When Was Troy Discovered?

A self-taught German archeologist, Heinrich Schliemann, excavated an area near Dardanelles,Turkey in 1870 and declared he had found the city of Troy. His claims were taken with a pinch of salt back then, but now many experts believe in his theories.

Many famous Greek works such as the Iliad and Odyssey mention about the city of Troy and an epic war, famous as the ‘Trojan War’, that took place there around the 12th century or 13th century BC. Although, archeologists confirm the existence of Troy; whether the war really took place or not is still disputable.
The story of the Trojan War goes like this: A prince of Troy named Paris, on a diplomatic mission to the kingdom of Sparta, falls in love with Helen the queen of Sparta. Both elope to Troy. Menelaus, the king of Sparta, is out to attend the funeral of his uncle when the incident occurs. He is furious on finding out what has happened. His brother and other kings come to the aid of Menelaus. They attack the city of Troy and the war lasts for ten years. Unable to defeat Troy in a direct battle, the Greeks play a game. They leave the battle field, leaving behind a wooden horse. The Trojans are duped into believing that the Greeks have accepted defeat and have left the wooden horse as a token of victory to the Trojans. The Trojans pull the horse into the city and celebrate their win over the Greeks, not realizing that about a dozen Greek soldiers are hidden in the horse. As night falls, the hidden soldiers come out and set the whole city afire. More Greek soldiers return to the battlefield and Troy falls. A few surviving Trojans are left looking for a new home as the victorious Greeks set off on their journey back home.

Wilhelm Dörpfeld, a German architect, and Carl William Blegen, an American archeologist, showed that Troy was built and destroyed several times in the past. They found nine cities layered over each other. Recent excavations by the teams from the Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Germany and the University of Cincinnati, in the United States, under the guidance of Manfred Osman Korfmann, a German archeologist, have found scattered evidence that a battle did take place during the 12th or the 13th century BC, but nothing can be said with certainty till now.

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