" 4 r-w& »* * ERRATA. Introduction, Page iii. 1. 3. after Chevalier dele comma. Page 3. 1. 16. for Scean, read Scaean. 1 4. I. 20. for Sigaan, read Sigean. 10. 1. (). for ifinSet, read ofioto'. — -i $. 1. 28. for Metrodofus, read Metrodorus. ——25. 1. 29. after they iflued, aaW both. ■ 37. 1. 7. after that add \t. »fl. 1. 9. yir feperate, rc«J feparate. VINDICATION OF HOMER AND OF THE ANCIENT POETS AND HISTORIANS WHO HAVE RECORDED THE SIEGE AND FALL OF TROY ANSWER TO TIVO LATE PUBI . IONS OF Mr. BRYANT. WITH A MAP AND PLATES. -FUIT ILIUM, ET IKCEKS GLORIA TEUCRORUM. By J. B. S. MO RR IT T, Esq. Sy t&s o~vv xviu avEXKoo-ms tj yj\tus Ttpo 13 lKixy.ii mohiy.a, Theophil. Antiochen. ad Autolicum, 1. 3, p. 253. Again he declares, " that not only Mofes but the other Prophets preceded all profane writers, and alfo Cronus, Belus, and the Ilian war ; for according to the hiftory of Thallus, Belus is found to have lived only 322 years before the fiege of Ilium, and we have already found that he confiders the aera of Mofes as no lefs than 930 years previous to that event." Ibid, p. 382. Laftantius cites this laft pafTage from Theophilus, and then deriding the temporary Gods of Heathen worfhip, in order to evince the recent date afligned to Saturn's birth, who was, however, the father of the reft, he founds a chronology on the com- puted ages of feveral generations, and adds, "ab excidio autem urbis Trojans colliguntur anni 1470," thus making this event the aera from whence hiftory a/Turned a more regular form ; for here the years are no longer computed by genealogical computation. Ladlant. 1. 1, c. 23. Speaking of Mofes in another place, he fays, " Trojanum Bellum nongentis fere annis anteceffit." Ibid. I. 4, c. 5. ( 5 ) to charge both the application and verfion of this fentence with unfairnefs. Juftin is afTerting the higher antiquity of Mofes, and he does not fay that the Grecians " had no hiftory on which they could depend," but that they had " none which was accu- " rately detailed," like the records of the Pentateuch ; in com- parifon with it " they had no writing of antiquity ;" but the war of Troy was fubfequent, and Homer ftill more fo. Paris, an Afiatic Prince, came to a Grecian Court, which he The grounds of the infulted by carrying off the Queen of the Country, and a quantity War a ey Tgmuy. Origen's conclufions from the impoffible events were very different from Mr. Bryant's, and the war of Troy was by him looked on as an undoubted faft, though a few oftenfible objeftions might eafily be brought againft it. Origen. contra Celfum, 1. i. p. 32. Edit. Spenceri. Cantab. 1658, 4U). t Paris was appointed the arbitrator between theGoddeffes on account of his exemplary juftice, an opinion which Mr. Bryant gives on the authority of Natalis Comes, and then argues on the abfurdity of this affertion; but Natalis Comes is fo modern, that this circumftance alone anfwers all that can be brought forward on this fubjeft ; and cannot attach fuch a charge upon Homer, who partakes very little in the abfurdity of his fucceffors. But the antient authors do not feem to agj-ee in this opinion of his juftice, for antecedent to his judgment every claimant for the apple offered him a different bribe, therefore he was at Ieaft deemed capable of corruption. * Obfervations on the grounds of the War. Bryant, page ic. B Goddeffes, ( 6 ) Goddeffes, are in his opinion abfurdities To grofs as to impeach the credit of every part of the ftory. When in fubfequent times Alexander claimed a heavenly defcent, and had his claim allowed by the flatterers of his Court, the civilization of the age fcarce then prevented the miracle from being credited. In the days of Leda, Olympias would have received equal honours, yet we give very implicit credence to the exiflence of Alexander. Another remark I would make is, that many of the ftories are reveries of the Poets, or popular legends totally unconnected with Homer. Some of them might convey allufions which have long ceafed to be underftood. The traditions of an infant people are always fabulous, and often allegorical, and the introduction of thefe fictions would with them greatly enhance the merit of a poem, though the foundation of that poem might neverthelefs be a plain hiftorical fact. Far from palliating or apologifing for the abfur- dity of thefe collateral (lories, I fhall boldly affert that I do not perceive how any inference can be drawn from them to invalidate facts which partake not of their abfurdity, and that a very ftrong inference may be drawn on the other fide, fince they fhow that traditions relative to the war of Troy exifted independent of Homer, and therefore that he was the relater not the inventor of the hiftory. circamftancea of I will now proceed to confider the conduct of the war and the the antecedent arma- . i • 1 1 i j • i r i m:nt probable* antecedent armament which took place immediately after the elopement of Helen. Menelaus, the principal fufferer by this outrage, uniccd himfelf with his Brother, who was a man of power and comparatively exrsnfive dominion. Greece at this time fwarmed with warlike adventurers, and whilft Agriculture was neglected, and Commerce unknown, her bands of warriors •* " On ibe conduct of the War and antecedent armament." Bryant... page 12. Jed ( 7 ) led by enterprifing chieftains, were ever ready to afiemble, when the ftandard of war was ere&ed. Summoned by two of the moft powerful leaders in Greece, and fupported by their alliances, a large confederacy was formed at Aulis. It is however lefs to be B»TANT,pag« «. confidered as a combination of States than as an aflembly of war- like adventurers, " Amongft thefe were Boeotians, Locrians, Mag- " nefians, iEtolians, and Thefprotians of Dodona — the people alfo " of Samos, Rhodes, and Crete, contributed a portion of men and " fhipping." To this confederacy therefore we find that a num- ber of warriors acceded who were by no means perfonally in- jured, and who had little or no connexion with Menelaus and Agamemnon.* This with Mr. Bryant is an infuperable diffi- culty, but what reafon have we to to fuppofe that they were NOTE. * A ftory lb analogous to that of Troy is given us in Mitford's Hiftory of Greece, that I can- not help tranfcribing it ; its having happened is a proof at lead of the poffibility of a confiderable force taking arms on fuch an occafion, and it is againft this poffibility, that Mr. Bryant direfts his firft arguments. " Exploits like that of Paris, were in the twelfth century not uncommon in Ireland. Dermot, King of Leinfter, formed adefign on Dervorghal, a celebrated beauty, wife of O'Ruark, King of Leitrim, and by force or fraud fucceeded in carrying her off. O'Ruark re- fented the affront as might be expetted. He procured a confederacy of the neighbouring chief- tains, with the King of Connaught, the moft powerful Prince in Ireland at their head. Leinfter was invaded, the Princefs was recovered, and after hoftilities continued with various fuccefs, dur- ing many years, Dermot was expelled from his kingdom." The fugitive Dermot afterwards interefted Henry the Second in his quarrel, and the conqueft of Ireland by the Englifh, was the refult of this private animofity. (See " Mitford's Hiftory of Greece." Vol. i. chap. i. feft. 4.) How happened it that the King of Connaught and Henry the Second took fo much intereft in 3 quarrel for a woman, " with whom none but the hufband was concerned?" (Bryant, page 17.) " The lofs of a wife (whether Dervorghal or Helen) was a private misfortune in which O'Ruark or Menelaus only were interefted." We muft allow then that what really happened in Ireland, might happen in Greece. I take this opportunity alfo to acknowledge, that, though previous to reading this paffage in Mitford, I had written the greateft part of this work, yet on opening his ingenious apology for Homer, which precedes the ftory I have quoted, I was highly gratified to find fo many of my arguments anticipated, and done fuch ample juftice to by that Gentleman, that I fcarce had brought forward any anfwer to this part of Mr. Bryant's work, which was not fanftioned by his high authority. See the whole of the fe&ion.^ (Mitford, feci. 4. chap. 1 .) actuated ( s ) actuated only by the chivalrous motive * of recovering the frail runaway wife of Menelaus. f Achilles declares that he came thither from a perfonal regard to Agamemnon and Menelaus, the fame motive might poffibly influence many others ; a ftrong defire of military fame formed another motive, for in thofe days of piratical violence, the heroes who alferted the caufe of juflice, flood in the place of the Gods, and were almoft revered as fuch by the enthufiaflic gratitude of the nations they protected or avenged. Refentment of a breach of hofpitality was alfo an in- ducement, the more powerful fince the curfe which muft follow fuch a crime in their idea almoft infured fuccefs. But with numbers, no doubt, the chief allurement which the confederacy prefented was the promifed plunder of Northern Afia. The petty chieftains who, as Mr. Bryant juftly obferves, were con- tinually engaged in a freebooting warfare, would as certainly unite when a greater plunder offered, and a large force was af- fembling for the purpofe of obtaining it. Greece, at this moment, fwarms with adventurotis hordes who are ever ready to join in the wars of the Turkifh Governors, and are frequently employed in the heart of Afia, on whatever fide the greateft pay is to be ac- quired, or the greateft plunder is to be expected. And yet we find that agriculture is neglected, piracy frequent, little commu- nication between the provinces, in fhort every characteriftic of the early times, excepting their freedom and their honour. This analogy is unanfwerable, and we fhall allow it the more eafily when we find it acknowledged by Mr. Bryant himfelf, that NOTE. * Menelaus himfelf difa vows this motive in Euripides, and affigns that of revenge for the infult he had received. See Troades. f Horn. 11. i, 150 Bryant on the Trojan War, p. 13. Thucydides ( 9 ) Thucydides was aware of all thefe obnoxicms clrcumflances re- lative to the manners of the heroic ages and yet never confidered them as objections to the truth of Homer's ftory. The fame chapter however contains another objection of Mr. No analogy »*- clulive from the firft Bryant, in thefe words : " It feems flrange that fo many Cities Ra P e of Helen by g Thefeus. and States fhould combine to regain her (Helen) when fhe went away voluntarily, and that not a hngle hamlet fhould rife in her favour when fhe was carried away by force (by Thefeus) and in violation of the Goddefs whom fhe ferved." There are many different accounts of this Rape of Helen, fome of which are enu- merated by Plutarch. Without confidering the grounds of the ftory, I do not perceive that it is at all "flrange" that the arma- ment which took place againft Troy fhould not have been levied againft Thefeus. In Mr. Bryant's account indeed we find that Caftor and Pollux alone purfued him to recover her, and that they purfued him immediately ; fince he argues from their age that Helen was then a woman. In this however there is much inaccuracy. Her brothers purfued her ; but not till they had * levied a confiderable force. They befieged Athens during the abfence of Thefeus in Epirus, and after defeat- ing the Athenian forces, near Aphydne, took that fortrefs where they recovered their fifter. Thefe particulars are alfo from Plu- see riutarch, The- tarch, with many other circumftances which fhew the generality of thefe traditional ftories. Since Caftor and Pollux did in fact collect forces fufhcient to recover their fifter and revenge the in- fult offered them, there was certainly no occafion for a more mimerous armament; neither was the houfe of Tyndarus powerful NOTE. • From whence were thefe forces levied, if not a fingle hamlet would furnim them ? C enough ( io ) enough by its alliances and opulence, to affemble round it fuch auxiliaries as were afterwards convened under the more promiling aufpices of the fons of Atreus. When Mr. Bryant therefore con- cludes, that the whole hiftory is a fable inconfiftent from the be- ginning to the end, the reader mull decide whether the argu- ments he has hitherto brought forward will juftify fuch a general conclusion. *In his next chapter which we now come to confider, Mr. Bryant begins with an acknowledgement which will have much weight with all who are inclined to give credit to the common fenfe of •TiT Tbu'c° y did« rd * anc i ent Greece. " Thucydides," he fays, "though fagacious and a lover of truth, could not fet afide the hiftory of the Trojan war ;" the Glory and Religion of his country were too much interefted in the belief of that event. But we do not find that this hiftorian ever attempts to Jet afide the ftory of the Trojan war, nor are we authorifed to attribute to him any fuch motives for his preferva- tion of it ; on the contrary, he gives it a formal hiftorical fanction. He relates it as a well known fadl, and when we confider the many opportunities he had of examining the truth, and the mul- titude of collateral teftimonies which time and barbarifm have fince annihilated, we cannot avoid giving fome credit to the de- liberate opinion of an hiftorian fo judicious, and an age fo enlightened. Without refting our defence however upon his authority, let us confider the obje&ions which Mr. Bryant raifes wantofciviKfa,;™ from his narration. He had told us that before this event the X " 8 " meBt again " Grecians had done nothing in common, that they were in an uncertain and roving ftate. He defcribes the Pelafgi as -wandering in the country, where in confequence of their want of fecurity there was no traffick and little correfpondence. It was uncertain NOTE. • " The farther improbability of this hiftory." Mr. Bryant on the war of Troy, p. 16. into ( II ) into what hands their treasures or harvefts might fall, fo that commerce and agriculture were equally neglected. " Kow comes it then," fays Mr. Bryant, " that juft at this crifis they fhould vmite to recover a runaway woman, and that a hundred thoufand men fhould affemble from thofe dates, which could collect only ten thou- fand men at Marathon, and fcarce feven thoufand at Thermopylae." We will for one moment paufe here to obferve the little analogy between thefe events and the expedition of the Gre- cians againft Troy. The army of Marathon confided of Athe- nians alone, if we except one thoufand Plataeans, who were their only allies in the combat. The troops of Leonidas were fent to defend a narrow defile, till a larger army could be levied to oppofe the enemy ; in both cafes the Grecian forces confifted of a few heroes raifed in hafle to prevent a furprize, till their coun- trymen could prepare a more effectual refiftance. At the battle of Plataea it feems their army was much larger ; it confifted ac- cording to Mr. Bryant of 72,500 men, excluding the Helots ; but as thefe alfo were Greeks we may include them, and we fhall find that the whole army confifted of (wftxx f*uf»aJf?) 1 10,000 men. It will be remembered alfo that the Greeks were arming both by fea and land at the fame time, and that at the battle of Mycale no fmall force was engaged with the Perfians on the very day of the action at Plataea.* It NOTE. * Lift of the Forces at Plataea according to Herodotus. Men. Laconians and Spartans 10,000 Tegeates, • 1,500 Corinthians, 5,000 Potidaeans, 300 Arcadian Orchomenians, 600 Sicyonians., 3,000 EpidaurianSj, ( M ) It will be obferved alfo, that thefe were levied from a * much fmaller diftrict than the armament againft Troy, and at a time when many States of Greece were divided from the league by NOTES. Men. Brought forward 20,400 Epidaurians, 800 Traezenians, 1,000 Lepreatae, 200 Mycenasnas and Tirynthians, 400 Phliafians, 1,000 Hermioneans, - 300 Eretrians and Styrenfes, 600 Chalcidenfes 400 Ampracians, 5°° Leucadians and Ana&orienfes 800 Paleenfes, z°° ^ginates, 5°° Megarenfes, 3,000 Plataeans, ' 600 Athenians, 8,000 Unarmed Thefpians, 1,800 Light Armed Greeks, 34>5°° Light Armed Helots, 3v 00 ° Total 1 10,000 ivoixx iJ.uqia.ats Deduft Helots, 35'°°° Remain, 75- 000 Deduct the unarmed Thefpians, .... 1,800 Remain, ....." 73> 2 °o Therefore Mr. Bryant's ftatement of 72,500 is inaccurate even on his own principles. Herodot. b. ix, p. 597. * Lift of the Diftrias which furntfhed Troops for the Siege of Troy : Bceotia, Phocis, Locris, Euboea, Athens, Salamis, Argolis, Mycenas, Sicyon and Corinth, Achaia, Laconia, Meffenia, Arcadia, Elis, Hands on the Weft Coafts, Acarnania and yEtoha, Crete, Rhodes, Iflands on the South of the jEgean, and Thefialy. _ their ( 13 ) their politics, or weakened by intefline divisions. It feems ftrange to Mr. Bryant " that an army like that at Platsea mould be thought an extraordinary exertion, at a time when Greece abounded both in wealth and men ; and yet that me mould be able in the rude ages defcribed by * Thucydides, to levy and fupport fo extra- ordinary an armament as that under Agamemnon." But our aftonifhment will ceafe when we reflect that the barbarous and uncivilifed ages of the world have ever furnifhed armies whofe numbers in civilifed times are almoft deemed fabulous. To pro- duce fome inftances of this : We find in Paufanias, that when the Celtse invaded Greece, under Brennus, the numbers of the Barbarian army amounted to no lefs than 152,000 foot and 61,200 horfemen, in all to 213,200 effective men. The Cimbri and Teutones, whom Marius conquered, brought into the field againft him 300,000 effective men, according to Plu- tarch, an army which would be hardly levied in modern Ger- many, with every advantage of wealth and civilifation. The Gauls, who in the time of the Republic facked and burnt the City of Rome, and the Huns, Goths, and Vandals, of later times, aflembled troops which aftonifh almoft to incredulity, thofe who compare them with the modern population of Northern Europe. The very circumftances of rudenefs and barbarifm which form the ground work of Mr. Bryant's argument, are in reality the proofs of its futility. Armies are much fooner levied in barbarous and uncivilifed countries, where no commerce employs the in- N O T E. * Thucydides himfelf thought fo differently upon this fubjeft, that he exprefsly tells us the armies of the Greeks under Agamemnon were lefs than might be expedted from the extent and population of the diftridls which levied them ; a circumftance he attributes to the difficulty of viftualling a larger army in thofe days. Thucyd. 1. i. c. 10, 1 1. D duftry ( X4 ) duflry of mankind, no agriculture attaches them to their native foil, and where in confequence the whole population confifts of roving adventurers, ever ready to aiTemhle from defire of military- fame, or the itronger inducements of plunder. We mult alfo allow for the amplification of tradition, and we mult naturally fuppofe the Greek Poet would endeavour to enhance the glory of his country by adopting the greater! number which that tradition afforded. If he candidly confider all this, I believe the reader will hardly acquiefce in Mr. Bryant's conclufion againft the poffi- bility of the expedition. concerning the n.ips The next objection which Mr. Bryant makes to Homer's hif- mentioned. Bryant, j ' P a 8 e l8 - tory, is founded on the incredibility of fo great a number of fhips being fitted out for the Trojan expedition, by States which contributed fo few to the battles of Salamis and Artemifium. In the firft place we will obferve that the analogy between either of thefe inftances and the Trojan armament, is not fufficiently clofe any way to juftify Mr. Bryant's conclufion relative to the compa- rative force of the States at thefe different aeras. The fhips which tranfported Homer's heroes to Phrygia, were fuch as in thofe times were made ufe of indifferently for the purpofes of seeThucydidet.i.i. commerce, piracy, and war, and fuch as the numerous Sea Ports and Iflands of Greece might be very well fuppofefl to poffefs ; but the veffels which were oppofed to the naval force of Perfia, were armed Triremes and Pentecontores, built for the ex- prefs purpofes of war, and furnifhed not by individuals as in the cafe of Troy, but by the feparate States, mod of which, if we ex- cept Attica, were as yet nearly unprovided with a public naval force. It is then very poffible that the ports of the Peloponnefus might poffefs at this early period 430 veffels fit for the purpofes of tranfports, and yet not be able to equip above 89 fhips of war ch. 9, 10, and n. ( *S ) war for the fea fight of Artemifium * and Salamis. What renders this flill more probable is the fluctuating nature of commerce, and of maritime force in confequence. In fact we find that Athens which had alone attended carefully to her naval eftablifh- ment, fitted out no fewer than 147 vefTels to the fea fight at Arte- mifium, 20 of which were manned by Chalcidians, and afterwards at Salamis furnifhed 180 Triremes, befides 20 which were lent to the Chalcidians. Athens therefore furnifhed more vefTels than double the whole force of the Peloponnefus, fo little did the fhip- ping of the ancients depend upon the comparative population of the country. In Homer's time or rather in Agamemnon's, j" My- NOTES. * Lift of forces fent to Artemifium. * Lift of (hips fent to Salamis- Triremes. Triremes. From Lacedxmon . . lo"j From Lacxdemon . . 16-v From CorintU ... 40 l g of pd From Sicyon . ■ . . 12 > * ' From Epidaurus ..81 From Sicyon . . From Epidaurus . 10 l States of Pelopon- From Trarzene . . ■ H nefus. From Trazene ... 5 J From Corinth . . ■ 40 \ — From Hermione oJ Total 75 Triremes. ADD TO THESE Tot a 89 Chalcidians .... 20 ADD TO THESE Athenians .... 117 180 Megarenfts . • ■ . 20 20 iEgina 11 Ampracia .... 7 Eretria 7 3 Styrea a 30 Cios a 2 Pentecontores. 20 Locri 7 Pentecontores. 7 Melos, Syphnos, and ? Seriphos S 4 Pentecontores, a 2 Pentecontores 4 2 1 1 Pentecontoret. Total force of the Greek 1 Total force of theGreeks 265 Trir. 9 Pentecontores. s 368Trii . 7 Pentecontorei, t Mr. Bryant denies the accounts given us by the ancient writers concerning Mycenae. I fhall difcufs his objections in their turn. The reader ought to be apprized that the accounts here dwelt upon are from Strabo, Paufanias, and Diodorus Siculus. eense ( 16 ) cenas and Argos were at the head of a flourifhing country, which at the time of the Perfian war had declined, from the predomi- nance of Sparta and Athens. The great Legiflator of Sparta had not as yet forbid the Lacedemonians to engage in commerce, and it is probable that their maritime affairs were at this time on a much more confiderable fcale than they were for centuries after the Legiflation of Lycurgus. We fee then that a partial comparifon between the forces of the Peloponnefus at two periods fo effen- tially different, is extremely fallacious ; and if we extend the lift to the forces of the Greeks in general we fhall find that at Artemifium they had no fewer than 265 Triremes, and 368 at Salamis. Thefe form a force more than equal in maritime ftrength to Agamem- non's fleet of tranfports, and as far as the argument refts upon the number of men, it is I apprehend anfwered in the laft feclion. In the concluding paragraph of this chapter, Mr. Bryant, dif- miffmg the consideration of thefe comparative forces, brings another argument againft the poflibility of the expedition. It was a long time, he fays, before the Greeks ventured to traverfe the iEgean, and quotes Libanius* to prove that they never ventured farther than Delos. Whatever might be the ftate of Greece afterwards, we have the ftrongeft ground for believing this affertion to be falfe at the time whenHomer wrote. In fadt how can we fuppofe that a nation was thus entirely ignorant of fea affairs, who were themfelves imported into Greece and Afia, by Tyrian and Egyptian fleets, confiderably prior to the Trojan expedition. The early intercourfe with the latter, to which Mr. Bryant refers even the ftory of the Iliad, and NOTE. » Libanius was tutor to Julian, and his authority therefore refpefting the ftate of early Greece, is entitled to very little attention (if any) when controverted by the ancient hiftorians. the ( 17 ) the family of Homer himfelf, prove fufficiently that the naviga- tion to Egypt by Crete, was well known, throtigh a ftormy ex- panfe of water far more dangerous than the feas which feparate Greece from Troy, in all which they could eafily run by day from ifland to ifland, or along the coafls. Indeed prior to the Iliad we hear of an expedition to Colchos ; but without having recourfe to what looks like fable, I will afk if the factis not fufficiently proved by the hiftory of the times ? *From Diodorus Siculus we receive the following account of the Cyclades, and maritime powers that pofTefTed them in the early times. " Minos, the fon of Jupiter and Europa, reigning in Crete, and having great forces both naval and military held the Empire of the Sea, and fent many colonies from Crete. He civilifed mofl of the Iflands of the Cyclades, and divided them by lot amongft the colonifts ; he alfo obliged great part of the Afiatic coaft to fubmit to his dominion. Hence many of the ports of Alia and Crete were in after ages called Minose. After this he joined Rhadamanthus his brother in the kingly authority, on account of the extent of his dominions, but becom- ing envious of his influence obliged him afterwards to leave Crete, and fly to the extremity of his colonial pofleflions ; here he in- duced Erythrus to build the town of Erythrse on the coaft of Ionia, and gave (Enopion, the fon of Ariadne, the fovereignty of Chios. And thefe things (fays Diodorus) took place before the war of Troy. But after that event the Carians {another maritime poiver) conquered the ifland, and in part exterminated, in part fub- dued the Cretans ; fmce which the Greeks becoming powerful fupplanted the Carians in their turn, and vindicated their pof- N T E. * ' Miy«'»« W^« txf» mgmk 1i y.xl mv l*is \fawT%K$fo ta &c. Diodor. Siculus, lib. v. p. S oo. Edit. Weffehngn. Fol. Amftel. 1745. F ™ v E fe flion ( i8 ) feflion of the iflands." So far Diodorus. Thefe lad conquefts of the Greeks over the Carians took place not long after the war of Troy, at the time of the Ionic migration, of which the reader may find an account in the 14th book of Strabo, and a flill more minute one in the 7th book of Paufanias, both of whom give the particulars of their colonization. Thucydides too, " fagacious and a lover of truth," (for thefe are Mr. Bryant's own words refpecting him) mentions the Carian and Phasnician pirates, and the Empire of Minos over the Sea.f For, fays he, the inhabitants of the Iflands, at that time Carians and Phaenicians, exercifed conflant piracy ; but when Minos had eftablifhed a fleet, the feas became more navigable, for he drove many of the pirates out and fettled colo- nies in the Iflands. The Greeks, who before had chiefly lived inland, did now, as he tells us, remove their towns nearer to the fea-fhore for the fake of commerce ; the States of Greece afTumed a more regular form, and thus, he proceeds, having become powerful they after-wards -warred with Troy. Homer himfelf gives a very detailed account of the Phamicians ; and Hefiod in his works and days, mentions the commerce of the times as much carried on by fea. Such a mafs of authority will, I apprehend, be deemed a fufE- cient anfwer to Mr. Bryant's inference from the almofl modern Libanius. But he ftrengthens his argument flill farther by a quota- tion from Herodotus, who fays that a fleet from Argolis and Sparta refufed in the Perfian war to fail beyond Dclos.* Mr. Bryant it will be obferved in this paffage, puts a little dafh where NOTES. f Thucydides, 1. i. ch. 8. • Uerodot 1. viii. c. 132. p. 6S2, Mr. Bryant on the War of Troy, p. 22. a part ( *9 ) a part of the fentence is omitted ; but the reader fliould be informed that the reft of it runs thus, " All beyond feemed full of danger, as they had little knowledge of thofe parts, which appeared to them to be full of enemies" Their fears then proceeded from the dread of falling in with a fuperior fleet. We fhould alfo reflect, that foon after the Trojan wars, Greece underwent a cruel revo- lution. The thrones of the Peloponnefus were completely over- turned : Mycense, Argos, and Lacedxmon, underwent a variety of changes ; Athens was long torn by civil diflentions ; the Ionians, iEolians, and Dorians, were forced from their country, and the manners and civilization of Greece, of which Homer is at once a witnefs and a proof, were thrown back into a barbarifm from which neither their arts nor fciences emerged till the age of the Piflftratidae, which immediately preceded the time of the Perfian wars. Add to this, that Lycurgus had forbidden navigation to the Spartans who at this time commanded the Grecian fleet. However ignorant therefore they might be from fubfequent difufe, we cannot fuppofe that they were in the fame ignorance at the time of Agamemnon, when the fea had been covered with Phaenician and Egyptian colonifts, who of courfe imported with them the naval arts of their native country. The conduct of the Grecians on their difembarkation, fur- nifties Mr. Bryant with another objection ; but notwithstanding the abfurdity which he difcovers in the whole of Homer's ftory, I own I can fee nothing in their conduct and proceedings on and after their landing in Troas, that is not highly probable, and ftrictly conformable to the tactics of the time he reprefents. Upon the firft appearance of the Greeks before Troy they were immediately oppofed, and fufFered fome lofs ; they neverthelefs effected ( 20 ) enec~ted their landing and beat the enemy back into the city.* Of ■what followed we know but a fmall part, the writings of Homer comprifing in detail no more than a few months of the tenth year. We only know that whilfl the attacks upon the town were fufpended, the coafts of Thrace, Afia, and the neighbouring Iflands, were ravaged by the Grecian army ; that fome of the Grecians, and particularly Achilles, diftinguifhed themielves by this warfare of pillage ; that the camp was by this means fupplied with proviiions, and that the different independent forces which combined in the war were kept together by a participation in the plunder. Agamemnon would have fhewn himfelf a very impo- litic general if he had acted otherwife, and by a tedious inveft- ment of a ftrongly fortified place, difgufled and wearied out men who cared little for the termination of the war, provided the pro- fee ution of it was attended with profit to them individually. Homer's filence on this fubject by no means proves that no at- tacks were made upon the city in all this time. The fhips were fometimes employed on thefe expeditions ; fometimes inland in- Homer,n.i.ix.v.3ij. curfions were made, the plunder was brought to Agamemnon, who divided it amongft the Chiefs. Thefe affaults weakened the powers of Phrygia, and were perhaps defigned to flraiten the city for want of provifions. It is pofhble, in the mean time, that many events happened with which we are unacquainted ; but it will not be eafy to prove from Homer that the army acled with the abfurdity Mr. Bryant afcribes to them, fince Homer fays little or nothing about the army in all this time. NOTE. * I (hall fo frequently have occafion to make ufe of this fame anfwer to Mr. Bryant's argu- ments in the following chapters that I muft warn the reader before-hand,, that the point I wilh to prove is only the general truth of Homer's flory, not that lie relates every detailed circumftance which happened during the war ; in Ihort, that the Iliad is true upon the whole, though it be not what Mr. Bryant feems to expeel — a Trojan Gazette. Yet ( 21 ) Yet it is a matter of wonder to him, that the Grecians mould ra °" t £ujl?S* with fuperior forces, and heroes of fuch diftinguifhed prowefs, be cian hwoefc nine years unable to make any effectual attack upon a city, which Patroclus could have taken in a few hours, and which Achilles was on the point of ftorming in one day but for the intervention of Apollo. Neverthelefs wefhallhardly join inthis opinion if we reflect on the real ftrength of Troy, and the difficulty in thofe barbarous ages which attended the ftorming of a fortified city. The ma- chines of war for that purpofe were as yet not invented, and it mult be obvious to every one, that though the Trojans with an inferior army might not be able to cope with their enemies in battle, they might be extremely well able to defend their town."* But it would be an infult to the reader's underftanding to dwell long upon the comparative fuperiority of the Grecian heroes ; Homer's national partiality is evident through his book, and the exaggerated hy- perboles on the more than mortal might of Achilles and Patroclus are beautiful, but furely flattering compliments to the prejudices of his countrymen. Indeed we find from his teftimony, that great as were the wonders which he fays the valour of his countrymen " might have" performed, their hopes, were always unluckily difappointed ; and Troy fell at laft by an adventurous ftratagem. But enough of this ; for a more ferious argument is contained in the next paragraph. There is no inftance, according to Mr. Bryant, of any objeaion ar,fi ng — , _ * from tlie unfrequencv Grecian army carrying on a liege in winter till the Pelopon- of winler fie «« P rior f. ji-iti to the Ptloponncfian neiian war, and at that time the Lacedemonians generally con- w » r > confidercd. tented themfelves with inroads into Attica, and never inverted Athens. That in thofe barbarous ages armies were with diffi- culty kept together to profecute a tedious fiege, is very true ; NO TE. * In a fubfequent age we find the Romans engaged for ten years before Veii ; the forces of Wflich could not refill them in the field. £ but ( » ) but we have feen in tliis cafe that the war was frequently not fo much a fiege of Troy as an attack xipon the whole Phrygian dominions. When they firft landed they probably expected to carry the place by a coup de main ; they were difappointed, the winter came on ; where in fact could they go ? the Thracians were hoftile ; the iEgean was impaffable ; they were therefore obliged to -encamp. The difficulty of their fubfiftence accounts for their plundering the towns upon the coafl ; and I would afk whether, allowing that a winter campaign was never thought of be- fore the Peloponnefian war, we can any way account for Homer's prophetic imagination ? How in effect can we fuppofe, that a poet who is fo accurate a defcriber of the manners of his times would in a feigned flory fo openly violate all probability. Homer being therefore himfelf prior to~the aera of the Peloponnefian war, it follows that Mr. Bryant's affertion proves too much. We read, however, of great difcontents in the army, the natural confequence of fo long a fiege, and they appear always to be kept together by * emulation, fhame of being baffled, profpects of plunder, hope of a fpeedy furrender, and a natural unwillingnefs to abandon an object which had cofl them fo much trouble. Such is the conduct of nature in fimilar circumflances, and fuch is recorded by Homer. obj c a!on from the a. ]yj r> B ryant n0 w flarts another objection, for he afTerts that fuppofed decay of the * J •> ' Chipping, confidered. NOTES. * In the Second Book of Homer the Grecians are reprefented as on the point of quitting the fiege, and are kept only by thefe motives being held out to them in the fpeeches of the different leaders. See thole of UlyfTes, Agamemnon, Neftor, &c. U. ii. paflim. f The whole of this argument depends on the degree of decay, which it is neceflary to allot to the Grecian veflels. Mr. Bryant maintains that they were totally ufelefs at the time, and alfo irreparable, as he cannot fuppofe that the Greeks could fail back in them. Agamemnon on the contrary aflerts only that they were decayed in their timbers and rigging, but employs them afterwards to return. Can Mr. Bryant prove the irr.poffibility of Agamemnon's being right, and that he did not repair them for the purpofe of returning ? the ( n ) the fliipping of the Greeks rauft, by a ten years anchorage, have been rendered totally unfit for fervice. Agamemnon, who men- tions the decay of their rigging, confeffes that he had loll a number of men during the fiege, and yet no mention is made of recruits. We rauft remember that the Iliad only records the events of a few months, fo that Homer's filence on thefe fubjects proves li- terally nothing relative to the reft of the time during which the fiege is faid to have lafted.* We know that the fliipping was con- ftantly employed along the coaft, and that coaft abounds every where with materials fit for repairing a fleet, particularly the lower parts of Mount Ida. j" Is it necefTary to fuppofe that the fhips were never repaired, becaufe they are never mentioned as undergoing that operation during the time the army were more immediately engaged in the fiege, that is to fay, for a few months of the tenth year ? At the time to which Agamemnon alludes, the rigging might want repairing ; we fuppofe before they failed it was repaired. From the quotation,:): which Mr. Bryant gives at the end of this chapter, he infers that Menelaus ufed the fame fhips for eight years after the deftruction of Troy* Homer's words are iv wy oyttouru tru y\Qov. In this paflage I can find not one word that proves what fhips Menelaus poffefTed, or how they had been built, or how often repaired. That he brought his wealth to Greece " in (hips," is all that is faid, and without a very curious inland march, Ido not fee how he could carry it thither any other way. rebuilt ( 24 ) rebuilt is a -fubject on which he is totally filent. There are many fea boats in England whofe duration has been greater than that of any of their veffels. The other objection of their not being recruit- ed is equally founded on Homer's filence. We read however of the recruits brought afterwards by Pyrrhus ; and allowing the argu- ment in its fulled extent, it will only prove that the army muft have been greatly weakened before the tenth year. This is exactly . what is recorded of them, and they were fo difpirited that they were repeatedly on the point of abandoning the fiege ; and Troy at lafl fell only by a well-timed ftratagem. Homcr-t filence no "\Ve now come to another argument drawn alfo chiefly from the proof that there was ° ' fittie correfponder.ee filence of Homer. We do not find, it is true, any mention of a resm- betvveen Greece and . ' "O «iie army, f ] ar correfpondence, which was owing to the circumftances of the times ; but that there was no intercourfe at all cannot be inferred from Homer's not having recorded it. From different accidents they might fometimes not hear from Greece for a confiderable time, and thus * Achilles is very naturally made to exprefs a concern about his abfent friends whofe fate he was little acquainted with. Penelope was flill farther feparated from Ulyffes, (whofe ten years- voyage is recorded) by the flormy fea which wafhes the fouthern coafts of the Peloponnefus, a fea which long continued to be thought dangerous, even when navigation was in a more advanced ftate. The private conduct of fome of the Ladies during the ab- fence of their hufbands, and the domeflic diffentions which agi- tated their courts long before the tenth year, will account for the communication not being very folicitoufly kept up. NOTES. f On the little correfpondence of Greece with the army. Brt. p. 27. * That Achilles had fome intelligence appears from his own fpeech, quoted in Mr. Bryant, p. 28. Zuut (A.xi hi tfxal Mm/let* &c. they fay that Mensetius is alive, &c. Horn. II, xvi. v. J4. The imperfect.* ( 2 5 ) The next arguments againft the Trojan war are inferred from the No inferences toh R 1 1 • 1 drawn from a chro- age of Helen at that time. They turn upon a chronology given by noiogy acknowledged Scaliger, Petavius and Clemens Alexandnnus. 7 On this chronology, however, fays Mr. Bryant, I place not the leaft truft ; and indeed in his firft chapter he had fixed the Olympiads as the earlieft aera of all Grecian hiflory, which cannot be fuppofed fubfequent to ac- curate chronology, though it is eafy to fuppofe the reverfe. All inferences, therefore, drawn from fuch grounds, are inadmiflible, and the objection is anfwered. Many inconfiflent accounts are given of the heroic ages, which thefe chronologers have in vain endeavoured to reconcile ; but they no where affect the uniform confiftency of Homer, who fcarce mentions one of the accounts here alluded to, and the exiftence of Troy, as far as it refts on his authority, is unfhaken by the argument. || The flory of the covenant entered into by the lovers of Helen Lovers of Helen un- G> noticed by Homer. f IS NO TBS. * Inferences made from the age of Helen. Brt. p. 29. f The mod grave and judicious hiftorians and other writers of antiquity have, it is true, en- deavoured in vain to eftablifh the chronology of the fall of Troy ; but though the difficulties attending on fuch an effort may be accounted for by the uncertainty of thefe early dates, yet this defeft would be a mod extraordinary reafon for abolifhing all faith in the event, of which the exiftence being acknowledged has actuated the wifeft men to aim at afcertaining the time when it took place. Befides thofe writers fo often mentioned in this work, we find this epoch made ufe of repeatedly by very literary men. Eratofthenes of Cyrene, invited from Athens to Egypt by Ptolemy Euergetes, compleated an imperfeft feries of Egyptian Kings in Greek " et fut Thebanorum regum laterculi terminum ad Trojx akaimt pofuit, P.p. 3. v. 249." Dicaearchus Meffenius was a hearer of Ariftotle, " ille yEgyptiaca tempera tractavit, Dicaearchus etiam in animo habuit ad Excidium Ilii calculum ponere." The Arundel marbles, of which the authority is defended by Sir John Mafliam, (p. 15.) give us the date of the time ap' 5 r^aia. *\ai. The Chronographium of Thrafyllus, as preferved in Clemens Alexandrinus, affumes the fall of Troy as an epoch. This ancient writer as well as Clemens Alexandrinus acquiefces in the truth of the tale of Troy. Clemens. Stromata. 1. i. p. 335. Sir John Mafham, p. 295. \ On the lovers and fuitors of Helen. Brt. p. 33. || Mr. Bryant afferts Homer to have been acquainted with the improbable ftory of Helen's rival lovers, and quotes a line from the Iliad ; nS ( 26 ) is no where mentioned in Homer, and is I believe unnoticed by the very early authors. It is one of thofe fables engrafted on the hif- tory of a remarkable event by after ages ; and if it proves any thing at all, it corroborates the fact, by fhewing that there were '-traditions relative to it which were not tranfcribed from Homer, and confequently that the original foundation of the ftory does not arife merely from his imagination. The remainder of the argument, which refls upon a chronological calculation of the ages of Helen's lovers, is for that reafon defective, fince I have already mentioned how little we are acquainted with the chrono- logy of this early sera. inland Ctuation of j-Mr. Bryant draws his next objection from the inland fitua- tion of the Arcadians. Homer tells us, it is true, that their fhips were procured for them by Agamemnon, but does not tell us who taught them to row, fteer, and manage the fails. Hence concluding that nobody did teach them, he finds it difficult to account for their getting to Troy ; he allows at the fame time that they had ten years preparation, and obferves that they could have no room for fupernumeraries fince there was the full comple- ment of their own people, for which affertion he quotes a line from the Iliad.:}: I have already cautioned the Englifh reader againft Mr. Bryant's NOTES. " In Qct£o$moi or of a bar- barous language, a reafon is contained in the very epithet for declining to ufe fome at leaft of their native names ; Greek ver- sions of the fame import, and certainly Greek terminations would be fubftituted for them. Thus it is clear that Amphimachus was a Greek name, but Naftes, the other leader, appears to have retained his original appellation, made capable of a Greek inflexion. How can Mr. Bryant fay that Homer gave to thefe na- tions on the coaft of Afia the names that they bore after the Grecians had colonifed the + coaft, when he himfelf tells us in ano- ther place, that at a period long before this fecovd Ionian migra- tion, the people of Troy, Myfia, Ionia, and Hellas, were of the fame family ? Whether, by Meropes was formerly underftood a particular race or not ; and however others may doubt his inge- X T E S. * Terminations of this fort are conftantly made ufe of in Greek, even where poetical motives da not require them. The Mithridath, Rehum, Shimfhai, Tabeel, and Biihlam of the Canonic*! Ezra, appear in the Apocryphal Efdras under the names of Mithridates, Rathumos, Semellios, Tabellios, andBelemos. See Ezra, iv. 7, 8, and 1 Efdras, ii. 11. xvi. 30. Are not thefe names as apparently Grecian as molt of thofe recorded in Homer's catalogue r The radicals of Achilleu?, Aias, Odyf- feus, Idomeneus, Merion, and a hundred others, are juft as much loft as thofe of Priam, ^Eneas, Anchifes, &c. The names of many places alfo, as Kifibs, Erymanthos, Pholoe, Corinthos, &c. &c. are not now to be traced to any root in Greek, are they therefore not Grecian ? and when we are in the fame ignorance with regard to many of the other names, becaafe we know not the radicals of the Afiatic language, are we to conclude that they were not Afiatic, nay more, that they were Greek, becaufe Komer and his countrymen had hellenized them ? + In the places above cited. Vol. iii. p. 385, 435, and other places in the third vol. O nious ( 54 ) nious conjectures on this part of ancient mythology, dill againft him the argument is conclufive. Inflead therefore of cavilling at the Greek appellatives, if Mr. Bryant had taken them to pieces with half his ufual etymological talents, I have no doubt but he could have traced them back to any one language he had been pleafed to aftign. Homer's general " Homer," fays Mr. * Bryant, " was engaged in a period of ob- confiflency the proof J J ° ° *■ of his truth not of his fcurity, and being to adapt his hiftory to another age and a ingenuity. J ox j o different race of men, he was obliged to render it confident with the traditions of the people for whom he wrote." Confiftency is not a fault in any hiftory, certainly, and whether the hiftory was naturally confident, or made fo by Homer's judgment, it can hardly be brought forward as a proof of its falfehood. " But he has invented names and characters ; and made them plaufible by anecdotes and genealogies." So plaufible indeed, that the nations of Greece and Troy quoted thefe genealogies as their titles of defcent ; fo plaufible that Pericles claimed his defcent from Neftor, and was believed at the moft learned period of his learned country. If then fuch names were given as might have exifted, and anec- dotes and genealogies recorded which might have taken place, who fhall contradict Homer and argue from the probability of a fact's being true, that therefore it was falfe, and the ftory adapted to the occ'afion ? Is this logical ? and would Mr. Bryant allow the inference on any other fubject ? " But moft of thefe genealogies ended in a god." Of this Mr. Bryant gives many inftances. He had told us however in the page before that Homer was engaged in a period of NOTE. » Further confiderations concerning names, and likewife of families. Bryant, p. 76. obfeurity, ( 55 ) obfcurity, when letters had juft been introduced into Greece ; yet here he blames him for not poffefling the genealogy of his heroes for more than one or two generations. Really if he had given us more it would be a ftrong proof of his invention, but a bad argument of his veracity, provided the days were in fail as obfcure as Mr. Bryant himfelf fuppofes them. In thofe times when a man diftinguiihed himfelf by an heroic action, he raifed his family into notice, perhaps into riches and power. The flattering zeal of a grateful people traced back his origin till their brief tradition was loft in an obfcurity which imagination affigned to Beings of fuperior order. Have we not at this hour, the letter from Olympias to Alexander, gravely affuring him that he was not the fon of Jupiter ? If fuch was the folly of the age, even in the refined days of Alexander, can we be furprifed at the popular ftories of great men's genealogies, during " a period of obfcurity," in a nation by nature both fuperftitious and poetical ? A poet naturally availed himfelf of the wild my- thology of the times, and peopled his poem with the kindred of his Deities. Such is the conduct of Homer, and fuch is the conduct of nature. If Homer alone had brought forward the gods fome doubt might have arifen, but we find every hero of the times make the fame claim to a divine original with thofe of the Poet : which fhews that thefe celeftial pedigrees were not peculiar to Homer, and that his cuftoms and ftory are only recorded, not invented by him. Objciflion founded To the name and character of Agamemnon, Mr. Bryant next on the name of A ga - brings forward an objection, which he repeats in a fubfequent chapter. * It feems from Homer, that Agamemnon was com- memnon tonlid<.rt.U. NOTE. * See Bryant. Concerning the heroes who were deified. m ander ( 56 ) mander in chief and king of the " powerful Mycense ;" but Mr. Bryant fays, there is no reafon to think Mycenae was ever a place of fuch eminence as Homer makes it. He fhould have {hewn, however, that there was fufficient reafon to be fure of the con- trary, iince Homer's evidence is good till contradicted by an evi- dence equally pofitive and equally authentic. The ftates of Greece were fo far from looking upon Homer, as Mr. Bryant does, that we find him quoted by their lawgivers and ambaffadors to afcertain differences arifing from claims of territory. We find in Plutarch, that when the Athenians and Megarenfians made pre- tentions to the poffeffion of Salamis, the difpute was referred to Sparta. Before their afTembly Solon pleaded the rights of his country, and one principal ground of claim were two lines from Homer : This ftory is confirmed to us by Demofthenes ; j" it is alluded to by Ariftotle, andD. Laertius is arfo another tranfcriber of it. Now if Homer was made an arbiter to decide property in Greece, I fee no reafon to doubt his evidence with regard to Mycenae. But we find other ancient authors believing and confirming that evidence. Strabo^ gives us the following account of Argos and Mycenae. " At firft," he fays, " Argos was the moft powerful, after- wards Mycenae took the lead, in confequence of the fons of Pelops NOTES. • Horn. II. 1. ii. v. S57-— t Demofth. de felf. Iegat. p. 332. Ariftot. Rhetor. 1. i. c. ult. X Strabo, 1. viii. p. 372, having ( 57 ) leaving Argos to fettle there. For all the power devolving on the fons of Atreus, Agamemnon, the elder, being fovereign, his good fortune and courage enlarged his dominions, and added Laconia (or as fome read Argolis) to his kingdom. For his brother Menelaus held Laconia. Agamemnon commanded, therefore, Mycence, the diftrict as far as Corinth and Sicyon, and the country which was then called Ionia and iEgialia, and which has in later times been called Achaia. But after the death of Agamemnon and the end of the Trojan war, Mycense declined, and that chiefly at the return of the Fleraclidse." A ftill ftronger evidence is furnifhed in this page by Mr. Bryant himfelf. "Thucy- dides" (fays his note) "mentions it as a mean place : Mmmmm y.^ov nv t but fuppofes it to have been once of greater repute, for which he gives noreafon.*" The paffage inThucydidesis however as follows. " Now becaufe Mycena has been a/mall place, or if any other town of thofe times fhould feem of fmall importance, let not any one from fo deceitful a circumftance conclude that the expedition (to Troy) was lefs than the poets reprefent, or than fame has reported it. For if the city of Lacedaemon fhould be defolated, and only the temples and the foundations of their ftruclures fhould remain, I conceive that in the lapfe of years, it would become very doubt- ful whether their power had ever equalled their renown. For though they poffefs two fifths of the Peloponnefus, and govern the whole of it, and are at the head of a great alliance out of it, yet it is clear that they would feem inferior to their fame ; fince :he town is neither compactly built, nor adorned with temples ind magnificent edifices ; but confifts of fcattered hamlets after NO T E. * Bryant, p. 78. — ThucyJides, !. i. c. 10. P the ( 58 ) the earl mode of Greece. But if the fame defolation {hould happen to Athens, the power of that City would be thought by pofterity to have doubled that which it really poffeiTes. Letus not therefore doubt thefe hiilories, and eftimate the appearance rather than the flrength of ancient towns." This is at full length the paffage, a part of which Mr. Bryant has quoted. If Homer's ftory was plaufible enough to fatisfy an hiflorian fo fagacious as Thucydides, and who was well acquainted with the ancient hiilories of his own country, I take his acquiefcence in the fuppofed power of Mycenae to be an in- finitely ftronger teflimony than any unsupported affertion made after a fpace of above 2000 years, when all the early hifto- ries have perifhed. I have now amply difcuffed the fubject of Mycenae, with which, if the reader is not fatisfied, he will find Hill more in Paufanias.* When Mr. Bryant afferts, therefore, that its primitive fplendor is to be found only in Homer, he Ihould reflect that Homer is now the only authority we have of thofe early times ; but that Thucydides mentions Poets in the plural number, and alfo common fame; fo that he had concurrent tefti- monies, and we have feen the refult of his inquiries in the paffage above quoted. " But the wide rule given to it is contradicted " by the hiilories of Corinth and other Cities, as may be inferred " from Plutarch, Strabo, and other writers." The contrary, however, is pretty plainly inferred from the paffage of Strabo above quoted, and as Mr. Bryant has not produced one line from any of thefe writers, I cannot anfwer the affertion better. Names of the heroes " Homer borrows the names of many of his heroes from and of Agamemnon ....... .... _ , r \, particularly, not bor- " provincial deities, known in his time, from whence many 01 tne rowed from the pro- vincial deities, or if borrowed no proof ajaiafl their eiiAence. NOTE *■ Paufan. 1. ii. c. 16, 17. " heroes ( 59 ) " heroes were afterwards fuppofed to have their altars ; which in " reality were erected to the gods whofe names they bore." Mr. Bryant elfewhere repeats this argument with more detail ; and in its proper place the reader will find it fully, and I hope fatis- factorily anfwered. He here confines himfelf to the fingle in- ftance of Agamemnon, and tells us that "Lycophron* and Clemens " Alexandrinus mention altars of Zsu? Ayay-vM^, fo alio we find " mentioned in Athenagoras.f" Suppofmg Agamemnon, how- ever, to have been one of the various names or epithets under which Jupiter was honoured, is it not jufl as probable that it fhould be given to men by the cuftom of the times, as thatKomcr, in viola- tion of every cuftom, fhould adopt a name which could not be given to men? — "Euftathius," he proceeds, "quotes alfo two other " titles of Jupiter in this very chapter, fujuxf hm and eypptSw, having " wide rule and extenfive command." Admitted ; but Eurycreon and Eurymedon are both ufed as proper names by the Grecians. J' In another place Mr. Bryant himfelf tells us that Lycurgus was only a name of the Sun as worfhipped by the Amonites ; and yet wc repeatedly find the name of Lycurgus applied to men at different no T E s. * Mr. Bryant here quotes two verfes from Lycophron very rightly, (Bryant p. 79) but as tl are prophetic of the future dignity of the hero they cannot be conftiued into a proof that Agamemnon had been previoufly a title of Jupiter ; befides it appcr.rs this title was confined to the diftrict of Sparta. Tzetzes in his comment on this pafTage, fays, "O; Axxioxi/Aiv^i i&guo-aiiJo 'AyxjA^^io; Aioi iffov us 1/^.w 7a H'f^oj. Canter, Meurfius, and Potter are of the fame opinion, and are quoted by Mr. Bryant himfelf. V. 335 of Lycophron is of the fame import, and tends to prove that he confidered the leader of the Grecian hoft as the perfon deified under his nr.me. f The pafTage from Athenagoras has the fame tendency, however perverted by Mr. Bryant. He is actually Hamming up the names of the heroes and heroines who were afterwards worshipped. 0' jx£» IXilvi Qjov E'ktoj* Xs'ysi, k, %y EAemiii A^oirum nriToc/jiivo! Tr^c^y.vvli. o 2s AeuubxiiMtms 'A- it(.'.!/i'.;.z Ai'z, j£ £ /3*g/3«5«. " Becaufe he was a citizen of two different ftates, one Grecian and one Barbarian." If Petes, therefore, never left Egypt, and Meneftheus never faw the war of Troy, how is Diodorus in the right ? The names of William the Conqueror and all his followers were French, but they have never been denied to exift in England. f Msns Xaov as Meneptolemus from Me»oi irW/xou. J Of the chief heroes in the Grecian army and of their extraordinary prefervation. Bry. p. 83. CL lo s uc ( 62 ) logue are by Homer reprefented as alive for the moft part in the fequel of the Iliad. They are forty-fix in number, and their names all recur again ; fuch a prefervation is in Mr. Bryant's opinion impomble. How far however is fuch a ftricture to affect the veracity of Homer ? In the fecond book we find the Grecian army in the tenth year of the war drawn up in the plain of the Scamander. Homer* invokes the Mufe to enumerate " who were' the leaders of the Greeks and the commanders of their forces."' Ci'tive? rihy-M'-s Aavawv £ xligotvoi y\y Stxxioaims. * When Mr. Bryant gives us the date of Anaxagoras's birth, he would have done well to have added that he lived to a confiderable old age, and that if ever he refided at Lampfacus, it was not till very late in life, and after the condemnation for impiety, which was parted on him at Athens, had obliged him to leave that city. According to fome Authors he never left it, but died there by a fuicide. — See Diogen. Laert. 1. 2 Segm. 13. He wrote therefore about Troy much later than the 70th Olympiad, and perhaps never was there at all. fhould ( 6 5 ) Ihould make us very cautious in trufting implicitly to his opinion. We fliould conlider alfo what character he had as a judge, before we pay deference to his unfupported authority. It is curious to obferve, that in the very next fentence we find him recorded as believing that the Heavens were an arch of (tone j* becaufe one ft one was faid to have fallen from the air. If his conclufions were frequently fuch as this, we may doubt whether the premifes would warrant them. Of Metrodorus we know nothing, but both he and Anaxagoras had this fimilarity with Mr. Bryant ; they not only pulled down the received fyftem, but built up another. Now they fuppofe the whole (lory allegorical, the fir ft making it fymbolical of virtue and vice, the other of na- tural philofophy. Each of thefe three fceptics are therefore con- tradicted by the other two, and notwithftanding this contradiction they ufe each others authority as far as it coincides with their own ; their miftakes however in converting Homer into allegory are too apparent to be dwelt upon, and from thence we may learn how far the vanity of fophiftry might carry them in fupport of a lingular hypothefis. But fays Mr. Bryant they lived in Phrygia, in or near the part called Troas. The coaft mujl have been known to them, they were men of knowledge who would hardly omit an opportunity of information. Thefe words, qualified as they are with mujl and hardly ', fhew that all this is conjecture. A man of knowledge wotild hardly believe ftones fell from heaven, but we find that Anaxagoras did believe it, fo that it is poftible thefe men of know- ledge and curiofity might not do all that Mr. Bryant afcribes to them. NOTE. * He is alfo recorded, as maintaining the Sun to be a red hot iron, larger than the PelopoH- oefus. f*vog/o» . Thefe paflages, therefore, indifputably prove that the Cyprian verfes, in which Alexander is faid to have failed with a profperous gale in three days from Sparta to Ilium, belong to fome other poet and not to Homer,' who thus declares that Alexander when carrying Helen off, returned by a very wide and wandering courfe. — But we now take leave of Helen and the Cyprian verfes. f Herodotus mentions a tradition prevalent in Afia, and defcribing the Greeks as the ag- greffors, to which they attributed the long animofity that involved the nations in perpetual w ars, and which terminated only with the Peifian monarchy. This tradition he acquired at Perfepolis. See Herodot. Clio. ch. i. s in ( 70 ) in fupport of Mr. Bryant's hypothefis. The reader will judge whether Mr. Bryant could be ignorant of the inferences which followed from the paflage, and will be either indignant or amufed at the adroit manner in which he has kept back the remainder of this account. Euripides follows Herodotus in fuppofing Helen not to have been at Troy; but fo far from insinuating that the reft of the ftory was fabulous, he founds many of his plays on it as on a well-known fact. His authority on what he pofitively afferts is, therefore, at lead as good as on the fingle point he denies. When he or Herodotus mention that Helen was not at Troy during the fiege ; this certainly implies that there was a Troy, and that there was a fiege ; otherwife, I would afk Mr. Bryant whe- ther they would have faid {he was abfent from a place where no one was prefent. All thefe authorities, therefore, are, unfortu- nately for Mr. Bryant, in direct oppofition to his hypothefis.— But as argviments from Egypt are more immediately conclufive againft him on this fubject, it may not be irrelevant from our purpofe to afk him here, how the traditions, and early hiftories of Troy in Egypt came to be fo completely deftroyed, as that nothing relative to this plagiarifm of Homer mould appear when the Ptolemies called together Zenodotus, Ariftophanes, and Arif- tarchus, whofe very name is proverbial of feverity. We muft confider alfo that thefe men revifed Homer in Egypt, whofe traditions were coawal with her priefthood, and whofe library at Alexandria was the wonder of the world. Let every reader alfo recoiled that * Callimachus and Apollonius Rhodius were librarians of this very collection, and yet how often do they NOTE. » Callimachus "lis Apnu,tv, 1. 230. mention ( 7i ) mention this part of ancient hiftory, without even dreaming of its fuppofed Egyptian origin. The other teftimonies are as fol- lows. Strabo mentions a learned Lady, Heftixa Alexandrina, who wrote concerning Troy, but could not, fays Mr. Bryant, dif- cover its lituation. Demetrius of Scepfis was in the fame ig- norance, and from thefe Strabo gives his account. In one cir- cumllance they all agree, that the htuation of the modern town of Ilium was not that of the ancient Troy : they alfo agree in re- prefenting moft of the tombs of the heroes, and many other landmarks mentioned by Homer as flill exifting in their time r they feem all however to be perfuaded of the existence of Troy, and therefore certainly did not fufpedl that fo ftrong an inference as Mr. Bryant's could be drawn from their ignorance of its htuation. That Strabo had not vifited the Troad in perfon, is certain, fince however Mr. Bryant may contend for the contrary, we find him every where quoting Demetrius in this part of his work, and qualifying thofe paffages of which he was in doubt by referring to him, or arguing on the poffibility of his being miflaken. It is after him that * Strabo quotes Heftiaza ; after having recorded the controverfy refpecting New Ilium, and giving a defcription of the plain, he fays, -j- E/iATrsijo? $' cou ruv roiruv us ocv eirt^upto; ocvrip o AypriTP ioj tote (Aw outuj; X'.yn ire ft xutuv. Demetrius, a man well acqiiainted with the country, and a native of the place, gives this account of them.. Relative to the J Rhefus in the next page, he quotes him again. In the § pages before this, we find for ever, TVom» A*i/**iTf«o?; $*io-i AnpiTftoj o ZKfTTiJ/iof. In another place having argued his account NOTES. • Strabo, I. 189. p. 599.— f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 602.— J Strabo, ibid ibid. "Demetrius imagines." § Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 596. alfo p. 594. " Demetrius of Scepfis fays." to ( 7^ ) to imply a contradiction, he fays, " but I approve *the reft, and think that in general we may rely upon Demetrius, an acute man and born in the country." Is this the concife and clear language of Strabo on a place where he had been ? or with his extenfive knowledge of Homer, would he have quoted Demetrius for what he had feen himfelf and could fo ably judge of? or would he en- deavour to controvert Demetrius, by {hewing an inconfiftency in his account, if he could have contradicted the fact itfelf from his own obfervation ? The authority therefore of Strabo, is only that of Demetrius and Heftixa ; and to what does it amount ? to prove that new Ilium was not Troy, and that the old town was fo deftroyed they could not find it. This laft circumftance Mr. Bryant thinks conclufive. How did Strabo fee it ? -f-Eixorw?, fays he, " it is probable ; for when all the diftrict was ruined, and the other towns laid wafte, but not deftroyed, Troy, which was entirely overturned, was made ufe of to repair the others." Of thefe Sigseum was one. Demetrius, as we are told, in the next| page, accufed Timajus of a blunder in aflerting that Achilleum, a village near it, was built of the ftones of Troy by Periander ; but he fays the nature of the ftone was not the fame as that of Troy ; a circumftance which fhews him to be well acquainted with it. " This is the evidence of a native of the very diftrict," and if he could not find the city he ieems at leaft to have found the ftones belonging to it. But Stefichorus, an author prior to Herodotus, had the fame opinion that he has, fays Mr. Bryant, fince he maintained that NOTES. * Strabo, 1. Xlli. p. 603. Ti-'/.i.x Ss dwoKa(/.@dmp.a ri ra rt wXT/i-a Sf~v •n^-si'/tiiy us a>Jf( f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 599. — J Strabo, ibid, p. 600. Helen ( 73 ) Helen was never upon the fea. In the firft place as Herodotus mentions her being in Egypt, I hardly know by what other means fhe could get there, unlefs we fuppofe her to have made a very curious circuit indeed. But " Stefichorus flourifhed in the 42d Olympiad ;" therefore Anaxagoras and Metrodorus were not the moft ancient authors, as we had been aflured a few pages before. It is a flory told alfo of Stefichorus, that Venus {truck him blind for his blafpheming, and that he retracted all that he had affirmed ; from hence we may infer that his hiftory is not particularly authen- tic, nor can we place implicit reliance on the whole of it. But though Venus might not ftrike him blind, we have, at leaft, juft as good authority for his retractation as we have for his original writing, and if Mr. Bryant can argue fo ftrongly from his firft work, I have equal right to build upon his palinodia. We only know his work, as quoted by Dion Chryfoftom, who like Mr. Bryant was fupporting an hypothecs ; it was however an hypothefis from which Mr. Bryant can derive but little flrength ; for fo far was he from denying the exiftence of the Phrygian Troy, that he contends for its having furvived the fiege, >-.*» ^ x\up»i. he only denies its fall, and from the filence of the Grecian Homer reflect- ing the final event, infers the defeat of the Poet's countrymen, and concludes that Ilium had repulfed the Greeks. To whatever Homer has affirmed, he accedes, and then only feels himfelf at liberty to indulge his imagination, when the incontrovertible teftimony of the Iliad offers no obftacle to an hypothefis which is fo evidently written in fport, that it is wonderful to hear him ferioufly quoted on any occafion by fo grave a writer as Mr. Bryant, whofe arguments I now conceive to be fully anfwered. I will therefore conclude with his own triumphant quotation, which the reader will poffibly apply rather differently. Cujufvis homi- nis eft errare nullius nifi infipientis in errorem perfeverare. T Mr. ( 74 ) colonies of Greeks Mr. Bryant in his next * chapter enumerates the immenfe number moriais of the war, a of Colonies, which in after ages claimed their defcent from the of Homer. e c " y victors or vanquifhed of this memorable aera. He notices alfo the different altars and memorials faid to be left by them in va- rious and improbable parts of Europe. Thefe circumftances have been ufed as an argument, and furely a juft one, to prove the exiftence of the Trojan war ; not it is true from the authenticity of thefe fettlements, but from the generality of opinion which the fuppofition implies, even if it be falfe. Whilft we can ac- count for exaggeration in the national vanity of after times, we can account for the original idea no otherwife than by fuppofing its truth, fince the colonies who pretended to derive their origin from iEneas, Diomede, or Menelaus, certainly believed that fuch perfons had exifted. They likewife agree in placing them with Troy in Phrygia, and the general outline of their flory is the fame with that of Homer, however their vanity may have altered fome particulars which were not adapted to their national pretenfions. Returning to Homer, we find in his plain narration, few of thefe inconfiflencies. iEneas lived and reigned in Troas, and the tra- ditions of the Scepfians corroborate this account. As to the other flories, it is very poflible many colonies were founded, for the victors returning home, were in many places vanquifhed in their turn. Driven from home as they had driven the Trojans, both parties fought a refuge elfewhere. Such were frequently the colonies of the early ages, unlefs the account that is univerfally NOTE. • Concerning the argument which is founded on the many memorials of the Trojan war, Aippofed to have been extant in different parts of the world. Bryant, p. 92. and Corollary, ditto, p. 98. given ( 75 ) given of them by the ancients is to be fuperfeded in favour of Mr. Bryant's heroes, the Tynans, Sidonians, and Cuthites. In another very fingular * chapter Mr. Bryant enumerates the Homer's names not . applied arbitrarily to names of the heroes who were worshipped or rather revered in mere creatures of his i ii « • • imagination. different places, and who received heroic honours in countries where they had little right to expect them. Thefe he qxiotes chiefly from the "latebrse Lycophronis atri," of which the extreme obfeurity is univerfally acknowledged. He concludes that the beings fo j~ worshipped were gods, whofe titles or whofe fecondary appellations Homer conferred upon his heroes. Would £ Homer, who is the ftricteft obferver of coflume, give to fictitious characters names unknown or unufed by his countrymen ? If not, why might not fuch names be real ones at the time ? But if the beings fo worfhipped were the heroes of Homer, the fact proves at once both their exiftence and their celebrity. In either cafe Mr. Bryant will find it impoflible to draw from thefe data any inference which does not militate againfl his hypothefis. For feveral pages after this Mr. Bryant contends flrongly that No i„fe rcnC e to be Homer was not an Afiatic but a native of Greece, probably of JSSSSSSS Mr. Bryant's on the Country of Homer, NO T E S. * Concerning the heroes who were deified. f The general plan of Lycophron is perfpicuous enough, and accords with Homer. A Nuntius relates to Priam the prophecies of his imprifoned daughter Caflandra, and by her l\ia$uroi amy^alon "/;xai the fcene and characters are liifficiently afcertained. The fcene is Phrygia. the chara&ers Greeks and Trojans. This is the more worth notice, becaufe the Poet lived in Egypt under Ptolemy Lagus ; and yet no Egyptian tradition occurred to him, though his character for refearch and antiquarian learning was iuch, that of all men he was perhaps the moft likely to deted and expofc the error of his countrymen. J See notes on Agamemnon, p. 59. Ithaca, ( 76 ) Ithaca, and of Egyptian origin, this he had already infinuated, and I have waved the conteft, fince mere conjecture requires no anfwer. I mail do the fame here, owning, that in fome. points I have the pleafure of agreeing with him, and not knowing any real authority that either contradicts or confirms one tittle of his aflertions, Befides this I am able fafely to give him. here, at lead, a tacit acquiefcence, fince I cannot perceive that any fort of in- ference refults from the establishment of either fide of the question. (a*ospituiation. From the thorough destruction of his fuppofed feries of evi- dence, I come to a conclusion diametrically oppofite to Mr. Bryant's. If Homer bears fuch a femblance of truth; if Varro and Justin do not refute his veracity; if the grounds of the war were probable and natural, the men engaged in it, and the con- duct of it fuch as might be expected ; if Thucydides, Diodorus, and Herodotus, both confirm and account for it ; if the ac- counts given of the numbers and fhips of the Greeks are credible, and if their proceedings in Troas, as far as are re- corded are confonant to nature; if their correfpondence with Greece and the age of Helen, and of the Lovers and Suitors, all prove nothing against the fact ; if the objection about the Arcadian mariners is without any foundation ; if the fofs and rampart were fuch as might easily be deflroyed, and the topogra- phical objections every where founded on miftaken notions, as I lhall now endeavour to prove ; it follows that all conclusions drawn from fuch premifes are annihilated, and therefore that Troy may have existed notwithstanding the objections of Mr. Bryant. There feems besides to be still lefs reafon for fuppofing it to have existed in Egypt. Conjectures upon Homer's life and writings may be anfwered by other conjectures, but in reality as they prove nothing, they need not be anfwered at all ; Homer's acquaintance ( 77 ) acquaintance with Egypt is flight ground for fiich an inference ; of the writers who treated the fubject, only one (Phantafia) is faid to be an- Egyptian, and her name confutes the (lory. Not one is mentioned as placing Troy out of Phrygia either before or fince, fo that if it belonged to Egypt, fuch a concurrence in favour of one particular fpot is wholly incredible. Therefore we muft either fuppofe Phantafia wrote on a Greek ftory, or that Homer, Syagrius, Diclys, Dares, and other Greeks, wrote on an Egyptian one, and both ideas are equally abfurd. The ancient traditions for ever are in contradiction with refpect to the particulars, many different accounts are tranfmitted, but mofl of them are fubfe- quent to Homer, whofe confiftency bears great internal marks of truth, and not one tradition or ftory, either ancient or modern, ever removed Homer's Ilium to Egypt, till the attempt of Mr- Bryant. If I have accounted for the difficulties which he finds in refpect to the Greek names and Grecian worfhip introduced by Homer into Phrygia ; if the names faid to be borrowed by Homer from the deities, were, in his time, probably the common names of his country ; if the Egyptian derivation of Agamemnon is without proof; and if his own authorities, fo far from aflifling him when they are fairly quoted, really difprove his arguments ; if the memorials found in the different parts of the world, and the deification of Homer's heroes are really confirmations of the received opinion, the confequence follows that we have no fort of ground, from any argument Mr. Bryant has ufed, to fuppofe that the fcenes of the Iliad were originally foreign to Phrygia, but we have many unanfwerable reafons to believe the reverfe. Having fhewn therefore, as I truft, that Ilium did notexifl in Egypt; having before fhewn that there is no reafon to doubt the ancient ftory -concerning the war in Phrygia, it fhail be my effort to convince U the ( 78 ) the reader that it did exift, and in the very fituation where Homer has placed it. — »**vvwvyyyyYy»« PART the SECOND. introduaion. Qf all the arguments which have been ufed in fupport or an- cient hiftorians there is none fo conclufive as that which is drawn from the exact concurrence of their topography, with what we find to be the prefentjlate of the country. Their accuracy, in points of which we are able to judge, is a rational ground of belief in thofe for which we have only their uncontradicted affertion. But there is no hiflorian, however exact;, who can compare in this refpect with Homer. The ingenious publication of Monfieur Chevalier, had fhown that many more circumftances illuftrative of the Iliad might ftill be traced in the Plain than were generally imagined to be there. His work had to combat with incredulity, which will ever attend a difcovery of this fort unfupported by concurrent teftimony. That teflimony I am happy to be able to give, for though I may perhaps fometimes differ with him in his conjectures, yet I found him every where a faithful relater of facts. AfTifted by his book, I examined the whole country with fome degree of attention, and before I proceed any further I beg to refer the reader, through the whole of this treatife, to the fubjoined Map, of which the chief part exactly agrees with that of M. Chevalier ; fince I found it (except fome trifling overfights which are here cor- rected) as accurate as that of Mr. Bryant's is erroneous and defective. To make thefe arguments more conclufive, I previoufly inform the reader, that confidering, a priori, the fituations, and remains which Homer's writings would lead us to expert, I will fhow that in ( 79 ) in mod points our expectations may be gratified, and will endea- vour to anfwer the topographical arguments which Mr. Bryant has brought forward both here, and in his previous publication on this fubjecl:. According to Homer's defcription the armies are repeatedly en- 0a !hc t"'" ° r _ * , J and extent of i!;e gaged in a plain between Troy and the fhips, and in all this fpace plain- it no where appears that there were any defiles, or mountain panes,"}" as thefe were circumftances which Homer could not fail to mention, fince they would have given a different character to the whole tenor of his battles. Through this plain two rivers % the Simois and the Xanthus poured their waters ; the chain § of Ida + commanded it on one fide, fince Gargarus, one of its fummits, is repeatedly mentioned as overlooking the city and Plain ; a part of Ida, called Callicolone, or the beautiful hill, || was near the city and the Simois ; the plain ** on the other fide was bounded by the Hellefpont, and alfo by the more open fea as we may learn from the "I" j* defcriptions of an extenfive ocean, which are inapplicable to the fir aits of Abydos. The extent of the Plain was fuch as to contain two armies one of fifty thoufand, the other of a hundred NOTES. \ Horn. II. ii. ver. 465. Ibid. 812. t Juno and Minerva defcend at their confluence. Horn. tl. v. ver. 774. $ Horn. II. viii. ver. 47. Ibid. xi. ver. 183. Ibid. ver. 337. Ibid. xiv. ver. 157. Ibid. xv. ver. j> .. || Horn. II. xx. ver. 53. * * The Camp of the Grecians was near the Hellefpont. II. xvii. v. 432. and paffim. ft Homer, II. i. v. 34. Ibid. i. v. 327. lb. xxiii. ver. 59. alfo xxiii. ver. 230. where this Sea, is called 0^, X ios iroylos. " The Thracian Sea.". thoufand ( So ) thoufand men in order of battle,* nay more, when they combated at the fhips,f to place them at a considerable diftance from the city : Had the city and the fhips been very near each other, the encampment of the Trojans near the Scamander and the tomb of Ilus, would have been ufelefs, but Hector affigns as the reafon for that encampment, that the Grecians might otherwife attempt to efcape J in the night: the City therefore was not in fuch a fituation, as to command the Grecian camp. In this defcription it will be obferved, that I make the Hellefpont of Homer fynonimous with the Hellefpont of every other writer, and the fame as the (traits of Abydos. Mr. Bryant § maintains that they were different : Homer, he fays, ufes the Hellefpont for the upper part of the iEgean, and it bounded Myfia to the Eaft. How any part of the iEgean, which is on the weft coaft of Afia Minor, bounded an Afiatic province to the Eaft, I am at a lofs to comprehend. Homer, however', calls the Hellefpont Trxdn; i. e. broad, dya^ooc, flowing ftrongly, or with a ftrong current, xtth^v, || impervious; but broad \ which is merely a comparative term, is applied with a reference to rivers, and other confined channels ; flowing ftrongly is not -the epithet of the fea, but is particularly appropriate to the (traits of the Hellefpont, down which there is a very rapid current ; aws^ which is tranflated boundlefs by Mr. Bryant means only difficult of pajlige, impervious, or little navigated; [a. priv. and srflgu tranfeo.)**«7rE»f«c, u Kidxt^^c, zx NO T E S. * Homer, II. v. 543. x.t.A. f Ex«?e» woXews wtkr,s mi nvai. 11. v. ver. 79 1, alfo II. xviii. 256. I Horn. II. viii. ver. 510 — § Mr. Bryant " on the War of Troy," p. 157. fj Sigaea igni freta lata relucent. Virgil. Fretum it will be obferved always means a Strait. Therefore, Virgil ufes the word Lata in exaflly the fame fenfe with Hornet's uKarvs, and both apply them to the Straits of the Dardanelles ; perhaps to that part of them near the Sigean, more pajticularly as being comparatively broader than the parts immediately above the Troad. * * Sophocles. Oedip. Tyrannns. I. 1088 and fee. ten ( Si ) urn tm *uf»3i/ vxvfov. in the original. |j Lucas in arce fuit fumraa ^En. ix. 86. Hoc eft apud Gargara, qua difta funt quafi x«f* XgtXTCS. ( 84 ) "*' fhewn, in which is fituated Gargara, a city of iEolia." In a fub- fequent page we have this calculation: "After*Lectum is the town " Polymedium at forty fladia, then a fmall grove at eighty more, " then at 140 Gargara ; " therefore from Leclum to Gargarus was a diflance of 260 ftadia, that is, without difcufling the precife meafure of a ftadium, about thirty miles, a diflance greater than from Gargarus to Troy. Mr. Bryant, however, contends that, fince Homer brings Jupiter to Gargarus, to look down on the city and plain, the plain muft have been extended immediately to the foot of the mountain. Strabo, he fays,")" makes the coaft from Ledum to Abydos, about fifty miles, of which Ilium was rather more than half, that is 200 ftadia, or about 26 miles. At the fame time he adds, that the whole country was divided by ridges precluding all diftant view. It will be obferved by the reader that he argues as if the view from Gargarus were the fame with that from Lectum, when they were 30 miles afunder. Gargarus we find was mvich higher ; it was alfo nearer Troy, for Lectum runs out weftward into the iEgean. But even fuppofing the view to be taken from Lectum, his own Author directly confutes his arguments. In the very place Mr. Bryant has juft quoted, Strabo has this pafTage, which is however omitted in the quotation : " Upon JLectum an altar of the twelve Gods is feen, it is called the " fane or feat, tyvpx, of Agamemnon ; this place is in fight w nro^i < " of Ilium, at the diflance of two hundred ftadia, or rather more." NOTE S. •viroi-. id eft Caput Capitis ; Altitudinis allitudo, xxpx eft v xtQato. Gargara autem funt montis Ida- cacumina. propter quod dixit in arce fumma. Servius. See alfo Macrobius and Ladantius, the Annotator of Statius. » Strabo, I. xiii. p. 606. — f Mr. Bryant on the War of Troy, p. 163, 164. 4 Strabo, !. xiii p. 902, (605 of the margin.) Where I -,*-*,.*_*.*.. * * «? I 6fe-4L -- ■"':■':'■ m"TY/. H ■-. , /,;.., ' ' Xn ■ ... /. , i // ,„ , s._ ./,, ( 8 5 ) Where then are the ridges defcribed fo apropos by Mr. Bryant ? If human eyes could fee the altar of Lectum from Ilium, much more could thofe of Jupiter view Ilium from Gargarus ; a lefs diftance from a higher fummit. Indeed the topography of the country confirms Strabo beyond confutation. On the fouth of the plain the hills rife gradually vip to Gargarus, which is a pro- minent feature* in the outline, and the only one of the fummits of Ida which is feen from the plain. Homer confidered it as the higheft point of Ida, and therefore chofe that throne for the King of the Gods. It is perhaps 25 miles from the Hellefpont, and do- mineers over the whole country. The fituation was ftill more appropriate, fmce he was the tutelar Deity of the town of Gargara I uQu St ciTipwos te (lapo; re Sv*i£i?."'f" Now if the reader wifhes to be acquainted with the ftrength of eyefight % Homer allots to his Gods, he will find in the Iliad § this account of Neptune, Meantime the Monarch of the wat'ry main Obferv'd the Thund'rer, nor obferv'd in vain. In Samothracia, on a mountain's brow Whofe waving woods o'erhung the deeps below, He fat, and round him caft his azure eyes, Where Ida's mifty tops confus'dly rife, Below fair Ilion's glitt'ring fpires were feen, The crowded fhips and fable feas between. j| NOTES. • See the adjoined View from the Sigjean Promontory. f Where he had a fane and an altar for facrifice. X Ol-vs 6tm otpQaXpos as rx trxtlx iSnv. Euripid. ex Stobaso. — § Horn. II. xiii. 1. 10. || Upon the fame fyftem with Mr. Bryant we might difpute the diftance of JEgx, fince Nep- tune went thither from Salamis in three ftrides. Y The ( 86 ) The maps of the country will tell Mr. Bryant that this view of Neptune was taken from a much greater diftance than that of his brother Jupiter. Since, therefore, the lofty fummit of Gargarus is feen from the plain, and forms a commanding feature in the outline of the landfcape ; I conceive all objections of this fort are thoroughly anfwered, and the reader will admire the grandeur with which Homer exalts his Sovereign of the Gods, more, per- haps, than if he had conformed to the lhort-fighted fyftem of Mr. Bryant. on the nature of ^he f ame precifion which points out fo accurately the fituation the Plain and of the r r J Rivers - of the plain, is alfo obfervable in the different epithets and de- fcriptions which are applied to it in the Iliad. The fertility of it is noticed more than once, and the diftricT: of Troy is generally marked out as a rich foil, the Tfom t£&w\a%. The lower part of the plain is, in general, defcribed as overgrown with reeds and aquatic plants, the confequences probably of a marfh near the junction of the rivers, which is mentioned by Homer * once in the 2 1 ft Book. Thus when Diomede and UlylTes are engaged |on their night excurfion, the latter fufpends the arms of Dolon upon a Marfh Myrtle (muj !xri) -j- and marks the road by which he is to re- turn with heaps 'of reeds (Aokzxe?), % and branches of the myrtle. The various characteriftics of the Simois and Scamander, are pointed out with a ftill greater degree of minutenefs, and every where with the fame accuracy. They joined their waters in the NOTES. * Horn. 11. 1. xxi. ver. 317. ra wS /xaAa m'061 x!fj.ns Kt/Vefl' vTt \Xvos xix.x>djj./xiiijc. f Horn. II. 1. x. ver. 466, -1-67. Alfo the [a^kvi is mentioned II. xxi. ver. 18. Plain, ( 8 7 ) Plain, for in the * fifth book, Juno and Minerva defcend at their confluence. The Scamander rofe in the Plain, near the Scsean Gate, from two fources, which are thus defcribed in the "j" 22nd Book of the Iliad : Next by Scamander's dovible fource they bound, Where two fam'd fountains burft the parted ground j This hot through fcorching clefts is feen to rife, With exhalations (teaming to the fides. That the green banks in Summer's heat o'erflows, As cryftal clear, and cold as Winter fnows. Each gufhing fount a marble cittern fills, Whofe polifh'd bed receives the falling rills ; Where Troy's fair Dames 'ere yet alarm'd by Greece, Wafh'd their fair garments in the days of Peace It was owing to the fituation of thefe fources at the foot of Ida, that in " Summer's heat" the flream was not dried up, being fed by the gradual and conflant vapours, which filter through the earth. But the mountain torrents, which depend entirely on the rains of Autumn, or the melting of the fnows in Spring, always difappear during the Summer in this warm climate. The epithets applied by Homer to the Scamander, in different parts of his Work, are ayXaov v$u^ x«X« f££0£>a, ai/Sfjuon?, mofif, txgyvooJans, (Timif, ivppeio? t (upjoof and once or twice, particularly in the 21ft Book,:]: (ZxQuSivws and piyce<; Trolxpos (izMurnu The meadow, through which it runs, NOTES, * Horn. II. v. ver. 774. — (• Horn. II. 1. xxii. ver. 1+7. and feq. t Horn. II. 1. xxi. ver. 15, ver. 329 and paffim. is ( 88 ) is alfo ftyled the * " flowry mead of the Scamander." The other river is mentioned lefs frequently, but fome of its characleriftics may, however, be traced in different parts of the Iliad. In the 2 1 ft book f the Xanthus calls in thefe terms on his ally the Simois, Hafte my Brother flood, And check this mortal who controuls a God. — Call then your fubjec~t ftreams, and bid them roar, From all your fountains fwell your watry ftore. With broken rocks and with a load of dead, Charge the black furge, and pour it on his head. In the feventh book he is defcribed as The gulphy Simois rolling to the main, Helmets and fhields and godlike heroes flain. We fee then that whilft the Scamander is pointed out as a clear, beautiful, perennial ftream, the Simois is characterifed as a vio- lent, unequal mountain torrent rolling down in his " black furge," ftones, trees, and dead bodies. It appears alfo that below the junc- tion, the waters of both took the name of Scamander, for in the paflage juft quoted from the twenty-firft book, we find the Xan- thus calling to the Simois for affiftance, which would have been very ufelefs, unlefs the battle was fought below the confluence. NOTES. "£S"J(» 5 « Aei/awm Sxa/xavSf/w a»9£/xc:»Ti. Horn. II. ii. VCr. 4^7 • f Horn. II. 1. xxi. v. 308. and feq. No ( 89 ) No mention is made of the Simois fpringing in the plain, and that many flreams joined it in its courfe appears from the fame quota- tion. Mr. Bryant, however, contends that Chevalier is miftaken in all this defcription.* The epithets bm&s, tuffeo?, tvgftw, convince him that the Scamander was a larger ftream than is here defcribed, and he obferves that no epithets are beflowed on what he calls 'the fubordhiate and ignoble Simois. Mr. Bryant, the reader will obferve, is not fo fparing of his epithets as Homer with regard to this river ; the character of which muft be collected from Homer's •defcription. That the Simois was not always fubordinate and ig- noble appears from the "im ft piy* *!?/**, iro\w So^pxySov c^vt $iTfwp £ ;w, which is quoted above. That it often is fo, is the very thing "which Monfieur Chevalier allows ; his Simois being a very consi- derable mountain river in winter, or after fevere rains, and being frequently dry in fummer, which laft circumftance he afligns as the probable reafon why the ftream below the junction retained the name of the Xanthus, which flowed perpetually in the channel. With regard to the epithets of the Scamander, a fmall ftream may •be both eddying firms* and beautifully flowing tv^m, iv^ao;. In the 2lft Book the battle was below the junction, and here we find it defcribed as (3a3-uJim£i?, and peyus tto]x^o; (3«6iJi «??;"]" in fhort if thefe epithets are found in the Iliad, they are always allufive to the united waters of the two rivers, which as I have already obferved bore the name of Scamander only. From this circumftance alone arifes the alledged inconfiftency. The Scamander was alfo on the weft of the plain, for though NOTES. » Mr. Bryant's '* Obfervations on a Trcatife," &c. page, 29, 30.— \ See above, 1. iv. Z Mr. ( 9° ) Mr. Bryant* contefts the meaning given by Chevalier to Hector's hghting pax"* **' *? lSfa when they are in the left of the fight. If this argument could Hand in need of confirmation, however, we find that Ptolemy affords it. I Ptol. Geogr. p. 137. Bryant's Obfervations, &c. p. 31.— § See Map. marked Mil-can fin.,-'. Sferwot sculp. 1//W/ aw,/ //r y/v////'/\ ///f,r : .1/ ( 9* ) marked by Monf. Chevalier as Rheteum, took the adjoined view from the barrow, fuppofed the tomb of Ajax. * Of thefe tombs I will fay more in a fubfequent Section. In the mean time the reader cannot but obferve the flat low form of the plain in this part, and the long promontories, which the river has formed by the conflant accretion of fand and mud at its mouth. From hence we crofTed over low hills and a narrow vale, now called the vale of Thimbrek, in which we cannot but recognize the Thymbra of Homer and Strabo. We paffed near Halil Eli, a fmall Turkifli village, and then by the other village of Tchiblak. The plain, which had hitherto extended below us on the right, now turning eaftward lay before us at our feet. The hills to the left form a a beautiful and gay fcene, covered with verdure and wood. The foil here has loft its marfhy nature, and is rich and fruitful !fi(3wAa£. The river which we had already crofTed in the morn- ing, rolled along at the foot of thefe beautiful hills, which termi*- nate the plain a little above. Beyond this point the courfe of the river is confined between high romantic px'ecipices. Having crofted it we afcended the oppofite hill to the village of Bounar- bachi, where we paffed the night. The morning after this our firft object was to examine the nature of the fotmtains below the village, from which we took the adjoined view. The cold fpring gufhes out from four or five crevices at the foot of the rock, which forms the foreground of this picture. At the fmall diftance here delineated another fpring rifes, which, at the time I was there, - ]" was of confiderable warmth. Its waters are even now received into a marble bafon, like thofe of Homer's Scamander, and in that NOTES. •See Chevalier on the Plain of Troy, p. 102 and 106. On the Rhaeteum and the tomb of Ajax. f November 13, 1794. part ( 9* ) part of the bafon where the water enters, the temperature is fcarcely of lefs heat than that of the warm fpring at Briftol. The Turks who had attended us from Bounarbachi, confirmed the afTertion of Chevalier, that the water was considerably warmer during froft, and {learned very vifibly. If this was the Scaman- der, then the Scosan gate was near the fprings, but I {hall fay more of this, when I come to confider the htuation of the city. After examining what related to the city, we followed the courfe of this ftream, riding along the foot of the hills which bound the plain to the fouth and weft. The warm and cold fprings very foon unite their waters, and roll along in the plain with a beautifully clear current. At the foot of the hills below Erkifliqui, the plain becomes marfhy, and is overgrown with fedges and nifties ; defcending thence into the plain we crofted the Scamander over a bridge, which we had before paffed in coming from Alexandria, The river here after winding through the marfti changes its courfe, and runs down a valley on the left in a perfectly ftraight canal. The ground on each fide of this canal is thrown up, and affords the cleareft conviction of its having been the work of art.* From hence, therefore, guided by Chevalier, we attempted to trace the ancient channel : A winding bed, in which fome water ftill trickles when the Scamander is full, immediately Caught our eye; it is of the fame fize with the adjoining part of the ftream where it branches off, and by following the windings of its banks we arrived foon after at thofe of the larger river, into which it has formerly fallen. At and below the conflux, marfti myrtles, ofters, and aquatic plants, grow in abundance : I have already noticed the NO T E. * See Chevalier, page 24. high i:2&&£i-«&.-i"i H^^^^^HI ___^^^^_| Merigat sculp? < /' ( 93 ) high banks of fand through which the larger river flows : I will add that in fummer this laft is often dry, except where the fea which inundates the marihes flows in at the mouth of it. It is always muddy, and rolls down flones and fragments from the mountains. But the other, notwithftanding fevere rains, was (till, when I faw it, " like chryftal clear," and in fummer its channel is never dry ; a property which, in this climate, might well juftify the epithets of xyXxov iowf, Sec. I own, throughout every part of this defcrip- tion, I cannot recollect any one local expreflion of Homer, which is not accurate at this day, if applied to the fpot I have defcribed. I have already mentioned fome circumftances relative to the 0n the i> ,u: > t!on of J t the City, and of the fituation of the city, about which indeed we find Homer ex- monuments mention- ed asexitling.pjeviout tremely precife. We find in the firfl place that it was fituated t0 the war - near the fources of the Scamander,* at a diflance from the fhips, and in a part of the plain from which the whole of the Grecian f flation could not be properly reconnoitred ; fince Polites trufling to his fkill in running, went for that purpofe to the tomb of iEfyetes, for which there would otherwife have been no necefftty. Speaking of its fituation, % he calls the town Tf mint, the wall flood on uneven and Hoping ground, fince this part of it only is mentioned as being an^ouog, or where the foot of the wall was eafily accefli- ble. A fituation in which all thefe characteriflics fhall agree, can hardly, I think, be contefled by any one. Before I draw the parallel, however, I will mention fome other monuments, defcribed by Homer, as exifling prior to the events of the Iliad. Batieia, or the Sepulchre of Myrinna J was afoarp conical hill, anract xoAokh, and Homer therefore fhews us what were the Sepul- chres of the ancient heroic times. The tomb§ ofiEfyetes we may expect, therefore, to have been a iimilar cone, commanding the view of the coaft, and at fome diftance from the city, yet not fo as to be cut off from it by any part of the Greek army in the plain, N O T E~S. * Homer alfo calls the Citadel in another place " n^ya^u ax s -». the lofty Pergamus." Virgil after him mentions the " Priami Arx alta. the lofty Citadel of Priam." See alfo Horn. II. vi. ver. 297. Odyffey, viii. ver. 504, and feq. •j- Horn. U. vi. ver. 434. — X Horn. II. ii, ver. 811. — § Horn. II. ii, ver. 793. when ( 95 ) ■when drawn upon the banks of the Scamancler, as in the i it Book. This appears from Polites the fon of Priam, being there as a fcout to reconnoitre the naval ftation of the Greeks.* He trailed to his fleetnefs, therefore he was not near the city, and was in a fituation whence he could command a complete view of the lower part of the plain, uninterrupted by any intervening points or hills. The only other monuments that I can find mentioned in Homer, f as exifting previous to the Trojan war, and which might ftill exift, are the tomb of Ilus, and the mound of the plain. The firfl was in the middle of the plain, that is, in the middle between the two fides, for that it was nearer to the fhips than to the city appears from the 8th Book. The Trojans encamped ewi Sfuo-pu iriitoio clofe to the mound J of the plain, which was alfo not far diflant from the Grecian army, as appears from Homer. Mr. Bryant, § entering into a long controverfy, in order to tranflate SfiKr/Aof, /alius, a tract of foreft land, obferves that no army could encamp rm upon fuch a mound as Chevalier defcribes, but he mud be aware || that £?ri means " clofe up to," as well as locally " upon." That this ^ws-.uo? , or mound, was near the tomb of Ilus alfo appears, becaufe the Trojan council was held that night v^cc any-xn Iaz,** N o T E s. * rioSwxEiW/ nmoiQus. Horn. If. ii. ver. 792. f Horn. II. x. ver 414, and paffim. alfo 11. x. 160. lb. xi. 56. and 20. 3. and paffim. J This mound was near the mips. Hem. II. x. ver. 160. § Mr. Bryant's Obfervations, &c. page 9. || Em •sXxIci E,\X»^w. II. v. 36. " On the Banks of the Scamander." * * The tomb of Ilus was very near the ford of the Scamander, as Mercury meets Priam at that ford immediately after pafTing the tomb of Ilus. Horn. II, ii. 3. I 96 ) Noa-fnv a.™ * (pxoi<7|3oj. Mr. Bryant,!" very unfairly, in my opinion, tranflates this " at the tomb of Ilus, apart and at a diftance from the noife of the. campy The words and meaning are " apart from tu- mult" that is, {hut out from interruption, and not one word rela- tive to diftance. For a council to retire to a diftance from an army in order to be free from noife, however common it may be in modern tactics, would I apprehend have hardly been deemed military by Hector or Agamemnon. I {hall now pro- ceed to deicribe the actual ftate of thefe fituations, and {how how many of them may {till be traced in the plain I have defcribed. Returning then to the fources of the fpring at Bounarbachi, let us confider the nature of the ground that rifes above them : A fhort Hope rifes on the eaft, and Bounarbachi ftands on the flat table land above it ; this plain farther eaft terminates at a deep dell, where the larger river (the Simois) enters the lower plain ; on the fouth eaft a pointed and high hill rifes terminated on three fides by high rocks, and the Simois rolls at the foot of thefe under a row of equally ftupendous precipices on the oppohte fide. Now, affuming the propofition that this place was Troy, let us draw the wall that defended it from precipice to precipice ; w< here then have the Acropolis furrovmded by the rocks, down which one part of the council would have precipitated the wooden horfe; below, on the plain round Bounarbachi we {hall have the city, 2V O T E S. * Horn. II. x. ver 415. Mr. Bryant ibid, page 9. f In the eighth Book Heclor withdraws his army and encamps vo&ov wtj/ Ixpiwoi Kpimi ,) a mound of earth, girt with a brcaft work of ftone. Such a mound is feen now in the very lame fituation, and is breaded by a high wall of enormous diamond cut ftone, fimilar in mafonry to the walls of Mycenae, and, like them, evidently a work of the moft remote antiquity. The two tombs of Eurytos and Cteatus, are ftill feen at Cleonae, and that of Minyas at Orchomenos. I could mention many more, but thefe will convince the reader of the accuracy of Paufanias, and will fhew what were the tombs of the heroic ages, in the opinion of Grecian antiquarians. See Paufanias Athe. p. 2. Arcad. p. 239. Corinthian, p. 57. Baltic, p. 311. * For inftance, the names of Henry VIII. Edward VI. or Queen Elizabeth ; or take it higher, | even to William the Conqueror, the impofture would not be borne. f See Chevalier on the Plain of Troy, p. 8 1 . Eflay on Homer's battles in Pope's Iliad, 2d vol. , probability ' ( i°9 ) probability in the Plain of Bounarbachi. A recapitulation of the Iliad would be here unneceflary, and the reader may eafily con- vince himfelf of the truth of the affertion, by turning to the Poem. The events there defcribed coincide completely with the map of the Plain at this day ; except in the diftancc of Troy from the fhore, which, as the plain now ftands, or rather as Mr. Bryant* makes Chevalier ftate it, docs certainly not admit of the events of the day on which Patroclus died. M. Chevalier calls the diilance from Bounarbachi to the fea four leagues, which Mr. Bryant in- terprets twelve miles, and then adds a mile to the citadel, which cer- tainly had nothing to do with events which took place between the Seaman gate and the Ihips ; and the ingenious traveller places that gate below Bounarbachi near the fources of the Scamander. Bclides this M. Chevalier in giving this ftatement of four leagues, conforms only to the rough local computation of four X2f«i or hours from Bounarbachi to Jenichehr : Each of thefe confift of three Turkifh or Italian miles, which are but little more than two miles Englifh ; and when we come to examine the map where there is a fcale of Englifh miles, we find that the diftance from the fources of the Scamander to the Sigaean is there laid down as about nine miles and a half, and indeed this is nearly confonant to the truth. Another circumflance which M. Chevalier takes notice of is, a confiderable accretion of land at the mouth of the Simois, for a proof of which my reader need only look at the drawing of that part of the Plain :f the long low points of flat marfliy ground run- NOTES. * Mr. Bryant's " Obfervations on a Treatife, &c." page i, 2. t See Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 595; Polybius, 1. iv. p. 12. Ee ning 1 ( "0 ) ning forward into the fea fufliciently evince their origin ; and the Simois has this property in common with every river in the country.. We know that formerly the Sigaeum and * Rheteum formed a bay, and (notwithstanding Mr. Bryant's doubts about the Situation of the latter) I fhall endeavour to prove that it was where Chevalier places it. Strabo j" fays exprefsly, that it was contiguous to the tomb of Ajax, and that tomb is, as I have {hewn, fully ascertained. It is true he dates the measurement from promontory to pro-- montory inaccurately, but Pliny reclines it and agrees per- fectly with M. Chevalier. When Solinus J reprefents it as forty ftadia, the difference probably arofe from the meafure of th ftadium. It is alfo evident that before the accretion of land in the Plain, this fhore formed a Bay. Drawing then a line fo as. ftill to make it one, we fhall find that from the Scaean gate to. the mouth of the united rivers, was probably not more than feven or eight miles. If we conhder alfo how much of this fpace§ was; occupied by the armies, when drawn up in the Plain we fhall not think it fo very hyperbolical, that large bodies of men fhould ad one time be fighting near the fhips, and at another almoft up to the town. Moft of the heroes alfo are reprefented a& chacing the enemies about the Plain in chariots, and I will add. that a lefs fpace than that which is here allotted will hardly be] fufficient for the various manoeuvres which Homer recounts, if NO T E S. * Mr. Bryant's " Obfervations on a Treatife, &c." p. 4. — f Strabo. loc. fuprac X Plin. Hiftor. Natur. 1. v. ch. 33. § It mult be obferved that the diftance from the city to the antient confluence was probably about feven miles, and from thence to the more, was in Homer's time only about fix ftadia., accord- ing to Strabo. Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 598. we ( III ) we only confider the numbers of each army. Hector,* it feems, fent after the battle, on the day preceding the death of Patroclus, forprovifions from Troy, and kept his army under arms in the Plain ; fuppofing Troy then to have been at fix or feven miles diftance, it is very poffible that the provifions would arrive in three or four hours ; but if Troy had been much nearer to the Grecian tents, the encamp- ment of the Trojan army would have been very ufelefs^as the town would have commanded the naval ftation nearly as well. Strabo gives his whole account from Demetrius, and with refpect to the I itive fituation of Troy, is never therefore a decifive authority. I He doubts fome of the facts, which he relates from hear-fay, and is in contradiction repeatedly with Pliny and other refpectable authorities. But the fprings of the Scamander are fo plainly pointed out ; the ground-plan of the city, and the rocks of the Acropolis afford fuch decifive proof of the fituation of Troy ; that when in addition to thefe facts I confider the marks of building ftill feen in the form of the hill, I can entertain no reafonable doubt but that this was the fituation alluded to by Homer. Much has alfo been faid on the pofition of the camp. Cheva- lier and others make the Sigaean and Rhetean promontories the - boundaries of their camp, tlnis confounding the flations of Achilles and Ajax with the fituation of their tombs. That the tomb of the firft was not far from his flation, we know from the Gdyffey.j" Suppofing, therefore, the camp on this fide to be flank- ed with the promontory under which his tomb is feen, it is pro- bable that the mouth of the river formed the other boundary ; NOTES: * Horn. II. viii. ver. 505. — f Horn. Odyfl". 24. ver. 80. and ( 112 ) and this will account for the fthutnefs * of the Grecian quarten fmce the mips could not all be drawn along the fhore in one line and Agamemnon's voice might be almoft heard from the centre to the two extremities. Indeed we find that the allies of the Trojans were in the night encampeu wap «Ao t on the fea fhore, but this could not happen if the Grecian camp occupied the whole of it ; the junction of the rivers and the tomb of Ilus were very near the camp, fo near that the Grecians could hear the noifes froi Hector's pofition, when he kept his men under arms in the Plain^ This fuppofition alfo obviates an objection of Mr. Bryant's with regard to the Simois and f Scamander running through the camp '{' but indeed the rivers are of that nature, that there is no occanoii to have recourfe to fuch an expedient. On the topography of the Plain, as de- ferred by the later "writers of antiquity. If in addition to the teftimony of Homer we examine the collateral evidence of other ancient writers, it will feem to ftrengthen his authority, and will completely fhew the accuracy] of the adjoined map. Pliny \ coming from the fouth along the •coaft, arrives at Alexandria, then at Nee, "then at Scamander a na«] vigable flream, and then at Sigeum a town on the Sigaaan promon- tory, then at the port of the Grecians, into which flowed Xanthus joined with the Simois, making firft a marfli, and now called NOTES. * This is a conjecture it will be faid ; be it fo, if it is uncontradicted by Homer, and if the£ fuppofitions that make the camp of greater extent arc not equally favourable to his account, the conje&ure will at lead fhew the poffibility of his being accuiate, and will obviate the objection arifing from fuch inconfiftency. f Bryant's " Obfervations on a Treatife, &c." p. 6, 7. X Plinii Natur. Hid. 1. v. cap. 30. Troadis primus locus Hamaxitus dein Cebrenia, ipfaque Troas, Antigonia ditta, nunc Alexandria, Colonia Romanorum, oppidum Nee, Scamander amnit tiavigabdis, & in promontorio quondam Sigsum oppidum. Dein portus Achxoium in quern itiiluit Xanthu; Simoenti jundlus, Sugnumque piius faciens Palas-Scamander, &c. the ( H3 ) he Old Scamancler ; beyond this creek are the fhores of Rhe- eum, then Rheteum, Dardanus, and Arifba." We find therefore hat the new and old channel of the Scamander were known to 'liny, and that the new channel was navigated, which will account "or its formation ; and it probably was ufed near its mouth as a :anal from New Ilium or Sigseum to that part of the fhore. Ptolemy, who does not mention the new channel of the Scaman- ler, mentions thefe places in the following order, and is alfo thus j-uoted by Mr. Bryant himfelf ; coming from the north he enume- ■ a tesDardanum,Simoeis,Scamander,Sigxum,*Alexandria,LecT:um; jut thefe correfpond precifely with our defcription ; and indeed ve fhall find that all the difference between ancient authors arofe rom the new mouth of the Scamander, and that this fingle cir- rumltance cleared up, all the obfcurity is removed. ByStrabo, that is by Strabo's informer, the Scamander of Homer 'eems not to have been known, and indeed this is to be accounted or in the fame manner ; fince prepoffeffed with the idea, that the jiimois and Scamander of Homer muft unite their waters, he pur- Iued the greater flream into the mountains, and then from its name .t the mouth, concluded this the Scamander,"f" and calls it fo, not- i vithftanding he owns that it had not the characteristics mention- id in Homer. Notwithstanding this, at other times Strabo places the Scamander and Simois both in the Plain jj and feems Is if he considered the leffer flream to be the Simois. Indeed he .jnakes the two rivers join near New Ilium, and no ftreams but NOTES. * Ptolemy Geog. p. 137. Bryant's Obfervations, &c. p. jr. f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 602. — t Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 597, 598. F f thofe ( i« ) thole here defcribed, can be meant by Strabo in this paffage. The confufion refuking from this is inextricable, and fhews plainly that he had not been there in perfon. But Ave find that in his days mod of the monuments of Homer flill exifled, and were pointed out in this Plain ;* the Erineos or place of wild fig- trees, the Sepulchres of iEfyetes, Batieia, and Ilus. The Callicolone alfo was feen in his time, and retained its name. The naval flation, Naujlathmus, was fhewn alfo ; and he argues from its fituation, with great juflice, that New Ilium was not on the fite of ancient Troy. We may alfo learn the flate of the Plain from another paffage. He fays New Ilium was near the conflux of the rivers, and in his time twelve fladia diflant from the fea. The con- flux is now at a much greater diflance, and Strabo f adds, that of thefe twelve fladia, we ought to deduct half; fince the whole of this part of the Plain is formed by the rivers ; fo that it feems the diflance of the conflux from the fhore is eflimated by Strabo,^ at fix fladia in the time of Homer, and it is now about fixteen or feventeen. He alfo mentions the tomb and temple of Aj ax, near the Rhetean promontory on the edge of a fandy fhore. The fepulchre of Achilles and temple in honour of him were fitu-; ated on the Sigasan ;§ alfo the monuments of Antilochus and. Patroclus ; at which fhrines the Ilians facrificed. Strabo alfo feems to have been mifled by the confufion which the new mouth of the Scamander occafioned ; for in the furvey of the coafl he mentions Sigazum || next to Rheteum, and then the naval flation, and the camp of the Greeks, the Stoma limne, and mouth NOTES. Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 597, 598 — f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 598. — J; Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 595. § Strabo, 1. xiii p. 595, 596. — 1| Ibid ibidem. of ( "S ) of the Scamander. But all thefe objects were between the two pro- montories, and the miftake has arifen from the mouth of Scamander being changed, and Strabo not being fo well informed as Pliny of the diftinction of the Old and New Scamander (Palas Scamander). In another place, however, he feems to have been better informed of the fituation of the Plain. " For," fays he, " the Simois and ! Scamander forming a junction in the Plain, bring down a quantity 1 of mud, and heap up the more, 8cc. — But the length of this JJjore (tt:? irctfaxia; t«i1»i?) from the Rhetean to the Sigaean promontory is • fixtv ftadia." In this paffage Strabo evidently places the confluence 'and the mouth of the two rivers between the promontories men- tioned. Here then Strabo is directly contrary to the hypothefis -which I combat; and the paflage is perfectly correfpondent to the i geography of the Plain of Bournabachi. The paflage in which the places along the coaft are mentioned, is poflibly corrupted there- ! fore by tranfcribers,. and indeed few ancient authors have been handed down to us in a more imperfect condition than Strabo. At the mouth of the Old Scamander, Pliny informs lis that a fmall village flood called Scamandria, * which had a port ; and Ilium immune or New Ilium flood a Roman mile and a half higher up, that is, as near as can be, twelve ftadia. Here then we ! have a confirmation of Strabo, who fays that New Ilium was exactly twelve ftadia from the fhore in his time ; being near the con- flux of the rivers, as we have fccn above; and to this town Scaman- dria was probably a kind of harbour. Strabo, therefore by no NO TE. • Pliny Natur. Hift. Eft tamen et nunc Scamandria civitas parva, & 1500 paff. remotum a portu Ilium immune. means ( "6 ) means miftook Scamandria for New Ilium, as has been faid by fome.* Nor did Pliny authorife us to confider his New Ilium, as the fame with Strabo's Pagus Men/mm, which he places at thirty ftadia or about three miles and a half higher ftill. Here Strabof imagined Troy might be found, but there is nothing in the Plain that can favour fuch a fuppofition, and his means of judging were defective, fince he only ipeaks from hearfay. So far the geographers inform us concerning the fituation and (late of the Plain in their time. In former ages we find it alfo men- tioned by the hiftorians ; and firft in Herodotus.^ In the route by which the army of Xerxes marched to Abydos, is included the Troad. There is a paffage in this author which has much per- plexed Mr. Chevalier ; he fays Xerxes marching from Antandros, palTed Mount Ida on the left hand Is a^a-r^h x i k u -> w hich Mr. Cheva- lier would willingly tranflate "on the left branch of the mountain," but the words will fcarcely bear that interpretation. Mr. Bryant remarks very juftly, that according to Homer, Gargarus was the Ida xxt ^ojcii/, and this was the name of it in Herodotus ; it was considered as the fummit of Ida, and therefore whoever pafled it on the left hand, paffed Ida on the left. Such was the route of Xerxes. § When the army arrived at the Scamander, having not met NO T E s. * See a Review of Mr. Bryant's publication. Britifh Critic, No. 50. f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 597. J Herod. 1. v. cap. 93. J. vii. cap. 42. quoted in Chevalier's Uefcription, &c. p. 42. § "Eri Tslov J» tov ■B-o'Lt^on us aipixtli Sf'afnj is lo nfia/j-ti T\i$ yxyM ati&ri <;xtf9» ix u ' QiviaaoQai. iir.crxoi*»:s oi xj vuOo/Atvof Xf/wm tx3r«> "li ]aSw«<»i 1» 'IX/«o» tOtm &ns ^iXia-s. x oas " "' f-'^f" to~ot v^ao-i IxizjTo. Herod, vii. 42. Xerxes afcended from the Scamander to the Pergamus of Priam; he there facrificed to Minerva Ilias, and to the manes of the heroes. The Peigamus of Priam, ( ii7 ) met with a river nace they left Sardes, they cxbaujled its Jlream y which did not fuffice to the men and cattle ; this ihews the fize of it, and alfo the nature, for they did not drink at Simois, which was a muddy troubled torrent. Xerxes being come to that river, afcended to the Pergamus of Priam to view the place. When the army marched away, they left Rheteum, Ophryneum, and Dar- danus, on their left, and the Gergethes andTeucri on their right ; i.e. inland. This quotation I have mentioned, though given in Che- valier, fmce the route I have marked out, appears to me to agree en- tirely with that of a perfon coming from Antandros, and obviates the objection arifing from the fituation of Ida. The vifit paid by Alexander to the tombs is related by Freinfhemius in his appendix to Q\_Curtius,* who tranfcribed it originally from Arrian. This account is given us with gr^at detail in the work of ;Chcvalier. Q\_Curtius himfelf abridges it, for he fays, that Alexan- der,'! having offered feveral different facrifices, more particularly venerated the tomb of Achilles, and declared him the happiefl of men, who had fuch a poet as Homer to celebrate his praifes. Lucan \ makes Caefar penetrate into theTroad, but this fact is not mentioned in his own Commentaries ; the authority of the poet is therefore NOTES. 'riara was different from the New Ilium w hich never went by that name. Did another Perga- ms exift in Egypt ? or where are we to look for it, if not where Xerxes found it on the banks of he Scamander ? It was then under the protection of Minerva Ilias ; a ftrong fuggeflion that this ortrefs was once Ilium ; and it is incumbent alfo on Mr. Bryant to prove tnat Minerva was im- orted here after the Trojan war, fince he will not allow her to have been at that lime a Deity f Phrygia. * Arrian. I. p. 3Z. Alexander alfo facrificed 'A0»)va t5, I*/«Si " to the Ilian Minerva," to riam, and to Achilles whofe tomb he crowned. f Q^Curt. 1. ii. ch. 4. — J Lucan Pharfal. 1. ix, vex. 960 etfeq. G g doubtful, ( ix8 ) doubtful, but it tends at leaft to fhew Lucan's opinions on this fub~ ject. His defcription of the Plain I have already fet down at length. All thefe accounts, and many other lefs important, appear in the ftrongeft manner to confirm the identity of the Plain, and of the monuments found in it. That they agree with Homer's account has been lhewn in the foregoing parts of this work. We here fee that all the Geographers of Antiquity who have come down to us, agree alfo as much as we can expect:; and that we can account for J the difference that has arifen amongft them from particular locafcrn circumftances, which therefore corroborate their accounts in ge-.J?i neral. Other quotations are cited by Chevalier already, and ftilllj more might be collected, but thofe I have fet down are fufficient J to prove the facts, and are unfliaken by any contradictory teftimony. Recapitulation. Having in the firft part of this work endeavoured to prove th pofBbility of Homer's two poems, containing hiftorical facts, have proceeded in the fecond part to prove, that they really di fo. I have lhewn that Homer gives a very detailed account of t fituation of the Plain of Troy, and both from M. Chevalier's wori and the teftimony of what I myfelf have feen, have lhewn that there is a Plain in that fituation, and that no other exifts which can have the fliadow of a claim to rivality. I have lhewn many Jo; circumftances illuftrative of the nature of the Plain, and alfo that it had two rivers which are rather particularly defcribed ; and that in thefe circumftances the fituation I had afligned is exactly fuch as previous to the finding it we Ihould have expected to find fro the account given us in Homer. I have lhewn that Homer me: tions feveral objects as exifting before the Trojan war, as well as the city of Troy' j that the fituations of thefe are very minutely defcribed, and ( "9 ) and that in this Plain there are fituations which agree with them in the moft minute particulars, and that traces of many of them are to be feen at this day ; the form and fituation of the tombs of fome of the heroes are mentioned by Homer, and it is mentioned that there were others of which the topography is not particularized. Tombs of that form we fee do flill remain in this plain, and where Homer has fpecified the place we there find them ; we alfo find others which are not fpecified. Referring to a map of the Plain, we find that the battles and events recorded by Homer, have every where an aflignable place in it. And laftly, to the teftimony [of Homer I have added that of fome of the ancient Geographers Hid Hiftorians of the greateft credit, and have fhewn that their iteitimonies uniformly coincide with his, and that their differences wife from a real change in the topography of this plain, which lerefore was certainly the fituation where they all fought for the races of the Iliad. The inference from hence, is therefore, either lat the events recorded did really happen, or that Homer adapted le whole of his hiftory with the greateft accuracy, to a real fcene. That the latter was not the cafe is what I fhall endeavour to prove the few pages which remain.. As I have already fhewn that we have no rational ground to Proofs from the i«n v 1 n_ c 1 ti - i r ' r l r • internal evidence of (iilbeheve the ltory of the Iliad, lo in many parts of the foregoing the n.ad, and from iti 1 • J 1 r 1 c I • • • i the authority of anci- ivork I have hinted at the reaions we have for ranking it with em writers, .» favour Hiftory. Turning back to Mr. Bryant's firfl chapter, I will ro^ rea '" y ° epeat his own conceflions : "Tn the defcription of the fiege and lifthe great events with which it was attended, the poet," (fays he) " is very particular and precife. The fituation of the city is pointed out as well as the camp of the Grecians, &c. &c. fo that the [ery landfcape prefents itfelf to the eye of the reader. Hence the fjholefeems attended with the greateft appearance of truth. The poet alfo ( 120 ) alfo in many parts of this work, introduces incidentally, part events as well known. He alludes to the arrival of Memnon, and to the death of his father Antilochus by that hero. He fpeaks of Pyrrhus as fucceeding to Achilles, &c. &c. All thefe cafual refe- \ rences feem to have been portions of a traditional hiftory, well known in the time of Homer, and as they are introduced almofl undesignedly, they are attended with a great femblance of truth. | For fuch incidental and partial intimations are feldom to be found in romance or fable." Having fliewn the futility of all Mr. Bryant's objections, and by confequence the reafonablenefs of thefe conceflions, the in-.l ference from them will follow of courfe. But the air of truth [ with which the Iliad is written, is by no means the only proof of its veracity. When we examine the different traditions pre- i ferved to us by other Authors, we find a great many varying ac-l counts of thefe times, evidently independent of Homer and of each- > other ; fome containing additional circumflances, and fome con- f tradicting different parts of his narration. All of them, however agree in the general outline, and their difference arifes from a portion of them being configned to futurity by the authentic and unaltered writings of Homer, and the reft being handed down to the later ages -of Greece by uncertain and varying traditions. Of thefe traditions I have mentioned two or three ; one was found by Herodotus,* recorded as a well-known fact in Mr. Bryant's; i favourite feminaries, the colleges of the Egyptian Priefls ; Straboj:.! informs us of another which prevailed among the people of ^ NO T E S. * Herod. 1. 2. ch. 117.- f Strabo, 1. xiii. p. 607. Scepfis. ( *« ) Scepfis. In the firft chapter of Herodotus,*" we find another pre- valent amongfl the Perfians, and the people of Alia, who dated their hoftility to the Greeks from this event, and give an account of prior tranfacKons reprefenting the Greeks as the aggrefTors. Of the Grecian traditions I take no notice ;f their altars to the heroes, their local memorials, their feftivals and games alluhve to the war of Troy, would fill a volume, and are too well known to require illuflration here. Add to thefe the united teftimony of Ana and Egypt ; where Herodotus in perfon was made acquainted with this part of their annals ; and it muft be owned, that no hiftorical event was ever fupported by a ftronger concurrence of traditional evidence. Let us next recollect the fuccemon of events which took place before, during, and after the war of Troy ; and we fhall find that to- gether with Homer, Mr. Bryant's hypothefis annihilates the whole of the early hiflory of Greece. Before the war we are acquainted with moft of the heroes, their birth, defcent, and intermarriages : Thus Agamemnon and Menelaus marry two fitters, the daughters of Tyndarus, and rule over Mycenae and Sparta. Uiyffes marries Penelope the daughter of Icarius ; and traditions, and monuments relative to thefe fads, and a hundred fimilar to them, were found in the country of Sparta, Ithaca, and Argolis. We know independent of thefiege the private hiftoryof all the great families of Greece dur- ing this time ; many of thefe are flightly alluded to by Homer, and are preferved by other Authors. Thus, Clytemneftra and iEgiale ! plotted againft their hufbands during their abfence ; Penelope and NOTES. * Herod. 1. i. c. i.— f See Paufanias, &c. pafTmi. H h Telemachus ( t*2 ) Teleniachus were opprefTed by enemies till the return of Ulyfles : Pyrrhus was educated at Scyros by his mother's father, till he fuc* ceeded to the command and honours of Achilles ; and different ftories of this fort all connected with the Iliad, and preferved by other means, ihew that it contains only a few links of the great chain of events, which Homer's hands have preferved from the ruft that covers the reft. After the Iliad, we know the lot of the heroes,* we know the conduct of their wives and children : Greecs weakened by her dear-earned victory, and torn by internal diifen- tions, faw all her thrones overturned by the return of the Heraclida*. Thus we have at once a regular feries of events, of which no part can be annihilated without affecting the credibility of the whole of hiftory, and the united teftimony of the ancient world. To thefe evidences I will only add the almoft univerfal con- currence of the ancient Authors, to whom I place references at the end of this work. We find almoft every poet from Hefiod downward, mentioning this event ; we find it recorded in every hiftorian who treats of the times. Herodotus, Thucydides, Dio- dorus, give it their unanimous fanction. The geographers ac- knowledge the places mentioned to exift, and Strabo's whole book is a commentary on the poet. The philofophers and critics have never looked upon the ftory as fabulous. Men of fcience and judgment in all ages have paid the fame homage to Homer's veracity ; and Alexander, by facrificing at the tomb of Achilles, fhewed in what light his tutor Ariftotle had taught him to con- lider the Iliad. The reader, who will examine the references I make to ancient Authors, will foon convince himfelf of their NOTE. * Forinftance; The particulars of the murder of Pyrrhus by Oreftes, that of Clytemneftra, the fufferings of Elettra and Iphigenia, &c. all which are the frequent theme of the Greek tragedians truth; ( 123 ) truth ; and his mind will probably fuggeft to him many more ; but thefe are fufEcient to eftablifh my affertion. Therefore fup- pofing the ftory falfe, Homer adapted it not only to the plain, but to the names, characters, and collateral hiftory of the times ; and what is more extraordinary, to the traditions of Aha, Egypt, and different parts of the world, which traditions were difcovered by Herodotus; not to mention the prophetic fpirit which he mufthave had to adapt himfelf to many collateral {lories, brought into light by Authors who lived long after him. Nothing but acknowledging the truth can extricate us from this perplexed labyrinth of abfur- dity ; nothing more remains for me to prove. To thofe who have never doubted the veracity of Homer, I may perhaps have afforded fome fatisfaction, by the teftimony I have given in his favour from the actual ftate of the Plain. From thofe, who-, without being aware of the whole merits of the caufe, had placed an implicit con- fidence in the well-deferved fame of Mr. Bryant, I have perhaps - removed fome prejudices. If either as a witnefs, or as an advocate I have been the means of throwing additional light on this cele- brated part of Ancient Hiftory ; as this only has been my inten- tion, the candid reader will make allowances for the manner in which I have executed it, . »w,$\\VVfcV*$M« Authors who mention Troy as a real Place in Phrygia, Hcfiod "£fy» k, yi/j-igxi. 1. i. ver. 163. et paflim. Pindar Olymp. ii. Stroph. v. et paflim. OJymp. ix. Antiftr. iii. Olymp. x. Ep. i. &c. &c. Tryphiodorus IXib aXma-is This author v as .:n Egyptian. Callimachus as Xur^a. ™ VlxXXxlns. vei 18. et paflim. The Librarian of Alexandria. jEfchylus, Sophocles, Euripides, pifiuu Se< igmemnon, Philo&etes, Troades, &c. &c. &c, . Lycophron. AXt^xv^x paflim. This Autiior wrote in Egypt. Apollonius Rhodius. Librarian of Alexati Iria Syagrius, Phantafia, Daphne, Diftys Cietarfis, Dares Phrygius, Helena, authors who lived before Homer, according to Mr. Bryant himfelf, and two of them Egyptians as he (T-:ts. .■Efchines. Demolthenis Demofthenis mirapios Kayos, p. 1 392. 1. ii. Oratores Gneci. Edit. Reiflc. Lefches, the author of the little Iliad, from which Sophocles took his Philoftetes, " quern ante Terpandrum vixiffe ait Clemens Alexandrinus." p. 333. Tyrwhit. notes de re Poetica. Proclus. Fragment, publiflied by Mr. Tyrwhit. Note on Ariftotle de re Poetic. Sec. 33. It is a Synopfis of a Poem, mentioned by Herodotus and Ariilotle, t« xwgcc, and the fubjeft is the Rape of Helen, &c. therefore Ariftotle, the x-jirf<« and Proclus are all on myfide. Theocritus Idyll, xxii. ver. 214. et paffim. Coluthus irigi "LXims a^Tixyw. Herodotus, Thucydides, Diodorus, Strabo, Paufanias, Arrian, Ariftotle, are quoted already in this work; the Arundel marbles and chronological writers are alfo cited. Dionys. Halicarnafl". p. 27. ver. 9. p. 49. ver. 25. et paffim. Of Latin Authors. Livy derives Rome from Phrygia, which if wrong, ftill argues his belief in the groundwork of the ftory. After him Virgil, Ovid, Horace, Catullus, Tibullus, Propertius, Valerius Flaccus, Petruvius, Q^Curtius, Statius, Lucretius, Lucan, &c. &c. &c. In fhort on every fide " C'eft 1'embarras des richefles," and the authorities I have given areas conclufive as if I multiplied quotations ■tenfold. Writers who difbelieved the Tale of Troy entirely. Anaxagoras. This Philofopher born in the 70th Olympiad, and quoted by Diogenes Laertius, t the firft Sceptic on the fubjecl. Metrodorus apud. Diog. Laert. and Hefych. Tatian. Aflyr. p. 262. his Contemporary. A Perfon in Athenaeus. Athen. 1. xii. p. j 10. of whom we know nothing. Bafil Magnus -w%os ras nas. An Author of the lower ages of the Roman Empire. Mr. Bryant, A. D. 1796. The only author who places it in Egypt. His authority on " 1 imagine." Bryant, p. 62. ERRATA. "Page 69. Notes. Line 5, for Helen, read Homer. Page 7 1 . Laft line, for ExEirpior, read 2-x.ttpws . Page 81. Line 5, for EXAw iroW, read LK\r>s itmhs. Page 85. Line 13, for oirt^ms, read 0/ Ie^jvos. Page 90. Line 2, for ugiatgx, read a^z^x. Page 102. Laft line but one, for aavh, read «riJ.-. IS4-0 9^-Q> \S ^-^ 90-G >S42-\ THEGETTY CENTER 96>"5 I 5 4 2- 5 UBRMtt XT' Wt •- ^H ■ ' .2/^m