Trojan War (legendary)

c. 1,200 BCENotableContested

A conflict at Troy, possibly based on real events, becomes the foundation of Greek epic.

Longest chain: The Big Bang → First stars ignite → Supernovae seed heavy elements → The Sun forms → Earth forms → First oceans → First life → Photosynthesis evolves → Great Oxidation Event → Complex cells (eukaryotes) → Multicellular life → First animals → Cambrian Explosion → First vertebrates → Jawed fish → Fish walk onto land → The amniotic egg → The Great Dying → Dinosaurs appear → Asteroid ends the dinosaurs → Early primates → Apes split from monkeys → Human line splits from chimpanzees → Walking upright → First stone tools → Genus Homo appears → Homo erectus → Control of fire → First fired clay figures → First pottery → Copper smelting → Bronze Age begins → Minoan palaces on Crete → Mycenaean Greece → Trojan War (legendary)

Contested history

Consensus: Troy was a real city in Anatolia (Hisarlik), destroyed several times; the Iliad blends memory and myth.

A real war lies behind the legendDebated by scholars

Troy VI and VIIa show destruction around the right time; Hittite texts mention 'Wilusa.'

The war is entirely poetic inventionMinority view

Most scholars accept a historical kernel, even if details are legendary.

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BookEric H. Cline

The Trojan War: A Very Short Introduction ↗