The Trojan War

The Trojans lived in the city of Troy in what is now Turkey. The story of their war with the Greeks is told in the Iliad, a long poem dating from the 700s BCE, and said to be by a storyteller named Homer. The Odyssey, also by Homer, is the tale of the adventures of a Greek soldier named Odysseus, after the war.

Around 1200 BCE Helen of Troy was stolen from Sparta and taken to the city of Troy, by the Prince of Troy, Paris. The Trojan war raged on for ten years. In single combat, the greatest Greek warrior, Achilles, killed the Trojan leader Hector. In the end the Greeks won, by a clever trick using a wooden horse. Those who believe the stories of the Trojan war depict an actual conflict between 1194-1184 BCE. However, Greek scholars dated the conflict in the 13th or 12 century BCE. The story of the Trojan war is told through Homer’s epic poems The Iliad and The Odyssey.

Troy Troy was at first unknown to be factual city, known through Homer’s The Iliad and

the Odyssey, until an Archaeologist, Heinrich Schliemann in 1870 followed the geographical clues in the 'Iliad' and began excavating North West Turkey. He was convinced he had found the legendary city of Troy and excavated a hill called Hisarlick, in Anatolia, on Turkey's coast. He discovered huge city walls and evidence of a city destroyed by fire. The archaeology site called Troia, where the city is now called now Truva by the Turkish Government.

In 1988, Manfred Kauffman along with a Team from the University of Tubingen and Cincinnati excavated this site further. Findings included arrowheads that dated to the 12 Century BC. He is also reported to have found a deep ditch around the city, as Kauffman explains this ditch would be means of defense of a much larger city than originally thought.

However, it was still unclear which level of the city was Homer's Troy of 1200 BC, which was destroyed by the Greeks, as there are nine consecutive levels of occupation at Hisarlick. There are two levels that fit this period which are named Troy VI and Troy VII, archaeologists are agreeable to VII, which was destroyed by Fire in 1250 BC-1200BC. At this time, as told by Homer's Iliad the King of Troy, was Priam, which waged war upon the Trojans by the Achaeans (Greeks) over Helen, the wife of Agamemnon, who was kidnapped by Paris, the Prince of Troy. As Paris refused to return Helen, the War is thought to have lasted about ten years or more and eventually the Greeks won by using the deception of offering the Trojans a statue of a Horse as a gift that they would take inside the Walls of Troy, once inside the statue was filled with the Greek warriors that were able to open the Gates of Troy allowing and the Greeks to overcome, burn and pillage the city. Other references to the City of Troy include Homer's Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid. The language spoken in the ancient city of Troy is not certain, but though that the inhabitants, Trojans could understand Greek.

Greece About 3000 BC, there lived on the island of Crete a people now called

Minoans. The name comes from their King Minos. Minos and other Minoan kings grew rich from trade, and built fine palaces. The Minoan civilization ended about 1450 BC.

After the Minoans came the Myceneans. They were soldiers from mainland Greece, and were the Greeks who fought Troy in the 1200s BC. After the Mycenean age ended, about 1100 BC, Greece entered a "Dark Age". This lasted until the 800s BC when the Greeks set off by sea to explore and set up colonies. The Olympic Games began in 776 BC. This was the start of "Archaic" Greek civilization.

Around 480 BC the "golden age" of Greece began. This is what historians call "Classical" Greece.

Ancient Greece is called 'the birthplace of Western civilization. About 2500 years ago, the Greeks created a way of life that other people admired and copied. The Romans copied Greek art and Greek gods, for example. The Ancient Greeks tried out democracy, started the Olympic Games and left new ideas in science, art, and philosophy. The Ancient Greeks lived in mainland Greece and the Greek islands, but also in what is now Turkey, and in colonies scattered around the Mediterranean sea coast. There were Greeks in Italy, Sicily, North Africa and as far west as France . Sailing the sea to trade and find new land, Greeks took their way of life many places.

Homer Little is known about the life of Homer, the author credited with composing The Iliad and The Odyssey and is arguably the greatest poet of the ancient world. Historians place his birth sometime around 750 BCE and conjecture that he was born and resided in or near Chios. However, seven cities claimed to have been his birthplace. Due to the lack of information about Homer the person, many scholars hold the poems themselves as the best windows into his life. For instance, it is from the description of the blind bard in The Odyssey that many historians have guessed that Homer was blind. The Odyssey‘s depiction of the bard as a minstrel in the service of local kings also gives some insight into the life of the poet practicing his craft. What is undeniable is that the works of Homer proved to be the most influential not merely for the poets of ancient times but also for the later epic poets of Western literature. There is much evidence to support the theory that The Iliad and The Odyssey were written by different authors, perhaps as much as a century apart. The diction of the two works is markedly different, with The Iliad being reminiscent of a much more formal, theatric style while The Odyssey takes a more novelistic approach and uses language more illustrative of day-to-day speech. Differing historical details concerning trade also lend credence to the idea of separate authors. It is certain, that neither text was written down upon creation. By the eighth century BC written text had been almost entirely forgotten in Greece. Both The Iliad and The Odyssey conform to the diction of a purely oral and unwritten poetic speech that was used before the end of that century. Indeed, some scholars believe the name “Homer” was actually a commonly used term for blind men who wandered the countryside reciting epic poetry. Although Homer has been credited with writing a number of other works, most notably the Homeric Hymns, the same uncertainty about authorship exists. It is assumed that much of the poet’s work has been lost to time.

ARISTOTLE Aristotle was born in Stagira in north Greece, the son of Nichomachus, the court physician to the Macedonian royal family. He was trained first in medicine, and then in 367 he was sent to Athens to study philosophy with Plato. He stayed at Plato's Academy until about 347. Though a brilliant pupil, Aristotle opposed some of Plato's teachings, and when Plato died, Aristotle was not appointed head of the Plato’s Academy. After leaving Athens, Aristotle spent some time traveling in Asia Minor (now Turkey) and its islands. He returned to Macedonia in 338 to tutor Alexander the Great; after Alexander conquered Athens, Aristotle returned to Athens and set up a school of his own, known as the Lyceum. After Alexander's death, Athens rebelled against Macedonian rule, and Aristotle's political situation became precarious. To avoid being put to death, he fled to the island of Euboea, where he died. Where Aristotle differed most sharply from medieval and modern thinkers was in his belief that the universe had never had a beginning and would never end; it was eternal. Change, to Aristotle, was cyclical: water, for instance, might evaporate from the sea and rain down again, and rivers might come into existence and then perish, but overall conditions would never change. In the later Middle Ages, Aristotle's work was rediscovered and enthusiastically adopted by medieval scholars. His followers called him Ille Philosophus (The Philosopher), or "the master of them that know," and many accepted every word of his writings -- or at least every word that did not contradict the Bible -- as eternal truth. Fused and reconciled with Christian doctrine into a philosophical system known as Scholasticism, Aristotelian philosophy became the official philosophy of the Roman Catholic Church. As a result, some scientific discoveries in the Middle Ages and Renaissance were criticized simply because they were not found in Aristotle. It is one of the ironies of the history of science that Aristotle's writings, which in many cases were based on first-hand observation, were used to impede observational science.