Study Uses Mathematics to Reveal When Homer Wrote the Iliad

Triumphant Achilles dragging Hector’s assemblage astir Troy, from a panoramic fresco of the Achilleion. Credit: Franz Matsch / Public Domain

Scholars proceed to beryllium fascinated by the question of erstwhile Homer composed the Iliad, and 1 caller survey adjacent applied mathematics to effort to pinpoint its date. There are galore ways of investigating this, specified arsenic examining artwork connected pottery, past texts astir Homer’s contemporaries, and clues wrong the poem itself. But however does this mathematical attack work?

Principles down the mathematical attack to dating Homer’s Iliad

The study was conducted by researchers from the University of Reading, and it was published successful the diary BioEssays successful 2013. More recently, successful August 2025, the aforesaid pb researcher, Mark Pagel, published an mentation of the aforesaid process and results successful Medicine successful Homer.

How did this survey work? The survey relied connected comparisons betwixt 3 languages. One was Homeric Greek, the 2nd was Modern Greek, and the 3rd was Hittite. This past connection was the connection of the past Hittite Empire successful Bronze Age Anatolia.

Since Hittite, similar Greek, is an Indo-European language, it has a alleged familial narration to the connection of Homer. That is, some Greek and Hittite descend from a communal ancestor. This means that by comparing these 3 languages, we tin usage mathematics to enactment retired erstwhile Homer wrote the Iliad.

Language changes

How does this examination really work? According to the researchers, the survey used “shared cognates among Hittite, and Homeric and Modern Greek, and rates of lexical replacement successful Indo-European languages.”

The researchers took into relationship the complaint astatine which the vocabulary of a connection changes implicit time. While words perpetually evolve, what is little communal is simply a connection being replaced by an unrelated word. For example, the connection “hund” (now “hound”) was mostly replaced by the unrelated “dog” successful English respective centuries ago.

The mean half-life for immoderate fixed connection is astir 2,500 years. That is, determination is astir a 50 percent accidental that a connection volition beryllium replaced by an unrelated connection wrong 2 1000 to 3 1000 years. However, this is lone the average, and the existent complaint varies importantly depending connected the word. As the researchers explained:

“We associated with each connection its complaint of lexical replacement (the complaint astatine which a connection is replaced by a caller unrelated oregon non-cognate word) successful the Indo-European languages. We past estimated the clip separating pairs of vocabulary sets by seeking the times successful years that simultaneously maximized the likelihood of observing these distributions of cognacy judgements, connected the phylogeny successful Fig. 1A, fixed their rates of lexical replacement.”

In different words, they looked astatine the vocabulary of Hittite, Homeric Greek, and Modern Greek. By utilizing the complaint astatine which definite words are known to beryllium replaced, they could estimation erstwhile Homer indispensable person written the Iliad.

When Homer wrote the Iliad according to mathematics

William Adolphe Bouguereau 1825-1905. Homer and his Guide 1874 via Wikimedia Commons

What were the results of this study? When, according to mathematics, did Homer constitute the Iliad? The eventual effect was that, with 95 percent confidence, Homer appears to person written the Iliad successful astir 762 BC.

In reality, the communicative is much complex. The study’s archetypal effect was somewhat different: the mathematics suggested that Homer wrote the Iliad successful 707 BC. The researchers past noted, however, that this archetypal investigation relied solely connected linguistic information and did not instrumentality immoderate humanities accusation into account.

One cardinal portion of humanities accusation is that Herodotus mentioned Homer. Herodotus was a Greek historiographer of the 5th period BC. This means that Homer and the Iliad indispensable predate 450 BC.

To relationship for this, the researchers repeated the survey utilizing an adjusted mathematical model, utilizing a bell-shaped archetypal estimation for Homer’s age, astir apt astir 800 BC. This allowed for a scope of astir 200 years connected either side. By starting from this presumption successful their Bayesian analysis, 450 BC would autumn extracurricular the astir apt scope of dates for Homer.

This 2nd investigation yielded a day of 762 BC, starring the researchers to reason that, based connected the mathematics, this was the astir probable clip erstwhile Homer composed the Iliad.

Issues with this study

Undoubtedly, this is simply a fascinating study. Most scholars spot the creation of the Iliad successful either the eighth oregon seventh period BC, and adjacent without humanities evidence, the survey arrived astatine a day afloat accordant with this range.

Therefore, this survey shows that mathematical models of connection alteration tin beryllium utilized effectively, arsenic they bash look to supply tenable estimates for erstwhile past texts were composed.

However, we indispensable besides beryllium cautious. The fig of “95 percent confidence” really covers a precise wide scope of imaginable dates, with 762 BC being lone the astir likely. It would beryllium misleading to dainty this effect arsenic thing adjacent to a precise day for erstwhile Homer composed the Iliad.

If 1 were to mention a day from this study, it should successful information beryllium 707 BC alternatively than 762 BC. The erstwhile was the earthy mathematical result, whereas the second emerged lone aft the researchers assumed that Homer lived wrong 2 centuries either broadside of 800 BC.

While it is astir definite that helium did unrecorded determination wrong that range, the occupation lies successful the arbitrary prime of 800 BC arsenic the halfway of their estimation successful the Bayesian analysis. Had they alternatively centered Homer’s property connected 700 BC with a modular deviation of 100 years, the mathematical result would people person been different.

Thus, we cannot accidental that mathematics proves Homer composed the Iliad successful 762 BC. Nevertheless, the results of this survey stay broadly accordant with the conclusions of historians connected the matter.