Ok, I don't mean to seem obsessed with this Illiad topic, but I couldn't resist this one. My mother and I were talking about it just the other day, and I just can't get it out of my head. So maybe writing it down may help.
Now I know of two versions of how Paris brought Helen to Troy: 1) He brought her by force and so the Greeks were fighting to save her. And 2) Helen went on her own accord with Paris because she loved him. But after reading Book IV of the Odyssey, I saw Helen seemed quite faithful to Menelaus. This brings me to a possible third way of Helen's reason of leaving Sparta for Troy:
We know that Aphrodite promised Paris the most fairest and beautiful woman on earth if he chose her as the most beautiful goddess and not Hera or Athena. We also know Paris took Aphrodite's offer. Here's how I see: Helen may have loved Menelaus, and was happy. Aphrodite saw Helen was the most beautiful and fairest woman considered on earth, but also noticed that she was happily married. Aphrodite may have not liked Troy like Hera and Athena didn't, or it was just fate for Troy to fall, but Aphrodite was also a part of the construction of destroying Troy. Seeing how Helen was married, and wanting to keep a promise to Paris (or create chaos), Aphrodite sent her son Eros (Cupid) down to Earth to strike Helen with a love-struck arrow. After this was done, and Helen went with Paris to Troy, the battle began.
Now there have been in some Greek stories that the love sick feelings sometimes fade away, and I believed this happened to Helen. In Book IV of the Odyssey, she states in lines 288-296 how she was happy to see Odysseus and other Greeks in the city of Troy:
Now I know of two versions of how Paris brought Helen to Troy: 1) He brought her by force and so the Greeks were fighting to save her. And 2) Helen went on her own accord with Paris because she loved him. But after reading Book IV of the Odyssey, I saw Helen seemed quite faithful to Menelaus. This brings me to a possible third way of Helen's reason of leaving Sparta for Troy:
We know that Aphrodite promised Paris the most fairest and beautiful woman on earth if he chose her as the most beautiful goddess and not Hera or Athena. We also know Paris took Aphrodite's offer. Here's how I see: Helen may have loved Menelaus, and was happy. Aphrodite saw Helen was the most beautiful and fairest woman considered on earth, but also noticed that she was happily married. Aphrodite may have not liked Troy like Hera and Athena didn't, or it was just fate for Troy to fall, but Aphrodite was also a part of the construction of destroying Troy. Seeing how Helen was married, and wanting to keep a promise to Paris (or create chaos), Aphrodite sent her son Eros (Cupid) down to Earth to strike Helen with a love-struck arrow. After this was done, and Helen went with Paris to Troy, the battle began.
Now there have been in some Greek stories that the love sick feelings sometimes fade away, and I believed this happened to Helen. In Book IV of the Odyssey, she states in lines 288-296 how she was happy to see Odysseus and other Greeks in the city of Troy:
"The rest of the Trojan women shrilled their grief. Not I: / my heart leapt up--my heart had changed by now--I yearned / to sail back home again! I grieved too late for the madness / Aphrodite sent me, luring me there, far from my dear land, / forsaking my own child, my bridal bed, my husband too, / a man who lacked for neither brains not beauty." ll 291-296Now either she is a good liar, or Helen was telling the truth. That is how I view a possible third version of how Helen came to be with Paris.
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