Week 4 Assignment 1: Mysteries of the Trojans

Alicia Robinson
HUM 110 – World Cultures I
Strayer University

Dr. Bull

October 31, 2013

Mysteries of the Trojans In the following paper, I will attempt to explain the mysteries surrounding the lost city of Troy, the Trojan soldiers, the Trojan War and the famous story about the Trojan horse. This paper will show why I believe that sometimes myths may not be merely myths at all, but may actually have more validity to them than one may think. These so called myths should not be so easily dismissed and I will try to explain why I truly believe this.

The mysteries concerning these stories are the basis of the Homeric tales, the Odysseus, and the Iliad, written by a man whom history calls Homer, but no one is even sure if this was his name or maybe even his profession. There are many theories surrounding this alone. Many claim that he was a blind man and may be a descendent of singer, story tellers. Before Homer, epic stories were memorized and then sung. These were in fact true accounts of history, not like songs that are sung today. The Homeric stories are some of the oldest written stories of all time, (dating back to around 800 B.C.E.). The Trojan War is believed, (by scholars), to have taken place between 1800 and 1300 B.C.E., but the first written accounts were not written until, some five centuries later, after the Greeks adopted the Phoenician writing system. Stories, until then, had been handed down by word of mouth. The Homeric tales are tales of love, of soldiers, of vengeance, of war, of interplay of the Divine and the mundane, of human behavior, of interplay between the Divine and the mundane, of heroes, and of the ultimate deceit. Although, scholars of today have many reservations concerning these stories, one thing is clear and that is that the ancient world regarded these stories as historical facts. They are also the first great written stories, of Western civilization, that we have. But are Homer’s stories the true accounts of the historical city of Troy, the Trojans whom lived there and of the famous Trojan horse, or are they just mere myths?
The Search for Historical Evidence For years scholars have believed that these stories were myths, but now archeologists have uncovered, off the coast of the Aegean Sea, what they believe to be the fortress city of the ancient Troy. In the nineteenth century, a man named Heinrich Schliemann, (whom was also obsessed with the Homeric tales, from early childhood), whom retired after making millions, and set out to look for what he believed to be the real lost city of Troy. He was no archeologist, but he did have the money that it would take, so he set out to try to locate the lost Troy. He believed that Homer’s accounts were true and not just mere myths. He believed that the lost city of Troy was in what we now call modern day Turkey. He was also convinced that Troy would be found on a specific mound, in which is now called Hisarlik, (the modern-day name for the ancient city of Troy). He did uncover golden treasures, he believed to be the treasures of Priam. He also found that there was not only one city buried beneath the ruble of Hisarlik, but found instead nine cities one buries underneath each other. It was determined that the city number. When Schliemann came across Troy II, in 1871, 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. This gate, as he describes, was the gate that Homer had featured. Troy VI was destroyed around 1250 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, 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. The evidence of fire and slaughter around 1184 BC, which brought Troy VII a 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. After Schliemann, the site was further excavated under the direction of Wilhelm Dörpfeld, (1893–94) and later Carl Blegen (1932–38). 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. Finally, n 1988, excavations were resumed by a team of the University of Tübingenn and the University of Cincinnatii under the direction of Professor Manfred Korfmannn, with Professor Brian Rose overseeing Post-Bronze Age (Greek, Roman, and 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 Kolbb 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 differences 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.

Now as for my beliefs on these mysteries: I died about eight years ago now, and I also got the amazing chance to visit Planet Heaven, although for not very long. It seemed to me to last a lot longer than it actually was because I got to see so very much and there, there was no concept of time like we have here. When the wondrous gates opened up, unto just me, I was immediately aware of whom were opening up the gates, as they did so by using a golden rope that went around a huge pulley. The warriors who did so, were His Trojan warriors. They were wearing Trojan white robes, the same that I also was wearing. His Trojan warriors were beautiful, having perfect body building physiques. There were hundreds of them and they looked to be all cloned. I was the only female that I could see. They were all busy being taught by God and were preparing to come back here, as He has promised us that He would. This is why I do believe that the Homeric tales are more than just pure myths. I do truly believe that these stories are true. These stories were handed down before a writing system was in place by word of mouth and were regarded in historical time as being historically true, because they were. We have little scientific proof to prove that these stories are true, but at the same time, we have little proof to prove that they are not true. I do believe that the city of Troy did exist, as did the Trojan warriors and the Trojan War and the famous Trojan horse. One thing is certain; these stories have echoed throughout time and I have a strong feeling that they always will. I believe that the answer to this is simple; it’s because they are true. Do you believe now?

Sources for this paper are: Humanities textbook (Sayre 2011); https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5Jdu3EYTlU; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikxveCSJcNg; Professor Manfred Korfmannn;
History Channel; Discovery Channel; National Geographic