1466 BC - 1270 BC - Troy
Dardania is a poetical name for Troy. The Homeric epos is the sole source of origin of epic tradition as to the fall of the Dardanian kingdom and the foundation of AEolis; but at the same time also as to the entire life of the Hellenes up to the period of the great migrations. The settlement of Dardania was probably founded between 1466 and 1406 BC. And the overthrow of Troy, on the same basis of computation, would probably fall between 1286 and 1226 BC.
The Dardanian name in the Iliad is the oldest of all the names found in the Poems, which are linked by a distinct genealogy with the epoch of the action. Hector, Paris, and Aineias are in the seventh generation from Dardanos. They each individually may be taken as men of mature age. Dardanos at a corresponding age may thus be taken roughly to belong to a point in time about 180 years before the War of Troy. He founded the city of Dardania, situated upon the lowest slopes of Ida. And he was the son of Zeus ; that is, in legendary language, there being no mother or incident of the legendary phrase, he was the first recorded king and first regular settler of the country.
The Dardanians appear in the Catalogue as a separate contingent under the supremacy of Troy and Priam, Anchises, their king, was a sub-sovereign, and the famous prophecy of Poseidon, in Il. xx. 307, imports not the rebuilding of Ilios, but the continuance of the Dardanian sovereigns, and the resumption of their authority over Troas.
Though the Trojan name covers the whole force in the general descriptions, the Dardans or Dardanians are always separate in the vocative addresses of the Chieftains, which are directed either to "Trojans, Dardans, and allies," or to "Trojans, Lukians, and Dardans fighting hand to hand." Although it is rare in Homer to give a patronymic from a remote ancestor, yet Priam, and he only of contemporary personages, is many times called Dardanides. And, lastly, from the mouth of Poseidon it is revealed that Dardanos was more loved by Zeus than any other of his mortal children.
The plain of Troy, the site of the old city of Priam, the home of the beautiful Helen, whose dark eyes set the whole world fighting, lies near the mouth of the Hellespont, about three miles from the Aegean Sea. The topographical features of the country have considerably changed during the three thousand years since the Trojan War. The ancient city is buried deep, beneath the soil, the ranges of hills have been rounded off, ravines have been filled up, and the rivers have changed their courses, but the general outline of the country can easily be traced from the description in Homer's great poem.
The excavations made by Heinrich Schliemann and by Frank Calvert show that there are strata of cities, one upon another, under fifty feet of rubbish and soil and sand. The first city was built upon the bed rock, and there is no doubt that its population was Aryan, because of the symbols found upon the pottery.
The second settlement, whose foundations rested upon the ruins of the first, according to Schliemann, was built by the Trojans, and the ruins show that the town was destroyed by a fearful conflagration. The walls bear marks of having been exposed to intense heat; melted lead and copper are found in the ashes, and among the debris were charred human bones, skeletons with breast-plates, and helmets, and, most wonderful of all, "the treasures of Priam," whose intrinsic value is very great and whose archeological value is even greater. They are supposed to have been the hoarded valuables of the king, and to have escaped destruction at the time his palace was destroyed. They consist of dishes of gold, silver and electrum, caldrons and other utensils of copper, bracelets, rings, chains and ornaments of gold; battle-axes, swords, spear heads, and other weapons of copper, and many various articles of metal which were fused together by the great heat that occurred at the destruction of the city.
It seems extraordinary that the successors to the city that lies underneath should not have discovered these deposits, because they built their houses immediately over them. From the style of construction, the implements, weapons, utensils, and other articles that are found in the ruins, Dr. Schliemann believed that the third settlement was composed of Greeks, probably part of Agememnon's army, who took possession and continued to live there. The earth that concealed this ruin has been occupied for several hundred years by Turkish shepherds and farmers, who have been growing vegetables and feeding sheep upon the romantic spot.
According to the calculations of the archeologists, Troy was a much smaller city than students generally suppose. The ruins will not justify a larger estimate than five thousand population. It is also determined that the date of the Trojan War and the fall of Troy was about 1270 BC.
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