Troy and the Trojan War

by Machteld J. Mellink (editor)

Proceedings of a symposium held at Bryn Mawr College in 1986.

Table of Contents:

• Manfred Korfmann, "Troy: Topography and Navigation"
• Manfred Korfmann, "Beşik Tepe: New Evidence for the Period of the Trojan Sixth and Seventh Settlements"
• Jerome Sperling, "Reminiscences of Troy"
• Hans G. Güterbock, "Troy in Hittite Texts? Wilusa, Ahhiyawa, and Hittite History"
• Calvert Watkins, "The Language of the Trojans"
• J. Lawrence Angel, "The Physical Identity of the Trojans"
• Emily D. T. Vermeule, "'Priam's Castle Blazing': A Thousand Years of Trojan Memories'
• Machteld J. Mellink, "Postscript"

101 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 1986

Reviews

[Ryan Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

As with any collection of papers/essays, the quality is uneven. This contains a report of Korfmann's early work at Beșik Bay, but already you can see him chomping at the bit to make connections with Troy and the Trojan War, despite his insistence that he is not a classicist/philologist. But the report of his findings at Beșik Bay are solid, and he convinces me that Troy was important because of its geographical location. Probably the best of the lot, though, are those dealing with the Hittite source materials, by Güterbock and Watkins. The evidence is laid out nicely and clearly for a non-expert audience. Interestingly, Watkins suggests the language of Troy was Luwian, even before the discovery of the Luwian seal stone at Hisarlık/Troy. The paper on the skulls found at the site is too inconclusive to be useful, although Angel does at least provide lots of data on what has been found. And Emily Vermeule's piece raises some interesting questions, but the paper itself rather rambles in an unfocused fashion, making it difficult to know what to make of it.

Still, we get a nice kind of summary of the state of knowledge about ancient Troy from the 1980s.

[Mac · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very interesting compilation of papers presented at a symposium held at Bryn Mawr College to celebrate the institution's centennial in 1984. As the title suggests, all somehow relate to Troy and the Trojan War. The contributors, all pre-eminent in their fields, come to the topic from a variety of angles.

Manfred Korfmann, an archaeologist, discusses his then-recent discoveries in the region of historical Troy and how they may match the details given in the Iliad. (He suggests that the Greeks could have anchored their ships in a safe harbor to the west of Troy rather than the more danger Hellespont.) Another archaeologist, J. Lawrence Angel, who studies the human remains found around Troy attempts to use that information to hypothesize what other people the Trojans may have been genetically related to.

Hans Güterbock discusses the history of Troy as it be discerned in Hittite records. My favorite article was by Calvert Watkins, an Indo-European linguist, who attempts to piece together what language the Trojans might have spoken. His conclusion is that it might have been closest to Luwian. Other contributors include Jerome Sperling and Emily Vermeule.

In a postscript, Machteld Mellink of Bryn Mawr summarizes some of the discussions that took place after the speeches. I found this short book fascinating and informative. It's well worth seeking out for those who are interested.