# Trojan horse=siege tower? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 18, 2004, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764 "2004-05-18T14:35:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bromley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4da419/32.png) [@Bromley](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bromley)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/1 "2004-05-18T14:35:05Z")
One of the Harry Harrison books in the _The Hammer and the Cross_ series has the hero, Shef, dreaming about new siege weapons. He sees the sack of Troy and sees the Trojan horse. Rather than being a stealthy assault, the horse is actually a standard siege tower with a lot of troops running over the neck/head and onto the walls. I like this explanation for something that always puzzled me before (if only they’d listened to Orlando 🙂 ). Is there any academic support for this idea or is it purely Mr. Harrison’s? Gogling didn’t throw up anything. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/2 "2004-05-18T15:16:43Z")
The idea was raised in the PBS series (and the book based on it) **In Search of the Trojan War**. It seems reasonab;e to me, as well, but I’m not personally aware of any papers supporting the idea. Perhaps a search of the credits to ISOTTW will reveal some (I have the book at home). ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/3 "2004-05-18T15:50:40Z")
There is also a theory that the Trojan Horse was a battering ram supported by a saw-horse shaped frame. This theory was suggested by some Greek and Roman writers. ---
**Author:** ![Mollie\_Magill](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mollie_magill/32/20882_2.png) [@Mollie\_Magill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mollie_Magill)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/4 "2004-05-18T17:37:32Z")
My persona take on the Trojan Horse was that it was symbolism of an earthquake. Bear with me here. **In Search of the Trojan War** mentioned the walls of Troy had been destroyed in an earthquke. Poseidon brought earthquakes. Poseidon also was god of Horses. Poseidon’s favor brought victory to the greeks. Add 800+ years of oral history to the mix… You get the picture. What? Stop looking at me like that. ---
**Author:** ![Kizarvexius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/da6949/32.png) [@Kizarvexius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kizarvexius)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/5 "2004-05-18T18:11:49Z")
The siege engine and earthquake are the two most prominent theories among contemporary scholarship in explaining the origin of the Trojan Horse story. Someone will no doubt correct me if I am wrong, but Homer does not mention the horse at all in the _Iliad_ (seeing as how it ends shortly before the horse makes its appearance in the sequence of events) nor in the _Odyssey_. The earliest source that I specifically recall telling the story of the horse is Virgil’s _Aeneid_, written perhaps 800 years after the Homeric epics. Even if Homer didn’t include that particular episode, though, I’m quite sure that it was part of the overall legend and that Virgil didn’t just pluck it out of thin air. Perhaps some of the other Trojan epics or even Herodotus refer to it. Too lazy to check right now. It’s easy to see, though, just how either the siege engine or earthquake theory could evolve into the story we know, considering that the Homeric epics were not composed until perhaps three hundred years after the alleged historical events upon which they are based. And during that particular point in time, the art of writing had been lost to the Greeks, which meant that the story was preserved only through oral traditions. Imagine that all we knew about the American Civil War was what had been passed down through individual families for 140 years, and that these events and characters were only now being committed to paper. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/6 "2004-05-18T18:18:46Z")
Oddly enough, I happen to have copy of the Iliad with me (I’ve been plodding through it for the past 6 weeks), translated by Richard Lattimore. He discusses the various writings about the Trojan war in the intro, and says the following: > [@](#): > > There is no reference to a wooden horse in the Iliad. It is mentioned several times in the Odyssey (4. 272; 8. 493-494; 11. 523), and is said to have been built by Epeios (8. 493; 11.523). Epeios comes into the Iliad once (23. 665) as an undistinguished warrior but a champion boxer. So it appears the Trojan horse was talked about in the Odyssey. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Llama](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a698b9/32.png) [@The\_Llama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Llama)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/7 "2004-05-18T18:25:37Z")
Maybe shef was thinking of the song about sweet loving down by the river. You would sing this song and solve all of the childrens problems while also knocking down the walls like at Jericho. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/8 "2004-05-18T18:37:53Z")
> [@Kizarvexius](#): > > And during that particular point in time, the art of writing had been lost to the Greeks Say what? I’ve never heard of this happening. ---
**Author:** ![Kizarvexius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/da6949/32.png) [@Kizarvexius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kizarvexius)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/9 "2004-05-18T19:15:17Z")
Thank you for the correction, **muldoonthief**. It’s been too long since I read either the _Iliad_ or the _Odyssey_. Two more additions to my ever-growing to-be-read stack. **sturmhauke** , the Mycenean Age saw three different writing systems used with the Greek language. The first was a style of hieroglyphs, and the others were more alphabetical types of script referred to as Linear A and Linear B. A series of catastrophes (earthquakes, invasions, etc) destroyed Mycenean civilization and reduced Greece to a political and cultural backwater. During the period known as the Dark Ages (1100 BC - 800 BC), the use of writing was abandoned. Greece was invaded by a mysterious people called the Dorians, and many Greeks scattered throughout the eastern Mediterranean to escape. They founded new communities that built up their own powerbases, such as the region of Turkey known as Ionia. Some historians even believe that the biblical Philistines were displaced Greeks. The widespread Greek communities learned ironworking from the Hittites, writing from the Phoenicians, and many other arts and crafts, the knowledge of which was slowly brought back to the Greek homeland. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/10 "2004-05-18T19:51:14Z")
Interesting thing about that bit with the Greek writing – the myth of Bellerophon (cited in at least one of the Iliad and the Odyssey) in its present form has Bellerophon delivering a _written_ message to the King , which tells the king to kill Bellerophon (kinda like the story of Uriah the Hittite in the Bible). If the story was still told during the Dark Ages, what must they have thought about a written message at this point? ---
**Author:** ![paperbackwriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/53a042/32.png) [@paperbackwriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/paperbackwriter)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/11 "2004-05-18T21:21:53Z")
As does the myth of Iphigenia. Although Euripedes wrote _Iphigenia in Auris_ after the Greek Dark Ages (obviously), he used a story that was much older and is set in the context of the Trojan War. My college Euripedes professor theorized that during the Greek Dark Ages, the knowledge that writing existed remained, even though the practice of writing was either wholly or mostly lost. This imbued written messages in myths with a near-magical quality. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/12 "2004-05-18T21:27:05Z")
The Bellerophon story is in the Iliad. I don’t have time to type the whole thing, but here are the relevant quotes about the message: > [@](#): > > …but sent him [Bellerophon] away to Lykia, and handed him murderous symbols, which he inscribed in a folding tablet, enough to destroy life, and told him to show it to his wife’s father, that he might perish. > > … then he [the wife’s father] began to question him [Bellerophon], and asked to be shown the symbols, whatever he might be carrying from his son-in-law, Proitos. Then after he had been given his son-in-law’s wicked symbols… The story continues with the wife’s father giving Bellerophon tasks designed to kill him, then finally sending some men to kill him (unsuccessfully). So in Lattimore’s translation at least, the message was specifically written as symbols, not words. BTW, this was one of those stories that’s told by a combatant in the middle of a battle. Half the Iliad seems to be enemies telling each other their life story before actually fighting. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/13 "2004-05-18T21:50:48Z")
> [@](#): > > Maybe shef was thinking of the song about sweet loving down by the river. You would sing this song and solve all of the childrens problems while also knocking down the walls like at Jericho. Sweet lovin in a _van_ down by the river. And that’s all right wth me. ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2004, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/14 "2004-05-18T23:33:14Z")
Hmm, I’d heard of Linear A and B, but I didn’t know they were from an early Greek civilization. I’d also heard that there was no “Rosetta Stone” to translate those languages, is that still true? ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/15 "2004-05-19T00:13:55Z")
Linear B was famously deciphered by Michael Ventris, who astutely assumed that the underlying language was an archaic, but recognisable, form of Greek and was able to figure out the “alphabet” from this. In doing so he only needed the Linear B texts themselves (together with a knowledge of Greek). The classic - and highly recommended - account of how he did this is John Chadwick’s _The Decipherment of Linear B_ (1958), which Cambridge University Press still have in print. Linear A is [undeciphered](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_A) and possibly not closely related to Greek. Finding a Rosetta Stone-style artefact would probably help. ---
**Author:** ![constantine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3bc359/32.png) [@constantine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/constantine)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/16 "2004-05-19T06:25:43Z")
> [@Kizarvexius](#): > > The siege engine and earthquake are the two most prominent theories among contemporary scholarship in explaining the origin of the Trojan Horse story. > > Someone will no doubt correct me if I am wrong, but Homer does not mention the horse at all in the _Iliad_ (seeing as how it ends shortly before the horse makes its appearance in the sequence of events) nor in the _Odyssey_. The earliest source that I specifically recall telling the story of the horse is Virgil’s _Aeneid_, written perhaps 800 years after the Homeric epics. Even if Homer didn’t include that particular episode, though, I’m quite sure that it was part of the overall legend and that Virgil didn’t just pluck it out of thin air. Perhaps some of the other Trojan epics or even Herodotus refer to it. Too lazy to check right now. Remember that there are gaps in what we have of the Homeric epics. There were other epics, now lost, that covered the rest of the story of the Trojan war. I don’t have an online cite for this, but Elizabeth Vandiver discusses it in her masterful course of tape “The Iliad” available from the Teaching Company.l ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2004, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trojan-horse-siege-tower/245764/17 "2004-05-19T23:22:10Z")
I dug out my copy of **In Search o the Trojan War** by Michael Wood. On page 230 he says that Pausanias was the first to suggest that the horse as a siege tower. In fact, he’s downright convinced o it: “Anyone who doesn’t think the Trojans utterly stupid will have realized that that the horse as really an engineer’s device for breaking down th walls.” (Pausanias really was a ationalist party-pooper, saying that the “wings” of Dedalus and Icarus were really sails on the oat they used to escape Crete, and turning the story of Perseus and Medusa into an ordinary battle.) A quick look through the indices of my copy of Pausanias didn’t find this passage for me, however. On the opposite page is a Babylonian relief of a siege tower, alhough it looks most un-horse-like. As **Mausmaill** notes, Wood also brings up the Horse = Poseidon = Earthquake theory, on pp. 250-1 of the book.