Turkiye

Troy

WHS Score 2.83 Votes 60 Average 3.01

The Archaeological Site of Troy comprises the remains of a citadel and lower town which have been settled for over 3,000 years.

The most visible remains date from ancient Troy II and VI and later Roman and Greek settlements. The site is the traditional location of Homeric Troy and the center of the Trojan War. It is located where Anatolia, the Aegean, and the Balkans met.

Community Perspective: “Anyone familiar with the stories of the Trojan War will find it difficult to imagine the city of legends in this jumble of layers of ancient ruins.” The site itself is rather small and has few (if any) memorable structures. A visit should include the nearby Troy Museum which was opened in 2018.

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Site Info

Official Information
Full Name
Archaeological Site of Troy (ID: 849)
Country
Turkiye
Status
Inscribed 1998 Site history
History of Troy
WHS Type
Cultural
Criteria
  • ii
  • iii
  • vi
Links
UNESCO
whc.unesco.org
All Links
UNESCO.org
Related Resources
News Article
  • Jan. 16, 2018 dailysabah.com — Turkey’s new Troy Museum to draw 1 million tourists, celebrities

Community Information

  • Community Category
  • Archaeological site: Ancient Greece
  • Archaeological site: Civilizations of Sub-Saharan Africa
Travel Information
No travel information
Recent Connections
View all (32) .
Connections of Troy
Individual People
  • Alexander the Great
    He landed there to anoint the Grave of his ancestor Achilles
  • Heinrich Schliemann
    Excavated by him (from 1871 on)
  • Pausanias
    He was one of the first known to write of seeing the ruins of Troy, Alexandria Troas, and Mycenae. (wiki)
Geography
  • Straits
    Dardanelles (The ancient city of Troy was located near the western entrance of the strait, and the strait's Asiatic shore was the focus of the Trojan War)

    See en.wikipedia.org

  • Mediterranean shore
    "overlooks the plain along the Turkish Aegean coast 4.8km from the southern entrance to the Dardanelles. In antiquity much of this plain was submerged and so there was access by boat to the settlement" (AB ev)
Trivia
History
  • Helladic Greece
    the siege of Troy by Mycenaean warriors from Greece in the 13th century B.C., immortalized by Homer in The Iliad, has inspired great artists throughout the world ever since (OUV)

    See en.wikipedia.org

  • Sieges and Battles
    Acheans c1200BC
  • Buried treasures
    Priam's Treasure / by: Schliemann/ in: 1873 / now: Pushkin Museum Moscow
  • Bronze Age
    "a major archaeological site that vividly illustrates the meeting of Near Eastern and Mediterranean cultures in the Early Bronze Age." (AB ev)
  • Homeric Locations
    Site of the Trojan War
  • Ancient Anatolian cultures
    Assuwa league: Wilusiya is commonly identified with Ilion (Troy)

    See en.wikipedia.org

  • Bronze Age Collapse
    Level VIIA see

    See web.ics.purdue.edu

  • Hellenistic Greece
    The surrounding landscape, known as the Troad, is a unique creation by Hellenistic and Roman rulers, who developed it as a memorial to the Trojan War and its heroes, for pilgrimage, festivals, and tourism. ... Hellenistic burial mounds... (OUV)
Architecture
Damaged
Religion and Belief
  • Hercules
    Hercules and his followers attacked Troy and sacked it
  • Prophecies
    Cassandra, daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy, foresaw the destruction of Troy. She warned the Trojans about the Trojan Horse, the death of Agamemnon, and her own demise, though was unable to do anything to forestall these tragedies since they did not believe her.
  • Atlantis
    The geoarchaeologist Eberhard Zangger has proposed the hypothesis that Atlantis was in fact the city state of Troy(Wiki)

    See en.wikipedia.org

  • Legends and Folk Myths
    Trojan Horse
Human Activity
  • Famous Archaeological Trenches
    The "Schliemann Trench" - "German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann was the first to explore the Mound of Troy in the 1870s. Unfortunately, he had had no formal education in archaeology, and dug an enormous trench “which we still call the Schliemann Trench,” according to Rose, because in the process Schliemann “destroyed a phenomenal amount of material.” (Wiki)
Constructions
  • Bouleuterion
    Part of Troy VIII. The Bouleuterion is situated just to the left of the current entrance (or alternatively at the end of the circuit). See

    See cerhas.uc.edu

  • Theatres and Opera Houses
    Odeion
  • Tell
    "The archaeological site of Troy consists of the hill of Hisarlik and the fields below it to the south. The hill is a tell, composed of strata containing the remains left behind by more than three millennia of human occupation" (wiki)
Timeline
  • Built in the 2nd Millennium BC
    "struggle for commercial supremacy between Troy and Mycenae that culminated in the siege of Troy in the 13th century BC was immortalized by Homer in The Iliad" (AB ev)
Science and Technology
  • Early Archaeology
    Excavation by Schliemann and Calvert started at 1865. It was the first time a historical text was connected to an archaeological excavation. This was also the first stratigraphic excavation.
  • Recorded cultural discoveries
    Charles Maclaren (Scottish) 1822 established the area, Frank Calvert (English) 1850's-60's did early excavations , Charles Schliemann 1870's provided "proof"
18
  • Shakespearean plays
    Troilus + Cressida
  • Literature
    It is ... of exceptional cultural importance because of the profound influence of Homer's Iliad on the creative arts over more than two millennia (AB ev)
  • Famous Love Stories
    Helen and Paris
News
dailysabah.com 01/16/2018
Turkey’s new Troy Museum to draw 1…
Recent Visitors
Reserved for members.

Community Reviews

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First published: 24/12/21.

Clyde

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Clyde

I visited this WHS in Spring 2021. The vast majority of this site are ruins and foundations of old buildings. There are no "iconic" buildings here, in fact the only "iconic" aspect of the site is the modern Trojan Horse just after the entrance which seems like a playground for children and adults alike (the one used for the film starring Brad Pitt is along the Canakkale waterfront). That said, the highlight of this site are its superimposed strata marked as Troy I-IX.

Why does Troy have so many superimposed strata? The settlement mound of Hisarlik comes into being through a combination of circumstances. First of all its favourable position caused it to be reoccupied time and again over more than 3,000 years. Secondly, sundried mudbrick was largely used for building the walls of houses. Mudbricks, scarcely known in Europe, are the normal building material in the Near East. When rebuilding took place, the earlier mudbricks were of no value and buildings of the preceding phase were always levelled. Thus the succession of settlements gradually formed an enormous mound.

Within this mound archaeologists could distinguish finds and structures that are most recent (in the higher strata) from those that are earlier (in the lower strata). The many layers of settlement and the associated finds can be grouped in broad chronological periods or phases. Halfway through the very well organised audio tour (if you want to skip the audio tour there are several information boards in English) on the …

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First published: 03/03/21.

Patrik

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Els Slots

I visited Troy on the 18th of March 2020 and the place was almost empty. It was an emotional visit. I had been traveling for almost three years now and the evening before I had made a decision to return home. In the week before it had become clear that Turkey was not immune for covid19 either and nothing could be taken for granted anymore. Will the public transport still run? Will the site be open? Will they close the hotels? Troy would be the last visit on my travel and I did not know when I would be able to travel again.

Troy is not very big and I could imagine how different it would be full of tour groups and tourists, but today I could imagine myself a Schliemann, as if discovering the place for the first time. I felt sad that all this beauty would be closed soon for an undetermined period of time. Troy as a civilization was sacked many times but our civilization nowadays is so rich and sophisticated that we are able to open this history to anyone who is interested in it, and on this day it was very clear how extraordinary this is.

The museum is magnificent too, it honors both the history of Troy and the Turkish national pride. The presentation is fresh and modern though in a few parts it felt the building is a bit too big for the exhibition.

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First published: 21/11/20.

Frédéric M

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Frédéric M

I visited Troy in July 2018. Despite the fame, legend and mythical side of the site, I remember it as a rather banal archaeological site. I was taking part in an organised trip through Turkey and we made a stop in Troy on the road between Selçuk (Ephesus) and Çanakkale (we were travelling with private transport for this part of the journey). The guide who followed us during the whole trip also acted as a guide for the visit of the archaeological site.

Troy is surrounded by an aura of mystery and legend. It is an extremely ancient site of settlement of human civilizations. However, today, it is difficult to separate facts and legends. For example, we do not know how much of Homer's stories are true and how much are fiction. I admit that this aspect makes the site a little less interesting for me. As much as I love history (the facts!), spirituality and mythology leave me cold.

The site itself is rather small and has no remarkable structure. It is a series of stone and brick walls, without much personality or artistic value. The city, as is often the case, has expanded by building on the structures of the previous city, creating a succession of several layers (nine in this case). Nevertheless, the fact remains that a 4500-year-old brick does not differ much from a contemporary brick, and impresses me very little when the structure it formed has long since disappeared. The oldest parts are …

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First published: 28/01/20.

Bergecn

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Els Slots

Troy is perhaps one of the most iconic sites, not because of the ruins but because its legendary place in history and literature. It is a good moment to visit Troy again. On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Troy becoming a UNESCO site the new Troy Museum was opened in 2018, and has quickly acquired the reputation of one of the best museums in Turkey if not in Europe with educational displays, animations, interactive films and simulations. We visited in January 2020, and we had the entire Museum to ourselves, same was at the Troy archaeological site, the historic setting of the Trojan War as eternalised by Homer in the Iliad. The weather was gorgeous, a bit cold but sunny with a deep blue sky; the view was great from the Museum’s roof top across the archaeological site; and all the way to Mount Ida from where the gods were watching the Trojan War and the island of Tenedos where the Greek ships were hiding before the city fell; and in the distance, across the Scamander plains and the entrance to the Dardanelles, the glittering snow covered mountains of Samothrace. 


The Museum is built as a cube, construction started in 2013, and was completed in 2018. It reaches the height of the pre-excavation hill of Hisarlık, the modern name of the Troy site and is meant to resemble an artefact that was excavated. The building’s outside walls are made of steel that are meant to put on …

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First published: 15/07/14.

Anonymous

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Els Slots

A visit to the site of Troy was a highlight of our trip to Turkey. The local guide was quite knowledgeable and the site is well marked for understanding the various levels of the nine "Troys" including the siege of Troy 6 or 7 which inspired the foremost classic of western literature.

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First published: 19/09/08.

Peter Day

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Els Slots

As other reviews have said the jumble of 9 different settlements makes it hard to work out what is what. It helps if you have read the story of the first excavations. The site has a number of very helpful boards explaining what you are looking at. The wooden horse is kitsch - the nearby town of Canakkale has the one from the movie, which is more impressive but you can't climb inside it.

The greatest thing - to have stood on the same ground as KIng Priam and Achilles!

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First published: 26/03/06.

Glenn Austerfield

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Glenn Austerfield

Visited in 2000.

The site is not very big, but is well worth a visit if you have an interest in Troy. The site is a bit of a jumble, as Heinrich Schleimann's excavation was hodgepodge, so it's worth it to get a map. The Trojan horse is pretty kitschy, but a fun photo op.

For WWI buffs, it's worth it to stay in Canukkale to combine a visit to Gallipoli as well.

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First published: 01/05/05.

Anonymous

Troy

Troy (Inscribed)

Troy by Els Slots

This archeological site which is assumed to be Troy named in Illiad of Homeros, actually is not one ancient city. Instead it is the ruins of at least 9 different settlements built one on the top of the other, dating back to early bronze ages.

Although there is not much to see for someone who is not interested in the history and the myths; for anyone interested, this site represents a chance to take a glimpse to the wound of modern western civilization on the green skirts of Mount Ida.

The Archeological Museum of Canakkale gives a chance to view some of the ancient artifacts taken from the site.

The old road to Assos might be a focus of atraction cutting through the ruins of more that 20 ancient settlements predating Christ; in addition Gallipoli, with the monuments and other traces of the well-known epic drama of World War II.

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