One of the greatest epicslong poem about legendary or historical heroes, written in a grand style of ancient Greece, the Iliad tells of events during the final year of the Trojan Warlegendary war between the Greeks and the people of Troy that was set off by the kidnapping of Helen, wife of the king of Sparta; inspiration for Homer's epics the Iliad and the Odyssey. Iliad means "poem of Ilios," one of the names of the city of Troy in Asia Minorancient term for modern-day Turkey, the part of Asia closest to Greece.

The Greek poet Homer is credited with creating the Iliad. Some scholars, however, doubt that Homer ever existed and suggest that the poem was woven together by generations of storytellers. In any case, the...