Trojan War Happened In England.

[spankythehippo]

The Trojan War is usually dated to some point before the Spartans you speak of migrated into Greece. It's a bit like criticizing notions of an ancient Egyptian religion by claiming that everyone knows Egyptians thought Allah was the only god.

The Trojan-era Sparta would have been more of a grouping of loosely associated aristocrats. These aristocrats might easily have owned their very own naval craft, with which they would have sailed the Mediterranean looking for plunder and glory: the overarching motivations of a Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age aristocrat warrior. Both plunder and glory aplenty would be found at Troy. Anyway, Sparta "only" sent something like 50 ships in the Iliad: 4%.

There isn't even total agreement on the historicity of a "Trojan War". This reinterpretation only makes it less credible. :/

But with all of the ancients, they tend to exaggerate a bit.

Also, the site of Troy in Turkey was desTROYed (geddit... heh heh) by a very inept amateur archaeologist, by the name of Heinrich Schliemann.

Exactly, the Spartans were not Spartans. They were descended from the Dorians, Peloponnesians, and migrants. So Homer was exaggerating, if there was a shred of truth to his story.

And some of the narratives in the Iliad are really far-fetched. When Achilles was about to fight Hector, Hector ran away. Achilles went after him, and circled Troy 7 times. That's quite alot of running. But there's also the story of Pheidippides, who ran from Athens to Sparta in a single day.