DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.959#0420
1873.] EXTENT OF TROY.
I now perceive that the cutting which I made in April
1870 was exactly at the proper point, and that if I had
only continued it, I should in a few weeks have uncovered
the most remarkable buildings in Troy, namely, the Palace
of King Priam, the Scaean Gate, the Great Surrounding
Wall, and the Great Tower of Ilium; whereas, in conse-
quence of abandoning this cutting, I had to make colossal
excavations from east to west and from north to south
through the entire hill in order to find those most interest-
ing buildings.
In the upper strata of the north-western and western
excavations we came upon another great quantity of heads
of beautiful terra-cotta figures of the best Hellenic period,
and at a depth of 23 feet upon some idols, as well as
the upper portion of a vase with the owl's face and a lid
in the form of a helmet. Lids of this kind, upon the
edge of which female hair is indicated by incisions, are
frequently found in all the strata between 4 and 10 meters
(13 and ^2> feer) deep, and as they belong to vases with
owls' faces, the number of lids gives us an idea of the
number of the vases with the figure of the owl-headed
Athena, which existed here in Troy.
But Troy was not large. I have altogether made
twenty borings down to the rock, on the west, south-west,
south, south-east and east of the Pergamus, directly at
its foot or at some distance from it, on the plateau
of the Ilium of the Greek colony. As I find in these
borings no trace either of fragments of Trojan pottery
or of Trojan house-walls, and nothing but fragments of
Hellenic pottery and Hellenic house-walls, and as, more-
over, the hill of the Pergamus has a very steep slope
towards the north, the north-east, and the north-west, facing
the Hellespont, and is also very steep towards the Plain,
the city could not possibly have extended in any one or
these directions. I now most emphatically declare that
the city of Priam cannot have extended on any one side
I now perceive that the cutting which I made in April
1870 was exactly at the proper point, and that if I had
only continued it, I should in a few weeks have uncovered
the most remarkable buildings in Troy, namely, the Palace
of King Priam, the Scaean Gate, the Great Surrounding
Wall, and the Great Tower of Ilium; whereas, in conse-
quence of abandoning this cutting, I had to make colossal
excavations from east to west and from north to south
through the entire hill in order to find those most interest-
ing buildings.
In the upper strata of the north-western and western
excavations we came upon another great quantity of heads
of beautiful terra-cotta figures of the best Hellenic period,
and at a depth of 23 feet upon some idols, as well as
the upper portion of a vase with the owl's face and a lid
in the form of a helmet. Lids of this kind, upon the
edge of which female hair is indicated by incisions, are
frequently found in all the strata between 4 and 10 meters
(13 and ^2> feer) deep, and as they belong to vases with
owls' faces, the number of lids gives us an idea of the
number of the vases with the figure of the owl-headed
Athena, which existed here in Troy.
But Troy was not large. I have altogether made
twenty borings down to the rock, on the west, south-west,
south, south-east and east of the Pergamus, directly at
its foot or at some distance from it, on the plateau
of the Ilium of the Greek colony. As I find in these
borings no trace either of fragments of Trojan pottery
or of Trojan house-walls, and nothing but fragments of
Hellenic pottery and Hellenic house-walls, and as, more-
over, the hill of the Pergamus has a very steep slope
towards the north, the north-east, and the north-west, facing
the Hellespont, and is also very steep towards the Plain,
the city could not possibly have extended in any one or
these directions. I now most emphatically declare that
the city of Priam cannot have extended on any one side