In most dialects of North American English, the word kebab usually refers to shish kebab. The phrase is essentially Turkish in origin, and tradition has it that the dish was invented by medieval Turkic soldiers who used their swords to grill meat over open-field fires. However, some authorities contend that the dish has been native to the Near East since ancient times. Indeed, there exist pictures of Byzantine Greeks preparing shish kebabs, and a food described in Homer's Odyssey also bears a close resemblance. The origin of shish kebab may lie in the short supply of cooking fuel in the Near East, which made the cooking of large foods difficult, while urban economies made it easy to obtain small cuts of meat at a butcher's shop.