I have spent too much time on the Elian research when HERE is where I belong , here where I can bring enlightenment to my amici.
As you know, because it is one of the great feats of my teen years, I translated the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Ahem. The Greeks were tired of waiting for the Trojans to surrender and Ulysses advised them to try strategy. So they pretended that they were ending the siege, packed up and sailed away, leaving on the shore the fabled horse. The Trojans opened the gates, all excited at getting out of the town, and looked at this big thing and argued about it. Some decided it was a trophy, Kind of like the Stanley Cup and they should take it into the city.
WHile they were debating, Laoco”n, a priest, said the immortal line, "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes (I fear the Greeks even when they are bearing gifts)." He threw a spear at it, and it made a hollow sound, which made some people a little nervous, but then, some others came up dragging Simon, a Greek, who on told them he'd been left behind ecause Ulysses was mad at him or something, and he told them that the horse was an offering to Minerva and was built big so that they COULDN"T carry it into the city as some prophet had said if the Trojans got it into the city, then the Trojans would win the war. And then for some reason, these serpents came out of the ocean and killed poor Laoco”n and his sons (hence the term Laoco”n struggle, and also the subject of that famous statue in the Vatican).
Well, after that, the Trojans figured it WAS a sacred object, dragged it into the city, partied, passed out and the rest is mythology. |
