Troy

Homer the great blind poet of ancient Greece wrote a long account of Trojan war in the Iliad.People had long been interested in finding the city of Troy,but the only man who took Homer's description seriosly was Heinrich Schliemann Using Homer as his guide,Schliemann discovered what was almost certainly the ancient city of Troy.Though he had made in his aim to find Troy as a young man ,Schliemann was only able to realize his ambitions after he had become a successful merchant.Schliemann at once realized that the spot in Asia Minor generally believed to be Troy did not match Homer's detailed description.According to Homer,a palace of sixty rooms had been built on a hill and the Greeks and marched between their ships and the city several times a day.The hill on which Troy was supposed to have been built was not only very small ,but was a great distance from the sea as well.Much nearer the sea ,Schliemann came across a bigger hill .Homer had written that Achilles and Hector had run round the walls of Troy three times while fighting each other.Having calculated that this would have been possible,Schliemann decided to did.It was not long before he discovered the remains of a city -not Troy,but a much later one called New Iliium.when his workmen dug deeper,Schliemann was most surprised to find that there were no less than nine cities built on top of each other .But which of these was Troy?.Homer again provided Schliemann with two important facts: the city had been built of stone and had been burnt to the ground by the conquering Greeks.Schliemann believed that the second city must have been Troy,for he found the ruins of a palace and a large gate blackened by fire.Yet the most astonishing discovery was still to come .After noticing something shining in the soil ,Schliemann got so exited that he dug with his bare hands.He unearthed the beautifully preserved treasure of King Priam: gold,silver,and jewellery,thus completing one of the most important historical discoveries ever made.