Talk:Trojan War/Archive 3

Order of sections

Minus a tactics section (that I'll add tomorrow) this is pretty much my vision for this article. I'll also try to add references. I put non-fiction as introduction first and myth later. Please, before changing order please write why here. Ikokki 22:54, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

No tactics, please--if you want to discuss Homeric warfare and its possible relation to history, go to Historicity of the Iliad.

We all agree that mythology is the focus of this article. That means the main part of this article is the story of the Trojan War, so I want the article to get to the narrative of the Trojan War as quickly as possible. And that's pretty fast. The introduction already contains material on the possible historicity of the war and its possible date. The sources section can be 1-2 paragraphs long.

Why do it this way? I imagine that many Wikipedia users will come to this article to learn the parts of the story of the Trojan War that aren't in Homer--they want to know about Philoctetes, the Amazons, the death of Achilles, etc. They'll want to know where we get these stories from, which means that we need to say specifically where each episode is told. The best way to do that is to include that information along with the narrative--e.g., give a summary of the contest for Achilles' arms and Ajax's suicide, and say that the contest was in one of the cyclic epics and Sophocles' Ajax is a famous version of Ajax's suicide.

Those users who want to know more about the possible dates of the war and its historicity will be patient enough to read through the article, or click through to Historicity of the Iliad. But someone who's just looking for a summary of the myths is going to be exasperated by off-topic stuff like the Dorian invasion. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Sources

I appreciate the work and thought that went into the "Sources" section. We all agree that the article needs to say something about the primary sources for the Trojan War. But the present treatment is a bit...long. It's longer than the summaries of the myths! This is out of proportion; the editorial consensus here is that this article's focus is on the mythology of the Trojan War, and that means the mythic narrative should form the bulk of the article. So, I'm sorry, but I'm going to prune a lot of the Sources section. If it's really felt to be essential, perhaps there can be a separate article "Sources for the Trojan War" vel sim.

And, as previous discussion has determined, the consensus here is that the historical (or not) nature of the Trojan War should be covered at Historicity of the Iliad. --Akhilleus (talk) 05:04, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

The historicity of the Iliad article covers the historicity of Homer, not of the whole war. BTW if you check out the king Arthur article you will see that the largest section is Arthur in various media followed by historicity, rather than his legend. Anyway the consensus seems to form from 2 people

These comments aside I also agree that the main focus of this article should be the myth because in the end we have little real history. That historicity is larger than the legend is a call to expand the coverage of the legend, not reduce historicity. In any case this article is what, 20-25 kb long? There is lots of room for expansion, some of which I will do myself after I fix the mistakes I inadvertently introduced yester-night.

In any case I feel strongly that the date belongs to the top rather than the bottom.Ikokki 19:49, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

you are mistaken. The Historicity of Homer is treated at Homeric question. Historicity of the Iliad deals with the historicity of the Trojan war. Be that as it may, I have no problem with summarizing the historicity debate further up in the article. dab (ᛏ) 21:13, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

The article is 33kb right now. This information is displayed near the top of the page if you edit the entire page (press the "edit this page" tab). There's not much room for expansion if we're going to stick to the Wikipedia recommendation of ~32kb. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:08, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

size is no problem so far. The recommendation is outdated, we have lots of FAs with 50k+. Articles begin to get unwieldy at around 60k. My preferred article size for an article on a major topic, including a detailed footnote apparatus and detailed bibliography is at some 55k (cf. JRRT). Let the referencing to primary sources commence :) dab (ᛏ) 21:12, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Ok, that's good to know. However, I stand by my statement that the "Sources" section is too long, especially in comparison to the summaries of the myths, which we all agree are the main focus of this article. It includes a lot of unnecessary information (e.g., "The tales of the wandering poets eventually formed large poems known as epic poems. After the greek alphabet was introduced, they begun to be written.") that's more appropriate to a history of Greek literature than to a section on literary sources for the Trojan War. Why talk about the Dorian invasion? Not necessary, especially since the whole concept of the "Dorian invasion" is under question anyway (see, e.g., Jonathan Hall, Ethnic Identity in Greek antiquity). Why talk about the Argonauts?

Many of the things the section states as fact are highly controversial. For instance, it's not true that "Most scholars accept that Homer lived in the second half of the 8th century BC in Ionia where he composed these poems." Dates from the 9th to the 6th century are proposed, with many opting for a 7th century date (e.g. Snodgrass, Burgess). There are statements about the nature of the Epic Cycle that many scholars would question (their dates are hotly disputed, and some would argue that they formed largely independent of the influence of the Iliad and the Odyssey). Many scholars don't think there was a single historical individual named "Homer" who was responsible for composing the epics, much less writing them. Even the idea that the Odyssey covers the last 40 days of Odysseus' journey home is disputed by some scholars. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:20, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I put up the paragraphs on historicity higher, added two more dates on Date of the fall and started adding references. IMO it is best if the readers know of the historical context of the myth's origin. Changed also the wording to be more NPOV so that other opinions will show. If you have other things to add, please add them along with references. BTW there is a great site out there with translations of original sources http://www.theoi.com/ This has been my primary source of references. You can add, too Ikokki 14:00, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

As I said, much of the material is irrelevant. Why do readers of this article need to know anything about the Dorian invasion? It has almost nothing to do with the Trojan War. Why does this article need to say anything about the controversy over the dating of the Iliad and the Odyssey? That's covered at Homer and should be discussed at Homeric question also.

Why do you think all this historicity stuff belongs before the mythology? The only argument you've made, in several different forms, is that you think "non-fiction" comes before "fiction". But this is hardly a universal principle of article-writing; it may be quite appropriate for some subjects, not at all for others. This article is about mythology; its core matter is a story. A compelling article on a story doesn't start with a huge introduction on the origin of the story--after a few introductory paragraphs, we get a plot summary. This is what happens with Hrafnkels saga, War and Peace, The Lord of the Rings, Ulysses, Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius and many other novels/stories on Wikipedia. (The Brothers Karamazov is an interesting counter-example.) The Hrafnkels saga is particularly instructive for us, as it has an "Origins" section as the third major heading in the article (a synopsis of the saga is first). In other words, it's an example of putting the possible historical core after the synopsis of the story, and this is with material whose historical circumstances are much better documented than the Trojan War.

To repeat myself, the focus of this article is the mythology, which means that the story should come before the sections on dating, historicity, etc. The intro already contains information on the possible historical basis of the myth and the possible date, so it's not as if a reader will be unaware of these issues if the "Date of the Trojan War" and "Historicity of the Trojan War" sections are moved down.

To me, placing the "date" and "historicity" sections before the story of the war makes an implicit argument that the Trojan War is historical. It's an error similar to putting the Military Conflict infobox at the top of the article--it gives the impression that this article is about the historical nucleus of the war (if there is one), instead of the stories about the war. --Akhilleus (talk) 22:51, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

The Trojan War is a real war that happends to be known only through mythology. Nowadays the historicity is less questioned than before Schliemann. The focus is and should be the myth, unless some Luwian or Hittite (or less likely a Mycenian) letter is discovered with an detailed account of the operation, historical element will always remain very thin, and this is why it should remain thin here too.

The Karamazov brothers and War and Peace are a books by Dostoyevsky. The Lord of the Rings is a book by Tolkien. The Hranfleks saga is a book written once in Iceland. On the other hand there is no Trojan War saga, book or whatever. The Trojan War is known through various poems, stories, plays etc. written primarily by ancient Greeks and to a less extent by the Romans. If there was an ancient book called Trojan War from which everybody was drawing inspiration from and simply every generation would write new materials it should have a book treatment. This does not happen anywhere in Greek mythology. The myth belonged to the people; poets, playwriters and prose-writters would draw inspiration but they would never really finalise the myth which was always fluid.

The origin of the myth which is the ruins created by the Dorian invasion should be noted. The Dorian invasion I agree was not a major event per se (after all the force that conquered Sparta did not exceed 2000 people) as much as the transitional point between the Bronze and the Iron age. The reader should know that this is an Iron Age myth that evolved over time until St. Constantine. What he is to read below is a compilation from among the various conflicting myths (who told Zeus he was to be outhroned by a son of his? Prometheus or Themis?). One can see at the webpage I mentioned earlier just how conflicting they are. To repeat myself If exactly there was a Trojan War book in antiquity, then like all books this should be treated, synopsis first, comment later, historicity last. But there isn't. So let us treat it like the semi-historical king Arthur: Did he exist? Who wrote about him? What do we know of his deeds?

The date is part of the myth, as much as of history. No more historicity is given by the conflicting data given by various Greek historians than by the date given by Tolkien as the true date of the events of the Lord of the rings (supposedly the took place 10,000 years ago).

BTW in Robert Grave's the Greek myths he begins the Trojan War chapter with the foundation of Troy. Should we mention the foundation of Troy, construction of its walls and first fall of the city to the Argonauts or just put a for foundation of Troy etc. line see whatever article? Ikokki 11:54, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Your statement "The Trojan War is a real war that happends to be known only through mythology" is exactly the problem with putting the historicity sections first. It looks like you want to make this an article about what historical facts can be extracted from the mythology of the Trojan War. That's the only way I can interpret your suggestion that we "treat it like the semi-historical king Arthur: Did he exist? Who wrote about him? What do we know of his deeds?"

But this is not a good way to treat this body of mythology. How can we see the wedding of Peleus and Thetis as "semi-historical"? What historical core lies behind the Apple of Discord? What can we say about a historical Palamedes, or Philoctetes? Most of the narratives we're summarizing on this page have a very tenuous relationship to history, if they have any at all.

Maybe you should look at the article on Hrafnkels saga again, especially the "folklore" section. There's an ongoing controversy about the authorship of the saga and its origins, including the date. Many scholars now think the saga derives from oral tradition. And this controversy is only one part of a wide-ranging debate about the nature and origins of the Icelandic sagas. The issues are similar to the problem of the origins and composition of the Homeric and Cyclic epics, whose origins lie in oral tradition.

King Arthur is not a good example for what this page should be doing, because we're dealing with a mythological narrative. King Arthur is only a character in a mythological narrative; he is not identical with the Matter of Britain. If we were writing an article on Paris (mythology) or Achilles, then perhaps King Arthur would be the right model, but the subject matter of the Trojan War article is not limited to a single character. And at any rate, note that most Greek mythology articles start with the mythological narrative, and then only afterwards consider issues of historicity, the etymology of the hero/god's name, etc. Some articles on gods start with the cults of the god, but this makes sense because for those articles cult practice is as important as the mythology. If we're going to look to other pages for models, I'd rather follow articles on Greek mythology than on British mythology.

I agree that the reader should be made aware that the mythology changes over time, and that the summary given on this page is drawn from different sources. However, the current form of the "Sources" section is not the best way to do this. Rather, the article should give specific examples of different versions of the myth in the appropriate section. For instance, if two authors give different accounts of the construction of the Trojan Horse, we should describe those differences in the "Trojan Horse" section. That will be more helpful than a vague assertion in an introductory section.

The Dorian invasion is irrelevant to this article, and the idea that the myth of the Trojan War is an attempt to explain Bronze Age ruins is naive. Mythology never has a single function or a single origin. Anyway, the argument that the Trojan War "explains" Bronze Age ruins contradicts the idea that the mythology of the war derives from historical events. At any rate, since many scholars now argue that the Dorian Invasions is as mythological as the Trojan War, I don't think we need to drag it into this article. --Akhilleus (talk) 07:53, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

The Hrafnkels saga like the epic of Digenis Akritas was originally one text written by someone based on oral that was corrupted over the ages. Both of these have an oral tradition source but a text was written which took the form of the definitive edition, which is why they were corrupted over the ages. No Trojan War narrative was ever definitive, not even Homer. The Trojan War was always was a collection of tales. There is a core (the Achean campaign to the North Aegean) to which other various mythological stories were added not just before but also after Homer. Shouldn't the reader know what he is reading? I do not claim that the current sources section is perfect. It should have origin, main source (Homer and Kyklia), later development of the myth. Origin of the myth was tales after the ruin of the Mycenian centers, otherwise the Mycenian palaces would have mythological frescoes, not realistic war frescoes. Also we would have myths of those buried in the great graves of Mycene. Now, what brought the ruin of Mycenian civilisation is debatable but the event is usually known as the Dorian invasion and even that term is no more than a conventional name it is the origin of mythology in general and this myth specifically.

The treatment of the Trojan War should be different than the rest of Greek mythology because at this event ends pure mythology and begins semi-history. Even the campaigns of Seven on Thebes and the Epigonoi, which are of greater historical core than say Hercule's and Dionysus' campaigns are nothing near as historical as this war. I do not wish to have this reader think that this article is about an attempt to draw historical conclusion of the mythology (those do belong here, even if at the end, not at historicy of the Iliad which about historical conslusions of the Iliad). I agree that the main focus is mythology and should be the largest section, but not by watering down sources and conclusion. Like I said perhaps the sources section that I added should be improved, not readuced.

As I asked earlier, should we start here with the Foundation of Troy (as Graves does) or with the marriage of Peleus? Ikokki 12:09, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Your concept of the "origins" of the myth is not in-line with that of scholarly consensus. There are some epic formulae which go back to Mycenaean or even earlier stages of the Greek language, indicating that there was a tradition of epic composition before the supposed date of the Trojan War. That means that the themes associated with epic language, which are also found in the mythology of the Trojan War, are older than the Trojan War itself. For instance, Nagy and others have demonstrated that the notion of kleos aphthiton is paralleled in Indic epic, and is probably a common Indo-European inheritance. There's also strong Near Eastern influence on the myth of the Trojan War; the most obvious example is Zeus' plan to reduce overpopulation given at the beginning of the Kypria, which is a motif found in several Near Eastern sources; this again is older than the Trojan War.

There are also artistic depictions of sieges of a city in Minoan and Mycenaean art which suggest that this was a theme in Bronze Age epic as well. (See Jeremy Rutter's website.) If this is the case, there would have already been a tradition of epic poems about the siege (and probably the sack) of a city which predates the Trojan War, and this would have influenced how the (supposedly) historical sack of Troy was passed on in poetry.

Significant elements of the Trojan War story therefore predate any event that we could call the Trojan War. The origins of these myths are complex. If the article is going to discuss the origins of the myths (and it's not clear to me that it needs to), it should be in the historicity section, and it should be well-grounded in scholarship (with citations) instead of advancing only one theory that apparently originates from an editor's personal views.

Just a note: in English, we don't refer to the "Kyklia". We rather refer to the Cyclic Epics, the Epic Cycle, or the individual poems. The phrase Trojan War Cycle is not a common way of referring to these poems in scholarship, but that's the title of the Wikipedia article about the Cyclic epics.

Where to start? Why not with Zeus' plan, since that's where the Kypria began? After that, follow Proclus' summary. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:58, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

What I am writing is not my opinion as an editor. They are included in scholarly sources like Kakridis's Elliniki Mythologia or the History of the Greek Nation of Ekdotiki Athinon. Your opinion might reflect the concesus in the English-speaking literature but mine tries to include concensus in Greek-speaking literature. I agree that there are origins from myths earlier than the conflict that led to the destruction of Troy although we must not forget that the indoeuropean theory is stricly linguistic, not archeological, but Greek mythology (at least according to the sources I mentioned earlier) mostly originates from after the fall of the mycenian centers. I've been at the palace of Knossos (and the Heraklion archeological museum) and seen the frescoes there, I've been to the palace of Englianos (associated with Pylos), I've seen the frescoes there and also the sculptures at various ancient temples from the archaic, classical and hellenistic era. At the Minoan and Mycenian palaces there are scenes of games (Minoan), war (including the siege scene mentioned in the site you linked), chariots and other things but not mythological scenes. While in temples from the historical era there are only mythological scenes as decoration (and, after the Persian Wars, some scenes from that conflict too) this discrepency, along with the Greek tendency to sing about something after its destruction (for example there extremely few articles on how beautifull Athens was with its neoclassical buildings when they were standing but entire books written after they were demolished) leads most Greek sources to place the formation of most myths after the Dorian invasion.

As I've read in an article by a professor of literature of the university of Athens (alas, I no longer remember which one, its been a few years) in modern Greek folk literature (akritika, kleftika) which was composed mostly by illeterate bards there are strong themes from Homer which are used to describe conflicts as late as the 1821 revolution. There is no reason Homer or his predecessors did not use literrary forms from an earlier time to describe the conflict over Troy. But the origin of form is not the origin of the myth. The origin of the song of Daskaloyiannis is the Cretan rebellion of 1770 (see Sfakians), not Homeric prose. Ikokki 10:11, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Compromise Proposal

A Compromise sugestion: After the initial 2 paragraphs a Sources section with 3 paragraphs: One on the origin of the myth, one on the main sources (Homer and Kyklia) and One on later developments and Roman writers. Then the date section (saying that since this,according to the ancient Greeks, is either the last event of the mythical age or the first of the historical age these dates ae given). Then the myths, followed by historicity that will include data on contemporary sources but not numbers (since they will be included in Greek fleet gathers at Aulis). Any other suggestions? Ikokki 14:27, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I think this is a productive suggestion. However, I don't think your proposal for the "sources" section is workable (see my comment above).

The date section should follow the myths. Note that the introduction has two sentences about the date: "They believed that this war took place in the 13th or 12th century BC, and that Troy was located in the vicinity of the Dardanelles in what is now north-western Turkey." and "Those who think that the stories of the Trojan War derive from a specific historical conflict usually date it to between 1300 BC and 1200 BC, usually preferring the dates given by Eratosthenes (1194 BC – 1184 BC) which roughly corresponds with the burning of Troy VIIa." This is enough information for most readers, who are coming here for the myths of the Trojan War. The way the date section is currently written does not add much information to what's in the introduction; it's mostly a list, with no indication of how these authors obtained their dates or why one might be better than another.

On historicity, we've said several times that Historicity of the Iliad is the main article. This Trojan War article doesn't need to discuss "contemporary sources" like the Manapa-Tarhunda letter; they're covered elsewhere.

So, my proposed order: Introduction, Sources, myths, and a "historicity" section that combines the current "date" and "historicity" sections. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:34, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

The Historicity of the Iliad article says nothing of Telephus, nothing of the role of Lesbos and Tenedos, nothing of Aias's campaign against Aeneas, nothing of Achilles campaign in the Thracian penninsula. These events are included in all attempted reconstructions of the "true" Trojan War. Frankly, I don't even think they belong to the historicity of Iliad article, since by the definition it deals with the Iliad. Since they do belong to Wikipedia, if not in this article, where do they belong?

The date, which comes from the sources, is more related to sources than historicity. This is why it should be near sources rather than historicity. For the time being I will put the historicity down (but without the Date), and will keep on adding refernces to myths text, modifying it along the way to confront with the sources. Feel free to change the sources text as you will, I would like to see what your POV in the matter is. I will add to what you will modify (with references) from sources of my POV Ikokki 10:28, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

My "POV", as you put it, is that the sources section should be as short as possible, so that we can get to the myths quickly.

If you want to deal with the historicity of non-Iliadic events, perhaps the best thing to do is to create a Historicity of the Trojan War article. The mythological section here is incomplete, as I'm sure you realize: it says almost nothing about Palamedes, for example. Full coverage of just the mythology should bring the article to around 50k, I think, and that doesn't leave a lot of room for discussion of historicity. --Akhilleus (talk) 17:53, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I doubt there is anything to say about the historicity of non-Iliadic Trojan War events worth more than a footnote. Why, even the reconstruction of the myths is dodgy, much more their historicity. Name one example of non-Iliadic Trojan War lore with any however remote chance of historicity. dab (ᛏ) 19:08, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you, but it does seem that there are some scholars who discuss the historicity of the Telephus episode: see Rutter's page on the historicity of the Trojan War. Rutter's discussion, though, connects the Telephus/Teuthrania stuff with the Aeolic migration, which is post-Mycenaean. I'm sure there are people who try to connect other parts of the Trojan War with history. It's clear, though, that most discussion of the historicity of the Trojan War focuses on the Iliad, simply because that's our best-preserved epic about the war. --Akhilleus (talk) 20:27, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

There many major non-Iliadic events that are worth far more than a footnote, e.g. the Trojan Horse. The Iliad is the best preserved-epic, but not our main source of the whole conflict (most references so far I've added are from Apollodorus), just of the 51 days it talks about. For the last 10 days or so I've been adding mostly references but also some extra text to the mythological section (something I hope is appreciated). The way I see it the mythological section will end up over 30 paragraphs long. Not adding a 4-5 paragraph section on historicity even at the end makes the article seem unbalanced. As it says at WP:SIZE Sometimes an article simply needs to be big to give the subject adequate coverage; certainly, size is no reason to remove valid and useful information. Attempts since the 20th century to reconstruct events of the time should belong to the Historicity section.

A new Historicity of the Trojan War is probably warranted, but lets write a section here first as a summary of it. In general that what I've read is that the tale of the Trojan War reflects (among other things) the memories of a long term Achean expedition in the North Aegean which intended to bring it under the command of the Anax of Mycene.Ikokki 21:43, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Catalogues

Just because Apollodorus gives extensive lists of all of the suitors of Helen and later on all the suitors of Penelope, doesn't mean that this article needs to report them. Lists don't make for good reading, and these don't communicate much valuable information to the Wikipedia reader. --Akhilleus (talk) 17:15, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Apollodorus' lists are extensive but not complete. I agree, they do not make good reading. But IMO a Trojan War article needs a (partial at least) list of major Acheans and Trojans. I put the Acheans here as suitors (instead of campaigners later) and with an indentation so that exactly they can be skipped by a busy Wikipedian. There is going to be another, smaller, list of major Trojans when their army will gather. I would rather have these two lists far apart. I am aware there is a list of Trojan War characterts, but having a smaller here will give the Wikipedia reader an idea of just how many heroes were involved. Ikokki 16:49, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

The Iliad

This article does not need a book-by-book summary of the Iliad. We can direct readers to the Iliad article with {{main}}; all that needs to be here is a concise summary. The summary in the Iliad article could use some beefing up, perhaps. Also, in English, it is now typical to refer to books by number, not by Greek letter. Remember that most of the audience does not know Greek, not even the Greek alphabet. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:32, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I did try to put up a concise summary of the action and nothing more. I hoped to put up a summary on the same par as the summary of mostly Apollodorus that I put up earlier. I put up book letter in case anyone wanted to go and find out where this action takes place. I preferred letter because it is prettier than the dry book one, book two, book three. In engineering and mathematics at least Greek letters are very well known though probably not their order. I always assume that the audience does not know Greek. If the letters are distracting delete them. As for the beefing up, I'll do it on the Iliad article on some later date. But any summary of the Iliad should include the wrath, the duel of Menelaus and Paris, the four battles and the savagery of Achilles if perhaps not in this extent. Ikokki 21:01, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I shortened the summary. It could, I think, be slightly longer (a sentence or two about the duel of Menelaus and Paris, another sentence or two about how savage Achilles is in his aristeia and his mistreatment of Hector's corpse, plus the gods' reaction), but it should not be much longer than it is now. Our basic audience is readers who are familiar with the general course of things in the Iliad, but don't know the rest of the Trojan War narrative. Those readers who do want to know more about the plot of the Iliad have a handy link to the appropriate article through {{main}}, and that's the best place to summarize the days of battle, etc.

The Greek letters really aren't helpful for most readers. I know classical Greek, and the letters don't help me very much, I have to translate them into numbers before I can look up a reference. Most editions/translations of Homer published for an English-speaking audience use the numbers now, so it will be more helpful for readers of this article if we use numbers and not letters, though I see your point that "Book One" is not as aesthetically pleasing. --Akhilleus (talk) 07:08, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Why do you assume that are basic audience has a familiarity with the events of the Iliad, at least a bigger familiarity than the one the film "Troy" showed? In my experience, even among Greeks who have done the Iliad in school many, 5 years later, don't even remember much save just how realistic Homer is in his wound descriptions. In any case I had put up the letters as a form of quick reference. Since you deleted it, we're gonna need new references now...Ikokki 22:42, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

I imagine that many readers of this article have encountered the Iliad in a Greek mythology course or Greek literature course in college, and want to know more about the rest of the story of the Trojan War. But if the reader is not familiar with the Iliad, there's a link to an article that they can read...

The Iliad section doesn't need references. Unlike the rest of the article, this section is a summary of a single poem. Since we're summarizing the entire work, it's not necessary to supply references to precise passages, any more than a summary of War and Peace would need to give page or chapter numbers. If a reader needs to know what happens in which book, again, there's a link to an article they can read. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:00, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually the Wikipedia policy is to assume that the reader knows nothing of what he is reading. The articles are written for the general reader, not the Ancient Greek literature student. In the largest part of the world the Iliad is not part of the curicullum. In any case however minus two or three sentences that I'll add on Friday (that the army is gathered again for the first time since the original landing, a little on the duel and the ensuing first battle) I have no intention on changing.Ikokki 09:24, 28 June 2006 (UTC)