Trojans
Around 1200 BC the barbarian invasions began, coming from the northwest, across the
Dardanelle. Homer's epic poem, the Iliad, tells the story of the war in which Troy was in
danger. (1193-84 BC), though some modern researchers think that it is more likely to have
taken place about 1250 BC. The city which was and immortalized by Homer as he stood on a
hill dominating the plain, thirty kilometres south of Canakkale and at the entrance to the
Dardanelle. It was built on the bank of the river Scamander, and the site is now six
kilometres from the sea. Troy stood at the crossing of the maritime routes linking the
Aegean with the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea, and Anatolia with Thrace. The land
route, climbing from the shores of the Aegean towards the north, also passed through Troy.
For a long time this strategic location guaranteed Troy its position of a wealthy
commercial centre and a powerful political city. Troy was the natural port of entry to
Anatolia for anyone arriving from the west and the northwest.
Excavations carried out on the Trojan site have revealed nine different cities,
flourishing from the third century BC to the fifth century AD. The town of Homer's epic
would have been Troy VI or Troy VIIa. Troy VI, a prosperous town surrounded by ramparts,
was destroyed around 1300 BC caused by an earthquake. The inhabitants restored the
ramparts and rebuilt the town on the original site. It is this new town, Troy VIIa, which
seems to have been besieged and then laid waste by the Hellenes, after they had gained
entry hidden inside the famous horse. According to the Iliad, it was the abduction of
Helen by Paris, son of Priam, King of Troy that provoked the Achaeans of Sparta to
assemble a fleet of twelve hundred ships for a war that lasted ten years. Helen was the
wife of Menelaus, and daughter of the King of Sparta. The Iliad recounts further that, in
order to face the 'coalition of Hellenic forces under the command of Agamemnon, King of
the Mycenaean's and brother of Menelaus, the Anatolian peoples too were similarly all
allied into a single army. Even the Lycians, as far removed from Troy as was Greece,
formed part of it. If the 'Kantians' cited by Homer are the Kantians or Hattians one can
assume that the whole of Anatolia was there. The Anatolians, however, spoke different
languages, whereas the Hellenes had the advantage of a common tongue, Greek. As to the
reason for the conflict, it is difficult these days to accept the idea of a ten-year war
started to protect a man who has abducted the wife of another. All modern commentators
agree that more serious rivalries set Anatolia and Greece against one another, of which
the antagonism between Aphrodite and Hera was only symbolic. We could consider this from a
different point. Troy VI and Troy VIIa, surrounded by ramparts, both measuring 180 metres
in diameter. They could have held at the most four thousand soldiers. It is inconceivable
that anyone might have believed it necessary to use an army so large that it needed twelve
hundred ships to carry it out, in order to attack a fortress of this size, or that, having
done so, they would then have been unable to conquer it. The legend has obviously
magnified the town and the forces of the attacking Mycenaean's. Alternatively, perhaps the
truth is completely different and, as certain archaeologists have suggested, the town
existed on the same peninsula, but elsewhere.
One wonders, too, where the famous chariots of the Hittites were while all Anatolia fought
at Troy. It is known that at Kadesh (in 1299 BC) the Hittites had as allies the Dardanians
and the Ilians, that is to say the people of Troy. Perhaps the Hittites had to face up to
a more serious threat in the southeast of the country. Whatever the real circumstances,
the Trojan War appears to have been an event of great significance. It demonstrated the
willingness, somewhat rare more than three thousand years ago, of diverse people to
overcome their differences in order to achieve unity in Anatolia. Caesar, who was an
ardent admirer of Homer, traced his descent from Iulus, son of Aeneas. Augustus honoured
Troy by rebuilding the temple of Athena there, and Hadrian and Caracalla also visited the
city. The Roman Emperor Constantine I, the Great, visited Troy in the year AD 326, thus
demonstrating his interest in Anatolia, whose unity he had restored. Constantine
considered rebuilding the town, but abandoned the idea. Julian the Apostate, who was shown
the city by the local bishop, was pleased to find the old altars still burning with
sacrifices to Hector. Ten centuries later the young Sultan of the Ottomans, Mehmet the
Conqueror, worked to restore Anatolian unity on the debris of the Byzantine Empire. Mehmet
would have read the Iliad. He wrote a letter to Pope Pius II, who was preparing a crusade
against him, in which he justified his own expedition against the Peloponnesus. It was, he
said, revenge for Troy and vengeance for the death of Hector. He professed astonishment
that Italy should be hostile towards him, since she shared the same origins, and ought
therefore to be his ally. The book by the Greek historian Kritobulos, who was at the court
of Mehmet the Conqueror, describes how the Sultan went to Ilion with him and looked for
the graves of Achilles and Ajax. Like Alexander the Great, he praised Homer, and said that
he `commemorated these heroes who rendered a great service,' and added that `we Asians
have revenged the Trojans after so many years and eras'. Mount Ida has remained sacred to
this day. Even in this century the local Greeks still go there every year to celebrate a
festival on 15 August, which was the ancient day of the Great Mother, though they now
replaced her with the Virgin Mary. The Turks also maintain this tradition that they
attribute to the `Fair Maiden' (San Kiz). More recently, the attempt in 1915 by the
countries of the Entente to storm the Dardanelle's reminds us of Troy. The epic lived by
the Anatolians in the face of the combined attack of the Great Powers, who wanted to
finish the Ottoman Empire with a single blow, is no less heroic than that of Troy, nor of
less political importance. It is said that the future saviour of Anatolian unity, Mustafa
Kemal, whose crucial role in this battle is well known, and who was destined to prevent
the penetration of the enemy into Anatolia, spoke of the example of Troy.
Mustafa Kemal would have had occasion again in 1921 to invoke the heroism of the Trojans
during the War of Independence at Sakarya. All serious threats coming from the west were
always directed initially at Troy, Anatolia's first and most important western line of
defence. Whoever managed, in one way or another, to get past Troy could divide the country
and menace the political unity of the nation. Thus, each time Anatolia was faced with a
question of life or death, Troy was involved. Indeed, over the centuries, many Europeans
have had a tendency to identify with the Achaean heroes, and especially with the Trojans.
They have yielded to the very natural sympathy that one feels towards the vanquished that
have fought valiantly. On the other hand, perhaps Homer, in whom one discerns a certain
partiality in favour of the Trojans, influenced them in this direction. Be that as it may,
for us the Iliad is not only an epic narrative whose heroes we admire and whose poetry
charms us. It was Anatolia; it was our country, which created this marvellous epic both on
the battlefield and in literature, which it has since relived many times during its long
history.
