The Trojan Horse: Fact And Fiction?

A Case Of No Smoke Without Fire?

These days, when people hear the word Trojan their first thought might be of a pernicious piece of malware that outwardly poses as a normal functioning application but underneath conceals a virus that is going to engage in some unethical hack of a PC system. But the naming of this deceptive virus was inspired by a story in Greek Mythology known as the Trojan Horse, of a relatively well-known military encounter in ancient Greece.

The Story

As the legend goes, Greek soldiers had laid siege to the ancient city of Troy for 10 years to no avail. However, in a feat of ingenious subterfuge, the Greeks built a giant wooden horse and presented it as a gift or offering to the Gods, leaving it outside the gates of Troy. Curious, city guards wheeled the wooden horse into Troy, unaware that Greek Soldiers were hidden inside. Once inside, the soldiers surprised the guards and took the City of Troy.

Questions

This mythical military deception has clearly an aura of incredulity about it. Surely, a large, unexplained vessel like this, (large enough to fit an entire insurgency force in) would have drawn some suspicion? Could that many soldiers have been silent for that long? Wouldn’t they have suffocated or overheated? The obvious impracticalities seem endless.

Historians have also questioned the tale. For example, while archaeological evidence indicates that Troy was burned down, there is no such evidence of the existence of the Trojan Horse. This idea or myth was mentioned in The Odyssey by Homer, who was one of the greatest of the Ancient Greek Poets. He was a bard or minstrel, a bit like Alan a Dale in Robin Hood or Jaskier in the Witcher, and it is hard to know how much historical faith can be placed in such oral minstrelsy.

The Expert’s Views On The Trojan Horse

As a result, various experts including historians at Oxford university have come down heavily on the side of myth: they believe that the Trojan Horse is an imaginative fable potentially inspired by the way in which siege engines were clothed in damp horse hide to prevent them from being set alight. There seem to be lots of different variations of siege engines deployed but one such model bore structural similarity to the Trojan Horse. This was a large square tower on wheels from which men could get to the top of the wall and it may be that the myth was imaginatively constructed around this!