Troy is the most literary of archaeological sites: the mound of Hisarlık, rising above the plain near the southern entrance to the Dardanelles, holds some 4,000 years of superimposed cities — among them, most scholars believe, the Bronze Age citadel behind Homer’s Iliad. Heinrich Schliemann’s excavations here from 1870 are widely seen as a starting point of modern archaeology, and the site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1998.
At a glance
The mound of Hisarlık overlooks the Turkish Aegean coast a few kilometres from the southern entrance to the Dardanelles — a position commanding the sea route between the Aegean and the Black Sea, which goes far to explain the city’s long life and repeated destructions. Archaeologists distinguish nine principal cities stacked one upon another, from Troy I in the Early Bronze Age, around 3000 BCE, to Troy IX, the Greek and Roman city of Ilion.
UNESCO inscribed the site in 1998 for its immense significance in understanding the early development of European civilisation, and for the profound influence Troy has exerted on the arts for more than two millennia through Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid.
Key facts
- Location: the mound of Hisarlık, Çanakkale Province, north-western Turkey, near the southern entrance to the Dardanelles
- Occupation: nine principal layers, Troy I to Troy IX, spanning roughly 3000 BCE to the Roman period
- Homeric candidates: the fortified cities of Troy VI and Troy VIIa are the layers most often identified with the Troy of the Iliad
- Excavations: begun by Heinrich Schliemann in 1870 and continued, with interruptions, by successive international teams ever since
- Priam’s Treasure: the gold hoard Schliemann unearthed in 1873 and smuggled out of Ottoman Turkey
- Heritage status: UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed 1998 under criteria (ii), (iii) and (vi)
History
Troy grew, burned and was rebuilt many times over. The earliest walled settlement rose around 3000 BCE, and by the later third millennium Troy II was a citadel wealthy enough to leave behind the gold that Schliemann would one day mistake for the treasure of King Priam. The city of Troy VI, with its fine limestone walls and towers, was the most imposing of the sequence; its successor, Troy VIIa, shows signs of violent destruction around the twelfth century BCE — the layer an American expedition from the University of Cincinnati identified as the likeliest setting for the war remembered in the Iliad. Hittite documents mentioning a city called Wilusa are read by many scholars as referring to this same place.
Greek settlers later knew the site as Ilion, and the Romans — who traced their origins to the Trojan prince Aeneas — favoured it as Ilium. The city faded in late antiquity, and its very location became a matter of legend until the nineteenth century.
Schliemann began digging at Hisarlık in 1870, convinced that Homer’s Troy lay at the bottom of the mound. His great trench through the centre of the site destroyed much that later archaeology would have prized, but his finds — above all the 1873 hoard he named Priam’s Treasure, published in Troy and Its Remains in 1874 — made the site world-famous and helped found archaeology as a public science. The treasure itself, taken to Berlin against the terms of his Ottoman permit, was removed from the city at the end of the Second World War and later resurfaced in Moscow, where it remains — one of the most contested antiquities in the world.
What you see
The site rewards slow reading. A marked circuit leads around and across the mound, where the cut of Schliemann’s trench exposes the layered cities in section — bands of wall, floor and burnt debris from different millennia visible in a single face of earth. The most substantial standing remains are the sloping limestone walls and towers of Troy VI, including the well-preserved eastern gate area.
From the Hellenistic and Roman city, the sanctuary area and the small theatre (odeon) survive near the entrance. The large wooden horse that greets visitors at the gate is a modern replica — a nod to the stratagem of Odysseus rather than an archaeological find.
The Troy Museum, opened in October 2018 some 800 metres from the site at Tevfikiye, displays thousands of finds from Troy and the surrounding region in a striking weathering-steel building, and is the essential companion to the ruins themselves.
Practical information
- Access: the archaeological site and the Troy Museum are ticketed separately; a visit to both comfortably fills half a day
- Base: the city of Çanakkale, about 30 km to the north, is the usual base for visiting Troy and the Gallipoli battlefields
- Official information: check the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism museum pages (muze.gov.tr) for current visiting arrangements
Getting there
Troy lies in Çanakkale Province in north-western Turkey. From Çanakkale, the site is about half an hour south by road, with local minibuses and taxis making the run; Çanakkale itself is reachable from Istanbul by intercity bus or by air. GPS: 39.9573, 26.2390.
Nearby
- Troy Museum (Troya Müzesi) — 800 metres from the site at Tevfikiye, the modern museum of the Troad’s archaeology
- Çanakkale — the provincial capital on the Dardanelles, about 30 km north
- Gallipoli battlefields — the First World War memorials of the Gallipoli peninsula, across the Dardanelles
- Alexandria Troas — the ruins of a large Hellenistic and Roman port city to the south, visited twice by St Paul
Sources
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre — Archaeological Site of Troy (ref. 849)
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Troy; Heinrich Schliemann; Priam’s Treasure
- Troy Museum / Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism
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