“What is written here is everywhere else and what is not written in here is nowhere in the world!”

I remembered these legendary words from our all-time best epic ‘The Mahabharata’ penned by Muni Ved Vyas when I saw this great movie recently. I went to the library and read the Greek epic on which the story of this film is based – The Iliad. It’s one of the two epics of Greece (Iliad and Odyssey), both written by blind poet Homer.

For the whole last week I wasn’t actually here in the polluted streets of Mumbai, for my mind knew now a place which created a virtual ‘troy’ within my day-dreams! I literally walked the roads of Sparta, I literally crushed the walls of great Troy! I can say, I lived in the times of the Trojan horses!

”I see skies blue, I see clouds white;
Why do you smile sleeping in the night?
I see the gods watching, I see angels flying
despite the fact that the great city’s falling!

THE STORY

The great war between Sparta (Greeks) and Troy (Trojans) happened in 1183 BC. The ‘never-falling’ walls of Troy were better known as ‘Iliam’ and hence Homer named his great epic ‘The Iliad’ which was penned in 800 BC. Iliad is a story of a great battle caused by a beautiful woman led to envy, revenge and complete destruction of the great city.

The hero of the story is Achilles considered to be the greatest warrior ever born (Arjuna of Mahabharata)!The epic itself starts with the story of the marriage between Achilles’ mother (Thetis) and father. Thetis was the daughter of ocean (Remember Bhisma grandpa?). They forgot to invite the divine goddesses (Hera, Athena and Aphrodite) and later on sent an apple stating ‘To the fairest!’ in their respect!. Hera – the wife of Devraj Zeus (Indra of Greece!), Athena – another wife of Zeus and Aphrodite – the goddess of sex and beauty – all had a fight among them and yet could not consider that for whom the apple was sent! Who’s the most beautiful among them! They decided to select a teenager boy from the earth and let him judge who’s most pretty. The lucky judge was Paris – the son of the king of Troy, Priam.

The 1st beauty contest of the world!

And so held the first beauty contest of the world between these three pretty women (goddesses indeed). It was no different from today’s world. Hera offered Paris a huge territory if he selects her as the most beautiful among them. Athena gave the word to bless him with greatest strength on the earth if Paris chooses her as the fairest. But, what attracted teenage Paris was the offer of the sex goddess Aphrodite. She offered her the most beautiful lady on earth and Paris couldn’t think of anything else now! The beautiful lady was in fact a married woman – the wife of the king of Sparta, Menelaus. Her name was Helen! It was said that a normal man can’t stare at her gorgeous eyes and watch her beautiful body for more than a few seconds! Paris was so happy and thankful to Aphrodite, but he never thought that he will have to pay a bloody price for this pretty gift!

Someone had to take the initiative!

The background and cause for the battle was set. But, somebody had to take the initiative (!) to start the deadliest war in the history of the ancient Europe. Menelaus was weary of making peace between his empire Sparta and his strongest rival Troy. He asked his brother Agamemnon regarding it and they invited the Troys for this so called peace treaty between the two empires. Aphrodite played her role at this historic event. Helen saw Paris and fell in love with him. Paris went mad about her and took her secretly along with him to Troy! Paris was young but had never fight any battle and hence was scared after taking this step. He told his elder brother – Hector – regarding what he did.

Prince Hector was considered as the greatest general the ancient Europe had ever seen! He was never defeated, believed in peace and never wanting to go for meaningless battles. But, when time comes, he was more than enough for any rival army. His personality was so pleasing and a ‘complete man’ kind of thing that even Helen got attracted to this brother-in-law! It was said that if Hector is the chief of the Trojan army, nobody could even touch the great walls of Troy and steal Helen back from his younger brother Paris.

A man who’s lost his beautiful wife and the rigid fact that somebody ‘stole’ her made the king of Sparta, Menelaus thirsty for a war with the Trojans to get her woman back! He urged his elder brother Agamemnon to help him fight the Trojans. Agamemnon gathered the whole of Greece and prepared an army of thousand ships and marched towards the great city of Troy.

Achilles, the great warrior, was not willing to fight for a single man’s personal and selfish cause. He never considered Agamemnon his king and never followed his orders if he himself was not willing to do the job. Agamemnon once said about him, ‘A man loved by the gods….. I hate him the most!’. But, king Odysseus convinced Achilles to fight for Greece if not for his king! For he believed that great wars require great warriors and there won’t be a great war if Achilles is not in the Greek army.

Armies reaching Troy

The fierce united armies of the Greek empire reached the beach of Troy. Thousands of ships and lacks of warriors entered the land of the Trojan gods and destroyed all the temples cited on the coastal area of Troy. Greeks acquired the beach very easily for Achilles was leading the army! Ocean daughter Thetis’ great son Achilles was an ironic warrior. He was invulnerable because his mother Thesis had held him into an invulnerability-giving fire as a baby, the only part of him that remained penetrable for arrows and thus vulnerable was his heel because it was there that she held him. (Something like the Gandhari-Duryodhan stuff, ain’t it?)

King Agamemnon robbed the villages in the coastal area of Troy and destroyed all the temples of holy gods. He kidnapped one girl named Kraisei, said to be the daughter of the Priest of Apollo’s temple (the god of light – Surya Dev!). The soldiers misbehaved with the girl, cursed and abused her which couldn’t be seen by Achilles. He asked king Agamemnon to release the slave girl but king didn’t listen; he thought Achilles was disobeying and violating his rule and kidnapped Achilles’ personal slave girl instead. Achilles got angry and denied to take part in the rest of the war, ‘Then fight the Trojans yourself. I will just sit here and watch you dieing!’Paris knew that his wife was the main reason for this war and he was the one who made it happen! So, he went to his brother, prince Hector and showed him another way of challenging the Greeks in spite of the bloody war. With both the giant armies on the battlefield, Hector urged the different way of solving the problem.
‘Your best man versus our best man and the winner takes Helen home!’
From the Trojans Hector himself challenged anybody from the Greek army. The Greeks remembered great Achilles at this troubled time who was the only soldier able to defeat Hector. But, he was not in the army so grandpa alike Jeff Ayas accepted the challenge and fought against Hector. The battle between the two continued the whole day and in the evening Hector said, ‘Perhaps the gods don’t want us to end up so easily. We’ll have a war tomorrow morning!’

Day 2 of the War

With Achilles not in the Greek army, the next day Trojans fought brilliantly against the rivals. Diomide was one big man in the Greek army who was killing many Trojan warriors at a time! This disturbed prince Hector and he himself challenged the giant man. Hector was seriously injured but killed the main strength of the Greeks. The Greek army was forced to draw back to their ships within 5 hours.

Petroclues – the cousin brother of Achilles – was a young man. Achilles didn’t let him fight against the Trojans. Petroclues secretly wear Achilles’ amours, helmet etc. and moved into the battle just like him. Everybody thought it was Achilles again back in the army, even Hector thought it and challenged this rival. Petroclues was killed during this fight and then everybody got to know that it was him and not Achilles. The sad news reached Achilles. He had lose a friend cum cousin brother and went almost insane.

Achilles challenges Hector

The next morning he challenged Hector to fight him. All the gods and angels arrived on/over the battlefield along with the kings and citizens to watch this historic fight. Because probably the result of this war was much depended upon this single fight between these two greatest warriors of the time. Achilles killed Hector and dragged his body with his cart towards his tent and laid the dead body there for the birds to eat.

The same night Trojan king Priam made a secret path and came to the tent of Achilles demanding his elder son’s dead body. The crying but responsible father said, ‘Let me wash his body, O great Achilles, let me place two coins on his eyes, let me say prayers for the peace of his soul!’ Achilles was convinced by this aged king and let him bring the body back home.
‘You are a far better king than the one leading this army!’

The great depression

Both the armies agreed to have a peace of 12 days. No Greek will enter the sights of troy and vice-verse.

Although the Trojan prince Hector was killed, the great walls of troy couldn’t be rushed to the grounds so easily. The Greek army wasn’t having heavy siege weapons or rams. But, king Odysseus came out with a historic plan. The Greeks started making a big Trojan horse made up of timber/wood. Some selected Greek soldiers including Achilles, Odysseus etc. went inside the wood-made horse. The Trojans thought it was a gift to the gods from the Greeks and that the Greeks have left Troy now after 12 days of peace, they brought the ‘Trojan horse’ inside the city. The Greek warriors came out by the night and destroyed the citizens, soldiers or whoever comes the way. All of the troy was demolished in a night! A great city said to be never beaten was destroyed completely.

Paris killed Achilles by shooting at his penny. Like he was made for this great battle, he fought it and fought it well; killed Hector, killed thousands of Trojans but everything and everybody’s got an end. As poet Homer put it, ‘In all the wars and battles we fight, the ultimate victory is of death always!’

A great battle caused by a beautiful woman ended up at the cost of a great empire’s fall down and death of lacks of innocent people! History will never forget these names for they were made to be remembered forever.

“Let them say we lived in the time of Hector, mercy and glory, let them say we lived in the time of Achilles!”