The tragedy of the one guy who was right about the Trojan Horse - Noah Charney
For ten grueling years,
the Greeks laid siege to Troy,
scattering ships and encampments
across the city's shores.
But as the Trojans awoke
for another day of battle,
they found their enemies
had vanished overnight—
leaving behind only
an enormous wooden horse.
Seeing this as a symbol
of the Greek’s surrender,
the soldiers dragged their prize
into the city and began to celebrate.
But one Trojan wasn't happy.
Laocoön, a seer and priest,
was deeply suspicious of the Greek gift.
He reminded his fellow Trojans
of their enemy’s reputation for trickery,
and cautioned them not to accept
this strange offering.
The crowd jeered at his warning,
but Laocoön was undeterred.
He forced his way to the wooden beast
and thrust his sword into its belly.
Yet his blade drew no blood.
And if there were men shifting inside,
Laocoön couldn't hear them over the crowd.
Still grim with foreboding,
Laocoön retreated home
and enlisted his sons in preparing
a sacrifice to the gods.
But his fate— and that of his
fellow Trojans— was already sealed.
The gods had decided to grant
the Greeks victory
by ensuring the success of their scheme
to infiltrate Troy.
And Poseidon sought to punish
the priest for threatening that plan.
Two great serpents emerged
from the sea’s rolling waves
and descended on Laocoön and his sons.
The seer’s violent death went unnoticed
amidst the celebrations.
But, that night, when tragedy struck,
the Trojans finally remembered
the old priest’s warning.
Laocoön's tragic tale inspired countless
retellings across the ancient world.
Virgil describes the seer’s demise
in his epic poem “The Aeneid,”
and Sophocles composed an entire play
about the ill-fated priest.
However, his most famous
and influential depiction
is a marble statue called
“Laocoön and His Sons.”
Likely carved by a trio
of artists from Rhodes,
the exact origins of this piece
remain mysterious,
with current theories dating its creation
anywhere from 200 BCE to 68 CE.
Whenever it was made,
this sculpture remains the epitome
of the Hellenistic Baroque style.
But even within a tradition known
for its dramatic facial expressions
and contorted figures,
no other piece in this style comes
close to the intensity
of “Laocoön and His Sons.”
The nearly life-sized figures
are writhing in agony,
straining to untangle massive snakes
from their limbs.
Their faces are packed
with desperation and hopelessness,
yet Laocoön’s expression is
fiercely determined to resist.
The scene is also uniquely brutal—
paused precisely as the serpent’s
venomous jaws are about to bite down.
Displayed as the centerpiece of
Emperor Nero’s Domus Aurea palace complex,
this gruesome sculpture was one of the
most talked about artworks of its time.
Renowned Roman writer Pliny the Elder
even went so far as to call it
“preferable to any other production
of the art of painting or of statuary.”
Unfortunately, the statue was lost
when Domus Aurea
was consumed by fire in 109 CE.
But Laocoön's tale was far from finished.
In 1506, Michelangelo Buonarotti—
then the most famous sculptor in Rome—
received a message that Pope Julius II
had unearthed something marvelous.
Even caked with dirt, “Laocoön
and His Sons” astonished Michelangelo.
The dramatic musculature was over-the-top,
but all the more powerful
for being so extreme.
And the curving shapes of its serpent
and human figures
drew his eyes in constant motion.
Pope Julius prominently displayed
the piece at the Vatican,
but its influence on Michelangelo is
what made the statue truly famous.
The sculpture's emotive, exaggerated
elements transformed his approach
to representing the human body.
His paintings and sculptures began
to feature contorted poses,
referred to as “figura serpentinata,”
meaning snake-like shapes.
And his celebrated work
in the Sistine Chapel
centered on muscular,
hyperextended figures.
Soon, Michelangelo’s new style sparked
an entire artistic movement
called Mannerism—
influencing artists throughout the 1500s
to exaggerate and twist human bodies
for dramatic effect.
Since artists of the Renaissance revered
ancient Greco-Roman art above all else,
perhaps it’s not surprising that “Laocoön
and His Sons” made such a large impact.
But not even the real Laocoön could have
predicted that his likeness
would become one of the most influential
sculptures ever made.
