PREFACE
The first time I came in sight of the Troad, I felt as if the whole panorama of the Homeric wars had been suddenly spread out before me. This, I am sure, has been the experience of all visitors to the Trojan plain. About four miles off the mainland is Tenedos. Farther to the west is Imbros, while high above it, clear and distinct on the horizon, is the great Saoke of Samothrace. On the north, the Hellespont resembles a large river with steep banks, where the Thracian Chersonesus meets the eye. On its southern shore, between Sigeum (marked to-day by the unattractive houses of the village of Yeni Shehr) and the mound In Tepeh—indicating where the high and rocky Rhoetean shore began—was the position of the Greek fleet. The coast along the Aegean consists of a line of foot-hills, while the eastern boundary of the plain is formed by the spurs of the Ida chain. Between these ranges, in a spot especially favored by nature, sheltered as it is by hills and sea, is the valley of the Scamander (modern Mendere), fertile and rich-soiled, where to-day is still to be recognized much of the Homeric flora. The present course of the river is toward the northwest corner of the plain, but in ancient times it probably flowed close beside the Ida range, and, meeting the Simoïs at the swamp of the modern Dumbrek Su, emptied by what is now a dead arm of the sea (In Tepeh Asmak) into the Hellespont. Here, on a ridge of the mountains where the valleys of the Mendere and the Dumbrek Su meet, is the plateau of Hissarlik, with its nine strata of settlements dating from an age of thirty centuries before Christ to the time of the acropolis of the Roman Ilion, which reached its end about fire hundred years after the Christian era—a spot in full view of the traveler as he enters the Dardanelles en route to Constantinople.
The excavations (1893–94) which Dörpfeld continued after Schliemann's death (1890) show in the sixth stratum from the bottom a Mycenaean city built in terraces, with a mighty circuit wall, three massive towers, three gates, and numerous buildings. For this stately acropolis Dörpfeld claims the title of Homeric Troy, and few archaeologists who have stood under its imposing walls are inclined to dispute this claim. He notes the following characteristics (Troja und Ilion, pp. 601–612) in which the VI City agrees with the description in the Homeric poems:
1. Its low site in the Troad corresponds to that described in Υ, 216, "Sacred Ilios, built upon the plain." The epithets "well-walled" (εὐτειχής), "steep" (αἰπεινός), "sheer" (αἰπύς), apply to its high and precipitous walls, which to-day impress every visitor with their massiveness and strength. "Beetling Ilios" (Ἴλιος ὀφρυόεσσα, Χ, 411) appropriately describes the abrupt slope of the northern side of the plateau, while "windy" (ἠνεμόεις) fully characterizes the plain swept by the breezes from the Hellespont.
2. The well-wrought stones, as seen in the South Citadel Wall, the towers, and several buildings, show that the poet's description of dwellings built of "polished stone" (ξεστοῖο λίθοιο) was not based on the imagination, although, when the Cyclopean walls of Tiryns and Mycenae were the only relics of the heroic age, they seemed to contradict the Homeric picture.
3. In Π, 702, we are told that "thrice did Patroclus seek to climb upon the 'elbow' of the lofty wall." Such an escalade is possible in the strongly scarped lower wall of the VI City, where its rough stone forms an "elbow" with the perpendicular upper wall. Again, we read (Ζ, 433) that "beside the fig tree the wall may he best scaled, and the city is more assailable." This portion of the citadel must have lain on the western side, where the slope of the hill makes the town more accessible than on the north, and where, too, the excavations show the walls of our city to be more poorly constructed.
4. Of the many gates of Troy (Β, 809), Homer gives the names of two, the Scaean and the Dardanian. Of the three gates unearthed in our city, VI T must have formed the principal entrance on that portion of the hill where the city was most accessible; while on the northern side, where the wall is entirely destroyed, the gate towering high above the plain could have been reached only by a ramp, such as is seen to-day in the ruins of the retaining wall beside the Northeast Tower. It is presumable that the Dardanian Gate lay in the direction of the Ida range, toward the southeast, where Dardania was situated, and where the excavations have brought to light the great South Gate, VI T. From this gate, the farthest removed from the battlefield, the Trojans (Ε, 789) did not dare to issue while Achilles went forth to battle, nor did the Trojan women (Χ, 155) venture longer to wash their garments at the springs lying near.
The Scaean Gate, on the other hand, must have been on the side of the hill toward the Greek ships. If we restore a northwestern gate in the missing North Wall, we should have a gate opening, as did the Scaean Gate, on the battlefield, and flanked on the assailants' left by a mighty tower from which the beholder had an extensive view over the plain. With the North Wall and the Northwest Gate restored, the following plan may mark the outline of the Trojan citadel.
Plan. I.The Restored Citadel
5. Inside the city, according to Homer, were separate dwellings. The royal palace must have lain in the center of the citadel, where, in the VI City, all buildings are destroyed. The house of Alexandros (Ζ, 316) consisted of thalamos, doma, and aule. Such an arrangement is seen in the stately building VI A, where we observe a closed room, a half-open antechamber, and an open court. While VI F shows Cyclopean masonry, VI A is constructed of small rectangular stones. In fact, Homer's description so fits the buildings of the VI City that it seems as if the poet had an accurate knowledge of the Trojan house.
In two places in the poems (Ζ, 88 and Ε, 446),—regarded by many scholars as interpolations (cf. C. Robert, Studien zur Ilias),—references are given to temples. Moreover an altar of Zeus lay at the summit of the citadel (Χ, 172). There is a possibility that the building VI C of our city may be a temple.
6. The citadel walls of the VI Stratum, forming an immense polygon, the broad circuit street inside the city, with several cross streets leading to the summit of the acropolis, and the houses arranged in terraces about the center of the citadel, justify the Homeric epithets, "well-stablished" (ἐύδμητος) and "well-built" (ἐυκτίμενος).
My special obligation is due to Dr. Wilhelm Dörpfeld for his kind permission to use freely his great work, Troja und Ilion, on which I have based the description of the Mycenaean City, and from which I have taken much of the illustrative material.
Professor Alfred Heinrich also has allowed the use of his excellent monograph, Troja bei Homer und in der Wirklichkeit. On this work the chapter entitled "The Mycenaean Age and the Homeric Poems" has been largely based, but several of Professor Heinrich's views are here slightly modified.
I have adapted to the present work—especially in the chapters on the "Troad" and "Mycenaean Civilization"—a number of sections from an article on the Troad, which I wrote shortly after a journey to the Orient.
In my preparation of this volume Mr. Gilbert Campbell Scoggin, my former pupil, and now a teacher of some years' experience, has been closely associated, and it is an especial pleasure to me, as his old teacher, to connect his name with mine on the title-page.
Mycenaeology is a little over a quarter of a century old. It was in 1876 that Dr. Schliemann unearthed the treasures from the royal graves at Mycenae and gave the world the first glimpse of that ancient civilization which has since been shown to have extended over the mainland of Hellas and the isles of the south Aegean—a civilization whose type is the same, however widely distant the localities where remains are found, whether in Crete or Thessaly, in Rhodes or Argolis, in Cyprus or Boeotia. It was for him to present the problem which is daily assuming vaster proportions. It will be for others to solve it. But the solution is not now. Theories advanced yesterday are to-day set aside. It is only when all the evidence has been gathered in that the great questions connected with Mycenaean culture can be finally settled. It is almost providential that Dörpfeld's Troy, with its imported Mycenaean pottery, should remain buried until the very time when the new science could pronounce verdict upon it. Herbert Cushing Tolman.
Vanderbilt University,
Nashville, Tenn., October 2, 1903.