Trojan Horse

The Trojan Horse comes from the story of how the Greeks, by guile and deceit, won the Trojan War. The original Trojan Horse was a large wooden contraption in which a small group of Greeks hid in order to secretly enter Troy and thereby initiate its demise. The term Trojan Horse has subsequently come to be used for several different forms of deception.

The legendary Trojan Horse was a contrivance that allowed the ancient Greeks to finally end the 10-year siege of the city of Troy and conclude the Trojan War. In the 13th century b.c.e. a coalition of Greek city-states was formed to wage war on the powerful city of Troy in Asia Minor. The primary literary sources for the Trojan War are several ancient works of Greek and Roman literature, principally the Iliad of Homer, as well as Book IV of Homer's Odyssey and Book II of Virgil's Aeneid, which describes the sacking of Troy.

The Trojan Horse was a ruse to help the Greeks finally conquer Troy. The horse was actually regarded as a sacred animal by the Trojans. The wood used to make the horse was cut from trees in a grove sacred to the god Apollo. The crafty Greek hero Odysseus took credit for the idea of the ploy, said to have been given to him by the goddess Athena in a dream. The Trojan [Page 899]Horse consisted of a large wooden figure of a horse built in just three days under the direction of Epeius, a talented boxer, with the guidance of Athena. The Trojan Horse was constructed with a hollow belly, in which Odysseus and a small contingent of elite soldiers could conceal themselves. An inscription was written on the side of the Trojan Horse that said the horse was an offering of gratitude to Athena for pleading for the safe return of the Greeks on their long journey home.

The Greek army broke camp and boarded its ships as if to return home to Greece. However, the fleet hid behind the island of Tenedos, off the Trojan coast. The Trojans then entered the remnants of the Greek encampment and saw the colossal Trojan Horse. They also found a lone Greek, Sinon, who had been coached by the wily Odysseus as what to say to the Trojans. Sinon told the Trojans he had deserted from the Greeks, whom he said wanted to sacrifice him, and he said the Trojan Horse was left as a peace offering to the gods. Sinon added that the Greeks had made the horse very large so that the Trojans could not bring it into their city. He also said that the Greeks hoped that the Trojans would desecrate the Trojan Horse and thereby incur the divine wrath of Athena.

Most of the Trojans thought the Trojan Horse would make a great trophy and wanted to bring it into their city. However, at least two of the Trojans warned against accepting the Trojan Horse. One of these was Cassandra, the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy; she had been given the gift of prophecy by Apollo, but he also cursed her, when she resisted his amorous advances, such that no one would believe her prophecies. She walked around and around the Trojan Horse, taunting the Greeks inside with insults, including remarks about them and their wives, but the Greeks, at the physical forcing of Odysseus, kept their silence.

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