In what manner the city was actually taken is nowhere upon record; for as to the story of the wooden horse, it is so absurd, that the judgment even of Virgil may be arraigned in respect to it. That it was burned, however, is scarcely to be denied; and that it was destroyed is not to be doubted. The event occurred in the year coinciding with that of 1184 before the Christian era. “The name of Priam,” says a judicious writer, “will therefore ever be memorable, on account of the war which happened in his reign—a war famous to this day for the many princes of great prowess and renown concerned in it, the battles fought, the length of the sieges, the destruction of the city, and the endless colonies planted in divers parts of the world by the conquered as well as by the conquerors.”
When the Greeks had destroyed the city, they sailed back to their own country. They made no attempt to appropriate the land to their own use or authority. They were, doubtless, not only wearied, but exhausted, by the conquest. The whole plot of Virgil is supposed to be no other than a fable; for Homer signifies that Æneas not only remained in the country, but that he succeeded to the sceptre of the Trojans.
From this period the history of the country is exceedingly obscure. Whether Æneas did succeed or not, certain it is that this and the adjacent countries were laid open, at no great distance of time from the destruction of Troy, an easy and tempting prey to adventurers, Greek as well as Barbarian. Among these, the best known are the Æolian colonists, who are supposed to have put a final period not only to the unfortunate city, but to the name of its people.
The Troia was next invaded by the Ionians and Lydians; then there was a war between the Æolians and Athenians about Sigéum[284] and Achilléum[285]. This war was of considerable duration. Several melancholy circumstances are there related, as arising out of the possession of the Troia by Darius. Xerxes, too, visited it during his expedition into Greece, and the Persians lay one night encamped beneath Mount Ida. A considerable number of them were destroyed by thunder and lightning; and on their coming to the Scamander, that river was found to possess no water; a circumstance far from being unusual in a mountainous country. On his arrival at this river, Xerxes, having a wish to see the Pergamus of Priam, went thither; and, having listened to the accounts which were given to him in respect to it, he sacrificed a thousand oxen to the Ilian Minerva.
Many interesting occurrences are related of Troia during the first and second Peloponnesian wars. An adventure of Æschines, the famous orator of Athens, it may not be unamusing to relate. Dr. Chandler has given an abstract of the epistle, in which the orator relates it. It is this:—“After leaving Athens, the author says, that he arrived at Ilium, where he had intended to stay until he should have gone through all the verses in the ‘Iliad,’ on the very spot to which they severally had reference, but was prevented by the misconduct of his fellow-traveller, a young rake, named Cymon. It was the custom, he tells us, for the maidens who were betrothed, to repair on a certain day to bathe in the Scamander; among them was at this time a damsel of illustrious family, called Callirhoe. Æschines, with their relations and the multitude, was a spectator of as much of the ceremony as was allowed to be seen, at a due distance; but Cymon, who had conceived a bad design against this lady, personated the River-God, and wearing a crown of reeds, lay concealed in the thicket, until she, as was usual, invoked Scamander to receive the offer which she made of herself to him. He then leaped forth, saying, ‘I, Scamander, willingly accept of Callirhoe;’ and with many promises of kindness, imposed on and abused her simplicity and credulity. Four days after this ceremony, a public festival was held in honour of Venus, when the females, whose nuptials had been recently celebrated, appeared in the procession. Æschines was again a spectator, and Cymon with him; so when Callirhoe respectfully bowed her head as she passed by, and, casting her eyes on her nurse, said, ‘that is the God Scamander,’ a discovery followed. The two companions got to their lodging and quarrelled, a crowd gathered about the gate of the house, and Æschines with difficulty made his escape by the back-door to a place of security.”
The reader is requested to observe that on the destruction of old Ilium, another town or rather village was erected; and that this village was called New Ilium. This was the place visited by Alexander. It had only one temple. This temple Alexander visited. He viewed also all the antiquities which remained. He poured libations on the altar of Jupiter Hercéus to Priam, and prayed that the vengeance which the gods had taken of the son of Achilles, for having slain that unfortunate father and king, might not descend upon him, whose descendant he was. One of the Ilians offered him a lyre, which he said was the lyre of Paris; but Alexander refused, saying, “I set but little value on the lyre of Paris; but it would give me great pleasure to see that of Achilles, to which he sang the glorious actions of the brave;” alluding to a passage in the ninth book of the Iliad:
“Amused, at case, the god-like man they found, Pleased with the solemn harp’s harmonious sound: With this he soothes his angry soul, and sings The immortal deeds of heroes and of kings.”
He then desired to be shown the tombs of the heroes.
Quintus Curtius says, that when Alexander arrived at Illium, Menetius the governor crowned him with a crown of gold; and that Chares the Athenian did the same,—coming from Sigeum for that purpose. “Alexander was at length,” says Mr. Mitford, “amidst the scenes, sacred in his eyes, in which were performed the wondrous deeds that Homer, his favourite poet, had immortalised. He was treading on the ground which Achilles, the hero that was the object of his emulation and envy, fought, and conquered, and fell. Thoughts, emotions, and wishes, of the most ardent kind, doubtless swelled his heart and fired his brain.” On the site of Troy there stood only a village. The temple of Minerva, however, still existed, and thither he proceeded. It contained some consecrated suits of armour, which were said to have been preserved there ever since the Trojan war. One of these he took away to be borne before him on solemn occasions, and in battle; and in the place of it he dedicated his own. He performed rites and made offerings at the tombs of the heroes; especially those of Achilles and Ajax Telamon. He adorned the tumulus of Achilles, whom he regarded as his ancestor, with the choicest flowers that could be collected in the neighbourhood, anointed the pillar on it with delicious perfumes, and, with his companions, ran naked, as the custom was, round its base. He also wept on reflecting, that he had, as yet, done little to make men associate his name with so great a hero as Achilles,—thinking that hero beyond all others happy, not only in having so excellent a friend as Patroclus when living; but inasmuch that he had so noble a poet as Homer to celebrate him when dead. “What a number of writers of his actions,” says Cicero, in his defence of Archias, “is Alexander reported to have had in his retinue; and yet, when he stood near the tumulus of Achilles at Sigeum he exclaimed, ‘O fortunate youth! to have found a Homer to be the herald of thy valour!’” Nor did he ever forget the emotions felt in that, to him, sacred place. When, therefore, he had conquered the Persians at the Granicus, he is said to have adorned the temple with offerings, ordered Curators to repair the buildings, and raised Ilium to the rank of a city. He also declared it free from tribute; and when he had entirely conquered Persia, he wrote a letter to the inhabitants, promising to raise their town to importance, to render their temple famous, and to hold the sacred games there. In his memorandum-book, also, appeared after his death, a resolution to erect a temple to Minerva, which should be in splendour and magnificence, not unequal to any other then existing in any place. All this was prevented by his death.
After that occurrence, Ilium was chiefly indebted to Lysimachus. He enlarged its temple, encircled the town with walls to the extent of five miles, and collected into it the inhabitants of the old cities about it, which had gone to decay. Games also were subsequently instituted. He also patronised Alexandria Troas.