Spring Campaign at Troy

 

Professor Rüstem Aslan and Dr Gert van Wijngaarden on the walls of Troy

Yesterday, the spring campaign of our research at Troy has ended. We have been able to prepare and plan the summer campaign, which will take place in August. Because of your generous contributions, we are able to do this research. We thank you very much and will keep you updated on the developments this year.

 

The students' desk at the UvA library

In April and May of this year, the student members of our team have worked in the university library to investigate the various excavation campaigns from the multitude of publications on Troy. They were looking for deep trenches that have been filled after the excavations and that we could re-excavate this summer.

Vita has looked in detail to the work done by Heinrich Schliemann (1870-1890), who wrote not only a large number of books, but also a multitude of diaries. Fortunately, she could consult Wout Arentzen, an expert on Schliemann. Nina has looked and is still looking to the work of  W. Dörpfeld (1890-1893) and Fleur looked into the Blegen campaigns (1932-1936). Gert Jan read all of the campaigns of the Korfmann-Rose-Pernicka years (1988-2011).

 

Troy sculpture on the square at Canakkale

Armed with the students' reports, two of us (Bart and Gert Jan) went to Troy last week. We stayed in Canakkale, where we were amidst the excitement of the coming elections. We had good strategy meetings with Prof. Dr. Rüstem Aslan. Moreover, we were able to check all the excavation notebooks that are present in the excavation house. Also, we did some extra work in the Korfmann library.

 

Bart Rendering in the Korfmann library at Canakkale

Most importantly, we were able to check on site the feasibility for excavations of all the options we had. In the end, we decided on four possible places to do research; one for each of the main campaigns. And we even have a back-up plan! We are now ready for the main phase of the research this year: the re-excavation of trenches in August 2018.

 

The new look of the mini-market at Tevfikiye, the modern village near Troy

The summer promises to be an exciting time at Troy. Not only because of our own excavations. The nearby village of Tevfikiye is slowly being converted into a Trojan model city and the museum is scheduled to open in August. Ancient Troy is continuously changing. We will keep you updated!