Troy, one of the most famous cities in the ancient world or at least the Mediterranean adjacent part thereof. It’s history goes back to at least 2500BC and whenever it got wrecked such of the locals as survived persistently rebuilt it. So far about a dozen iterations of the same city have been found piled on top of each other.
Of course Troy is most famous for the entire Greek-Trojan war thing which may or may not have happened and if it did happen may or may not have played out the way we think. We have Homer’s word for it of course but since there’s some doubt as to whether he existed or not his testimony shouldn’t necessarily be taken at face value.
Still something pretty devastating happened to the Troy du jour at roughly time that we think the Trojan War may have happened. The survivors pieced together their shattered lives and their shattered city as best they could. Like many fallen empire since they relied on the tourist trade to restore their economy. Fortunately they had an amazing publicist. Homer may not have existed but he had a way with words and everybody who was anybody in the ancient world wanted a few selfies on the spot where Hector and Achilles threw hands. It got even more intense when the Romans took over as the Romans claimed their city was founded by a Trojan prince who escaped the city when it fell. As creation myths go this has the advantage of being slightly more plausible than the entire “suckled by a she-wolf” thing which was the Roman’s other stab at explaining their existence.
Troy rose and fell so often that an outside observer would probably have got nauseous just watching it. Finally Troy fell for good (so far) and eventually got covered in dirt. Strangely the worst thing to happen to Troy occurred some centuries later when a light fingered egomaniac from Germany turned up. This charmer thought archaeology involved blowing things up with dynamite and stealing everything not nailed down. He was only half right. Still his antics put Troy back on the map.
All of which is a very long winded way of explaining why I was currently traipsing through partially unearthed rubble for the third day in a row. Don’t misunderstand me, I was well aware of the historical and cultural significance of Troy it’s just that to the untrained eye one crumbling piece of stone seems very like another and, hey look! A squirrel! Our guide informed us that the site of Troy was rather well endowed with squirrels and I spent the rest of my time there looking for a photo opportunity with one. Perhaps that could be Troy’s new marketing slogan “Come for the horse, stay for the squirrels”.
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