But if the number twenty-seven had

But if the number twenty-seven had strong overtones for a Greek, the number ten was more significant still: the most famous war in Greek history, compared to which all others paled into insignificance, had lasted ten years. That of course was Homer's war, the war that occupied the central position in Greek history, indeed, the event that was central to Greek consciousness. Wars in Greece were automatically measured against the Trojan War. As is well known, Thucydides went to a good deal of trouble to prove that his war was the greatest of all wars in Greek history, especially in terms of its length and the suffering it entailed (1.23.1). Part of his proof involved a careful analysis of early Greek history, which he found to be much less grand than the Greeks generally considered it to be. In particular, the Greek expedition to Troy, upon close in¬spection, turned out to be quite small, "considering that it was sent out from all of Greece in common" (1.10.5). Thucydides gives his reason for this assessment: