The Controversy of How the Greeks Used Chariots in the Trojan War

In Homer’s Iliad, which presents part of the story of the Trojan War, chariots feature throughout the narrative. However, a common belief today is that Homer was incorrect in his portrayal of chariots.

According to this interpretation, Homer was working from a vague tradition that had come down from the Mycenaean Era, in which chariots were remembered but their correct usage was forgotten. However, does Homer’s account in the Iliad really misrepresent how the Greeks used chariots?

Greek chariots in the Mycenaean Era

First, before examining how Homer described their role in the Trojan War, let us consider how the Greeks historically used chariots during the Mycenaean Era. There are no surviving written accounts of warfare from Mycenaean Greece. However, the Greeks of that era created many depictions of warfare, which helped us understand their use of chariots.

From these depictions, it appears that there are two primary facts that we can perceive. Firstly, the Greeks primarily used chariots as moving platforms from which to attack the enemy. The warrior on the chariot would attack their enemies with either a spear or a bow.

Attacking from the moving chariot gave the warrior a significant advantage over the enemy infantry. He could approach and retreat with great speed, making it challenging for the enemy to defend themselves and counterattack effectively.

Secondly, the Greeks often employed shock tactics. A long and formidable line of chariots would charge towards the enemy troops and plow through them, the horses trampling over those who stood in their way.

These two basic points were also common to other Bronze Age cultures, such as the Egyptians and the Hittites.

How the Greeks used chariots in the Trojan War

With this in mind, how does this compare with the way Homer describes the Greeks using chariots in the Trojan War? Scholars have long noted that his descriptions bear very little similarity to Mycenaean warfare. In what ways?

Essentially, while the Mycenaean Greeks used chariots as weapons in themselves (for shock tactics) and as moving platforms from which to engage in battle, Homer’s Greeks used chariots as battlefield taxis.

The driver of the chariot would charge into the midst of the fighting and allow the warrior to jump off. The driver would then withdraw to the sidelines, out of harm’s way. Then, when the warrior needed to escape, the driver would quickly return, and the warrior would jump on the chariot and escape.

Explanations for this discrepancy

What explains the difference between how Homer describes chariots in the Trojan War and how the Mycenaean Greeks used chariots? After all, the traditional date of the Trojan War places it towards the end of the Mycenaean Era.

One common explanation is that the oral tradition about the Trojan War did not perfectly preserve details of warfare. What came down to Homer, centuries after the fact, was merely that the Greeks used chariots in the Trojan War. However, how they used them had been lost.

Therefore, Homer had to invent a use that seemed logical to him. He had no familiarity with shock tactics or the concept of chariots as moving platforms from which to attack. Therefore, he simply invented the use of chariots as battlefield taxis.

How the Trojan War chariots match real history

The problem with this interpretation is that it relies on the assumption that Homer’s portrayal of chariots as battlefield taxis is unhistorical. As it happens, we know that this is not true.

For example, during his invasions of Britain in 55 and 54 BCE, Julius Caesar encountered tribes there that used chariots almost exactly like the warriors of the Trojan War. He described this use of chariots in great detail, and his description is nearly identical to Homer’s.

The ancient historian Diodorus Siculus (a contemporary of Caesar) remarked upon this similarity, writing:

“They use chariots, for instance, in their wars, even as tradition tells us the old Greek heroes did in the Trojan War.”

Therefore, the use of chariots as battlefield taxis in the Trojan War is not unhistorical. Nevertheless, there is no evidence that the Mycenaean Greeks used these tactics. So how should we understand Homer’s portrayal of chariots?

The use of chariots in Archaic Greece

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Rather than divergences from Mycenaean warfare in the Iliad being the exception, modern studies have shown the reverse. Overwhelmingly, Homer’s descriptions match the warfare of the Archaic Greeks, essentially the Greeks of Homer’s own time.

This means we should not expect Homer’s descriptions of chariots in the Trojan War to match their use in the Mycenaean Era. Scholar Hans van Wees has made an excellent case that Homer’s descriptions match how the Greeks used chariots in Archaic Greece.

Contrary to popular belief, the Greeks continued to use chariots long after the Mycenaean Era. We see this clearly from depictions on pottery dating to 750 BCE and after. These depictions show chariots being used in combat. The Greeks did not just use chariots for racing in this late period, as is sometimes argued.

Pottery from the seventh and sixth centuries BCE increasingly depicts warriors mounted on horseback, engaged in practices similar to those Homer described with chariots. The horse rider would transport the warrior to the battlefield. Once there, the warrior would dismount, fight for a while, and then remount the horse to escape.

Hans van Wees argues that this indicates the use of horses in warfare began replacing the use of chariots in the seventh century BCE. Evidence from pottery crucially indicates that the use of chariots as battlefield taxis in that era was historical, as that is how single horses were demonstrably used.

Evidence from Cyrene

Documentary evidence supports the Greeks’ use of chariots as described by Homer in his account of the Trojan War. In his Cyropaedia, the fifth-century BCE historian Xenophon wrote the following:

“The method of managing a chariot employed of old at Troy and that in vogue among the Cyrenaeans even unto this day he [Cyrus] abolished.”

According to this, the method of using a chariot at Troy still existed among the Cyrenaeans of Xenophon’s time. In Homer’s Iliad, the Trojans use chariots in the same way as the Greeks. Therefore, Xenophon is referring to the use of chariots as battlefield taxis.

The Cyrenaeans were the inhabitants of ancient Cyrene, a Greek colony on the north coast of Africa. It was founded by settlers from Thera, or Santorini, who were themselves settlers from Sparta.

Therefore, this is strong supporting evidence for the use of chariots in the Homeric manner by the Greeks of the Archaic Era.