Fall of Troy

Title(s):
  • Fall of Troy
  • Historia de excidio Troiae
    (Historia de excidio Troiae, History of the destruction of Troy)
  • De excidio Troiae
Period covered:
Journey of Jason-fall of Troy
Language:
Latin
State of Preservation:
Full
Genre:
  • Secular history (classicizing history)
Remarks:
The history is introduced by a fictitious letter of Cornelius Nepos, who dedicates his work to the historian Sallust and presents it as the Latin translation of Dares of Phrygia's Greek original. The existence and the features of this Greek source have been extensively discussed (cf. BNJ 51).
The Latin Dares enjoyed great success in the Middle Ages (Faivre D'Arcier 2006: 14-18). This explains the high number of manuscripts.
Edition - Translation:
Fragments:
Sources:
Bibliography:
  • A. Beschorner (1992) Untersuchungen zu Dares Phrygius. Tübingen.
  • G. Bessi (2005) 'Darete Frigio e Ditti Cretese: Un bilancio degli studi'. Bollettino di studi latini 35: 170-209.
  • G. Bretzigheimer (2008) 'Dares Phrygius, Historia ficta: Die Präliminarien zum Trojanischen Krieg'. Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 151: 365-397.
  • L. Faivre D'Arcier (2006) Histoire et géographie d'un mythe: La circulation des manuscrits du De excidio Troiae de Darès le Phrygien (VIIIe-XVe siècles) (Mémoires et documents de l'École des Chartes, 82). Paris - Geneva.
  • S. Merkle (1996) 'The truth and nothing but the truth: Dictys and Dares'. In: The novel in the ancient world, ed. G. Schmeling. Leiden: 563-580.
  • J. Stenger (2005) 'Dares Phrygius und kein griechisches Original'. Zeitschrift für die klassische Altertumswissenschaft 24: 175-190.
  • N.K. Yavuz (2018) 'From Caesar to Charlemagne: The tradition of Trojan origins'. The Medieval History Journal 21: 251-290.
  • N.K. Yavuz (2018) Transtextual networks in the European Middle Ages: A digital corpus of the Trojan narrative in Latin manuscripts: http://www.transtextual.net/works/