Brandon Prince
Professor Joel Christensen
Classics 4973
8 May 2012
Topic Summary
The Trojan War has always occupied a special place in history. It exists outside of time in a place where man and myth meet and the ancient gods and goddesses preside over everything. But it is also a historical event replete with dates, locations and historical evidence to be sifted through. This nexus between myth and ancient history exists for all cultures and can be as ancient as the culture itself. As long as cultural memory exists there will always be a time before time, when the foundational stories that laid the groundwork for a society will have taken place. One defining characteristic of our culture is that we have to know the truth value in everything, especially those things which have influenced us as greatly as the Homeric epics have influenced us. So in our contemporary context examining the historicity of the Trojan War is a topic of great interest.
There once was an ancient city called Troy much like the Troy that Homer describes in his epics. There likely was a Trojan War waged by the Mycenaean Greeks against the Trojans; it is even more probable that there were several. And Troy VI-h, the Troy Homer brings to mind, that Troy was destroyed catastrophically. But beyond those generalized, non-specific statements not much more can be definitively stated in regards to actual facts we know about the Trojan War.
But regardless of its historicity Troy exists. In the hearts and minds of people across the world there has always been an Achilles and a Hector. The influence of these epics is undeniable and regardless of the truth content that the Iliad or the Odyssey provide, the lessons they have taught for over two millennia in western society are still being taught today. Homer’s Troy needs no Hisarlik, no Schliemann at Knossos. The Troy that Homer built still stands today.
The Trojan War 
“The Troy that Homer built still stands today.” A nice turn of phrase that confirms the epic’s own claims to kleos. Have you read the Gilgamesh poems that begin and end with a recitation of the size of the walls of Uruk–a metaphor as well for the building of the poem that translates into the eternal fame of the eponymous hero?
The niceness of your turn of phrase does distract a bit from what we can learn from the several Troys that do exist. How do these tangible Troys make us read Homer’s Troy differently?