The Trojan Horse is arguably the most celebrated military deception in ancient Greek mythology, representing the triumph of intelligence over physical strength. After ten years of unsuccessful attempts to capture Troy and countless casualties, it took an ingenious plan of Odysseus, king of Ithaca, to enter the city without fighting.
The Greeks used an extraordinary stratagem: first they removed their whole army from the siege as if they gave up their attempt to breach the walls. Then they constructed an enormous wooden horse to conceal their finest warriors inside it.
The Greeks presented the horse as a religious offering to the goddess Athena, convincing the Trojans that bringing it inside their city walls would secure divine favor and protection. Once night fell, the hidden warriors emerged, opened the gates, and enabled the returning Greek army to enter Troy and destroy the city.
But who exactly were the warriors hiding inside the famous wooden structure? How many men could it accommodate, and what do ancient historians, poets, and modern classical scholars tell us about its construction?
The answers are more complicated than popular representations suggest, because different ancient writers provide different numbers and lists of participants in the scheme to win the Trojan War.
Conception and construction of the Trojan Horse
The strategic conception of the operation is generally attributed to Odysseus, whose intelligence and ability to devise military deception had repeatedly distinguished him during the Trojan War. The principal architect of the Trojan Horse was Epeius (also written Epeios or Epeus), a Greek warrior renowned for his craftsmanship.
According to Apollodorus, in the Epitome (5.14), Odysseus conceived the construction of the wooden horse and proposed the idea to Epeius, who possessed the necessary architectural and technical abilities.
Apollodorus writes:
“He invented the construction of the wooden horse and suggested it to Epeus, who was an architect.
The ancient account continues by explaining that Epeius obtained timber from Mount Ida and constructed a horse with a hollow interior and an opening in its sides. This description is particularly important because it establishes that the horse was not simply a monumental wooden sculpture. It was a carefully designed structure intended to accommodate armed soldiers while remaining sufficiently convincing to deceive the Trojans.
The Roman poet Virgil provides one of the most detailed literary descriptions of its construction in Book II of the Aeneid. Describing the preparations from the perspective of the Trojan prince Aeneas, Virgil explains that the Greek leaders constructed a horse of enormous dimensions, using fir timber.
His description reads:
“Build a horse of mountainous bulk, and interweave its ribs with planks of fir.” (Aeneid, II.15–16)
Virgil further explains that the Greeks concealed their chosen warriors inside its dark interior, filling its enormous belly with armed soldiers (Aeneid, II.18–20).
The construction therefore involved several essential features: a wooden framework, a hollow internal chamber, an entrance through the side, and a mechanism allowing the soldiers to emerge when the appropriate moment arrived.
Modern scholarly details of the construction
An important modern scholarly contribution to understanding these details is the article The Trojan Horse Reconstruction, by Thomas G. Chondros, Kypros Milidonis, Stefanos Paipetis and Cesare Rossi, published in Mechanism and Machine Theory.
The researchers approach the legendary structure from an engineering perspective, examining its possible design, construction, transport, stability and relationship to archaeological evidence. Their abstract describes the horse as a huge wooden structure designed to conceal armed warriors.
Their research attempts to examine whether the ancient literary descriptions can be translated into a mechanically plausible construction. The authors consider structural design and the movement and stability of the supposed horse, rather than treating the story exclusively as a literary or mythological episode.
Another important modern contribution is Ioannis Doukas’ study, To Make a Wooden Horse. Doukas examines the construction tradition from Homer through later Greek and Roman literature. He observes that the earliest known narrative treatments belonged to the lost Epic Cycle poems, the Little Iliad and the Sack of Troy.
Particularly significant is his discussion of the relationship between the designer and the builder: Odysseus devised the strategy, while Epeius was responsible for its physical construction. Athena, goddess of wisdom and strategic intelligence, was also associated with the enterprise. Thus, the Trojan Horse emerged from a combination of military intelligence, divine assistance and practical craftsmanship.
The warriors iside the Trojan Horse
The most extensive surviving list of warriors inside the Trojan Horse appears in Book XII of the Posthomerica (also known as The Fall of Troy), written by Quintus Smyrnaeus, probably in the 3rd century AD.
Quintus provides an extraordinary catalogue of the Greek heroes who entered the wooden structure. Before naming them, he invokes the Muses, asking them to help him remember every individual who participated.
His invocation reads:
“Muses, I ask you to tell me precisely, one by one, the names of all who went inside the cavernous horse.” (Posthomerica, XII.306–307.)
Quintus then identifies thirty warriors by name, while explicitly acknowledging that additional warriors entered because the horse could accommodate more men.
The thirty named participants are:
Neoptolemus – Son of Achilles, also known as Pyrrhus. He was among the most formidable Greek warriors and entered the horse first.
Menelaus – King of Sparta and husband of Helen, whose abduction had precipitated the Trojan War.
Odysseus – King of Ithaca and mastermind of the deception.
Sthenelus – A distinguished Greek commander and companion of Diomedes.
Diomedes – One of the greatest Greek warriors, celebrated for his courage and military achievements.
Philoctetes – The famous archer who possessed the bow and arrows of Heracles.
Menestheus – King of Athens and commander of the Athenian contingent.
Anticlus – A Greek warrior who nearly betrayed the hiding soldiers when Helen imitated the voices of their wives.
Thoas – A Greek commander associated with the Aetolian forces.
Polypoetes – Son of Pirithous, renowned for his fighting abilities.
Ajax – An Ajax appears in Quintus’s list; he is generally understood to be Ajax the Lesser, son of Oileus.
Eurypylus – A Greek warrior distinguished for his military courage.
Thrasymedes – Son of Nestor, the wise king of Pylos.
Idomeneus – King of Crete and one of the prominent Greek commanders.
Meriones – A celebrated Cretan warrior and companion of Idomeneus.
Podalirius – Son of Asclepius and a skilled physician.
Eurymachus – One of the warriors named in Quintus’s catalogue.
Teucer – The celebrated archer and half-brother of Ajax the Greater.
Ialmenus – A Greek commander associated with the Boeotian contingent.
Thalpius – One of the Greek warriors accompanying the expedition.
Antimachus – Another member of the selected company.
Leonteus – A courageous Greek warrior, associated with the Lapiths.
Eumelus – Son of Admetus, famous for his horsemanship.
Euryalus – A Greek warrior distinguished in the ancient heroic tradition.
Amphimachus – One of the warriors concealed inside the horse.
Demophoon – Son of Theseus, who participated in the expedition to Troy.
Agapenor – King of Arcadia and commander of the Arcadian forces.
Acamas – Son of Theseus and brother of Demophoon.
Meges – Son of Phyleus and commander of the Epeans.
Epeius – The craftsman who constructed the Trojan Horse and entered it last.
The order is important. Quintus specifically identifies Neoptolemus as the first to enter, followed by Menelaus and Odysseus. Epeius enters last because he knows how to operate the mechanism that opens and closes the entrance.
The poet describes this final moment:
“Godlike Epeius last of all passed in, the fashioner of the horse.” (Posthomerica, XII.329–330.)
Epeius subsequently draws up the ladder and takes his position beside the mechanism controlling the entrance. His presence was essential because the success of the operation depended on the concealed soldiers being able to emerge at precisely the right moment.
Quintus’ thirty names should not be regarded as an exhaustive historical roster. His text explicitly allows for additional warriors.
How many men were inside the construction?
One of the most fascinating aspects of the ancient tradition is the disagreement over the number of soldiers inside the horse.
Apollodorus, in the Epitome (5.14), reports that Odysseus persuaded fifty of the finest Greek warriors to enter. However, he also records an alternative tradition attributed to the author of the Little Iliad, which gives the astonishing number of three thousand.
The later Greek poet Tzetzes, meanwhile, gives a different figure: twenty-three warriors, whose names he records in his Posthomerica (641–650).
These differences demonstrate that the Trojan Horse story was not transmitted through a single fixed narrative. It developed through centuries of poetic performance, literary adaptation and mythological interpretation.
The most reasonable approach is therefore to distinguish between the different ancient traditions rather than declare one number universally correct.
The Trojan Horse appears in the Odyssey, not Iliad
Interestingly, Homer’s Iliad does not narrate the construction of the Trojan Horse or the actual destruction of Troy. The events belong to the period between the Iliad and the Odyssey. Homer refers to the episode in two important passages of the Odyssey.
In Book IV (271–289), Menelaus recalls how the Greeks were concealed inside the wooden horse. Helen approached the structure and imitated the voices of the Greek warriors’ wives, attempting to provoke the men into answering her. This episode reveals how close the Greeks came to betraying themselves before the plan could be completed.
Anticlus was particularly vulnerable to the deception. According to Apollodorus (Epitome 5.19), he was about to respond when Odysseus covered his mouth and prevented him from revealing their presence.
Homer returns to the subject in Book VIII (492–520), when Odysseus listens to the bard Demodocus singing about the Trojan War.
The passage is significant because it associates the horse with both Odysseus’ intelligence and Athena’s divine assistance. The goddess had supported the Greeks in their undertaking, while Epeius was remembered as the craftsman responsible for constructing the wooden structure.
Homer’s references demonstrate that the story was already an established part of Greek heroic tradition by the time the Odyssey reached its surviving literary form.
Virgil’s alternative list of the warriors
Another important account appears in Virgil’s Aeneid, Book II, where Aeneas describes the destruction of his homeland to Queen Dido. The Roman poet provides a shorter list of Greek warriors who emerge from the horse. His account names nine individuals:
Thessandrus
Sthenelus
Ulysses (Odysseus)
Acamas
Thoas
Neoptolemus
Machaon
Menelaus
Epeus (Epeius)
This list differs considerably from that of Quintus Smyrnaeus.
For example, Machaon appears in Virgil’s account but not in Quintus’s list of thirty. Meanwhile, several important warriors inside the Trojan Horse named by Quintus are absent from Virgil. This variation illustrates how Roman and Greek authors adapted the Trojan War tradition to their literary purposes.
Virgil’s account also gives particular importance to the psychological deception surrounding the horse. The Trojans are persuaded that the Greeks have abandoned the siege and that the wooden structure is a sacred offering to Athena.
Laocoon, the Trojan priest, recognizes the danger and famously warns his fellow citizens:
“I fear the Greeks, even when they bring gifts.” (Aeneid, II.49)
His warning is one of the most enduring expressions of suspicion in Western literature.
Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. (Latin)
Φοβοῦ τοὺς Δαναοὺς καὶ δῶρα φέροντας. (Ancient Greek)
The Trojans ignore his advice. They bring the enormous horse inside their city, celebrating what they believe to be the end of the war and the horse is an offering to Athena. In that night of celebration, the Greeks emerge from their hiding place and open the gates for their returning army.
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