What was Athena's issue with Troy?

 

Athena with her war helmet, aegis, and spear. Notice: she is clearly a European. “White.” But when this was kept up, she’d have been painted with color, her hair, her eyes would all be painted on, but her facial features resemble her people who were “white.” Greek.

Most people will tell you it’s because she had a grudge against Paris because he didn’t choose her as the most beautiful goddess.

If you recall in the backstory of Paris, his parents were told that he’d be the destruction of their kingdom, but he was such a beautiful baby that they couldn’t kill him themselves. So, they gave him to a shepherd, Ageleus, on the instruction that he should kill the baby since he was a curse on the city. Ageleus takes the baby to the wilderness and leaves him there and then goes about his life. But it torments him that he’s done this to a baby, so he ends up going back to check on him and finds that a she-bear has been nursing the baby and he’s not suffered. In fact, he looks remarkably healthy. Ageleus takes this as a sign from the gods that the baby is not fated to die so he takes the baby back and raises him as his own son and changes his name from Alexander to Paris.

Paris, then, grows up tending these herds of the king of Troy. He particularly likes overseeing the cattle and he’s been able to breed them by their beauty and as a result, has this bull that he feels is the most beautiful one that has ever been born. (Ares and Hermes mess with him about this and they prove Paris is a remarkably honest and discerning guy). And he has some acclaim about this bull and how beautiful it is, and his ability to be able to distinguish beauty becomes something of renown.

It happens at about this time that the gods on Olympus are in a disagreement on who the most beautiful goddess is (there’s a golden apple at stake). Hermes knows about Paris’ renown on this so that’s why they (the gods and Zeus himself) ask Paris, who is just at this point a son of a shepherd who happens to have a very good looking bull, to be the judge of which goddess is the most beautiful one. When the goddesses make their case before Paris: Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, Paris’ initial judgment is that they are all equal in beauty.

A later rendition of this beauty contest

So, it extends into a round two where they offer Paris their gifts and now it becomes not so much a beauty contest, but a value contest. Hera offers him splendor and nobility, promising that he’ll be the greatest king of Asia if he picks her. Athena offers him ultimate wisdom. Aphrodite offers him the love of the most beautiful woman in the world and she uses a seashell to show him that woman who is Helen of Sparta (who at this time in history may not have been married). Once Paris sees her, he cannot look away, and he keeps the shell and he picks Aphrodite as being the most beautiful goddess. And it’s implied the other two go away outraged that they were weren’t picked. (Notice though, Paris has lived a life dedicated to breeding animals for their beauty so….he’d be particularly interested in owning the most beautiful woman on the basis of breeding value. With this woman as the mother, he could have the most beautiful children ever born and create a very remarkable kind of stock in the world).

But we know Athena is the goddess of logic and strategy, so, the least likely one to be jealous:

“She is not recorded to have shown petulant jealousy on more than a single occasion.”

- Robert Graves

And this occasion is with Arachne, not Paris, Arachne who is judged as weaving a better tapestry than Athena in a separate contest, a tapestry which Athena rips up with outrage and turns Arachne into a spider, however, some of this is because Arachne’s tapestry showed all of the flaws of the gods and Athena saw it as disrespectful, besides that she did not want this subject being called “the most beautiful.” So, it wasn’t the same kind of jealousy of it being strictly because she lost and Arachne’s work really was superior as far as skill level. It was also subject matter.

However, when Athena’s anger subsides, she returns and blesses Arachne to be able to keep weaving, despite her altered form. (Though, it would also be constantly ripped up).

So, even here we see that Athena gets over her anger and isn’t known to be a jealous person and definitely not for a long time.

So, this being the case, it’s highly unlikely she’d bear a grudge against Paris for very long. She, no doubt, found him quite stupid to turn down the gift of ultimate wisdom, but that’s his loss more than hers, while Hera continued to stay completely resentful against Paris because her nature is entirely different.

There’s also the account of when Athena is reasoning with Ares when his son Ascalaphus (Achaean) is killed by Deiphobus (Trojan Prince) in the Trojan War and Ares wants to abandon the Trojan side and fight for the Greeks because he is enraged by his son’s death. Zeus has forbidden the gods from interfering directly in the war at this point and Athena stops Ares from breaking ranks. Athena reminds him that he has already violated his oath once and suffered for it. (She was able to seriously wound him). If he breaks the divine order again, he’ll only make things worse for himself. She also tells him, in effect, that he can still take revenge on the person responsible without changing sides. Athena understands the difference between taking revenge on an individual and changing one’s allegiance to an entire side.

And this makes sense because, of course, why punish an entire city because of one offensive person? And the fact that she is able to convince Ares of this is just proof that she fully believes she could take out Paris if she wanted to and not have to punish all of the Trojans because of him.

So her being anti-Troy is really not because of Paris, or, not solely because of him, so then what is it?

Athena’s palladium. It’s supposed to be a miniature of her but likely it’s a little temple with a little Athena inside it and resembles the trophies teams win after a major bowl. They win a palladium.

One heart wrenching moment for the Trojans is when they take a beautiful dress and they lay it on the idol of Athena’s knees as a gift to her to help them “break the spear of Diomedes.” We then see that the Trojans are utterly reverent of Athena and have never insulted her, and they are making a very compelling cry to her for help. And from antiquity, they have reverently kept a palladium (a special idol of Athena) that has gifted the city with protection (they deeply believe this), so the Trojans actually love her. But it says in the account that she chooses not to respond.

She’s refused to answer their prayer.

Not only that, she blesses Odysseus with finding a way into the city (at the part of the wall that was built by mortals) and helps him steal her palladium so they (Trojans) will be disheartened and the protection on the city crumbles.

And it really begs the question of why? If she hasn’t been insulted, if she has no particular grudge against them, if the Trojans revere her and she’s not condemning them on Paris’ sake, then why is she fighting so hard against them, and why would Zeus say, “Hera and Athena have been long born a grudge against Troy?”

So we need to discuss the back history of the Trojans and also Athena herself in another tangent since this goes farther back than just Paris.

Troy’s history

Troy has become a Kingdom of a people called the Dardanians, descendants of Dardanus who was a son of Zeus. They end up worshiping the same gods as the Greeks. And, at first, they are a mighty, and a blessed people because of this.

But, then we come to this peculiar King, Laomedon. He has a reputation for being particularly stingy. When there’s a rebellion on Olympus and Apollo and Poseidon are the ringleaders, Zeus decides that he will punish them for resenting his rulership by compelling them to serve a mortal King and compare his ruling style with mortal men and see if they don’t come away more grateful of his style of sovereignty. And the king that he picks them to work for is King Laomedon of Troy. So , the idea is that this man is particularly not fun to work for or they would not learn this lesson about Zeus being a better ruler.

So, being stripped of their divine positions on Olympus, Apollo and Poseidon show up at Troy and they tell the king they are laborers looking for work. The king sees that they look like beautiful and athletic men, and he happens to be currently building a wall for his city, so he tells them that they could help build the wall, and even though Zeus has pretty much implied that they have to do this labor for free, Laomedon promises them that he will pay them these special horses that he has which are considered divine and were gifts to the city by Zeus. If they build him his wall, he will pay them with these horses. They make this agreement and the two gods get to work.

Poseidon calls for the rocks for the wall from the sea, and they come to him in the perfect size and shape, and Apollo uses them with his wisdom to lay them in such a way that they will never be toppled. And they work night and day, and they build this high and impressive wall in an insanely short amount of time, leaving most of the wall built by them and only a tiny part built by actual mortals. But when they come to collect the horses, Laomedon decides to renege and he sends them away with nothing.

Apollo and Poseidon are both offended but Poseidon moreso, and he sends sea monsters and tides against Troy, while Apollo sends a plague, and it’s so miserable for the Trojans that Laomedon beseeches his priests to reverse this and is told by them that if he sacrifices his daughter, Hesione, to the sea monster, that all of his curses will be nullified. So, Laomedon prepares to sacrifice Hesione but it just happens that Hercules is passing by with his men. 😏 He takes an interest in what’s going on and he offers to kill the sea monster for the king and asks what he would be paid in return and he is also promised these special horses. So, he defeats the sea monster and rescues the princess but then when he wants paid, the king refuses to give him the horses too. Thus creating the reputation of the Trojans for being horse hoarders, people who cannot part with their horses once they are given to them. And Odysseus uses this knowledge against them in the Trojan horse. If you give these people a splendid horse, they will take it and never give it away. 😏

Anyway, Hercules attacks the city because they are extremely stingy people. But he asks Hesione what she’d like as a gift, after he’s already killed the entire royal family of Troy, except the children and the women, and Hesione asks that her younger brother Priam be spared, and so Hercules leaves Priam as king of Troy and the Greeks leave. Hesione is given as a wife to his fighter from Salamis.

But this hasn’t fulfilled the fate that Poseidon promised on Troy. Poseidon swore that the walls would remain but the city would be destroyed. (Imagine realizing the entire purpose of this wall was for Laomedon to horde his treasures, to promise payment or trade deals and never fulfill them and then defy attack when people will just take what they were promised! You’ve now encouraged his hoarding tendencies to gift him with a wall no army can topple! So Poseidon swears the city will be destroyed regardless of its wall). Hercules has only attacked the royal family and manipulated the royal lineage, but he hasn’t destroyed the city or the people. So, the city of Troy is fated to be destroyed. And Athena seems to have chosen Apollo and Poseidon’s argument on this issue. The Trojans have made vows and broken them. They deserve destruction.

Zeus and Athena are highly cognizant of fate. Zeus follows it because this is divine law higher than him, and Athena never fights against it because that would be stupid. So, this is one reason why she cannot side with Troy. It would be against fate.

But that doesn’t mean she couldn’t punish or hold back Diomedes…(like they’re asking) but at this point she has promised to be behind the Achaeans and she particularly favors Diomedes because he fights by strategy, and she has a personal love for Odysseus because he is also cunning, so it seems like in these particular cases, she won’t hurt either of these two fighters because they’re her favorites.

Athena herself

If we look at her speech to Ares as well, she is telling Ares that he can’t break a vow and expect to not face consequences. He’s already done that once before and has been punished. It would be foolish to do it again. So, we see that she understands that vow breaking reaps terrible consequences. And it’s implied at this point that she has vowed to help the Greeks. That’s done and she can’t break it.

The Trojans have a temple to Athena, which has a palladium to honor her specifically at this point in the story, but the Greek nation has been worshiping Athena longer. Cecrops is the king when the Athenians become Athenians. There’s a dispute over which god should be their patron god and the people pick Athena. Athena went out out of her way to gain this city because she wanted it. It never explains why she wants this particular city so bad, but the olive tree was her particular blessing to them so that they would pick her, and afterward it’s implied that this is her favorite city on earth, a hub of her activity on earth, and it would later reverence her by building her the Parthenon. So, unless the Athenians completely turn their back on her and insult her, she has to defend them in their endeavors. She’d favor them above other nations. And while we don’t have the bones of Cecrops to verify this is historically real, we have an established reverence of Athena centered in Athens for 500 years (at least) by the time Homer writes the story and this is their deeply held tradition.

At the time he writes the story there’s also a long history in Ithaca not only of worship to Athena, but also a cult to Odysseus. It’s from a cave in the Polis Bay where it said that Athena led Odysseus after the Phaeacians brought him home and gifted him with lots of treasure, she led him to this cave to hide the treasure there. And it’s a cave where followers of Athena worshipped her. By Homer’s day, this is a centuries old custom.

Diomedes himself was from Argos, where traditionally, the cult of Hera was kept and Argos is considered her city, but they also worshiped Athena there.

So, you have these cities where Athena has been worshiped for something like more than 500 years, if not thousands, and then you have Troy who does worship her too, and they haven’t insulted her, but she knows that they’re fated to be destroyed and that her people from Athens and Argos and Ithaca and Mycenae are the ones who are going to do it, so Athena vows to help them and she centers herself around the fighters that she particularly favors: Diomedes and Odysseus.

Diomedes

Though she does council Achilles well also, he runs around offending so many gods and fights by passion that I wouldn’t say she’s particularly on his side, only that since he’s a very strong fighter, and when he fights, the Greeks do win considerable victories, so it’s smart to keep him alive as long as possible and also fighting for the Greeks, so she tries to hold him back from offending King Agememnon and be sentenced to death for offending him or outright murdering him.

So, to answer the question, Athena sides with the Greeks because that’s how she vows herself when this war is discussed by the gods. And her reasons seem to be because she knows that fate is on the side of the Greeks, she knows that Laomedon cursed the city of Troy by his stinginess, and she has all these Greek cities who have been reverent to her for centuries who she’s vowed to be the patroness of. So, she makes her vow and she keeps it. She fights for the Greeks so they’ll win. This forces her not to help the Trojans even though she hears them begging her for help.

Conversely, while Apollo and Artemis are also reverenced by the Greeks, both of them are offended by things the Greeks do. You would think Apollo would be on the Greek side since he is offended that he wasn’t paid for the work he did on the Trojan wall, but the actual king who did that to him is now dead, and the Trojans are particularly fond of him and have always given him great tribute and gifts (and he fell in love with Princess Cassandra who serves as a priestess at his temple) so at first he remains rather neutral. But when Agamemnon has the daughter of his priest and outright says he doesn’t care about honoring Apollo, he won’t give Chryseas back to her father, this offends Apollo so much that he decides to go against the Greeks and hits them with severe plague. (And he later inspires Paris to shoot the shot that kills Achilles and targets his one vulnerable spot). So. It seems like he never made a vow to help anyone in this war, but when he was outright insulted he decided to go against the Greeks, and because of this, his mother also decides to back him up and goes against the Greeks. So, just because cities of Greece reverenced these gods, it doesn’t mean that they would certainly help them. Or would make vows about it. And even under a vow, if the Greeks had insulted Athena, she would’ve backed out of helping them so adamantly, but they never do anything in the story to personally insult her. And Odysseus himself does several things that actually tickle her because he is so clever.

It was just the cherry on the cake that she’d be showing Paris the folly of having turned down her gift of ultimate wisdom. Considering that he had fate against him from the beginning, Aphrodite was the least one he should’ve picked since Hera might have been able to out maneuver the curse, and maybe Troy would be destroyed, but Paris would still have all the rest of Asia minor to rule and could rebuild Troy, and also Athena could’ve helped him out maneuver it through twisting with fate in some way that was extremely clever, but having the most beautiful woman in the world ended up being an added curse for Paris even though they were happy and in love, however brief. But maybe he reasoned that love is the ultimate gift of life, more than kingdoms or renown, and even having it for a moment was more precious than a lifetime without it. And…I rather agree. Tragic as that is. He’s probably right.