DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.959#0421
344 TROY AND ITS REMAINS. [Chap. XXIII.
beyond the primeval plateau of this fortress, the circum-
ference of which is indicated to the south and south-west
by the Great Tower and the Scaean Gate, and to the
north-west, north-east and east by the surrounding wall
of Troy. The city was so strongly fortified by nature
on the north side, that the wall there consisted only of
those large blocks of stone, loosely piled one upon another
in the form of a wall, which last year gave me such
immense trouble to remove. This wall can be recog-
nized at once, immediately to the right in the northern
entrance of my large cutting, which runs through the
entire hill.
I am extremely disappointed at being obliged to give
so small a plan of Troy; nay, I had wished to be able to
make it a thousand times larger, but I value truth above
everything, and I rejoice that my three years' excavations
have laid open the Homeric Troy, even though on a
diminished scale, and that I have proved the Iliad to be
based upon real facts.
Homer is an epic poet, and not an historian: so it is
quite natural that he should have exaggerated everything
with poetic licence. Moreover, the events which he describes
are so marvellous, that many scholars have long doubted the
very existence of Troy, and have considered the city to be a
mere invention of the poet's fancy. I venture to hope that
the civilized world will not only not be disappointed that
the city of Priam has shown itself to be scarcely a twen-
tieth part as large as was to be expected from the statements
of the Iliad, but that, on the contrary, it will accept with
delight and enthusiasm the certainty that Ilium did really
exist, that a large portion of it has now been brought to
light, and that Homer, even although he exaggerates, never-
theless sings of events that actually happened. Besides, it
ought to be remembered that the area of Troy, now reduced
to this small hill, is still as large as, or even larger than, the
royal city of Athens, which was confined to the Acropolis,
beyond the primeval plateau of this fortress, the circum-
ference of which is indicated to the south and south-west
by the Great Tower and the Scaean Gate, and to the
north-west, north-east and east by the surrounding wall
of Troy. The city was so strongly fortified by nature
on the north side, that the wall there consisted only of
those large blocks of stone, loosely piled one upon another
in the form of a wall, which last year gave me such
immense trouble to remove. This wall can be recog-
nized at once, immediately to the right in the northern
entrance of my large cutting, which runs through the
entire hill.
I am extremely disappointed at being obliged to give
so small a plan of Troy; nay, I had wished to be able to
make it a thousand times larger, but I value truth above
everything, and I rejoice that my three years' excavations
have laid open the Homeric Troy, even though on a
diminished scale, and that I have proved the Iliad to be
based upon real facts.
Homer is an epic poet, and not an historian: so it is
quite natural that he should have exaggerated everything
with poetic licence. Moreover, the events which he describes
are so marvellous, that many scholars have long doubted the
very existence of Troy, and have considered the city to be a
mere invention of the poet's fancy. I venture to hope that
the civilized world will not only not be disappointed that
the city of Priam has shown itself to be scarcely a twen-
tieth part as large as was to be expected from the statements
of the Iliad, but that, on the contrary, it will accept with
delight and enthusiasm the certainty that Ilium did really
exist, that a large portion of it has now been brought to
light, and that Homer, even although he exaggerates, never-
theless sings of events that actually happened. Besides, it
ought to be remembered that the area of Troy, now reduced
to this small hill, is still as large as, or even larger than, the
royal city of Athens, which was confined to the Acropolis,