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The Story Behind Homer's Epics The false assumption that Troy and the Trojan War was waged near Hissarlik in Asia Minor (Turkey), where no traces of the Trojan war are found, dates back to the eighth century BC when the first Greeks settled on Turkey's west coast. The Greeks did not know that the Trojans who once lived in that area were migrants, as the collective memory of this fact was lost during the Dark Ages (1200-750 BC).
The great migrations of the second millennium BC brought the Achaeans, Troy's enemies, from regions along the Atlantic coast of the Continent to the Mediterranean where they caused the collapse of many civilisations. The name 'Achaeans' means 'Watermen' or 'Sea People' (the Gothic 'acha' for 'water' or 'stream' is cognate with Latin 'aqua'). The Greek historian Herodotus (fifth century BC) confirms that Pelasgians ('Sea Peoples') had settled in Greece long before his time. They founded Athens, renamed places, merged with the local population and adopted their language.
The transfer of place-names naturally led to the belief that the events described in the epics took place in Greece and the Mediterranean and that the Achaeans were Greeks. In this way, the origin of the Trojans and Achaeans was forgotten while the reality behind the Iliad and the Odyssey was lost as well. The purpose of the book Where Troy Once Stood (September 2009 edition now available expanded and revised - see below) is simply to tell that lost story, the real story behind Homer's epics. Professor Sir Moses Finley (Ancient History - Cambridge Click here ) expreses the view that the weight of evidence made it clear that Troy and the Trojan War did not occur in the Greek and Turkish setting. Professor P H Damste (Speech & Language pathology) author of "Concentric Man" Click here takes the view (short summary): " Valuable knowledge is to be discovered about the people of the Northwest European coast around 1200 BC, how they navigated the oceans and a great war between the Kings of continental Europe and the Trojan king in England who held a monopoly of tin-mining in Cornwall. Such information is encoded in the Iliad and Odyssey. " The methodology of the research on Troy is explained in the author's lecture to the "Herodoteans", Classical Society of the University of Cambridge (UK) held on 26th May 1992, entitled "The Trojan Kings of England" this has been made available on the internet by emeritus Professor P.H. Damste, to view this lecture Click here or updated version Click here
Receive a Free sample of the Authors Outstanding work Just provide your email address below and we will immediately send you absolutely free Part II Chapter 1 of the revised edition of Where Troy Once Stood by Iman Jacob Wilkens, which was originally part of the author's 400 page book, first published in the UK by Random Century (1990 hardcover; 1991 paperback) and in the US by St Martin's Press (1991 hardcover). The second (revised) Dutch language edition of "Where Troy Once Stood" was published by Bosch & Keuning in 1999 and available in Holland and Belgium, but currently out of print. Contact address:
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