Burying the Heros: Identifying the Archaeological Background of the Homeric Burial

Abstract For centuries the Homeric epics, especially the Iliad, have fascinated and attracted the attention of the academic community and the wider public alike. Many scholars throughout the centuries endeavored to prove the historicity of the Iliad through the archaeological evidence. Though current academic research has long departed from those approaches, the epics contain important historical and cultural elements that were part of the reality not only of Homer’s contemporary (Iron Age) society but also, to an extent, of the Late Bronze Age. This paper argues that the Homeric funerary customs are not a purely literary creation, but rather the result of a mixture of traditions, contemporary customs and collective memory. This will be achieved through a survey of archaeological and written evidence pertaining to Late Bronze Age and Iron Age burial traditions, ranging from Hittite Anatolia to Central Europe, and in doing so suggest the possible origins, both geographically and chronologically, of ‘Homeric’ mortuary practices.