Troy: The World Deceived

Homer's Guide to Pergamon

John Lascelles

• Editorial: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Año: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781645365389
• Categoría: History
• Categoría: Greek Ancient History

The Ancient Greeks needed to deceive the Romans about the time and location of the Trojan War. At Ilios and Troy, their ancestors had destroyed the ancestral home and empire of Rome's leading families.

From the 5th century BC, they watched Rome become the world's greatest military power.

How could they avoid blood feud and genocide?

They used their intellectual prestige to minimize the Trojan War's potential for harm.

They set back the war four hundred years into pre-history.

They separated the war from the settlement of Ionia and the founding of Rome.

They created confusion in history and two thousand years of controversy.

They survived.

Homer guides you in finding Ilios and Troy around the greatest acropolis east of the Aegean Sea. You will realize that the Trojan War began the Western civilization.

Part 1

The Mystery of Troy

Preface

The author used leisure during his sea career, for wide reading in ancient history. This interest and study continued to the present. Two important works, studied during his last voyage in 1952, prepared him to confront the questions of ancient history and see the need for reconstruction of its timetables. Emil Ludwig’s exhaustive volume, Egypt, led him to read the pioneering work, Ages in Chaos, by Immanuel Velikovsky (1895-1979), and follow his lead.

He took up a full-time course in architecture in 1952. Attempting an essay on the development of Greek architecture, he found bewildering anomalies in the history of Mycenae and Crete. As architect for alterations to the Provisional Parliament House in Australia’s developing capital city of Canberra, in 1965, he noticed the works of Heinrich Schliemann (1822-1890) in the Parliamentary Library. Perhaps, some Australian politician took a lead from the interest of British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898) in Schliemann’s discoveries. The volumes he took out on loan were Schliemann’s Troy and its Remains, of 1875; Ilios, The City and Country of the Trojans, of 1881; and Troja, of 1882.

He became thoroughly dissatisfied with Hisarlik, near the Dardanelles, as the site of Troy, unable to believe that Homer had exaggerated so much. The problem continued to puzzle him. His reading broadened, to name a few, with Blegen’s Troy and the Trojans, Gladstone’s Homeric Synchronism, Lechevalier’s Description of the Plain of Troy, McLaren’s Dissertation, and Mahaffy’s The Site and Antiquity of the Homeric Ilion.

He read the Geography of Roman writer, Strabo, that led Schliemann to investigate the region of the so-called ‘Troad.’

He read the criticisms made of the identification of Troy at Hisarlik, in Schliemann’s own time. In 1882, the scholar, Sir R.C. Jebb, wrote that the collective opinion of intelligent antiquity rejected the claim of the Greek Ilium to occupy the site at Hisarlik. Jebb had a controversy with Professor J.P. Mahaffy, who had to argue that the alleged foundation of Ilion at Hisarlik in historical times is not true. To account for the later habitation levels found at Hisarlik, Mahaffy held that there had not been total and final destruction at Troy.

Jebb quoted Hellanicus and Demetrius of Scepsis against him, saying that ancient authors implied that the ruin was final and total  that the site remained desolate. Jebb capped his argument against Mahaffy, with what the orator, Lycurgus, had said, about 332-330 B.C.: “Who has not heard of Troy, how it became the greatest city of its time, the mistress of Asia, and how, since it was demolished once for all by the Greeks, it has been left uninhabited through the ages?” We can see immediately that the small ‘Troy,’ at the Hisarlik site, has never fitted this description by Lycurgus.

Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C.) visited the Greek Ilion at Hisarlik after the Battle of the Granicus (334 B.C.). Finding it inhabited, he gave it privileges and the title of a city. Therefore, Jebb held that Lycurgus, speaking a few years later, could not have overlooked the existence of the Greek Ilion at Hisarlik, and must have meant some other place.

Schliemann had also explored the coast from Hisarlik to Edremit (ancient Adramyttium). The author followed his description, wondering if any other place on that coast would fit Troy, as perhaps Schliemann himself had done. At Edremit, however, Schliemann had turned north. He never saw Pergamon. The area to the south remained unknown to him.

The author wondered if some other place in western Turkey would fit Troy. About 1978, he entertained the thought that the Attalid kingdom’s successors of Alexander the Great, in the third century B.C., might have built Pergamon (Pergamum to the Romans) on the acropolis site of ancient Ilios. Homer applied the name of Pergamos to the highest, most sacred part of the acropolis, Ilios, and he wondered why scholars disregarded it.

Bergama’s present town spreads out from its lower hill, which could be the site of ancient Troy. From his reading, the area corresponded remarkably well with Homer’s description. It occurred to him that the Catalog of Ships in Homer’s Iliad might reveal an extended location of Achilles’ domain.

Extensive exploration on foot at Hisarlik and Bergama, in 1980 and 1991, confirmed his suppositions beyond expectation. He thought that there must have been serious reasons for such long-standing mystery, confusion, and deception. He sought the motives in the politics of ancient times and realized he had no need to accept that conventional history had the last word.

The author’s training and daily work as a design architect required him to be a problem-solver. Clients normally brief architects with inadequate information. Architects are under pressure to produce a design solution within a short time.

They use problem-solving processes of lateral thinking that differ from the academic discipline of vertical thinking. Based on experience, they tend to conceive a loose-fit solution to their immediate information and make a rough sketch of it. They use it to extract more information. If the sketch has validity, it may progress toward detailed design.

If not, it can usefully confront the client with a realization of what is not wanted, and force deeper consideration of needs. Then, they cast the sketch aside, and seek other loose-fit concepts.

The design process may not wait until research has accumulated all relevant data. The mental process often involves turning around earlier ideas and asking: “What if…?” Good designers know that it is a fatal restraint on creative thought to hang on to an initial concept, fearful of not being able to produce alternate solutions. Architect or historian, approaching the problem of the mystery of Troy, is challenged to proceed with inadequate information.

Problem-solvers need to be prepared to propose loose-fit concepts until they find a structure that embraces as many as possible of the requirements. We can find answers to the questions raised, but only if we desire a solution regardless of the penalty. It will be necessary to revise hallowed texts. Be willing to pay that price, and we will gain a new view of the past, leading to new discoveries. We will deepen understanding and enrich experience. The nature of the enquiry does not supply unchallengeable proof of propositions put forward here. Further exploration might provide proof. Perhaps hard evidence might come out of museum backrooms or private collections. Always, we find only what we are looking for.

Do the concepts put forward provide simpler and better explanations of what happened at Troy? Will they lead to progress in historical studies? Please consider this new view of the place and time of Troy as a whole.

Introduction

Why bother with the war against the ancient city of Troy and revive old controversies? Scholars claim to have settled everything now. The Trojan War took place in the 13^th century B.C. (Before Christ), or B.C.E. (Before the Christian Era), they say. How could such an ancient conflict have any relevance to modern times? Is it merely of academic interest?

Homer wrote two epic poems on the Trojan War, the Iliad and the Odyssey, that endure as great works of literature. Many people have heard of Troy and seen films of the Trojan War. Those who have read Homer probably came to his works through the Penguin Classics paperback editions translated into lively modern English by E.V. Rieu.

We know little of Homer himself. It seems he lived between 800 and 700 B.C. Tradition says he came from Smyrna (now Izmir) and that he was blind. Was that physically true or a metaphorical slur? Did he commit his epic poems to writing, or when, or in what order? Pre-literate society used poetry in song and recitation to record their memories. In its original form, poetry existed for a practical purpose. Poetry used all the devices of alliteration, line, meter, rhyme, and verse, as aids to memory. Bards could recite traditions word-perfect.

By tradition, Cadmus founded the acropolis of Thebes (modern Thivai) in Greece, and taught the Greeks to write. He probably adapted a Phoenician script to the Greek language. Blue Guides: Greece dates it to 1313 B.C.

If the Trojan War turns out to be four centuries later than alleged, across the so-called Dark Ages, perhaps Cadmus and the advent of writing in Greece should be similarly down-dated.

Anyway, Greek culture in the seventh century B.C. had developed sufficiently to make it possible to create a poem in speech and commit it to writing.

However, placement of the Trojan War in the 13^th century B.C. leads to apologetics that are hard to swallow. Homer, they say, acquired all his detailed knowledge of the culture of the Trojans, of Ilios, Troy, and its surroundings, and the progress of the Trojan War, from records handed down through oral transmission. Bards, they say, sang or recited the knowledge of heroic events that occurred over four centuries before his time. Yet, if he lived in Smyrna, a great acropolis exists only 50 miles (80 kilometers) to the north to which we can relate all that he describes.

Ancient and modern scholarship says that Homer let his imagination run away with him. The Trojan War, they say, was only a small conflict at an insignificant site in a mythological past. From Roman times, we can read Homer’s works as literature, but not as history. Suppose it is mistaken. One of the great confidence tricks of all time has misled archaeologists, historians, authors, poets, geographers, and politicians, for two-and-a-half thousand years. The deception preserved a people to whom we owe the early institution of democracy.

However, the ancient Greeks intended the deception to deceive the ancient Romans, and to save the Greeks from retribution, blood feud, and genocide. It has no relevance in modern times. Modern Greeks do not fear that modern Romans will exact retribution for the destruction of the Trojans. The Greeks developed a precise language and writing providing for logical thought, and began science and philosophy. Middle Eastern languages and writing reveled in ambiguity and obscurity.

The Importance of Troy

Troy, the author believes, was not small, nor insignificant, nor did it belong to prehistory. Troy was everything Homer said it was: proud, dominating, splendid, wealthy, and powerful. The Trojans could draw on military support five-hundred to a thousand miles from their homeland. They had a well-developed civilization. Their superior skills in stonework and architecture impressed their Achaean enemies. In their heyday, as Lycurgus attested, they were the dominant power in the eastern Aegean area, north of Crete.

This study will show, first, that the Ilios and Troy of Homer’s epic was set in a location of grander scale than we thought, and second, that the Trojan War took place much later than we were led to believe. The story, only partly given to us in the Iliad, has more truth in it than we realize, and for understanding of Western origins, more importance than we imagine. The Trojan War was not a tribal skirmish. It was the invasion of a country. A ruling class, greedy for gold and power, led a population explosion of vigorous, land-hungry, warlike, and seafaring people, to war. They were desperate for fertile soil and unsettled by a period of increasing tectonic upheaval. The Trojan War was the culminating act in a process of colonization and the decisive stroke to decide ownership of a land.

At Troy, the early Greeks destroyed a civilization. Extreme violence and total defeat traumatized the survivors of destroyed Ilios and Troy. The surviving Trojans carried memories of their humiliation to a new life in another land, Hesperia.

Hesperia became Latium and Italy. They continued the tradition of extreme violence to create the Roman state.

Rome grew into one of the world’s greatest military powers. From their origin in disastrous defeat at Ilios and Troy, the Romans set out to conquer the known world.

Three or four centuries of Dark Ages are supposed to separate the Trojan War from the Classical periods of Greece and Rome. These false concepts need to blind us no longer: their manifold anomalies need to confuse us no more. We will see direct links between the Trojan War and later events. We will realize that the Trojan War took place at the beginning of Western Civilization.

The Trojan War altered the balance of power in the Middle East for a thousand years. For a millennium, it determined that Europe, not Asia, would lead the world. It moved the power centers of the world from Asia into Europe. Most important of all, as it moved culture and technology westward, it formed a new kind of person: questioning, individual, dynamic, and insecure. It formed new kinds of society: literate, democratic, republican, experimental, and technological.

Put the Trojan War into its rightful place and we find that the fall of Troy took place at one of those pivot-points in history where the world changes and human endeavor sets off in new directions. We open a window on a new vision of human development. We obtain a basis for reconstruction of the misplaced timetables of ancient history.

This study will guide tourists and readers, with an interest in ancient history, to find the Ilios and Troy of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey around Bergama, in Turkey, in situations that correspond with his descriptions in every respect. Homer wrote his poems on scrolls called Books, which we indicate as One, Two, Three, etc.

Homer: Iliad

Homer’s epic poem, the Iliad, or Wrath of Achilles, tells of events in the ninth year of war against the Trojans. In Book One, the Pelasgian leader, Achilles, feuds over possession of the captive woman, Briseis, with Agamemnon, who is supreme leader of Achaean and other forces from ancient southern Greece, the Ionian Islands, and Crete. Achilles, a military genius, withdraws his 50 shiploads of men from the fighting.

In Book Two, Agamemnon despairs of taking the great acropolis, Ilios, and the town of Troy. Odysseus, king of Ithaca, recalls the sacrifice of Iphigenia, daughter of Helen, before departure from Aulis, when the priest, Calchas, prophesied success in the tenth year. Homer describes all the attacking and defending forces in the so-called ‘Catalog of Ships.’ Priam’s son, Polites, keeps watch from Old Aesyetes’ tomb, and the Trojans muster at Thorn Hill.

Book Three: Menelaus fights Paris to decide possession of his previous wife, Helen. Paris escapes, and Homer describes Helen in the palaces and towers of the acropolis. Book Four: Widespread fighting resumes and Diomedes learns the history of Troy, as he fights the Trojan warrior, Aeneas. Book Five: Agamemnon reminds his brother, Menelaus, of their determination to wipe out the entire Trojan people. Book Six: Andromache warns Hector of the weak point, as Hector defends the acropolis. Book Seven: The greater Ajax, fearsome son of Telamon, fights Trojan leader, Hector, son of Pri...

Índice

• Troy: The World Deceived
• About the Author
• Dedication
• Copyright Information ©
• Notes
• Part 1
• Preface
• Introduction
• The Importance of Troy
• Homer: Iliad
• Homer: Odyssey
• Supporting Accounts
• Rejecting False Trails
• Hisarlik, the False Troy
• Inadequate Hisarlik
• Strabo, the Geographer
• Some Writers Undeceived
• Achilles’ Conquests
• Priam’s Realm
• Part 2
• See for Yourself
• Approach to Bergama
• Old Aesyete’s Tomb
• The Burial Mound Maltepe
• Toward the Acropolis
• Acropolis Ilios and Troy,
• Great Altar of Zeus
• Philetaerus, Founder of Pergamon
• Attalids of Pergamon
• Telephus Frieze from Pergamon
• Scaean Gate of Acropolis Ilios
• Place of the Wild Fig Tree
• The Weak Point
• Trojan Dwellings
• Water Supply
• Temple of Trajan
• The Athena Precinct
• Before the Attalids
• Archaeologists Amazed to Find Earlier Restorations
• Palaces of Priam, Hector, and Paris
• Features of the Acropolis
• Troy, the Citadel Hill
• Through the Markets
• Dardanian Gate
• Homer’s Wagon Track
• Homer’s Springs
• The Second Spring
• The Washing Tanks
• Processional Way
• Asklepion
• Water Channels
• Underground Bath House
• Treatment Building
• Viewing the Landscape
• The Hill, Erigöl
• Bakir Ҫayi or Caicus River
• The Ford of Scamander
• Achilles Routs the Trojans
• Homer’s Hill Callicolone
• Heracles’ Heaped-Up Wall
• Tumuli in the South
• Rising Ground of the Plain
• Tumulus of Ilus
• Dema Liman-Ancient Elaea
• Encampment of the Achaeans
• Priam’s Desperate Journey
• Mound by Selinos
• Ilios, the Acropolis
• Laomedon and Penthesilea
• Part 3
• Marble from Paros
• Clue to the Motive
• Why Hide Troy?
• Why Choose Paros?
• Pisistratus Edits Homer
• Poseidon’s View
• Aristarchus Edits Homer
• Part 4
• When Did Troy Fall?
• Dating the Fall of Troy
• Venture into Chronology
• Solomon to Carthage
• Assyrian Queen Semiramis
• Heracles: God or Man?
• Descent from Heracles
• Lengthening History
• What Is a ‘Generation’?
• Herodotus, the Historian
• The Theme of Herodotus
• How Old Is Cadiz?
• Egypt’s Trojan Colony
• Vergil Probes a Mystery
• 300-Year Bubble
• All-Pervading Skepticism
• Reconstruction
• Toward Understanding
• Part Five
• Bibliography
• Archaeology of Pergamon
• Tips for Tourists
• Covered Features