The Troy Game (History)

[Mick Harper]

Guess what the very most south-westerly point in the whole of the British Isles is called?

http://www.troytownscilly.co.uk

[Ishmael]

What is the significance of Scilly in relation to Troy?

[Mick Harper]

Well, you'll remember that we established that all south-west, north-west etc points in Europe had significant names. We also know that the Troy name has some Europe-wide significance. This is the first time (isn't it?) that the two phenomena have been linked.

Nor can it be accidental. Troy references are quite rare. South-west etc points are also rare. So the coincidence must be significant. Dunno what it is though.

[Mick Harper]

But to answer your question directly:

1. Carthage was founded by Trojans (Dido and Aeneas)
2. The Cornish tin-trade was controlled by the Phoenicians who founded Carthage.
3. Troy-town is the first landfall when travelling from Carthage to Cornwall.

[Komorikid]

If you're up for a mystery then solve this one.

What is the origin of GogMagog Hill near Cambridge?
What are the two long ditches that face it between the hill and The Wash?
Why do seven rivers in the vicinity have Greek origin names?

[Komorikid]

The written version of the epics originated in Greece around the 8th Century BC but the original oral version on which it is based originated in Western Europe at a much earlier date.

Homer's poems are written in a specific meter know as dactylic hexameter which comprises six feet or metrons - five of 3 syllables, the first one stressed and a sixth of 2 long syllables the first one stressed. A simple example is thus:

DUM-diddy | DUM Diddy | DUM Diddy | DUM Diddy | DUM diddy | DUM dum

Meter has the advantage of making the oral composition of poems and memorisation of text easier, and helps prevent accidental changes being made. The same principle applies to popular music where someone like Elton John can remember the words of every song he has recorded when accompanied with music (not to mention legions of fans that can do likewise). The rhythms of specific metric content are extremely powerful memory triggers whereby poems, songs and text can be recalled at will. And if the content has an additional emotional attachment the memory trigger is even more acute.

This was one of the reasons Bards were so important to cultures that did not have a written language. Druidic and Vedic scholars were noted for their long and involved learning disciplines which lasted their whole lives. They were capable of reciting verbatim, cultural myths, religious ceremonies, astronomical sequences and concise histories from memory. Coincidentally Archaic Irish, Vedic Sanskrit and Homeric Literature bear a striking similarity.

The rhythm of dactylic hexameter is poorly suited to the classic Greek language, so that it is doubtful that the original language of the Homeric tales was Greek. It was more likely translated into Ionian Greek while retaining the original metre.

[Ray]

That's an interesting point - that the dactylic hexameter was unsuited to the Greek language. As you say it suggests that the Homeric epics were not originally in Greek.

But doesn't that imply that Troy's besiegers weren't Greeks?

[Komorikid]

Look no further than the places listed in my earlier post on the Helle Sea.

The Achaeans and the Trojans may have fought a ten year war; bloody and brutal. But where in Homer's tale does it say they were NOT ethnically related. That is a modern assumption conjured up from later battles between the real Greeks and Persians.

You're still under the misconception that the Trojan Wars had some Greek participants; it did not.
The later Classic Greeks inherited the Homeric poem from one branch of their descendants; just as they inherited most of the names of their cities and other geographical features.

As it turns out in light of recent discoveries at the time of the Trojan War places such as Thebes, Crete, Lesbos, Cyprus and Egypt had entirely different names. None of these name existed in the Mediterranean. In fact Egypt was only called Egypt by the Greeks from the time of Alexander the Great. Its historical name up until them was Kemi or Magan.

[Ray]

Have you any ideas about what type of language would be compatible with the dactylic hexameter?

[Mick Harper]

I don't want to blow a different trumpet but isn't English famous for being renderable into hexameter?

Not that I actually know what a hexameter is or whether iambic (wot Shakespeare wrote in) is related to dactylic hexameter.

I'll probably use it in the third edition anyway.

[Komorikid]

Bingo!

An ancient poem rendered in the world's most difficult language is translated into Greek, only to be translated back into its original rendition thousands of years later and in the intervening years everyone has assumed it was the epic of the translators. How much faith has orthodox history placed in other such writings and scripts.

How does that fit with your History of Britain Revealed, Mick.

[Oakey Dokey]

Don't know how relevant this is but I'll mention it in case it springs up more links:

Battle of Troy.

One, King Priam, supposedly fled at the falling of Troy.

Destination: Northern Europe

New assumed name, Odin.

The northern king lineage has a few instances where a new king will assume a name of a god to make his kingship more legal or seem more great. There is supposedly an old and new Odin. The new Odin may just have been King Priam, the Persian fallen king.

Don't know the actual validity of this but it's a rumour/myth.

It also links in Helen and many of the strange correlations within the myths of north and Mediterranean.

[DPCrisp]

I've seen it said that, since D = Th and vowels are highly mutable, ODIN = ATHENA, both gods of war and wisdom (cf. Helen/ Nehalennia). Now is that at the heart of the Saxon question or what?

[Komorikid]

Have you ever noticed how much of Paris is steeped in Egyptian iconography? Maybe it's because someone found out where the name Egypt really came from.

[Hatty]

Paris was supposedly called Lutetia before it became Paris - Paris because of the Parisii. I've no idea why it was called Lutetia. It would be interesting to know when exactly Lutetia became Paris.