Did Troy Actually Exist? Is The Iliad Real? Response To Leonidas Sparta

Link to the original video response https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJD7oH3eHi0 Check out part 2 on the Hittite Army Composition! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3BtfM8xsX8 My video response on the Roman Testudo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgW17hvHJJY All the good links: Come watch me live stream on Twitch! Almost every night 9pm CST https://www.twitch.tv/metatrongemini Join this channel to get access to more old school Metatron videos the algorithm wouldn't prioritize! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIjGKyrdT4Gja0VLO40RlOw/join I have a Patreon page with extra content! https://www.patreon.com/themetatron My second channel about languages https://www.youtube.com/@metatronacademy My third channel about gaming https://www.youtube.com/@TheProtectorate-yq7vi My Twitter/X https://x.com/pureMetatron The first attestations are from the Hittite realm. Along with chariots, cavalry is also mentioned. But in the Bronze Age, these were essentially ultralight cavalry units, mostly with reconnaissance tasks, or employed in contexts where chariots could not be used, since war chariots were more limited in a similar way as cavalry by terrain and one could argue even more. What are the factions in question are two we have the Myceneans and the Trojans. Now of course in the Mycenaean context, you have chariots, not cavalry. They are correct. I agree with them, but in this period if you move the camera more broadly then for instance in the Hittite context in this era. we do have cavalry specifically Now you might be asking "that's interesting but does that have to do with the Trojans and that's where this gets interesting. There absolutely is a strong conntection between historical Troy and the Hittite Empire. However considering the fact that we are talking about the Hylliad probably the first question we should address is: Has the Trojabn war really happened? Is this mythology or History? The answer is, it's both. Obviously, the Iliad is first and foremost a literary production, an epic and mythological text. The inhabitants of Troy historicallyWilusa were vassals of the Hittites, but they were a culturally separate reality (they were Luwians, but their aristocracy was probably Mycenaean), and they were on the periphery of the Hittite empire. Therefore, I wouldn't swear that they used troops consisting only of horsemen, even if perhaps they knew it could be done. "The organization of the Hittite army" by Richard Henry Beal notes the presence of the term of Akkadian origin PITHALLU in texts dedicated to the composition of Hittite armies in the Late Bronze Age. PITHALLU in subsequent Neo-Assyrian documents from the Iron Age clearly indicates the armed horseman, but its meaning in the Hittite context is debated, and is usually interpreted as a mounted messenger, or as a light cavalryman, scout. Beal does not only consider the use of mounted messenger, as other authors do, because he claims to identify units consisting of multiple PITHALLU in the documentation. A direct identifying relationship is a founding element. The site recognized today that represents the hill sung by Homer is the hill of Hissarlik, in Turkey. Furthermore, excavations have been carried out there. From the archaeological data, we will examine the literary evidence, with a corpus of documents found in the archives of the city of Hattusha, the capital of the Hittite empire, in Anatolia or Turkey. These documents deal with the relationships during the late Bronze Age between the Hittites and a western reality known as Ahiyawa, recognized as the Mycenaean world. Moreover, another element that emerges from this archive is that of the city of Wilusa, which should be recognized as the Troy sung by Homer. Archaeology The site of Homeric Troy, or rather the city that classical scholars have identified with Homeric Troy, is today universally recognized as the Hill of Hissarlik in Turkey, excavated between 1870 and 1890 by Heinrich Schliemann. It should be said that the city had gone through alternating phases of abandonment and repopulation, and that at least until the fifteenth century its location was still known when, according to the Byzantine historian Critoboulos, the sultan of the Ottoman Turks, Mehmed II, went there to celebrate, nine years after the fact, his conquest of Constantinople. The various excavation data that have emerged over the years offer at least two strata that could be associated with the Troy. Troy 6, dated from 1700 to 1300 or 1250 BC, and Troy 7A, dated between 1300-1250 BC and 1170. Troy 6, with its imposing bastions and its large settlement layout could maintain a population able to compete with that of actual metropolises, would be compatible with the majestic description that Homer makes in the Iliad, while Troy 7A presents a widespread ash layer compatible with a fire, moreover related to a whole series of findings that would seem to indicate an act of war. #trojanwar #ancientgreece #theiliad