), and there is nothing to corroborate that he actually existed. Now, we know that the epic poems exists, we also know that they were passed word of mouth for at least 300 years (if the assumption of his age by Herodotus, whose tendency to mix lots of fiction with scant facts is well known, is anything to go by) and that could have been as many as 800 years if we go by Pseudo-Herodotus, though that version is slightly less believable than the original himself.

Edited by questionmark
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Homer's an interesting topic, but it's hard to say how much he really knew. Let's put him into context. Homer was an Ionian, meaning he came from Western Anatolia a ways south of Troy. Scholars usually place him in the 8th century, composing his poems c. 750 BCE or a little later. While probably himself illiterate, his poems are roughly contemporaneous with the earliest extant examples of Greek alphabetic writing, and were among the earliest tales to be written down with the new system. Homer's existence was thus right at the end of the Greek Dark Age, which began with the collapse of the Mycenaean civilization c. 1200 BCE.

Now, he wrote about the Trojan War, an event which is itself debatable. It's clear archaeologically that there is a destruction layer c. 1200 BCE at the site of what is probably the city of Troy. This is probably from some sort of conflict, but how big and how important this conflict was isn't apparent from the archaeological record, though it was clearly a large settlement at the time. As a Western Anatolian, Homer is in more or less the right place for stories of the destruction of Troy. Tales of the far-away mainland Greek conflicts were likely less common in Ionia than of the closer Troy. So I think it's reasonably likely that the c. 1200 BCE destruction of Troy was indeed the event Homer immortalized in his writings.

So in that case, we have Homer, some 450 years after the war, trying to compose poems on the basis of the oral tradition that has come down to him. He was living in a Greek society that was very different from the Mycenaean civilization which participated in the war. We can naturally expect that his tales will be a blend of Mycenaean and Dark Age elements. We might expect more of the latter than the former, but it's clear from the texts that at least some knowledge of Mycenaean times has indeed survived the passage of time and made it to Homer. An oft-cited example is the boar's tusk helmet, an artifact type described by Homer and recovered from Mycenaean deposits. The strong kings evident in Homer's tales do sound like Mycenaean characters, as the leaders of Homer's time would've never been able to command large armies. But the Heroic deeds of the kings at times sound more like tales one would expect from the Dark Ages, as archaeological sites like Lefkandi seem to attest to a significant hero cult in that period.

(Those are just a few thoughts off the top of my head. I apologize for the lack of specifics.)

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Who was this Homer? How do we know he wrote the O and I and didn't just buy it from a passing Phoenician? :huh:

Sheesh. Everyone blames the poor Phoenicians. Read the first words of Herodotus's "Histories":

The Persian Learned Men say that the Phoenicians were the cause of the dispute.

(Of course, Herodotus was talking about the Persian Wars of the 5th century, not the Trojan Wars. But still - the Phoenicians again?

Edited by Peter B
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I've no problem with the idea that there may well have been a long drawn out conflict, probably over trade and control of the Dardanelles, that may well have culminated in some form of siege or at least occupation of the plains around where people now on the whole seem to believe that there was the city of Troy, but obviously the whole "ten year siege" and the whole Achilles/Helen/Paris etc was most probably a work of fiction based on the historical background, or at least the folk memory of what were probably historical events. Just like historical fiction set during, say, the Napoleonic wars or the time of Julius Caesar.

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Recently the Field Museum in Chicago opened a major temporary exhibit called "The Greeks: Agamemnon to Alexander the Great." The exhibit showcases over 500 artifacts ranging from Neolithic to Hellenistic times. The artifacts come from more than 20 different museums, mostly from Greece itself, and numbers objects that have never before left Greece.

Dang it. Any chance of this exhibition coming to Australia (Canberra specifically would be just grand!)?

[sNIP]

Naturally a common topic of conversation with visitors is the Iliad and the Odyssey. I'd like to bring this to discussion in our forum. I've been a little surprised by visitors' reactions to the fact that folks like Agamemnon and Menelaus were not real kings, or at least were more literary than literal. Many people seem to believe that they actually existed.

I'd like to talk about these great epics and build on my own knowledge of them. I've read both poems but not for many years. What parts of them do you believe are real and what was their inspiration for the ancient bards? Who really was Homer? Et cetera.

Peripheral topics such as Heinrich Schliemann are also welcomed. The more I can learn and expand my base, the better I will be in the exhibit. So let's share...

Our oldest son (8yo) got a book of Greek myths and legends for Christmas, including the Iliad and Odyssey, and it's been fun reading them with him and to his younger siblings. I cheerfully admit, though, that I've only ever read rewritten versions of the stories, and not attempted to tackle the originals.

My area of interest is more general - how the Trojan War fits into the broader geopolitical context of the time. After all, Troy's eastern neighbour was the Hittite Empire, and only a couple of generations previously the Hittites had fought a major battle against the Egyptian army of Rameses the Great. Then, within a generation of the end of the Trojan War, much of the eastern Mediterranean world was plunged into a Dark Age which lasted centuries, seemingly at the hands of the Sea Peoples; the Mycenean civilisation in Greece came to an end, the Hittite Empire collapsed, the Canaanite cities stagnated, and the Egyptian New Kingdom fell into decline, leading to collapse of central authority and the eventual occupation of Lower Egypt by Libyan tribes.

So where did these Sea Peoples come from? One idea I'd like to toss around (given my lack of knowledge about the time and place it doesn't even deserve the term 'hypothesis') is that the core of the Sea Peoples originated in the infantry of the Greek army. In other words, the origin of this Dark Age lies in the Trojan War and its aftermath.

Ten years of warfare is going to turn even the greenest recruit into a veteran, while the chariot-borne nobility in the Greek army are likely to have suffered a higher rate of casualties than the infantry due the way these armies fought (the nobles do the serious fighting while the infantry are little more than rallying points and cheer squads for the charioteers). So at the end of the war a large number of highly skilled fighters return, unemployed, to a Greece which is light-on for nobility. This can be a recipe for social unrest, all the more so if the surviving nobles attempted to corner the pillage for themselves.

Now most of the Greek infantry of the time fought with long spears and large figure-8 or rectangular shields. Let's assume, for some reason, there was a small group who were some sort of exception, led by a fighter of ferocious reputation. Let's call them Myrmidons and their leader Achilles. Rather than fighting with long spears they fight with swords. Now as the war progresses and weapons break, increasing numbers of Greek infantry are going to re-arm themselves and fight in imitation of the infantry of highest reputation in their army.

Meanwhile, in the absence of so many fighting men at the War, Greece itself becomes subject to the opportunistic raids from people further west.

One thing leads to another: disgruntled Greek soldiers overthrow their kings and Greece descends into chaos. Some charismatic leader emerges who manages to build an army out of Greek infantry and western raiders and the families of some of them, and they head east where they supplement their soldiers with a few surviving Trojans and their families with some out-and-out slave-raiding. The Army - by now the largest force of veteran soldiers ever assembled - then conquers the Hittite Empire, its professional army simply swept away by the much larger invading force. Borg-like, the Army simply absorbs any soldiers willing to fight for them and any women unlucky enough to be in its way, and marches on.

In the next decade the Army moves east, then south around the Mediterranean coast, conquering and pillaging as it goes. Finally it reaches Egypt, still at the pinnacle of its greatness only 30 years after the death of Rameses the Great. In an epic war the Egyptian army finally defeats and disperses the Army, but the cost is crippling. Egypt is impoverished. It will never again attain the levels of prestige and influence it's held over the last three centuries, and the large number of Army prisoners who are settled as military colonists on the Mediterranean coast of Canaan soon find they can defy the Pharaoh with impunity.

Is this really what happened after the Trojan War? Almost certainly not. But it's fun to speculate like this and it does fit some pieces of evidence I do know of:

- The Sea Peoples were a confederation of people from across the Mediterranean world, including Sardinia, Sicily, Greece and Asia Minor (what's now Asian Turkey).

- The main fighting troops in the SP army were sword-armed infantry, plausibly of Greek origin. But if the Greek infantry of the Trojan War were mostly spearmen why are SP infantry fighting with swords barely a decade later? My story provides a speculative explanation.

- The SP army contained a much lower proportion of charioteers than other armies of the time, and while most Asian and African charioteers of the time fought with a bow, SP charioteers largely fought with spears, in the fashion of Greek and other European charioteers.

- The Philistines - the Egyptians' military colonists up the coast from Egypt - are generally considered to have had a Greek origin. It's therefore interesting to consider that Achilles and Goliath may spring from the same culture (and possibly even the same sub-culture), roughly 200 years apart.

Once again, I accept that this is all highly speculative. But it's worth remembering that the Trojan War didn't happen in a vacuum - there were other states in the region at the time about which we know quite a bit, and they all suffered in various ways in the following decades. For me it's very tempting to tie all these events together

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Sheesh. Everyone blames the poor Phoenicians. Read the first words of Herodotus's "Histories":

(Of course, Herodotus was talking about the Persian Wars of the 5th century, not the Trojan Wars. But still - the Phoenicians again?

Yes I used that wording for that reason!

These are the researches of Herodotus of Halicarnassus, which he publishes, in the hope of thereby preserving from decay the remembrance of what men have done, and of preventing the great and wonderful actions of the Greeks and the Barbarians from losing their due meed of glory; and withal to put on record what were their grounds of feuds. According to the Persians best informed in history, the Phoenicians began to quarrel.

Three brownie points for being particularly well read and clever.

You may redeem the points from Kmt_Sesh.

Edited by Hanslune
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Missed my chance for the Lesbos joke so...

Vergina.

Yeah, best I could do under the circumstances.

Harte

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....I'd like to talk about these great epics and build on my own knowledge of them. I've read both poems but not for many years. What parts of them do you believe are real and what was their inspiration for the ancient bards? Who really was Homer? Et cetera.

Peripheral topics such as Heinrich Schliemann are also welcomed. The more I can learn and expand my base, the better I will be in the exhibit. So let's share....

Modern info, about the history of empires in the eastern Mediterranean region, indicates that Homer skirted three crucial themes about what "started" the Trojan War.

a) Cyprus was the dominant supplier of copper for Bronze Age Mediterranean societies;

b ) Hittites seized Cyprus, ca. 1230 BC, to supply the Hittite Empire with enough copper to let the Hittite empire continue expanding;

and c) Hittites tried to cut off shipments of copper from Cyprus to the Mycenaean Empire.

Synthesizing info, to explain the Trojan War, is the theme of a paper by Gerard Gertoux, titled The Trojan War: Chronological, Historical and Archaeological Evidence.

https://www.academia.edu/4295118/The_Trojan_War_Chronological_Historical_and_Archaeological_Evidence

Abstract. The Trojan War is the foundation of Greek history. If Greek historians had little doubt of its existence they remained extremely skeptical regarding its mythological origin. Archaeology has confirmed one essential point: there was indeed a general conflagration in the Greek world around 1200 BCE, the assumed period of that war, which caused the disappearance of two powerful empires: Mycenaean on one hand and Hittite with its vassals on the other hand. The inscriptions of Ramses III's year 8 describe actually a general invasion of the Mediterranean by the "Sea Peoples", but without giving any reason. A precise chronological reconstruction, based on few absolute dates shows that the annexation of the kingdom Alasiya (Cyprus), closely linked to the Mediterranean world, by Hittite king Tudhaliya IV (1241-1209), played a role of detonator in the confrontation between a Greek heterogeneous confederation, consisting of pirates and privateers on one side, and a set of vassal Hittite kingdoms, as Troy and Ugarit, on the other. This struggle to control a vital sea path from Crete to Egypt, via Cyprus, ended in complete mutual destruction in 1185 BCE, the climax of the Trojan War, which had begun ten years earlier. Surprisingly, this conclusion was already that of Eratosthenes (276-193). Historical and epigraphic context shows that Homer wrote his epic shortly after Queen Elissa founded Carthage (c. 870 BCE).

endquote

quote from page 26 of the above paper:

The conquest of Cyprus by the Hittite king Tudhaliya IV [1241-1209] will cause a chain reaction ultimately leading to the conflagration called "Attack of the Sea Peoples", of which the Trojan War is the most famous episode. Indeed Cyprus became the heart of global commerce through its copper used to make bronze (the end of Cyprus marks the end of the Bronze Age) that was used to make utensils for palaces and weapons for soldiers. So copper acquired an economic role of first magnitude.

endquote

A Hittite war with Assyria started ca 1232 BC, while the Assyrians were busy in the east, conquering the Kassite Babylonian king Kastiliasu (reigned 1233-1225 BC). (reference, page 26 of the paper)

After ca 1225 BC (with their eastern flank secure), the Assyrians turned their attention to conquering their western flanks.

A map from page 12 of the above paper shows that a highly contested middle-region (perhaps Palistin?; and/or "land of the Peleset"?) was centered between 3 empires: Egyptian, Hittite, and Assyrian. (However, one of the arrows representing "invasion directions" in this map is not quite the way I envision that era. For example; I don't think the Hittite navy from Ugarit invaded Crete and Mycenae at that time, as depicted on the map.)

https://html2-f.scribdassets.com/5g0mna8rls4xgx6s/images/12-af89f20296.jpg

Edited by atalante
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An interesting paper. I don't think I've ever seen the Trojan war as related to the Sea Peoples but the theory puts an interesting spin on things. At the same time, I tend to side with many modern historians who see too much destruction and invasion credited to the Sea Peoples. They probably did not have nearly the widespread effect on the eastern Mediterranean as old theories entertain, but were more of another symptom of the collapse of the Bronze Age. They certainly caused their share of societal upset, however.

Around this time last year I started a thread called Collapse of the Bronze Age to discuss the theories as presented by author Eric Cline. We discussed the topic in detail, and along the way the author himself joined and contributed a number of helpful posts, so I needn't consume this thread with the same information.

Cyprus was indeed an important copper-resource location but the Hittite capture of it wasn't permanent. This, too, was a symptom of the collapse of the Bronze Age—by this point the Hittites were already experiencing decline. In fact, I've read that the Hittite empire had dissolved and its population scattered even by the time the Sea Peoples were ravaging the coastal Levant and Asia Minor (they used to be blamed for the sacking of Hattusa, but this no longer seems to be the case).

I would agree with your skepticism about the Hittite invasions of Crete and Mycenae. I don't know of any solid evidence for their being behind this.

Thanks for the post, atalante.

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Okay, this is my new favourite thread. :)

What do you mean Agamemnon didn't exist?

Achilles, Ajax, Hector, Paris... Hell, even Helen herself could've been fictional.

Wait, I'm selling my Jeep for a trip to Chicago. Do you have an extra couch?

Achilles did exist and he looked just like Brad Pitt. No, wait, that's the movie Troy. I really like that movie.

An obvious thing to remember about some of the details shared in the Iliad is that, as one example, Menelaus was the king of Sparta. Depending on which historian you prefer, the battle in an historic context would've occurred any time between 1250 and 1150 BCE...and Sparta didn't even exist yet. The Spartans arose as we know them in the Archaic period. But the Iliad is loaded with such historical inaccuracies, and its ancient readers wouldn't have known that nor would they have cared. It was a story which took place in the Bronze Age but its details and events were definitely contemporary to the Iron Age.

Do come to the exhibit. I don't have a spare couch for you but the boiler room in my apartment building is cozy and warm. If not there, maybe you could shack up in our museum's full-size replica of a Pawnee earth lodge. I hear the buffalo robes are bug free and very comfy.

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Awwww man, I miss the Field museum. How long is the exhibit going on?

The exhibits ends April 10. You're practically my neighbor, so no excuses. Get across the lake!

Well, I'm kind of hoping all of the museums that contributed artifacts will succumb to amnesia and will utterly forget we have their Greek stuff.

So, Kmt. Your extra couch.

First dibs!

Still no extra couch. The only one I have is where I store my ancient mummies.

...but I want to talk about the Cypris, the Aethiopis, the Little Iliad, the Iliou Persis, the Nostoi and the Telegony! Why you got restrict it to just the Iliad and the Odyssey?

--Jaylemurph

You just went way over my head, of course. I've never read those.

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Keep it simple.

ETA: Lesbos.

I was waiting for someone to do that. However, I expected it to be Harte.

Missed my chance for the Lesbos joke so...

Vergina.

Yeah, best I could do under the circumstances.

Harte

The final gallery is on Philip II and Alexander the Great, so if you look in there, you'll see Vergina all over the place.

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Some of the archaeological exploits behind the artifacts are fun. There are two Mycenaean death masks on display, both originally excavated from Grave Circle A at the site of Mycenae. Heinrich Schliemann was the leader of the dig, in the 1870s. This one is real, and was found first by Schliemann. Soon after he found this one, which is actually a replica in the exhibit but made of real gold (Greece will not allow the real mask to travel).

Upon finding the first one, Schliemann exclaimed, "I have gazed upon the eyes of Agamemnon!" Yet once he found the second one, which is of higher quality, Schliemann is supposed to have said, "No, now I have gazed upon the eyes of Agamemnon!"

I am not a great fan of Heinrich Schliemann but no one can deny his passion in his quest for finding proof of the Iliad. He really didn't understand what he was digging up. He was convinced he had found the grave of the legendary Agamemnon, but both of the death masks date to several centuries earlier than the events of the Iliad.

One of my favorite displays are the kouros statues in one of the Archaic galleries. They look like this. Two are of males (singular kouros, plural kouroi) and two are of females (kore/korai). I'm not well versed on the ancient Greek language but I understand either term can mean "youth" but kouros refers specifically to "boy" and kore to "girl." In typical fashion the males are nude and the females wear long gowns. Lots of people enjoy these statues, and to my surprise only some of the little kids giggle at the exposed weenies and butts.

Here's a photo of us docents walking into the Field Museum to work in the exhibit. That's me at the front.

Yeah, right.

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Some of the archaeological exploits behind the artifacts are fun. There are two Mycenaean death masks on display, both originally excavated from Grave Circle A at the site of Mycenae. Heinrich Schliemann was the leader of the dig, in the 1870s. This one is real, and was found first by Schliemann. Soon after he found this one, which is actually a replica in the exhibit but made of real gold (Greece will not allow the real mask to travel).

Upon finding the first one, Schliemann exclaimed, "I have gazed upon the eyes of Agamemnon!" Yet once he found the second one, which is of higher quality, Schliemann is supposed to have said, "No, now I have gazed upon the eyes of Agamemnon!"

I am not a great fan of Heinrich Schliemann but no one can deny his passion in his quest for finding proof of the Iliad. He really didn't understand what he was digging up. He was convinced he had found the grave of the legendary Agamemnon, but both of the death masks date to several centuries earlier than the events of the Iliad.

One of my favorite displays are the kouros statues in one of the Archaic galleries. They look like this. Two are of males (singular kouros, plural kouroi) and two are of females (kore/korai). I'm not well versed on the ancient Greek language but I understand either term can mean "youth" but kouros refers specifically to "boy" and kore to "girl." In typical fashion the males are nude and the females wear long gowns. Lots of people enjoy these statues, and to my surprise only some of the little kids giggle at the exposed weenies and butts.

Here's a photo of us docents walking into the Field Museum to work in the exhibit. That's me at the front.

Yeah, right.

Those two words still mean girl/boy in modern Greek.

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Around this time last year I started a thread called Collapse of the Bronze Age to discuss the theories as presented by author Eric Cline. We discussed the topic in detail, and along the way the author himself joined and contributed a number of helpful posts, so I needn't consume this thread with the same information

I remember the thread. It actually persuaded me to get both the audio and a print copy of Mr. Cline's book. Either/both of which are worth the price IMHO.

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I remember the thread. It actually persuaded me to get both the audio and a print copy of Mr. Cline's book. Either/both of which are worth the price IMHO.

I enjoyed that thread a lot. It may be my favorite of the limited number of threads I've started, and it was especially enjoyable to have Cline himself join the discussion. I still wonder what he must have thought of some of the stranger comments, and whether he understood the nature of UM. But he was a good sport for contributing his time and knowledge. And his continues to be, by far, the best book I've read on the collapse of the Bronze Age.

Cline came to lecture at the Oriental Institute, one of the Chicago museums at which I'm a docent. With great regret I was unable to attend but his lecture was very well received, I'm told.

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How do our the folks here view the Aeneid? A worthy follow on to the I & O or Roman derivative trash?

I read it in its Penguin prose version not as a poem.

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