The epic poem called the Iliad is the product of a tradition of oral poetry recited by generations of singers to audiences who were already familiar with the myths and believed that these stories of earlier heroes and heroines, goddesses and gods, were basically true.The events of the Iliad take place during the Trojan War, a ten-year conflict between the various cities of Greece and the non-Greek city of Troy in Asia Minor (modern Turkey). Troy is also called Ilion, and so the name Iliad means "poem of Troy."
Since the story was traditional and the audience already knew it, here is an account of the myths you need to know as you begin to read the Iliad. Each new name is in bold-face. You are responsible for knowing the story and the correct spelling of each and every name.
There are a lot of new names, and they may seem confusing at first. As you read the Iliad, they will quickly become familiar. You will probably want to re-read this page from time to time to make sure that the names, and the story, make sense.
1. Generations of the Gods
The Greeks did not believe that a god or gods created the earth or that Zeus, the king of the gods, had always been in power. According to one myth, first Earth came into being, along with Tartaros (the underworld), Chaos (a gap between Earth and Tartaros), and Eros (Love). Earth then created Sky (Ouranos) to be her husband. Sky would not allow their children to be born, so Earth gave to her unborn son Kronos, trapped in her womb, a sickle with which he castrated his father Sky. Then Kronos and his sisters and brothers were born; they were the earlier generation of gods called the Titans. Kronos, king of the Titans, took his sister Rhea as wife, but since he feared being overthrown by his children, he ate each child as it was born. With Earth's help, Rhea substituted a stone for her newborn son Zeus; when Zeus grew up, he caused Kronos to vomit up the other children. These younger gods then defeated Kronos and the Titans in battle and banished them to Tartaros.
Zeus and his brothers and sisters are the Olympian gods whom the Greeks worshipped and who play important roles in Homer's epic poem the Iliad.
2. The Threat to Zeus
Even when Zeus and the other Olympians had defeated the Titans, the rule of Zeus was not secure. Hera, a sister of Zeus, became his wife, but Zeus also fathered children with many other goddesses and mortal women. There was a prophecy, however, that the son of one of these would be stronger than his father, so that if Zeus had a child by her, he would be overthrown.
Zeus discovered that the prophecy referred to Thetis, a sea-goddess, so he arranged for her to be married to a mortal man, Peleus, king of a region in northern Greece called Phthia. Their son was Achilles, the hero of the Iliad: stronger than his father Peleus, but nonetheless a man, not a god.
3. The Judgment of Paris
At the wedding of Peleus and Thetis gods and mortals gathered together for a great feast. The goddess Eris (Strife), naturally, was not invited. To get even, she fashioned a golden apple, inscribed it with the phrase "to the most beautiful," and tossed it among the party-goers.
Immediately three of the goddesses at the banquet--Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, began arguing about who should get the apple. To resolve their quarrel they journeyed to the mountains above Troy. There they found Paris (also called Alexandros), one of the sons of Priam, king of Troy, tending a flock of sheep.
Each of the goddesses offered Paris a bribe: Hera, since she was queen of the gods, offered royal power; Athena, since she was a warrior goddess, offered victory in battle; Aphrodite, since she was the goddess of sexuality, offered Helen, the most beautiful woman in the world.
Needless to say, Paris pronounced Aphrodite the winner and was awarded Helen.
4. The Greek Expedition against Troy
Unfortunately, Helen was already married--to Menelaos, king of Sparta, a prominent city in Greece. After Paris visited Sparta and left with Helen, Menelaos called on his brother Agamemnon (like Menelaos, a son of Atreus), king of the city Mykenai and the greatest among Greek kings, to lead an expedition to Troy to get Helen back.
Each of the cities of Greece sent its own contingent of warriors to Troy, led by their own king or prince. (They had agreed to do this when all the noblest men of Greece were competing to marry Helen.)
The Greeks--called by Homer Danaans, Argives, or Achaians since there was not yet a single name for them--arrived at Troy, set up a camp on the nearby shore of the Aegean Sea, and besieged the city.
The siege lasted for ten years (some versions of the myth said twenty), and in that time many of the finest Greek and Trojan warriors were killed, including Achilles, whom Paris killed with an arrow, and Hektor, leader of the Trojan army and the most prominent of king Priam's many sons.
5. The Fall of Troy
Finally, the Greeks conquered Troy not by force but by stealth. On the advice of Odysseus, their cleverest speaker and most devious tactician, the Greeks constructed an enormous wooden horse and hid their best warriors inside. Then the rest of the army pretended that they were giving up and going home. They boarded their ships and sailed away, but anchored nearby, concealed by an island.
The Trojans, believing that the horse was an offering to the gods who had protected Troy, dragged it into the city. After night fell, while the Trojans were celebrating their apparent deliverance, the Greeks came out of the horse, opened the gates to the returning Greek army, and spread slaughter everywhere.
Troy was destroyed utterly; the king, Priam was killed; the women were carried into slavery.
(The story of how the Greek heroes returned from Troy is another tale, told most notably in the Odyssey, companion poem to the Iliad, which tells of Odysseus' ten-year voyage home to the island of Ithaka, his wife Penelope, and his son Telemachos.)
6. What is the Iliad about?
The Iliad, a poem of about 15,000 lines in 24 books (i.e., chapters), does not tell of the Judgment of Paris, nor the Trojan Horse, nor most of the war itself.
Instead, the Iliad describes what happened during a few weeks in the final year of the Trojan War. Its theme--announced by the first word of the Greek text--is not the war in general but the wrath of Achilles.
In Book 1 of the Iliad you will see the beginning of the terrible quarrel between the Greek commander-in-chief, Agamemnon, and Achilles, the best of the Greek warriors. The quarrel and its deadly consequences carry the action all the way through to the end of Book 24.
7. Other Characters in Book 1
Your first assignment in the Iliad is the most challenging, since every character will be new to you.
The Iliad is a vast poem with hundreds of characters, but the basic story is straightforward. Here are other important characters whom you will meet in Book 1:
8. Suggestions for Reading Book 1 of the IliadApollo (son of Zeus and the goddess Leto), a Greek god who, like Aphrodite, favors the Trojan side in the war Chryses, priest of Apollo and ally of the Trojans, who seeks to ransom his captive daughter Chryseis from Agamemnon and return to his home, the city of Chryse near Troy Kalchas, a prophet who interprets the will of the gods for the Greek army Briseis, a captive woman awarded as a prize to Achilles and taken from him by Agamemnon Nestor, a senior Greek warrior and would-be peacemaker between Achilles and Agamemnon Hephaistos, blacksmith of the gods and peacemaker between Zeus and Hera One good way of making sure you understand what you're reading is to write out a brief summary of each event in Book 1 as soon as you've finished reading that part of the text. This is much more valuable than consulting outline books such as Monarch Notes, which give you ready-made summaries. If you make your own summary, you are much more likely to remember important points about the story.
You should also be sure to answer the questions posed in the Study Guide and then take the self-correcting quiz which is provided for every assignment in Virtual Core 1. Even though these quizzes do not count, they are required. I will assume that you have checked yourself and mastered the information covered in each quiz.
Finally, and most importantly, when you have read and re-read Book 1 of the Iliad, and checked yourself by taking the quiz, you will be ready to post a contribution to our first Caucus discussion topic.
Be sure to read the question carefully, think about it, and make notes before you post your response. It's especially important--and it will make the difference between a good grade and a bad grade in this course--that you make specific references to the text of Homer's Iliad in your response. The goal of our on-line discussions is to understand the text, not to produce general statements unsupported by evidence.
Be patient and persevering as you read Homer for the first time. From past experience, I can guarantee that you will soon see why the ancient Greeks, and many who have come after them, have enjoyed hearing and reading the Iliad.
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