Was there a Trojan War

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Was there a Trojan War?
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Troys strategic importance
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Troys strategic importance
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Heinrich Schliemanns excavations

• He first looked for Odysseuss house
• Beginning in 1873, he went to Turkey and started
  excavating what he thought was Troy
• He died in 1890 but others continued to 1938

• Moses Finley The World of Odysseus (1978)

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Heinrich Schliemanns discovery

• 3 miles from Dardanelles, he found a mound
• Remains of city of Roman Ilion, which was built
  on what later Greeks thought was the remains of
  Troy
• Found layers of ruins
• 7th layer city of Hector Priam

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Troy VIIa

• Was a poor, little town
• No treasure, no palace
• Subsequent people lived on the site over 1500
  years, each building on top. Twice major
  construction moved much of the land.
• This construction moved or destroyed much of what
  might have been there, if anything was there.

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Excavators beliefs

• Actual historical Trojan War
• Coalition of Achaeans, or Mycenaeans
• Under a king
• Fought against Troy and its allies
• Troy VIIa destroyed c. 1250 BCE

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But

• Nothing links Troy VIIa to the Greeks or a war.
• Neither the war not Troy is mentioned in any
  contemporary document from any excavation

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What was going on at time of Trojan War--end of
13 C.?

• Wide destruction throughout Greece
• Break-up of Hittite empire
• Destruction in Cyprus
• Documents from Cyprus show massive marauding
  activity throughout eastern Mediterranean

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What do we know?

• Acc. to Moses Finley, ancient Troy--TroyVIIa--was
  destroyed late in 13th C. BC
• Homer, at the end of a long line of oral poets,
  was writing neither a history nor a war
  correspondents report

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So was there an actual Trojan War?

• Based on present evidence, we do not know!