Category: Troy

When it comes to marriage, even the most beautiful and desirable women and the most powerful and sage men can turn a blind eye to the conspiracies of people. As obvious as it may seem, marriages are not always founded on love and affection; sometimes, it takes excellent alliances to bring two people together.

The most beautiful woman in Greece

Helen was the most beautiful woman of the age of heroes in Greek mythology. She was the wife of Menelaus, the king of Sparta. Helen of Troy, also known as Helen of Sparta, is a figure from Greek mythology whose elopement or abduction by the Trojan prince Paris sparked the Trojan War. Helen was the wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta, and was regarded as the most beautiful woman in the world. Menelaus convinced his brother Agamemnon, king of Mycenae, to form a large army and besiege the powerful city of Troy in order to recapture Helen.

Helen returned home with Menelaus after the Greek victory in the war, but she became a symbol of moral failure and the dangers of placing lust over reason in the ancient world. Helen had a divine form and was the focus of cults at numerous Greek sites, including Rhodes, Sparta, and Therapy.

Helen was the daughter of Zeus and Leda, the queen of Sparta, and the wife of Tyndareus in Greek mythology. Zeus disguised himself as a swan to seduce Leda, and Helen was the result of their passionate relationship. In another version of the myth, Helen’s mother is the goddess Nemesis, the personification of vengeance. Helen is born from an egg in both versions, regardless of who her mother is. Helen’s siblings included the hero twins Castor and Pollux and Clytemnestra, the future wife of King Agamemnon, king of Mycenae. One day, Tyndareus offered sacrifices to all the gods but forgot Aphrodite. Angered by the slight, the goddess vowed that all of the king’s daughters would become notorious for adultery.

Capture by Theseus

Theseus was considered an early king of Athens in Greek mythology. His most celebrated adventure was the slaying of King Minos’s fearsome Minotaur. During the Classical period, Theseus came to symbolize the ideal Athenian: a man of action who was committed to serving his city to the best of his ability and a staunch defender of democracy. Theseus had not yet given up on finding a suitable wife, despite the tragic endings of his relationships with Ariadne, Antiope, and Phaedra. This time, he aimed somewhat higher. Instead of an Amazon queen or a granddaughter of Zeus, Theseus pursued a daughter of Zeus: Helen, a princess of Sparta who would become famous for sparking the Trojan War and was an exceptional beauty.

Therefore, Theseus and Pirithous, king of Larissa, went to Sparta and kidnapped Helen when she was 10 or 11 years old. Then, they brought her to Aphidnae, a small city outside of Athens. There, Helen cared for Aethra, Theseus’ mother. Then it was Pirithous’ turn to choose a wife, and he chose Persephone, the goddess of the underworld. Therefore, the two friends descended to Hades to retrieve her. But Hades, the supreme god of the underworld, realized that his guests intended to capture Persephone, so he imprisoned Theseus and let his dog Cerberus tear Pirithous to pieces. By the time Theseus was imprisoned in the Underworld, Helen’s brothers Castor and Pollux, also known as the Dioscuri, had invaded Aphidnae, rescued Helen and returned her to Sparta.

Menelaus

Menelaus was the king of Sparta and the husband of Helen, whose abduction by the Trojan prince Paris precipitated the legendary Trojan War. Menelaus was the son of Atreus, king of Mycenae and younger brother of Agamemnon, according to Greek mythology. In some traditions, the two brothers were the grandchildren of Atreus, but he raised them after his son and their father Pleisthenes died prematurely. Their mother was Aerope, the daughter of the king of Crete, Catreus. The family union between Greece and Crete may have reflected a desire on the part of Bronze Age Mycenaean Greeks to claim some sort of cultural heritage from the earlier Minoan civilization on that island.

Helena’s Return

Sparta was celebrating Helen’s return after her brothers had rescued her. Helen was looking for a suitor at this time because she was constantly at risk of kidnapping. Helen was the most desired and sought-after princess in Greece due to her ethereal beauty. After word spread that Helen had reached marriageable age, all of her suitors rushed to Sparta. The king was unable to choose between all of the suitors.

Odysseus, king of the island of Ithaca, was among the nobles present at the court. It was rumored that he was the son of Sisyphus due to his intelligence and cunning. Odysseus was uninterested in Helen because he believed that such a beautiful woman would only bring him trouble and misery. Instead, he had Penelope, Helen’s sister, in his sights. She was less attractive than Helen, but much smarter and more intelligent. Odysseus approached the king, made a proposal, and asked him to use his influence over his brother Icarus to convince him to marry Penelope. This would relieve the king of the burden of selecting a suitor for Helen.

The Last Suitor

After hearing the Proposal, the king agreed and declared that Helen would choose her own husband and that he would not interfere with the will of the gods. Helen was permitted to choose her own spouse. As she evaluated the men present, she noticed Prince Menelaus. Her knees began to shake because he was so charming and handsome. Helen chose Menelaus in accordance with the king’s and Odysseus’s plan, and Menelaus reciprocated by recognizing Helen’s immaturity. Helen had many famous suitors, but she ultimately married Agamemnon’s brother Menelaus, king of Sparta. As part of the marriage agreement, Tyndareus sacrificed a horse and made all the Greek leaders swear to recognize Helen as Menelaus’ rightful wife and to protect his daughter from harm. When the time came for battle, this oath would have grave consequences. Before Menelaus married Helen, Helen’s earthly father Tyndareus extracted an oath from the Achaean leaders that they would all bring their troops to retrieve Helen for her rightful husband should she be kidnapped again. When Paris took Helen to Troy, Agamemnon gathered these Achaean leaders and compelled them to keep their word. This marked the beginning of the Trojan War.

The movie Troy is about the conflict between the Greek city-states, led by Agamemnon, and Troy, ruled by Priam. These two have this conflict because Paris, Prince of Troy, fell in love with Helen, wife of Menelaus who is Agamemnon’s brother and king of Sparta, and took her back to Troy against the wishes of his brother, Hector, who, with his father, had been trying for years to make peace with Sparta and had finally gotten that peace. Agamemnon had recently united all of the Greek city-states and wanted to take over Troy too, so this conflict over Helen was his perfect opportunity.

He uses the main character, Achilles, to fight his battles, even though Achilles hates fighting for him and only fights for himself. A fleet of one thousand Greek ships sails to Troy and a battle occurs. After Achilles kills Hector out of revenge for Hector killing his cousin Patroclus and drags Hector’s body behind his chariot to the Greek encampment, King Priam comes to the Greek camp by their boats and begs for Hector’s body back, Achilles agrees to give the body back and Achilles promises twelve days of peace.

During these twelve days, the Greeks build a horse, vanish inside of it and make it seem that they were cursed with a plague. The Trojans come to the camp after twelve days and find all the Greeks gone but there was a huge horse, which they saw as a gift. They take it back into the city walls and celebrate, but at night, the Greeks come out of the horse and burn the city down. The movie ends with Achilles being killed by Paris by an arrow shot through the heel when he was trying to rescue Paris’ and Hector’s cousin Briseis, whom he fell in love with, and the city of Troy in ruins.

The Advanced Placement World History theme of State-Building, Expansion, and Conflict is expressed throughout this movie. In the movie, the Greek city-states were creating an empire under the rule of Agamemnon. However, this is inaccurate because there was never one “Greece” as was portrayed in the movie. The Greeks called themselves what they were: Spartans, Argives, Athenians, Achaeans, or Danaans. Referring back to this, in the movie, Odysseus asks Achilles to fight for the sake of the Greeks, which shows a sense of nationalism, which in fact didn’t occur.

Also, there is no legitimate evidence that there was in fact a “Trojan War”. There was a war between the Greek city-states, but we do not have any evidence that a war was fought between the Greeks and the Trojans (Foros). The main reason, in the movie, that the Greeks fought the Trojans was because Helen left the Greek Menelaus for the Trojan Paris because she said that Menelaus was ugly and treated her wrongly. However, this is inaccurate because Helen left Menelaus because she was promised to Paris by Aphrodite after Paris named Aphrodite the most beautiful goddess in a contest between her, Hera, and Athena (Foros).

Other inaccuracies in the plotline are, for instance, in the movie, Achilles was a part of the Trojan Horse incident when in reality, he was killed by Paris before then. Also, in the movie, Agamemnon was killed by Briseis, when he actually was killed after he returned home to Greece by his wife (“Troy” Historical Inaccuracies”). Another inaccuracy is when in the movie Hector’s wife, Andromache, escapes Troy with her and Hector’s son Aeneas when in reality, Aeneas was killed by Odysseus and Andromache became a slave of Achilles’ son (“Troy” Historical Inaccuracies”).

Also, in the movie, Patroclus was Achilles’ cousin when in fact he was Achilles’ close friend. Lastly, there was an inaccuracy when Ajax the Greater was killed by Hector. Ajax the Greater was not killed by anyone and in fact, killed himself. This movie contributed to the understanding of this time period using this theme by expressing how easily people in the Greek city-states went to war and it showed me the violent nature of the Greeks and Trojans. The director showed the point of view of greed and wanting to expand and conquer the world with Agamemnon’s personality.

I believe this theme was clearly expressed in this movie Another theme that was expressed in this movie was the theme of the Development and Interaction of Cultures. The movie clearly expressed the religions and ideologies of the Greeks and Trojans. In the movie, the Greeks were extremely violent and barbarous which was true with respect to the Spartans. Also in the film, it expressed how the Trojans were very religious because they had temples, sculptures, and priests that were dedicated to Apollo and the gods, which is also true

As a consequence of this, women were far less represented in Ancient Greek society by a large degree, being unable to obtain any form of citizenship in their city-state – a right even freed slaves had could obtain – and were mainly restricted to their household to raise families. This lack of representation of women in Ancient Greek society was reflected in Greek poetry, as the plots poem often circled around men while the female characters were given little to no depth. However, in The Iliad, this long standing patriarchal norm is broken through the character Helen of Troy. Helen is given a much more active characterization than her other female counterparts throughout Greek poetry; this was done by Homer to display how seeing the chaos that war culture brings changes those responsible for the conflict. In The Iliad, Helen is made into a dynamic character through her growing regret over the decision she made to leave Menelaus and her native city state of Sparta to be the wife of Paris in Troy. Once content with her decision, Helen is now at her breaking point. She is filled with guilt that her decision to leave her husband and homeland for another man has resulted in countless deaths of soldiers from both her and her husband’s and country of origin. Soldiers who were still alive were being ripped away from their own families for the nine years of war.

This lead Helen to wish that “death had pleased me then, grim death. – that day I followed your [Paris] to Troy” (III. 209-210), and that she wished “that first day my mother brought me into the light some black whirlwind had rushed me out to the mountains or into the surf where the roaring breakers crash” (VI. 410-412), wishing that she would have just died so that countless other would not have to. As well, Homer makes it obvious who Helen wishes to be married to through Helen’s argument with her husband. This argument, which eclited no response from Paris, displayed that he does not really care about the relationship between he and his wife. Paris only views Helen as his possession and only values Helen because of her beauty. Furthermore, Helen makes it known which side she is still loyal to when King Priam asked Helen at the Trojan wall to tell him who were the Achaean Heroes that were present, and Helen points them out to King Priam but refrain from telling him any further knowledge of the Heroes, despite Helen having more information. This shows that Helen will refrain as much as possible from assisting the Trojans, meaning that she is hoping the Achaeans win the war. Considering Helen’s regret in her marriage to Paris, Paris’ lack of interest in their marriage, and Helen’s willingness to aid the Achaeans, it is clear that Homer, in the poem, is suggesting that Helen wishes to be wed with Meneluas once again. When comparing the characterization Homer gave Helen against the characterizations the poet gave other female characters in the Iliad, it becomes clear that the character of Helen has much more depth than other female characters in the poem. One of these characters, Brieses, the slave to Achilles, is the most characterized female character in the Iliad Homer outside of Helen. Despite Briseis’ importance to the plot of The Iliad, there is very little depth given to her. All that is known about Briseis is that she has a strong relationship with Achilles, as Briseis is taken away from Achilles tent, Briseis “trailed on behind, reluctant, every step” (I. 412), showing that she has a strong affection for Achilles although she is the slave to Achilles.

Also when Briseis speaks after Patroclus’ death there is more of her character revealed from her speech;Patroclus-dearest joy of my heart, my harrowed, broken heart!I left you alive that day I left these shelters,-now I come back to find you fallen, captain of armies…. . . you would sail me west in your warships, home to Phthiaand there with the Myrmidons hold my marriage feast. So now I mourn your death-I will never stop you were always kind. (XIX. 338-356)The speech displays that Briseis is able to forgive those who have committed wrongs against her, in this case Achilles, who as by making Briseis his slave took everything she knew away from her. In her speech, Briseis’ empathy for others is also displayed, even if she does not know those people well, through thanking Patroclus for everything he did to help warm her up to the man, Achilles, who enslaved her and for treating her with kindness and humanity even despite her being a slave. When the characterization of Helen is further compared to another female character in The Iliad, such as Hecuba, the added depth Homer gave the character of Helen becomes even more apparent. Hecuba the Queen of Troy and the mother to Hector displays the trait of protectiveness, as well as an ability to anticipate people’s future actions, with her plead for Hector to avoid fighting Achilles in book 22;Hector, my child! Look-have some respect for this!Pity your mother too, if I ever gave you the breastto soothe your troubles, remember it now, dear boy-beat back that savage man from safe inside the walls!Don’t go forth, a champion pitted against him-merciless, brutal man. If he kills you now,how can I ever mourn you on your deathbed?-dear branch in bloom, dear child I brought to birth!- (XXII. 97-104)Hecuba’s speech reflects her protectiveness over her son, wishing for Hector to challenge the “merciless brutal man” (XXII. 102) of Achilles, obviously not wanting her son to die, let alone having to watch his slaughter. This protectiveness of Hector also extends to Hecuba’s protectiveness of the city of Troy, for the Queen understands that if Hector, the Trojans most experienced warrior and general falls, there will be no future where the Trojans will be able uphold their city from the onslaught of Achaean soldiers. In terms of Hecuba’s knowledge about how people act, it is shown in how Hecuba exclaims to her son how if Achilles “kills you now, how can I ever mourn you on your deathbed?” (XIX. 102-103), Hecuba predicts that if Achilles defeats Hector, that he will not return her son’s body to the Trojans for a proper burial.

This prediction turns into reality as Achilles rage and mission of revenge for the slaughter of Patroclus at the hands of Hector leads Achilles to strapping the lifeless body of Hector to his chariot, and defaced the body as dragged it behind the chariot as Achilles paraded around the walls of Troy in order to keep Hector from entering the afterlife, before keeping the defaced body for himself. All would have stayed that way if King Priam wouldn’t have risked his life by sneaking into the Achaeans campground in order to plead for Achilles to return the body of his son to the Trojans. However, with Hecuba, along with Briseis, other than an array of character traits that can be gleaned from the Iliad there is nothing given from Homer that is gives the female characters any real depth unlike Helen, who as stated before also undergoes change in the poem, and whose choices have ramifications in the plot of the poem. Whenever stories, history, or other knowledge is passed down orally there is destined to become discrepancies in the information presented in those same stories, history, and other knowledge, and the same is true with The Iliad. With the Iliad one of the major differences between the retellings of the poem come with Helen’s importance in the start of the war.

On one side, some retellings portray Helen as passive in the start of the war, having no direct involvement in it occurring other than existing, instead having Paris abduct Helen which then leads to the beginning of the war, and on the other side of the spectrum Helen is portrayed as a driving factor in the starting the war by instead of being abducted, choosing to leave Meneluas to wed Paris. In Homer’s depiction of The Iliad I believe it to be the latter of those two depictions of Helen to be true. Looking at a quote by Helen in Book 3 where Helen explains to King Priam that she regrets “that day I followed your [Paris] to Troy” (III. 210). It can be inferred that Helen using the word “followed” suggests that she had a choice when to follow Paris to Troy and was not forced to wed him through abduction or another means.

In all, Homer was able to use the characterization of Helen in order to display how seeing the damage that war brings creates change in those who perpetrate the conflict through choosing to not make her character passive. By making the choice to make Helen decide to leave Meneluas for Paris on her own, Homer made Helen have responsibility for the start of the conflict, which opened herself up to feel guilt over her decision in the future. If in a different scenario Helen was passive, and was instead abducted, Helen would have no responsibility for the start of the war because she commited no action that would have started the war by being passive, and it would be impossible to feel regret or guilt over starting a conflict if she did nothing to spark the conflict. Also Homer’s choice to give Helen more depth and undergo change in the poem, making her a dynamic character, unlike her other female counterparts who were only given small amounts of character traits, allowed Homer to explore how the perpetrator of conflict may have mixed feeling or completely second guess their choice to spark the conflict when they constantly exposed to the tragedy their conflict has created.

People create fences in everyday life that either would have a positive effect or a negative effect, meaning keeping away from his or her enemies or keeping her loved ones within close distance. In Fences, by August Wilson, Rose builds three fences that separate and keeps people close to her. The fences that Rose builds around Bono, Cory, and Troy affect how she maintains or changes her relationship with them.

Rose builds her fence in her friendship with Bono to keep him inside it. Whenever Rose and Bono encounter each other, they treat each other with respect and courtesy. For example, when they encounter each other in the beginning, Rose offers Bono to stay over for dinner. Rose says “Bono, you gonna stay for supper”? Bono politely declines when he says, “No, I thank you Rose. But Lucille say she cooking up a pot of pigfeet”. Bono mentions that Rose wants Troy to build the fence because “Some people build fences to keep people out…and other people build fences to keep people in” (61). This shows why Rose wants to build the fence, but also let Bono know that Rose’s fence is built because she wants to keep Bono as one of people in the fence.

Rose’s second fence is when she and Cory encounter each other towards the middle and end. They tend to have an affectionate mother-son moments, which happens when Cory returns from the marines for Troy’s funeral. At that moment when Cory arrives at his home, Rose, who is glad to see him back, says, “I’m glad you made it”. But when Cory says, “Mama…I got something to tell you…I’m not going to Papa’s funeral”, it makes Rose doubtful about why Cory cannot attend his own father’s funeral. Rose argues back that “You standing there all healthy and grown talking about you ain’t going to your daddy’s funeral” (96)? As a result of Cory saying that he cannot attend the funeral, Rose gets upset about this and lectures about how she had met Troy until she has lost touch with him once Raynell came into the house.

Rose’s final fence with Troy changes since the beginning of the play. Rose acts very faithful Troy in the beginning. She is cautious when Troy is drinking too much, “You gonna drink yourself to death. You don’t need to be drinking like that” (10). This mainly gives an idea that Rose really cares about Troy and how she loves him. But Rose gets feisty when Troy talks about when Alberta has the baby after Rose told him the news. Rose gets upset and says, “I am your wife. Don’t push me away”, because Troy is focused on Alberta instead of her. Seven years later, Troy passes away and Rose has some grief, but not too much because of Raynell coming into the house after she is born seven years ago. Rose’s fence with Troy shows that their relationship begins with affection but comes to a miserable end.

Building fences are what people would metaphorically do in life. Rose has three fences that she either keeps them close to her or wants to be far away from them as possible. Her relationships with Bono, Cory, and Troy show that her relationship with all three of them can have a positive effect or a negative effect on her life.

As I watch the movie Helen of Troy, at first it was just fine because I tought that it was just desame as other movies, but I was in aw on how bizarre the plot of the story for me is. I’m not really a fan of greek mythology specialy there time back then. I don’t hate it at the same time I don’t like it, I just think it’s just so ridiculous how they live a life like that where you don’t have a choice or a say with your life. Maybe what I like about it is the message of the story. I think the characters did well although I hate how immature and childish Helen was.

First and foremost I learned that we should all be standing on our own beliefs like how Paris stands for his. He didn’t fight dirty but he fought with pride. Secondly is that we should be wise in making decisions specialy if many people are involved. Thirdly is that we should not be manipulated by what we feel, they say that feelings are easy to be manipulated and I believe Menelaus prove that. He was so weak to stand for his own, he let his brother control him and he was too late to realize what his brother’s true intentions. Fourthly is that we should not let our pride be in the first of us. King Priam, King of Troy let his pride first. Being a ruler is both an honour and responsibility and being a King should be wise for he does not only decide for his ownself but also for the people and his nation. King Priam being prideful, he let that big horse enter his kingdom whithout knowing that it was a trap and that it was all planed by there enemies. He should have been cautious and did not let his guard down knowing that the war lasted for years and there enemy wouldn’t just give up just like. Fifthly is that, no human is immortal even the the strongest of people are not immortal. Achilles, King of warriors was killed by Paris and Paris being one of the main character of the story was killed by Philoctetes and Agamemnon was killed by his own wife. Lastly, we should fight that person if we truely love them. Helen of Troy is about love and love transcends all. Paris and Helen’s love was the fruit of that Trojan War and that is the story all about.

After watching the movie I realize many things, and one of them is that it is somewhat like the story Rome and Juliet. It is both all about love, like how they fought for love and how they die for love. Also they have both similarities by being so stupid when being in love, but isn’t love all about that?. Love may be sometimes misunderstood by people but as you go through that process you’ll realize its true meaning. In the end love is not all about happy endings because love is connected by pain, it wouldn’t be called love if there is no pain with it. As they say, love is blind and love can be foolish. Our heart’s doesn’t always love the right person at the right time. Sometimes we hurt the ones that love us the most and sometimes we love the ones that we met but are not destined of.