Troy is a 2004 epic war film written by David Benioff and directed by Wolfgang Petersen and loosely based on Homer's Iliad. It features an cast that includes Brad Pitt as Achilles, Eric Bana as Hector, Orlando Bloom as Paris, Diane Kruger as Helen, Sean Bean as Odysseus, Brian Cox as Agamemnon, Rose Byrne as Briseis, Garrett Hedlund as Patroclus, Peter O'Toole as Priam, Brendan Gleeson as Menelaus, and Tyler Mane as Ajax.

It was nominated for the Academy Award for Costume Design.

Plot[link]

Prince Hector (Eric Bana) and his young brother Paris (Orlando Bloom) negotiate peace between Troy and Sparta. Paris has fallen in love with Helen (Diane Kruger), the wife of king Menelaus (Brendan Gleeson), and smuggles her back to Troy with him. Infuriated, Menelaus vows revenge. Menelaus approaches his brother Agamemnon (Brian Cox), a king who has conquered every army of Greece, and now commands them. Agamemnon, who has wanted to conquer Troy for years (which would give him control of the Aegean Sea), uses this as a justification to invade Troy. General Nestor (John Shrapnel) asks him to take the legendary warrior Achilles (Brad Pitt), to rally the troops to the cause.

Odysseus (Sean Bean), a king commanded by Agamemnon, visits Phtia to persuade Achilles to fight, and finds him training with Patroclus (Garrett Hedlund), his cousin. Achilles, pondering his decision, visits his mother Thetis (Julie Christie) for advice. She tells him that, before he was even born, she knew this day would come. She also tells him that if he does not go to Troy, he will live a long, happy life and have children, but after he dies, his name will be forgotten and nobody will remember him. If he does go to Troy, he will find great glory in battle, his name will be written into history forever, but he will die there. Achilles, wanting his name to be remembered, chooses to go.

The Greeks sail for Troy. Achilles and the Myrmidons are the fastest rowers and land before anyone else. They kill many Trojans and desecrate the temple of Apollo. Briseis (Rose Byrne), a member of the Trojan royal family, is captured and taken as a prize to the Greeks, despite Achilles claiming her as a war prize himself.

Achilles and his Myrmidons do not fight the next day because of Agamemnon's unfair claim to Briseis. With Greeks surrounding Troy, Paris challenges Menelaus to a duel to settle things. Menelaus agrees; however, Agamemnon plans on attacking the city regardless of the outcome. Paris is easily defeated, and wounded. Hector intervenes and kills Menelaus. The Greeks charge the Trojan lines but are forced to fall back when they are nearly wiped out by archers on Troy's walls. Ajax is slain in the battle as well at the hands of Hector.

Agamemnon gives Briseis to his men, but Achilles rescues her. He carries her back to his tent and tends to her wounds. Briseis then tries to kill Achilles but realizes that she has feelings for him and the two make love. The next day, Achilles is readying his men to leave, much to Patroclus' indignation.

That night, the Trojans launch a surprise offensive against the Greek encampment, aiming to destroy their boats and prevent their escape. As the Greeks seem to be on the verge of defeat, Achilles appears with the Myrmidons and joins the battle, eventually fighting against Hector. All are shocked when Hector cuts Achilles' throat; Hector removes his foe's helmet, revealing the face of Patroclus. After Hector finishes the mortally wounded youth, both armies agree to end fighting for the day. Before he leaves, Odysseus informs Hector it was Patroclus whom he had killed.

Achilles, who had slept through the battle, is told by Eudorus of his cousin's death. The Greeks had also mistaken Patroclus for Achilles, since he had put on Achilles' armour and moved like Achilles. Furious, Achilles attacks Eudorus and when Briseis tries to stop him, he throws her to the ground. Later that night, Achilles lights Patroclus' funeral pyre. Meanwhile, in Troy, Hector realizes that Achilles will seek revenge for the death of his cousin, and begins making preparations to save his loved ones. He leads Andromache to a secret path out of the city, asking her to use it if the city falls. He also passes on the Sword of Troy to Paris (who has begun training in archery), claiming that the city's people have a future so long as the sword is in the hands of a Trojan.

The next day Achilles approaches the gates of Troy alone and shouts for Hector to come out and face him. Hector knows he must face him alone, so he says his goodbyes to his family and friends and then confronts Achilles. The two fight an evenly matched duel at the start, but Hector begins to tire against the relentless assault of Achilles. Eventually, Achilles slays Hector by stabbing him in the chest. He then ties Hector's body to the back of his chariot, dragging it around the city, leaving all the Trojans shocked. That night, King Priam (Peter O'Toole) visits the Greek army's camp to convince Achilles to let him retrieve Hector's body. Moved by the king's plea, Achilles acquiesces to his request and allows him to take his son to be buried, promising him the 12 days for funerary rites. He tells Priam that Hector was the best he had ever fought. Achilles lets Priam take Briseis back as well. He later apologises to Eudorus for harming him and gives him one last order: to take the Myrmidons home.

Maquette Trojan Horse, used in Troy film, a gift from Brad Pitt to the Turkish town Canakkale.

During the 12 day-truce, Troy mourns Hector's death, while Agamemmnon fumes at the loss of an opportunity to end the war once and for all. Seeing that the mad king will sooner see every one of his own men slaughtered before he gives up his ambition, Odysseus plans to infiltrate the city by building a hollowed-out wooden horse. The Greeks leave the horse at their camp, then depart, hiding their ships in a nearby cove. Priam trusts his priests that the horse is an offering to Poseidon and a gift, despite the misgivings of Paris. Assuming victory, the Trojans take the horse into the city and celebrate. A Trojan scout finds the Greek ships hiding in the cove, but is killed by the Greeks before he can spread the news. A band of Greeks led by Achilles and Odysseus come out of the horse at night, opening the gates to the city, allowing the main army to enter. The Greeks commence the Sack of Troy, massacring the inhabitants and looting buildings. The Trojan army attempts to defend the royal palace but fails, and the Greeks storm in, killing Glaucus and Priam in the process.

While Troy is burned, Paris sees Andromache, Helen, and many others escaping from Troy through the secret passage Hector showed his wife. Seeing a man named Aeneas, Paris hands him the Sword of Troy, repeating his brother's words that the Trojans will have a future as long as the sword is in Trojan hands. After seeing the survivors off, Paris heads back into the city, bow and arrows at the ready.

Achilles searches for Briseis, who is being threatened by Agamemnon. She kills him with a concealed knife and is saved from his guards by Achilles. While Achilles is helping Briseis to her feet, Paris, seeing them together and misinterpreting Achilles' actions, shoots Achilles several times before Briseis manages to stay his hand. Achilles urges Briseis to join Paris and escape from the city, then dies of the wound to the one spot on his body that was vulnerable, his heel. The soldiers arrive to see the fallen Achilles with only the single arrow through his heel, as he had removed all the others, in keeping with the myth that Achilles was killed by a single arrow to the heel. Funeral rituals are performed for him in the ruins of Troy the next day. The film ends with a speech from Odysseus "If they ever tell my story, let them say I walked with giants. Men rise and fall like the winter wheat, but these names will never die. Let them say I lived in the time of Hector, tamer of horses. Let them say I lived in the time of Achilles."

Cast[link]

Greeks members, advisers and servants (Mycenae and Sparta)

• Brian Cox as Agamemnon
  He is the king of Mycenae and the main antagonist. He is the brother of Menelaus.
• John Shrapnel as Nestor
  He is the adviser of Agamemnon.
• Brendan Gleeson as Menelaus
  The king of Sparta and husband of Helen. He is the brother of Agamemnon.
• Ken Bones as Hippasus
  He is the adviser of Menelaus.
• Siri Svegler as Polydora^{[disambiguation needed ]}
  She is a Spartan entertainer.
• Diane Kruger as Helen
  She is the queen of Sparta and wife of Menelaus. She is the lover of Paris.

Myrmidons

• Brad Pitt as Achilles
  He is the son of Peleus and Thetis. He is the cousin of Patroclus and leader of the Myrmidons. He is the lover of Briseis and the main protagonist.
• Garrett Hedlund as Patroclus
  He is the cousin and student of Achilles.
• Vincent Regan as Eudoros
  He is the general of the Myrmidon army.
• Julie Christie as Thetis
  She is the mother of Achilles and aunt of Patroclus.

Kings and Warriors of other Greek states (e.g. Ithaca, Thessaly e.t.c)

• Sean Bean as Odysseus
  He is the king of Ithaca and friend of Achilles. He is considered the most clever of the Greeks.
• Julian Glover as Triopas
  He is the king of Thessaly.
• Nathan Jones as Boagrius
  He is a Thessalian champion.
• Tyler Mane as Greater Ajax
  He is the king of Salamis

Trojans

• Peter O'Toole as Priam
  He is the king of Troy, father of Hector and Paris, uncle of Briseis and father-in-law of Andromache.
• Eric Bana as Hector
  He is the prince of Troy and the best warrior among the Trojans. He is the elder son of Priam, brother of Paris, cousin of Briseis and husband of Andromache.
• Orlando Bloom as Paris
  He is the prince of Troy. He is the younger son of Priam, brother of Hector, cousin of Briseis and brother-in-law of Andromache. He is the lover of Helen.
• Rose Byrne as Briseis
  She is the priestess of Apollo, niece of Priam and cousin of Hector and Paris, cousin-in-law of Andromache. She is the lover of Achilles.
• Saffron Burrows as Andromache
  She is the princess of Troy and wife of Hector. She is the sister-in-law of Paris and daughter-in-law of Priam.
• James Cosmo as Glaucus
  He is the commanding general of the Trojan army.
• Nigel Terry as Archeptolemus
  He is the Trojan high priest and adviser of Priam.
• Frankie Fitzgerald as Aeneas
  A Trojan youth.

Production[link]

Major sets for the city of Troy were built in the Mediterranean island of Malta at Fort Ricasoli from April to June 2003.^[2] Other important scenes were shot in Mellieħa, a small town in the north of Malta, and on the small island of Comino. The outer walls of Troy were built and filmed in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.^[3]

Music[link]

Composer Gabriel Yared originally worked on the score for Troy for over a year, having been hired by the director, Wolfgang Petersen.

Yared wrote and recorded his score and Tanja Carovska provided vocals on various portions of the music, as she later would on composer James Horner's version of the soundtrack. However, after having screened the film with an early incomplete version of the score, the reactions at test screenings were against it and in less than a day Yared was off the project without being given a chance to fix or change his music, while Warner Bros was already looking for a replacement.^[4] According to Yared, his score was removed due to a complaint by the screening audience that the score was too "old-fashioned".^[5]

The replacement score was written by composer James Horner in about four weeks. He used Carovska's vocals again, and also included traditional Eastern Mediterranean music and brass instruments. Drums are conspicuous in the most dramatic scenes; most notably, in the duel between Achilles and Hector. His instrumental scenes have themes very reminiscent of Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 1, Gustav Holst's The Planets, and Benjamin Britten's War Requiem. The score also quotes themes from Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings and Dmitri Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony. A suspenseful note progression introduced in Willow was played numerous times in the score, particularly in battle scenes. However, the main theme of the score mostly resembles Ralph Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. His theme also can be heard in the song performed by Josh Groban, "Remember", on the soundtrack of the film.

Horner also collaborated with American singer/songwriter Josh Groban and lyricist Cynthia Weil to write an original song for the film's end credits. The product of this collaboration, "Remember" was performed by Groban with additional vocals by Tzarovska. The song is available on the film's original soundtrack.

A commentator, Alex Ross, claims that large portions of the score were essentially plagiarized from the pieces of which they are reminiscent.^[6]

Around the time of the film's release in theaters, Gabriel Yared briefly made portions of his rejected score available on his personal website, which was later removed at the request of Warner Brothers. Bootleg versions exist on the Internet. Yared's score has since gained much attention from the fans of film music. Several petitions were made requesting the release of Yared's score either on a limited edition CD or as a bonus feature or secondary audio track on the film's DVD. Those requests however, have been denied by Warner Bros.

Director's cut[link]

Troy: Director's Cut was screened at the 57th Berlin International Film Festival on February 17, 2007, and received a limited theatrical release in Germany in April 2007. Warner Home Video reportedly spent more than $1 million for the director's cut, which includes "at least 1,000 new cuts" or almost 30 minutes extra footage (with a new running time of 196 minutes). The DVD was released on September 18, 2007 in the US. The score of the film was changed dramatically, with many of the female vocals being cut. An addition to the music is the use of Danny Elfman's theme for Planet of the Apes during the pivotal fight between Hector and Achilles in front of the Gates of Troy.

Various shots were recut and extended. For instance, the love scene between Helen and Paris was reframed to include more nudity of Diane Kruger. The sex scene between Achilles and Briseis is also extended. Only one scene was removed: the scene where Helen tends to the wound of Paris is taken out. The battle scenes were also extended, showing much more of Ajax's bloody rampage on the Trojans during the initial attack by the Greek Army. Perhaps most significantly was the sacking of Troy, barely present in the theatrical cut, but shown fully here. Characters were given more time to develop, specifically Priam and Odysseus, the latter being given a humorous introduction scene. Lastly, bookend scenes were added: the beginning being a soldier's dog finding its dead master, and the end including a sequence where the few surviving Trojans escape to Mount Ida. In one of the commentary sequences, the film's writer, David Benioff, said that when it came to deciding whether to follow Iliad or do what was best for the film, they always decided with what was best for the film.

Reception[link]

When the film was completed, total production costs were approximately $175,000,000. This made Troy one of the most expensive films produced in modern cinema. It was screened out of competition at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.^[7]

Troy screenings have earned US$133,378,256 in the United States.^[8]

Troy made more than 73%^[8] of its revenues outside the U.S. Eventually, Troy made over US$497 million worldwide,^[8] placing it in the #60 spot of top box office hits of all time.

Troy met mixed reactions by reviewers. Rotten Tomatoes gave it an average approval rating of 55% from a base of 215 reviews,^[9] while Yahoo! Movies gave it a critic rating of "B-" based on 15 reviews.^[10] Roger Ebert, who disliked what he saw as an unfaithful adaptation of the Iliad, gave it two stars out of four. Ebert claimed that Troy "sidesteps the existence of the Greek gods, turns its heroes into action movie clichés and demonstrates that we're getting tired of computer-generated armies."^[11]

Box office totals[link]

• Budget – $175,000,000^[8]
• Marketing cost – $50,000,000
• Opening weekend gross (Domestic) – $46,865,412
• Total domestic grosses – $133,378,256
• Total overseas grosses – $364,031,596^[8]
• Total worldwide grosses – $497,409,852

Accolades[link]

2005 ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards

• Won – Top Box Office Film — James Horner

2005 Academy Awards

• Nominated – Best Achievement in Costume Design — Bob Ringwood

2005 Japanese Academy Prize

• Nominated – Best Foreign Film

2005 MTV Movie Awards

• Nominated – Best Fight — Brad Pitt & Eric Bana
• Nominated – Best Male Performance — Brad Pitt

2005 Motion Picture Sound Editors (Golden Reel Award)

• Nominated – Best Sound Editing in Foreign Features — Wylie Statesman, Martin Cantwell, James Boyle, Harry Barnes, Paul Conway, Alex Joseph, Matthew Grime, Steve Schwalbe, Howard Halsall, Sue Lenny, Simon Price & Nigel Stone

2005 Teen Choice Awards

• Won – Choice Movie Actor – Drama/Action Adventure — Brad Pitt
• Nominated – Choice Movie Actor – Drama/Action Adventure — Orlando Bloom
• Nominated – Choice Breakout Movie Star – Male — Garrett Hedlund
• Nominated – Choice Movie – Drama/Action Adventure
• Nominated - Choice Movie Fight/Action Sequence

See also[link]

• Epic film
• Greek mythology in popular culture
• List of films based on poems
• List of historical drama films

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Petersen, Daniel (2006). Troja: Embedded im Troianischen Krieg (Troy: Embedded in the Trojan War). HörGut! Verlag. ISBN 3-938230-99-1.
• Winkler, Martin M. (2006). Troy: From Homer's Iliad to Hollywood Epic. Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 1-4051-3183-7.

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Troy (film)

• Official website
• Troy at the Internet Movie Database
• Troy at AllRovi
• Troy at Rotten Tomatoes
• Troy at Metacritic
• Troy at Box Office Mojo

Coordinates: 39°57′27″N 26°14′20″E / 39.9575°N 26.23889°E / 39.9575; 26.23889

Archaeological Site of Troy *
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Country	Turkey
Type	Cultural
Criteria	ii, iii, vi
Reference	849
Region **	Europe and North America
Inscription history
Inscription	1998 (22nd Session)
* Name as inscribed on World Heritage List ** Region as classified by UNESCO

Troy (Ancient Greek: Ἴλιον, Ilion, and Τροία, Troia; Latin: Trōia and Īlium;^[1] Hittite: Wilusa or Truwisa;^[2][3] Turkish: Truva) was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida. It is best known for being the setting of the Trojan War described in the Greek Epic Cycle and especially in the Iliad, one of the two epic poems attributed to Homer. Metrical evidence from the Iliad and the Odyssey seems to show that the name Ἴλιον (Ilion) formerly began with a digamma: Ϝίλιον (Wilion). This was later supported by the Hittite form Wilusa.

A new city called Ilium was founded on the site in the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus. It flourished until the establishment of Constantinople and declined gradually during the Byzantine era.

In 1865, English archaeologist Frank Calvert excavated trial trenches in a field he had bought from a local farmer at Hisarlık, and in 1868, Heinrich Schliemann, wealthy German businessman and archaeologist, also began excavating in the area after a chance meeting with Calvert in Çanakkale.^[4][5] These excavations revealed several cities built in succession. Schliemann was at first skeptical about the identification of Hissarlik with Troy, but was persuaded by Calvert^[6] and took over Calvert's excavations on the eastern half of the Hissarlik site, which was on Calvert's property. Troy VII has been identified with the Hittite Wilusa, the probable origin of the Greek Ἴλιον, and is generally (but not conclusively) identified with Homeric Troy.

Today, the hill at Hisarlik has given its name to a small village near the ruins, supporting the tourist trade visiting the Troia archaeological site.^[7] It lies within the province of Çanakkale, some 30 km south-west of the provincial capital, also called Çanakkale.

Troia was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1998.

Homeric Troy[link]

Portion of the legendary walls of Troy (VII), identified as the site of the Trojan War (ca. 1200 BC).

Ancient Greek historians variously placed the Trojan War in the 12th, 13th, or 14th centuries BC: Eratosthenes to 1184 BC, Herodotus to 1250 BC, Duris of Samos to 1334 BC. Modern archaeologists associate Homeric Troy with archaeological Troy VII.^[8]

In the Iliad, the Achaeans set up their camp near the mouth of the River Scamander (presumably modern Karamenderes),^[9] where they had beached their ships. The city of Troy itself stood on a hill, across the plain of Scamander, where the battles of the Trojan War took place. The site of the ancient city is some 5 km from the coast today, but the ancient mouths of Scamander, some 3,000 years ago, were about that distance inland,^[10] pouring into a large bay that formed a natural harbour that has since been filled with alluvial material. Recent geological findings have permitted the reconstruction of how the original Trojan coastline would have looked, and the results largely confirm the accuracy of the Homeric geography of Troy.^[11]

Amphitheatre of Troy

In November 2001, geologists John C. Kraft from the University of Delaware and John V. Luce from Trinity College, Dublin presented the results^[12][13][14] of investigations, begun in 1977, into the geology of the region. They compared the present geology with the landscapes and coastal features described in the Iliad and other classical sources, notably Strabo's Geographia, and concluded that there is a regular consistency between the location of Schliemann's Troy and other locations such as the Greek camp, the geological evidence, descriptions of the topography and accounts of the battle in the Iliad. Further work by John Kraft and others was published in 2003.^[15][16]

Besides the Iliad, there are references to Troy in the other major work attributed to Homer, the Odyssey, as well as in other ancient Greek literature. The Homeric legend of Troy was elaborated by the Roman poet Virgil in his Aeneid. The Greeks and Romans took for a fact the historicity of the Trojan War and the identity of Homeric Troy with the site in Anatolia. Alexander the Great, for example, visited the site in 334 BC and made sacrifices at tombs there associated with the Homeric heroes Achilles and Patroclus.

After the 1995 find of a Luwian biconvex seal at Troy VII, there has been a heated discussion over the language that was spoken in Homeric Troy. Frank Starke of the University of Tübingen recently demonstrated that the name of Priam, king of Troy at the time of the Trojan War, is connected to the Luwian compound Priimuua, which means "exceptionally courageous".^[17] "The certainty is growing that Wilusa/Troy belonged to the greater Luwian-speaking community," although it is not entirely clear whether Luwian was primarily the official language or in daily colloquial use.^[18]

A small minority of contemporary writers argue that Homeric Troy was not in Anatolia, but located elsewhere: England,^[19] Croatia,^{[citation needed]} and Scandinavia^{[citation needed]} have been proposed. These theories have not been accepted by mainstream scholars.

Chronology in the search for Homeric Troy[link]

Initially, the layers of Troy VI and VII were overlooked entirely, because Schliemann favoured the burnt city of Troy II. It was not until the need to close Calvert's Thousand Year Gap arose—from Dörpfeld's discovery of the walls of Troy VI—that archaeology turned away from Schliemann's Troy and began working towards finding Homeric Troy once more.^[20]

Calvert's Thousand Year Gap[link]

Part of the city's archaeological chronology occurred during what is called "Calvert's Thousand Year Gap" (1800-800 BC), a period not accounted for by Schliemann's archaeology and thus constituting a hole in the Trojan timeline. In Homer's description of the city, a section of one side of the wall is said to be weaker than the rest.^[21] During his excavation of more than three hundred yards of the wall, Dörpfeld came across a section very closely resembling the Homeric description of the weaker section.^[22] Dörpfeld was convinced he had found the walls of Homer's city, and now he would excavate the city itself. Within the walls of this stratum (Troy VI), much Mycenaean pottery dating from LH III A and III B was uncovered, suggesting a relation between the Trojans and Mycenaeans. The great tower along the walls seemed likely to be the "Great Tower of Ilios".^[23]

The evidence seemed to indicate that Dörpfeld had stumbled upon Ilios, the city of Homer's epics. Schliemann himself had conceded that Troy VI was more likely to be the Homeric city, but he never published anything stating so.^[24] The only counter-argument, confirmed initially by Dörpfeld (who was as passionate as Schliemann about finding Troy), was that the city appeared to have been destroyed by an earthquake, not by men.^[25] There was little doubt that this was the Troy that the Mycenaeans would have known of.^[26]

Archaeological Troy[link]

Archeological plan of the Hisarlık citadel

The layers of ruins in the citadel at Hisarlık are numbered Troy I – Troy IX, with various subdivisions:

• Troy I 3000–2600 BC (Western Anatolian EB 1)
• Troy II 2600–2250 BC (Western Anatolian EB 2)
• Troy III 2250–2100 BC (Western Anatolian EB 3 [early])
• Troy IV 2100–1950 BC (Western Anatolian EB 3 [middle])
• Troy V: 20th–18th centuries BC (Western Anatolian EB 3 [late])
• Troy VI: 17th–15th centuries BC
• Troy VIh: late Bronze Age, 14th century BC
• Troy VIIa: ca. 1300–1190 BC, most likely setting for Homer's story^[27]
• Troy VIIb₁: 12th century BC
• Troy VIIb₂: 11th century BC
• Troy VIIb₃: until ca. 950 BC
• Troy VIII: around 700 BC
• Troy IX: Hellenistic Ilium, 1st century BC

The archaeological site of Troy was added to the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1998.

Troy I–V[link]

The first city on the site was founded in the 3rd millennium BC. During the Bronze Age, the site seems to have been a flourishing mercantile city, since its location allowed for complete control of the Dardanelles, through which every merchant ship from the Aegean Sea heading for the Black Sea had to pass. Around 1900 BC a mass migration was set off by the Hittites to the east. Cities to the east of Troy were destroyed, and although Troy was not burned, the next period shows a change of culture indicating a new people had taken over Troy.^[28]

Schliemann's Troy II[link]

When Schliemann came across Troy II, he believed he had found Homer's city. Schliemann and his team unearthed a large feature he dubbed the Scaean Gate, a western gate unlike the three previously found leading to the Pergamos.^[29] This gate, as he describes, was the gate that Homer had featured. As Schliemann states in his publication Troja: "I have proved that in a remote antiquity there was in the plain of Troy a large city, destroyed of old by a fearful catastrophe, which had on the hill of Hisarlık only its Acropolis with its temples and a few other large edifices, southerly, and westerly direction on the site of the later Ilium; and that, consequently, this city answers perfectly to the Homeric description of the sacred site of Ilios."^[30]

Troy VI[link]

Troy VI was destroyed around 1300 BC, probably by an earthquake. Only a single arrowhead was found in this layer, and no remains of bodies. However the town quickly recovered and was rebuilt in a layout that was more orderly.

Troy VII[link]

Troy VII, which has been dated to the mid- to late-13th century BC, is the most often cited candidate for the Troy of Homer. It appears to have been destroyed by war.^[31] The evidence of fire and slaughter around 1250 BC, which brought Troy VIIA to a close, led to this phase being identified with the city besieged by the Greeks during the Trojan War. This was immortalized in the Iliad written by Homer. ^[32]

Troy IX[link]

Silver tetradrachm from Troy during the Hellenistic period, 188–160 BC. Head of Athena in Attic helmet. Reverse female figure and owl with inscription: ΑΘΗΝΑΣ ΙΛΙΑΔΟΣ, ΚΛΕΩΝΟΣ ΙΛΙΟΥ, "Athēnas Iliados, kleōnos Iliou".

The last city on this site, Hellenistic Ilium, was founded by Romans during the reign of the emperor Augustus and was an important trading city until the establishment of Constantinople in the 4th century as the eastern capital of the Roman Empire. In Byzantine times, the city declined gradually and eventually disappeared.^{[citation needed]}

Beneath part of the Roman city, the ruins of which cover a much larger area than the citadel excavated by Schliemann, recent excavations have found traces of an additional Bronze-Age settlement area (of lower status than the adjoining citadel) defended by a ditch.

Excavation campaigns[link]

With the rise of modern critical history, Troy and the Trojan War were consigned to the realms of legend. However, the true location of ancient Troy had from classical times remained the subject of interest and speculation, so when, in 1822, the Scottish journalist Charles Maclaren reviewed the available material, he was able to identify with confidence the position of the acropolis of Augustus's New Ilium in north-western Anatolia.^[33]

In 1866, Frank Calvert, the brother of the United States' consular agent in the region, made extensive surveys and published in scholarly journals his identification of the hill of New Ilium (which was on farmland owned by his family) as the site of ancient Troy. The hill, near the city of Çanakkale, was known to the Turks as Hisarlık.^[34]

Schliemann[link]

In 1868, Schliemann visited Calvert and secured permission to excavate Hisarlık. In 1871–73 and 1878–79, he excavated the hill and discovered the ruins of a series of ancient cities dating from the Bronze Age to the Roman period. Schliemann declared one of these cities — at first Troy I, later Troy II — to be the city of Troy, and this identification was widely accepted at that time. Schliemann's finds at Hisarlık have become known as Priam's Treasure. They were acquired from him by the Berlin museums, but significant doubts about their authenticity persist.

The view from Hisarlık across the plain of Ilium to the Aegean Sea.

Although it is widely believed that Heinrich Schliemann was responsible for starting archaeology on his own with the discovery of Troy, this is inaccurate. Schliemann became interested in digging at the mound of Hisarlık at the persuasion of Frank Calvert. The British diplomat, considered a pioneer for the contributions he made to the archaeology of Troy, spent more than 60 years in the Troad (modern day Biga peninsula, Turkey) conducting field work.^[35] As a principal authority on field archaeology in the region, Calvert's findings supplied evidence that Homeric Troy might exist in the hill, playing a major role in directing Heinrich Schliemann to dig at the Hisarlık.^[36]

Dörpfeld and Blegen[link]

After Schliemann, the site was further excavated under the direction of Wilhelm Dörpfeld (1893-94) and later Carl Blegen (1932-38). ^[37][38] These excavations have shown that there were at least nine cities built, one on top of each other, at this site. In his research, Blegen came to a conclusion that Troy's nine levels could be further divided into forty-six sublevels .^[39]

Korfmann[link]

In 1988, excavations were resumed by a team of the University of Tübingen and the University of Cincinnati under the direction of Professor Manfred Korfmann, with Professor Brian Rose overseeing Post-Bronze Age (Greek, Roman, Byzantine) excavation along the coast of the Aegean Sea at the Bay of Troy. Possible evidence of a battle was found in the form of bronze arrowheads and fire-damaged human remains buried in layers dated to the early 12th century BC. The question of Troy's status in the Bronze-Age world has been the subject of a sometimes acerbic debate between Korfmann and the Tübingen historian Frank Kolb in 2001–2002.

In August 1993, following a magnetic imaging survey of the fields below the fort, a deep ditch was located and excavated among the ruins of a later Greek and Roman city. Remains found in the ditch were dated to the late Bronze Age, the alleged time of Homeric Troy. It is claimed by Korfmann that the ditch may have once marked the outer defences of a much larger city than had previously been suspected. The latter city has been dated by his team to about 1250 BC, and it has been also suggested — based on recent archeological evidence uncovered by Professor Manfred Korfmann's team — that this was indeed the Homeric city of Troy.

Pernicka[link]

In summer 2006, the excavations continued under the direction of Korfmann's colleague Ernst Pernicka, with a new digging permit.^[40]

Hittite and Egyptian evidence[link]

In the 1920s, the Swiss scholar Emil Forrer claimed that the placenames Wilusa and Taruisa found in Hittite texts should be identified with Ilium and Troia, respectively.^[41] He further noted that the name of Alaksandu, a king of Wilusa mentioned in a Hittite treaty, is quite similar to Homer's Paris, whose birthname was Alexandros. Subsequent to this, the Tawagalawa letter (CTH 181) was found to document an unnamed Hittite king's correspondence to the king of the Ahhiyawa, referring to an earlier "Wilusa episode" involving hostility on the part of the Ahhiyawa. The Hittite king was long held to be Mursili II (c. 1321—1296), but, since the 1980s, his son Hattusili III (1265—1240) is commonly preferred, although his other son Muwatalli (c. 1296—1272) remains a possibility.

Inscriptions of the New Kingdom of Egypt also record a nation T-R-S as one of the Sea Peoples who attacked Egypt during the XIX and XX Dynasties. An inscription at Deir el-Medina records a victory of Ramesses III over the Sea Peoples, including one named "Tursha" (Egyptian: [twrš3]). It is probably the same as the earlier "Teresh" (Egyptian: [trš.w]) on the stele commemorating Merneptah's victory in a Libyan campaign around 1220 BC.

These identifications were rejected by many scholars as being improbable or at least unprovable. However, Trevor Bryce championed them in his 1998 book The Kingdom of the Hittites, citing a piece of the Manapa-Tarhunda letter referring to the kingdom of Wilusa as beyond the land of the Seha River (the classical Caicus and modern Bakırçay) and near the land of "Lazpa" (Lesbos). Recent evidence also adds weight to the theory that Wilusa is identical to archaeological Troy. Hittite texts mention a water tunnel at Wilusa, and a water tunnel excavated by Korfmann, previously thought to be Roman, has been dated to around 2600 BC. The identifications of Wilusa with Troy and of the Ahhiyawa with Homer's Achaeans remain somewhat controversial but gained enough popularity during the 1990s to be considered majority opinion.

In later legend[link]

Such was the fame of the Epic Cycle in Roman and Medieval times that it was built upon to provide a starting point for various founding myths of national origins. The most influential, Virgil's Aeneid, traces the journeys of the Trojan prince Aeneas, supposed ancestor of the founders of Rome and the Julio-Claudian dynasty. In a later era, the heroes of Troy, both those noted in Homer and those invented for the purpose, often continued to appear in the origin stories of the nations of Early Medieval Europe.^[42] The Roman de Troie was common cultural ground for European dynasties,^[43] as a Trojan pedigree was both gloriously ancient and established an equality with the ruling class of Rome. A Trojan pedigree could justify the occupation of parts of Rome's former territories.^[44] According to Marcus Terrentius Varro, the gens Salentini descended from Idomeneus, see Grecìa Salentina.

Jordanes described how the Goths sacked "Troy and Ilium" after they had recovered from the war with Agamemnon.

Thus, the Franks filled the lacunae of their legendary origins with Trojan and pseudo-Trojan names: in Fredegar's 7th-century chronicle of Frankish history, Priam appears as the first king of the Franks.^[45] The Trojan origin of France was such an established article of faith that in 1714, the learned Nicolas Fréret was Bastilled for showing through historical criticism that the Franks had been Germanic, a sore point counter to Valois and Bourbon propaganda.^[46]

In similar manner, Geoffrey of Monmouth reworked earlier material such as the Historia Brittonum to trace the legendary kings of the Britons from a supposed descendant of Aeneas called Brutus.

Likewise, Snorri Sturluson, in the prologue to his Icelandic Prose Edda, traced the genealogy of the ancestral figures in Norse mythology to characters appearing at Troy in Homer's epic, notably making Thor to be the son of Memnon. Sturluson referred to these figures as having made a journey across Europe towards Scandinavia, setting up kingdoms as they went.

See also[link]

• Cities of the ancient Near East
• The Golden Bough (mythology)
• Where Troy Once Stood

Notes[link]

References and further reading[link]

• Carter, Jane Burr; Morris, Sarah P. The Ages of Homer. University of Texas Press, 1995. ISBN 0-292-71208-1.
• Easton, D.F.; Hawkins, J.D.; Sherratt, A.G.; Sherratt, E.S. "Troy in Recent Perspective", Anatolian Studies, Issue 52 (2002), pp. 75–109.
• Latacz, Joachim (2004). Troy and Homer: towards a solution of an old mystery. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-926308-6 
• Fantasies of Troy: Classical Tales and the Social Imaginary in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, edited by Alan Shepard and Stephen D. Powell. Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2004.
• Ilios. The city and country of the Trojans: the results of researches and discoveries on the site of Troy and through the Troad in the years 1871-72-73-78-79; (searchable facsimile at the University of Georgia Libraries, requires dejavu-plugin)

External links[link]

Wikisource has original text related to this article: The Iliad

Wikisource has original text related to this article: ΙΛΙΑΣ

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Troy

• General
  • Troy on the Internet Educational website, University of Cincinnati
• Archaeology
  • Project Troia - The new excavations at Troy
    • digital reconstructions of the city
    • Greek, Roman and Byzantine Pottery at Ilion (Troia)
    • Coins from Ilion (Troia)
  • Troy VII and the Historicity of the Trojan War

• Geography
  • Geology corresponds with Homer’s description of ancient Troy, article by Neil Thomas on the University of Delaware site

• Media
  • Richard Miles. "The Age of Iron". Ancient Worlds. 51:22 minutes in. BBC 2. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00w5lff. Retrieved 20 Nov 201. 

• Film and television
• Helen of Troy (1956) - IMDb
• Helen of Troy (TV mini-series 2003) - IMDb
• Troy (2004) - IMDb

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v t e UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Turkey Aegean Hierapolis / Pamukkale Xanthos / Letoon1 Black Sea Hittite Capital of Hattusa Safranbolu Central Anatolia Göreme and Rock Sites of Cappadocia Great Mosque and Hospital of Divriği Marmara Archaeological Site of Troy Historic Areas of Istanbul Selimiye Mosque and its Social Complex Mediterranean Xanthos / Letoon1 Southeastern Anatolia Mount Nemrut in Commagene 1 Shared with other region/s