Greek Mythology: The Iliad Day 2

Goals for the Week:

  1. Understand the mythology of the Trojan War.
  2. Understand the plot and characters of Homer’s Iliad.
  3. Complete the Iliad Character Research Prompt.

Today’s Checklist:

  1. Understand the plot of Homer’s Iliad
  2. Consider what’s history and what’s mythology
  3. Begin to grapple with the language of Homer

Your assignment for this week!

This week you will:

Today’s Lesson!



Learning Target: 

I can understand a broad overview of The Iliad by reading summaries of the text so that I can look more in-depth at the most important parts of the text.


Let’s start today by talking about history!

So, whenever I teach The Iliad, the first question my students as is “Did this really happen?” and the answer is….well…maybe kinda?

It depends on what you’re asking.

  • Did a guy named Achilles really exist? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  • Did the city of Troy really exist? yes!
  • Was there a Trojan War like Homer described it? There was probably a war, but we don’t know if it was like Homer described.
  • Was there a Trojan Horse? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

We have a lot more questions than answers. But one thing we do know is where Troy is supposed to have been:

For more info on what’s history and what’s mythology, read this article, “The Fall of Troy: The Legend and The Facts”. And you can check out this short TedEd video on the archaeological pursuits to find Troy!

Work Session: 

The goal today is for you to get a basic understanding of the plot of The Iliad. To do that, I’m going to give you a few resources to look into. Choose one to read. The others? Give them a cursory glance. Skim them. At least look at the pictures.

Closing Session:

Let’s sum up what happens in The Iliad with a video, shall we? Check out this rendition from CLEAN Classics Summarized on YouTube!

PS – we will have a ZOOM MEETING on Thursday at 11am! This is optional, but we are looking forward to seeing your smiling face on the camera, so please try to come!

Looking Ahead: Tomorrow’s Checklist

  1. Understand Hector’s death in The Iliad
  2. Consider various interpretations of Hector’s death scene in various media.
  3. Prepare for Thursday’s Zoom meeting!

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