Trojan language

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The Trojan language, the language spoken in the ancient city of Troy VIIa (which was probably destroyed violently c. 1200 BC, possibly in a Trojan War) is completely unrecorded.

A late Hittite seal found in the exacavations at Troy in 1995, probably dating from about 1275 BC and lettered in Luwian, is the only archaeological evidence for language at Troy at this period. It indicates that Luwian was known at Troy, which is not surprising since it was a lingua franca of the Hittite empire of which Troy was probably a dependency, but it does not necessarily represent the everyday speech of the city.

An Egyptian inscription at Deir al-Madinah records a victory of Ramesses III over Sea Peoples, including some named Tursha (spelled [twrš3] in Egyptian script). These are probably the same as the earlier Teresh (found written as [trš.w]) of the Merneptah Stele, commemorating Merneptah’s victory in a Libyan campaign at about 1220 BC. This may be too early for the Trojan War. Some have connected the name to the city Taruisas, Troy.

Some have sought the original Trojan language in that of the Etruscans. According to Herodotus these people led by a Tarquin, abandoned Asia Minor after a series of famines in the eighth century, migrating to Italy at that time. The Greeks referred to these people originally as *Tyrsenoi, later as Tyrrhenoi. Etruscans referred to themselves as "Rasena", possibly a later corruption of "Trasena", even "Tlasena" (possibly from Thalassa = pre-Greek or "Pelasgian" for Sea).

Later Greek legend gives at least two indications on the subject of language at Troy.

  • The allies of Troy, listed at length in the Trojan Battle Order which closes book 2 of the Iliad, are depicted as speaking various languages and thus needing to have orders translated to them by their commanders (2.802-6). Elsewhere in the poem (4.433–38) they are compared to sheep and lambs bleating in a field as they talk together in their different languages.
  • In the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite the goddess Aphrodite, inventing a history for herself when seducing the Trojan prince Anchises, claims to come from neighbouring Phrygia but to be bilingual, speaking his language as well as Phrygian because she was brought up by a Trojan nurse.

In addition, the Trojans in the Iliad have no difficulty in speaking to their Greek opponents. However, this may merely be evidence that a fictional convention frequently used in narratives in later times had already been adopted by the poet of the Iliad: for example, Jason finds no language barrier with Medea in Colchis, and Trojan Aeneas converses without difficulty both with Punic Dido and with Latin Turnus.

[edit] References

  • Ross, Shawn A., "Barbaraphonos: Language and Panhellenism in the Iliad," Classical Philology 100 (2005), pp. 299–316.
  • Watkins, Calvert (1986), "The language of the Trojans" in Troy and the Trojan War: a symposium held at Bryn Mawr College, October 1984 ed. M. J. Mellink. Bryn Mawr.
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