SECRETS OF TROY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23631, 15 October 1938, Page 11

SECRETS OF TROY

MORE DISCOVERIES RELICS OF FIRST TROJANS DATE OF THE SIEGE The American expedition now excavating the site of Troy is concluding its operations this season (says a writer in the Manchester Guardian). Troy will then have yielded almost all its secrets. The ultimate scientific publication that will result will be the fullest record yet published.

The excavation of the site for the third time since Schliemann first camped upon it has been rich in unusual results. The process of excavation was largely helped by the wisdom of the first excavator, who left at intervals on the site “islands” of unexcavated soil which contained the complete stratification from the latest and ninth “city” to the first. These islands have served as a perfect control for the present excavators. By his decision to leave such untouched specimens of the site intact Schliemann invented a method which all subsequent archaeologists have followed. The wisdom of his method is now made clear.

The excavators adhere to the main division of the periods of history of the site made by Doerpfeld from I to IX, but have been forced to subdivide these periods, and over 40 sub-periods have been identified within the main framework of the nine. TROY I FORTIFIED

The latest excavations have unexpectedly revealed information of the utmost importance for our knowledge of the very first Trojans. As yet no one can say who the Trojans were or whence they came, but we know for certain that they arrived on the site of Troy with a fully-developed culture. For at the level of Troy I the excavators found the foundations of great palatial houses of the ‘ megaron ’’ type, and last season made one of their most interesting major discoveries Apparently the first and earliest settlement of Trojans was fortified, and shortly after they had settled they built an enormous ring wall of powerful. masonry fortified with buttresses and entered by gates. Hitherto it had always been thought that the famous Settlement was the earliest to be fortified. These newly discovered walls are of a small circular fortress not 100 yards in diameter, but immensely strong. They seem to have been built to replace the provisional defences which the settlers had built cn arrival. No hint of their existence was revealed by the excavations of Schliemann and Doerpfeld The second citadel was an enlargement of the circuit laid down by the first, and in the house foundations of the second level were found traces which indicated the existence of houses with wooden plank floors. Such a method of floor building is otherwise unknown in ancient times although the usual custom to-day Earth or stone floors were the invariable rule in ancient Greece and Rome. AN EARLY CIVILISATION One astonishing find in the First Citadel was of three stone “stelae,” or slabs, one of which actually bore in relief the sculpture, highly formalised, of a human face, The other “ stelae “ had hollow markings like the “cupmarkings” on Western European megalithic monuments Indeed, the character of the sculptured human face, while perpetuated later in the wellknown “face-jars" of Trojan pottery, suggests comparison with similar carvings in the Early Bronze Age of Western Europe. The date of Troy I however, is of immense antiquity, going back to the fourth millennium, and so ante-dates anything Western, The excavators note that this carving has a feeling for style and is the product of a long age of development.

“The institution of kingship, of centralised royal power, and of a court, that fostered art in the north-eastern Mediterranean may thus be traced back to a much earlier period than was heretofore possible, and the origin of civilisation is seen to recede still further into the remote and inscrutable past.” This is the conclusion of the excavators resulting from their illumination of the high stage of culture represented by the first Trojans of the dawn of history. These settlers must have had a previous history in their place of origin of long duration But whether their origin is to be found in Asia Minor or in Europe is one of those baffling problems which remain for solution. At least we can say now with assurance that they were not mere savages who drifted to Troy and slowly developed there They arrived with a knowledge of elaborate architecture and the power of primitive sculpture. HISTORY UNALTERED

The history of the Second Settlement remains unaltered. The excavators examined anew the site of the house near the main gate, where Schliemann found his famous " Treasure' of Priam,” and they noted that the violent destruction of this settlement fay fire and sudden onslaught was verifiable in completeness. They found that the inhabitants had fled or been largely exterminated, for they had left behind them in many houses their most valuable possessions. Gold was found in almost every part of Troy II that the present excavators examined, A small hoard of gold pins and beads, 252 large and 1029 small gold beads in all, was found. All the gold objects alike were of the type known from the “ Treasure of Priam.”

One of the most important of the earlier discoveries by the American excavators was the knowledge that the Sixth Settlement, previously identified as the Troy of Homer, was, in fact, destroyed by a violent earthquake about the year 1350 8.C.. long before the Trojan War. It was rebuilt and reoccupied again, and the next settlement (entitled Vila) came to a disastrous end almost precisely at the year 1200. That is the date usually assigned by tradition to the fall of Troy to the Acheans. The second destruction was not by earthquake, but by human agency. .INDISPUTABLE PROOF

Proof of this was clear and indisputable, for in the narrow streets that branched off from the south gate adjoining houses whose date was firmly fixed at 1200 B.C. were the skeletons of the defenders of the city, lying where they had fallen. Troy was undoubtedly sacked at approximately the date (1184 is the date usually accepted in Greek tradition) at which legend said that event occurred. Historians and literary experts can take heart from the work of the archaeologists! There was proof even of the siege of Troy, for in the period immediately preceding the fall it seems that the inhabitants were grossly overcrowded. Not only were there too many houses within the circuit of the walls, but some of these houses had been built right up against the interior face of the wall itself. This alone is some indication of urgency, for it was an almost unbroken rule in antiquity never to build houses thus, as it allowed the possibility of treachery. A private resident might tunnel through the wall and communicate with the enemy. Apparently the Inhabitants of the Plain of Troy had concentrated within the walls of their central citadel, just as the Athenians did at the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War. This strongly suggests a siege. TROY NOT ABANDONED In one respect the results of the investigation of Troy Vila went contrary to tradition. Troy was reoccupied by refugees after its fall, refugees of the same race carrying on the same tradition. /Eneas was reputed to have returned to Troy after its fall, but the main legends assume that Troy was abandoned. But after this reoccupation apparently a tribe of wandering barbarians from Thrace or Hungary came and settled also and mixed with the surviving Trojans. This is verified by the archaeological evidence (hat concerns the level known as Troy Vllb. The excavators nave carried out their work with the greatest scientific precision. No fewer than 400 soil samples from different levels have been secured for pollen analysis and geological examination. Their excavations of the walls of Troy VI have

restored to view no less than 40 yards of the superb battlements of this age, and a further gate has been discovered. All the animal bones have been scrupulously examined and interesting results established; 150,000 bones in all were examined. Twenty species of quadrupeds were identified. Sheep, goals, and pigs were the main source of food throughout though at all periods the inhabitants were greatly addicted to “ shore dinners." The visitor to Troy is always struck by the immense quantity of sea shells, cockles, and the like, in the soil of all periods. One surprising result of the bone analysis was that the horse was first known only in the Sixth Settlement, from about 1800 B.C. In the Seventh Settlement traces of the leopard were found, and the bear was known. Fowl were as common a source of food almost as fish throughout the history of the site. In the Sixth Settlement at one place an immense deposit of “ murex ” shell was found, proof of the existence at that time of a large purple-dyeing industry. The present season may yet reveal more surprises, but it would be difficult to expect more results than those already achieved, which are eminently satisfactory. i