Empire: World History 334. Bronze Age Apocalypse: Did Homer Write History? (Ep 3)
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Feb 17, 2026 Simon Goldhill, Professor of Greek Literature and Culture at King’s College, Cambridge, discusses Homeric poetry and oral tradition. He questions single authorship, explains performance and memorised recitation, and teases how Homer preserves fragments of Bronze Age life amid imaginative storytelling. He also explores gods, heroic flaws, and how the poems were fixed into text.
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Extract Truths, But Beware Fiction
- Individual Homeric scenes may preserve factual details, but are embedded in obvious invention.
- The Cyclops cheese details can be informative while the monster remains poetic fiction.
Bronze And Iron As Layered Memory
- Homer preserves different technological layers, with both bronze and iron appearing in the poems.
- Scholars read these anachronisms as evidence of layered memories from different eras.
Troy Exists, But Not As Homer Describes
- Archaeology shows cities like Troy existed and were destroyed, but not at Iliadic scale.
- Homer offers a convincing world-map and social image without being a literal chronicle of events.
