Transcript The Trojan War - Mrs. Sellers' Class Website

The Trojan War
Oct. 2013
Because we ain’t done no mythology
yet this year. 
Homer
According to tradition, the poet
Homer lived in Greece sometime
around 800’s-700’s BC. .
Legend says that Homer was blind.
The epic poems the Iliad and the
Odyssey are attributed to him.
The great Trojan War is believed to
have been fought around 1200 BC.
Eris and the Apple of Discord
Eris, goddess of discord, crashes the wedding of the sea nymph
Thetis and the mortal Peleus. She brings a golden apple
inscribed “to the fairest.” Three goddesses immediately claim it.
Athena
Hera
Aphrodite
The Contest
Zeus refuses to judge, so the goddesses ask Prince Paris of Troy
to decide who gets the apple. Paris is promised many things…
…Hera promises
him the kingship
of Europe and
Asia…
Aphrodite promises
him the most
beautiful woman in
the world as his
bride…
…and Athena
promises him
victory over the
Greeks in war.
Paris Chooses a Bride…
Paris chooses Aphrodite.
The most beautiful woman in the world’s name is
Helen. She is a mortal daughter of Zeus.
Problem: She is already married to King Menelaus
of Sparta.
Helen was so beautiful that her father, Tyndareus,
made all her suitors swear an oath. Whoever did
not win her hand in marriage would have to
support the winner in battle. This way, no wars
would be fought over her.
…and the Trojan War Begins.
A thousand ships set sail for the fourwalled city of Troy, led by Menelaus.
The war lasted ten years.
ODYSSEUS
• Odysseus was king of the island of Ithaca.
• Odysseys was the wisest and most clever
of all the Greeks.
• He was a suitor of Helen but did not want
to go to war.
• He pretended to be insane by planting
salt.
• The Greek leaders put his son in front of
his plow to see if he was really crazy…he
turned the plow aside so as not to hit the
baby.
• His story after the Trojan War is told in the
Odyssey
The Tale of Mighty Achilles
– Son of Thetis and Peleus
– Greatest Greek warrior
– After he was born, Thetis
dipped him into the waters
of the River Styx, which
made him invulnerable in
battle.
– But---she held him by his
heel, so that spot didn’t get
the magic protection.
MIGHTY ACHILLES
– His mother Thetis had a prophecy that
Achilles would live either a short and
glorious life, or a long and unknown life.
– His mother hid him in a palace disguised as
a girl so he wouldn’t be found to join the
fighting in the Trojan War
– Achilles was tricked into revealing his true
identity!
– He was glad to join the army.
Agamemnon, Lord of Men
Brother of Menelaus, son of Atreus.
Brother-in-law of the kidnapped Helen.
He was the commander of armies.
He stole Achilles’ prize slave maiden, Bryseis, after
being forced to give up his own prize slave maiden
Chryseis.
He was later murdered in cold blood by his
wife’s boyfriend, Aegisthus, when he got
home from the Trojan War.
Achilles, continued
He stayed in his
tent a long time,
and refused to
fight even when
Agamemnon
brought her back.
Achilles refuses to
fight in the Trojan War
because Agamemnon
had stolen his prize
lady.
Achilles’ best friend.
He wears Achilles’
armor into battle,
and is killed by the
mighty Prince Hector
of Troy.
Patroclus:
Achilles swears
vengeance, and
his mother has
the god
Hephaestus make
him some new
armor.
Achilles, continued
Achilles dons his new armor, confronts Prince
Hector, and kills him.
Then he ties Hector’s body to the back of his
chariot and drags it around the walls of Troy.
This did not please the gods.
• Hector’s father, King Priam, sneaks into the Greek camp
at night and begs Achilles to return Hector’s body for
proper burial.
• Achilles surrenders the body and allows for 11 days of
non-fighting so the Trojans can observe funeral rites for
Hector.
Achilles, concluded
Later, Apollo caused an
arrow, shot by Paris
himself, to fly at the
only vulnerable spot
on Achilles’ body, the
heel, and kill him.
Odysseus was given the mighty armor in
remembrance of the mighty Achilles.
Odysseus and the Trojan Horse
The most formidable of all of the Argive captains
was Odysseus, Son of Laertes and King of Ithaca.
Wise beyond comparison,
Odysseus was a master of
disguise, of craftiness, of
cunning, and of guile—no one
could outwit this man “skilled
in all ways of contending.”
The Plan
• Odysseus had the Greeks build a
large wooden horse. A small group of
soldiers hid inside it.
• The rest of the Greeks sailed away
and hid their ships behind a nearby
island.
• The Trojans assumed the Greeks had
left, and dragged the “religious
offering” of the horse into their city.
• The prophet Laocoon tried to warn
them, but was eaten by a sea serpent
sent by Poseidon.
• The hidden soldiers sneaked out at
night and threw open the gates of
Troy.
• The Greek army, who had sailed back,
entered the city.
Troy fell overnight.
The Aftermath
• The Trojan women are captured as slaves.
• Troy is burned to the ground.
• The infant son of Hector is thrown from the walls to
die.
• The Greeks return home.
• Odysseus, however, takes 10 years to return home
and has many adventures. (his story is told in the
Odyssey by Homer)
• The Romans believed that Aeneas was a Trojan
survivor of the war who sailed to Italy and became
an ancestor of Romulus and Remus. (his story is told
in The Aeneid by Vergil, Rome’s greatest poem/poet)
Modern Connections
please copy these on your paper!
• Achilles’ heel: someone’s vulnerability or
weakness
• Trojan horse: a concealed danger that
appears innocent
• the face that launched a thousand ships: any
one person who causes disaster or war
• a judgment of Paris: any difficult decision
• odyssey: a long journey to a goal or
destination