Based in fact or myth?

IN one of his one-man shows, Micheal Mac Liammoir spoke about the arrival of the Normans.

He told how Diarmuid MacMurrough abducted Dervla, wife of Tiernan O’Rourke of Breffni and how O’Rourke and the Ard Rí O’Connor banished him from Leinster as punishment. MacMurrough then sought help from the Normans and Mac Liammoir warned of involving neighbours in domestic disputes.

He said they arrived to help MacMurrough get his territory and Dervla back and hundreds of years later, they were still here. Little wonder that Dervla was sometimes referred to as the Helen of Ireland, as another lady named Helen had caused similar problems in ancient Greece.

The history of Dervla is very much based on historical fact whereas that of Helen is based on ancient Greek mythology. The story is related in Homer’s Iliad and The Odyssey and since the Roman’s claimed descent from survivors of the Siege of Troy, also in works by Virgil and Ovid. It also figured in works by, among others, Chaucer, Berlioz and Shakespeare.

Following a row among the gods, Aphrodite caused Helen, wife of Hector, King of  Sparta, to fall in love with Paris who took her away to Troy. A great war followed which lasted ten years and which caused the deaths of the great heroes Achilles, Ajax, Hector and Paris himself. The Greeks besieged Troy but try as they may, they could not breach the walls to capture the city. Eventually they pretended to be leaving. They boarded their ships and pulled off shore having left a departing gift of a wooden horse for the Trojans. Amid great rejoicing, the Trojans brought the wooden horse inside the city walls. Overnight, Greeks emerged  from the horse, opened the city gates to the returning ships and captured the city.

Legend has it that the Greeks sacked the city and destroyed the temples. Because of this they earned the animosity of the gods, they were forced to wander and few returned safely to their homes.

The ancient Greeks believed that the war with Troy had actually happened and that the city of Troy was located in what is now Turkey. Down through the years that came to be disregarded and the story was looked on as legend. As with all legends, there is more than likely some modicum of truth behind it, which could be simply a gathering of stories of different wars. In the late 1800s, archaeologists discovered what is now accepted as the possible ruins of ancient Troy.

Further excavations in the 1960s backed up this theory when they found evidence of a city destroyed by fire around 1180 BC.  This was around the dates placed on the war by ancient Greek writers. Many who believe that this was Troy and that it was destroyed by fire, accept the dating by the Greek writer Eratosthenes.

Eratosthenes was born in what is modern Libya. He studied for a number of years in Athens, was a noted mathematician and philosopher, appointed tutor to the children of the Pharaoh and became the librarian of the Great Library of Alexandria.

According to him, the Trojan War started in 1194 BC and ended when the Wooden Horse was brought into the city on June 11, 1184 BC – 3196 years ago this week.