The Trojan War

Homer's Iliad describes a ten-year siege of Troy by a Greek coalition, and archaeological evidence shows that Troy (modern Hisarlik in Turkey) was indeed destroyed around 1180 BCE. Whether the destruction was caused by a Greek invasion, an earthquake, or something else remains debated. But the timing is striking — the Trojan War tradition places it right at the beginning of the Late Bronze Age Collapse, when the entire eastern Mediterranean world was falling apart.