WB Gallie coined the term “essentially contested argument” at the 1956 meeting of the Aristotelian Society. Gallie believed that although words like justice have a positive connotation in society, they have no legitimate basis as a word. Freedom is one of these words. Freedom is traditionally defined as the ability to act, think or speak without being limited. However, freedom is much more than the definition humans have given to conceptualize its meaning within a Webster's dictionary. Freedom as a most controversial topic is made especially evident in two of the most famous Western war stories of all time, The Liad and The Aeneid, where Homer and Virgil inadvertently show the stark contrast between what the word "freedom" means for each of them. respectively, to other writers of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, and among the cultures of ancient Greece and ancient Rome as a whole. The Iliad defines the essentially contested concept of freedom through the interactions between humans and the gods. From a modern perspective, it seems very likely that humanity in the Iliad has no “freedom” at all. But how would the characters of the Iliad have seen things? From the first lines of Homer's epic poem, Homer implores the Muse to show “how the will of Zeus was accomplished” (Homer 1). This line is a consistent undertone throughout the poem; freedom for Homer and subsequently for his characters means "freely" carrying out the will of the gods as a human being. Examples of this are evident throughout the Iliad, including when Achilles decides to return Hector's body to Hector's father Priam after the gods express their anger towards Achilles. But this Achilles, first massacring Hector, ripping away the... ... middle of paper ...... his ancient Greek and ancient Roman writers, and finally illuminating the differences between ancient Greek and ancient Roman cultures. Works Cited Aurelio, Marco. Meditations. London, England: Penguin, 2006. Print.Cicero. "Against Lucio Sergio Catalina." Cicero's political speeches. Np: np, n.d. 93-109. Cicero's political speeches. Web.Homer, Robert Fagles and Bernard Knox. The Iliad. New York, NY, USA: Viking, 1990. Print.Livy and Selincourt Aubrey. De. The ancient history of Rome. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1960. Print.Plato and GMA Grube. Republic. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 1992. Print.Tarnas, Richard. The passion of the Western mind: understanding the ideas that have shaped our view of the world. New York: Ballantine, 1993. Print. Virgil and David Alexander. West. The Aeneid. London, England: Penguin, 1990. Print.