They took note that according to Homer when Odysseus was beating the grooms seeking to marry his wife Penelope,
…the sun has perished out of heaven and an evil mist hovers over all
and they decided that this text pertained to a solar eclipse. The dates of solar eclipses, both in the past and future, can be easily calculated. Having compared these dates with other astronomical data provided in the text, scientists concluded that King Odysseus returned to Ithaca on April 16th, 1178 B.C. According to Homer, Odysseus’ wandering after the Trojan War took about 10 years. Thus, according to Magnasco and Baikouzis, the Trojan War could have been limited with chronological frame of 1188 and 1198 B.C.
After the earthquake, the city was built up again. There were no traces of people in the ruins of Troy 6, and Blegen concluded that the population survived and immediately after the earthquake ended they returned to the city and started to restore their houses. In due course, the city became more populated, as the streets became more compact and the houses became smaller. However, traces of imported goods and wealth vanished. In general, Troy 7 was nothing of the majestic city “rich in gold” described by Homer.
The city that belonged to the first phase of Troy 7, deemed as 7а (1300–1260 B.C.), was destroyed by fire. The territory of the settlement was once again covered with loads of stones, mudbricks and various wastes, burnt-down and half-burnt-down. Fragments of human bodies found in this layer point indicated that citizens died through violence. Thus, according to Blegen, Troy 7a was destroyed due to the city having been captured and citizens dying. “The crowding of numerous small houses anywhere a free place could be found points to the fact that the fortress walls were protecting many more citizens than before. Numerous uncountable capacious vessels for food and water standing on floors of virtually every house and room indicate the need to store as much food and water as possible in case of emergency. What else could that emergency be than the enemy siege?”[31]
Upon analyzing the Mycenaean pottery discovered in the cultural layer of the burnt city and comparing it to the chronology of ceramics of Arne Furumark,[32] Blegen realized that most of these samples referred to type 3 B dated first half of the 13[[th]] century B.C. Samples classified as the earlier type 3A is sparsely encountered in this layer, and there are no items of the later type 3C. On this basis, Blegen concluded that Troy 7a had been destroyed in approximately 1260, two generations earlier than the Mycenaean civilization declined. “Most of large Mycenaean cities in continental Greece (perhaps, but the cities of Attica) were destroyed in the end of the era when Mycenaean pottery classified III B was produced… Approximately by 1200 B.C., might of Mycenae waved; large cities, the population of which was referred in the Catalogue of Ships as the core of Agamemnon’s troops marching against Troy, were in ruins, and the survivors faced an even more difficult struggle for survival. The period, when type 3C pottery was used every day was characterized by people’s impoverishment and culture level decline, and only memories of Mycenae’s former glory remained. The Mycenaean kings and princes couldn’t unite their forces and leave to capture other lands. That was only possible much before that, when the Mycenaean civilization was at the height of its political, economic and military power, when splendid emperor’s palaces hospitably met dear guests in their entire splendor. The fortress was seized and burnt before the mid-13[[th]] century B.C., which was when the type 3B Mycenaean pottery was only introduced in Troy 7a being prosperous yet, and the type 2A pottery was doling out the seat.
Fig. 17. Carl Blegen affirmed that Troy 7a had been seized and burnt in the mid-13th century B.C. and argued this on the basis of the prevalence of type 3B Mycenaean pottery in its cultural layer. (Image © Olga Aranova.)
Thus, Troy 7a must have been the mythological Troy, a fortress with its sad fate, whose seizure attracted attention and awoke imagination of its contemporaries – poets and narrators, whose stories about the heroes of that war passed by word of mouth from generation to generation. There is no doubt that some details of those stories were forgotten and omitted in due course, and that some other things were made up. This had been going on until these legends reached the ingenious poet, who collected all the different stories and wrote two epical poems that survive until our day”.[33]
Carl Blegen identified Troy 7a as Homer’s Ilion. Troy 7a came to its end being captured by the enemy after a continuous siege. However, there is no proof that it was captured by the Greeks.
The results of excavations of the next cultural layer, relating to the phase of Troy 7b (1260–1190 B.C.), indicate that many inhabitants of this burnt city had survived. Soon after the conquerors left, the citizens returned and built new houses right on the ruins and, and the city rose by approximately one meter as compared with the previous ground level. However, the city that used to be great failed to return to its former power. The population got poorer and left the city. At the same time, the fortress wall wasn’t damaged, as it had happened before. Blegen wrote, “It looks like everything happened quietly enough: having simply cast the citizens out of their houses, new tenants moved in”.[34] The tribe that settled there brought some coarse pottery along, made without a potter’s wheel, which became kind of a business card for Troy 7b. According to some explorers, that moulded pottery with bumps, just like some other primitive bronze utensils found in the same layer, were obviously related to similar goods found in depositions of the late Bronze Age in Hungary.
The next devastation to the city caused by fire completed the history of ancient Troy. For 4 centuries, the city remained empty – its inhabitants might have found a quieter place for living. New Troy – Troy 8 (700–85 B.C.) – already belonged to the Greek world entirely. It is known under the name of Ilion, though, many scientists specialized in antiquity have categorically rejected its connection with Homer’s Ilion.[35] This city was not as mighty, as it changed states several times. In 480 B.C., King Xerxes visited that very city, and Alexander the Great came there in 334 B.C. After his empire had collapsed, the city was overtaken by Lysimachus, who exercised his “special concern for the city,” according to Strabo.
Then Ilion became part of the Roman Empire, and bathhouses, temples and theatres were built there. However, in 85 B.C., due to conflicts with Rome, the city was again plundered and destroyed – this time at the hands of the troops of Roman vicar Gaius Flavius Fimbria, who captured the city during the war against Mitridate Eupatore.
Fig. 18. Division of Alexander's empire after the battle of Ips (301 B.C.) The Lysimachus empire is dashed.
Fig. 19. The Roman odeum of Troy 9 (from 85 B.C. till 500 A.D.).
When Fimbria began boasting that he captured the city on the 11th day, whereas Agamemnon did it only in the 10th year with great difficulties and having a fleet of 1,000 vessels, and the whole Greece aiding him in the campaign, one citizen of Ilion remarked, “True, but we did not have such a defender as Hector”.[36]
Troy 9, dated 85 B.C. – 500 A.D., was restored by Lucius Cornelius Sulla, who routed Fimbria. Then it was dynamically developed in times of Julius Caesar and Octavianus Augustus. By 400 the city appeared to be deserted, and all geostrategic advantages were gained by Constantinople. In due course, Troy turned into a hill that Heinrich Schliemann would dug up into historical oblivion 1500 years later.
Chapter 3
The War for Troy, 20[[th]] century
A
Carl Blegen,
A. Furumark,
Carl Blegen,
Carl Blegen,
Strabo,
Strabo,
