Troy and Homer: Towards a Solution of an Old Mystery - Hardcover

Latacz, Joachim; Windle, Kevin; Ireland, Rosh

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0199263086 ISBN 13: 9780199263080

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2005

Synopsis

In this book Joachim Latacz turns the spotlight of modern research on the much-debated question of whether the wealthy city of Troy described by Homer in the Iliad was a poetic fiction or a memory of historical reality.

Earlier excavations at the hill of Hisarlik, in Turkey, on the Dardanelles, brought no answer, but in 1988 a new archaeological enterprise, under the direction of Manfred Korfmann, led to a radical shift in understanding. Latacz, one of Korfmann's closest collaborators, traces the course of these excavations, and the renewed investigation of the imperial Hittite archives they have inspired. As he demonstrates, it is now clear that the background against which the plot of the Iliad is acted out is the historical reality of the thirteenth century BC. The Troy story as a whole must have arisen in this period, and we can detect traces of it in Homer's great poem.

About this title

About the Author:

Joachim Latacz is Professor Emeritus at the University of Basel and the author of Homer: His Art and His World.

Review:

"Latacz's treatment of his topic is stimulating, often insightful, thought-provoking, and controversial." --Near Eastern Archaeology

"Latacz not only presents new evidence for the connection between Homer and Troy, but reveals the subtle and rigorous logic ('balancing the probabilities') that, applied to new archaeological evidence, leads to these conclusions. Latacz plots like a crime novelist. Fans of Simon Winchester will love him."--Tom D'Evelyn, Providence Journal (Favorite Books of 2004)

"Joachim Latacz, the best Homeric scholar writing in German, brings the field up to date in Troy and Homer: Towards the Solution of an Old Mystery by synthesizing the latest views of the Hittite tablets and the recent excavations at Troy. The story is well told, with excellent maps and chronological tables and illustrations; the reader is kept on tenterhooks throughout."--Times Literary Supplement

"Troy and Homer, by Joachim Latacz, pushes a case that is as thrilling as its prose is measured."--Independent on Sunday

"Throughout Troy and Homer, potentially daunting intricacies of argument and evidence are mitigated by the translators' serviceable prose and the author's provision of many charts, maps, plans, and explicit section and subsection headings. These help make a meaty volume readily intelligible to a broad non-specialist readership, Latacz's stated target audience, but scholars and serious students, too, will appreciate this exciting and up-to-date overview of the current state of Troy research."--New England Classical Journal

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0199263086
• ISBN 13: 9780199263080
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 362