ancient Greek warfare Archives - Page 2 of 2

Is There Really a Scene in the ‘Iliad’ Where Achilles Calls Hektor Out of Troy to Face Him?

If you ask someone who has never read the Iliad to name one scene from it, chances are, the first scene that person will probably name is the scene with the Trojan Horse. The Trojan Horse, though, is actually never even mentioned in the Iliad. The Iliad ends with the funeral of Hektor, long before the fall of Troy. The story of the Trojan Horse is first told in flashback by the blind bard Demodokos in Book Eight of the Odyssey.

If you tell the person that the Iliad ends with the funeral of Hektor and ask them to name another scene, then they’ll probably tell you the iconic scene where Achilles goes to the gates of Troy and calls for Hektor to come out and face him. It’s a scene that appears in nearly every adaptation of the Trojan War made in the past two decades. That scene, though, doesn’t appear in the Iliad at all either. In fact, it doesn’t appear in any ancient source whatsoever; it is purely an invention of Hollywood.

Ares Is Actually Kind of Pathetic

Sometimes it can be fun to debate which of the Twelve Olympians in Greek mythology were more powerful than others. Obviously, there is no doubting that Zeus was the most powerful, but the others are open to discussion. Because what a person considers “powerful” varies from one person to another, you can often make a case one way or another. I, however, think that the weakest of the Twelve Olympians in Greek mythology is clear and obvious: Ares.

“Archimedes’s Death Ray” Debunked

Most people with an interest in the history of science have heard the famous story of “Archimedes’s death ray.” In case you are unfamiliar with it, it goes like this: Supposedly, during the Siege of the Greek city of Syracuse by the Romans, lasting from spring of 213 BC through autumn of 212 BC, the brilliant Syracusan inventor and mathematician Archimedes (lived c. 287 – c. 212 BC) developed a spectacular invention to keep the Roman ships at bay; he built a death ray using mirrors to concentrate the light of the sun on the Roman ships, thereby setting them on fire. Unfortunately for all the people out there who love a good story about a brilliant inventor fending off enemy forces using science, the story of “Archimedes’s death ray” is certainly apocryphal.