ALL NOVEL Chapter 982 City Wall
Everyone is still full of confidence in the excavation work, because from a historical perspective, it is easy to imagine that scattered Greek cargo ships appeared here from time to time in that era.
These Greek merchants often sailed from Tiryns or Yasin, and their ships carried a variety of pottery, including ancient jars with arched handles on top filled with aromatic oils, as well as alabaster cups and bowls used in noble families in Asia. .
These can all be found in sunken ships salvaged from the Aegean Sea, so they should be easy to find in this ancient trading center connecting Europe and Asia.
In addition to these common goods, captains from Mycenae often brought some valuables exclusively for the core rulers of Troy to gain their favor.
These include agate beads, ivory boxes, an ivory chessboard with chess pieces, pins made of amber gold or silver, and possibly even painted ostrich eggs, all considered luxuries during the Bronze Age.
Different from modern times, in ancient times, these top-notch luxury goods were likely to influence the direction of a country. During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period of China, both the Heshi Bi and the Vertical Thorn Wall left a mark in history.
The same was true in the era when the Trojan epic took place. The epic records many times that both the Greek coalition and the Trojans had records of kings from non-participating countries arriving with troops to help in the battle or even dying on the battlefield.
When examining the reasons why they participated in the war, in addition to certain oaths or divine revelations, the most important one was that they had received valuable gifts from a certain participant in the war, so they had to return the favor.
Considering that Troy was destroyed by war, it is very likely that some of these fine artifacts from the Bronze Age still remain in the ruins, waiting for people to unearth these things.
The excavation work went very smoothly in the first three days. Although they did not dig out any meaningful cultural relics, through the analysis of the excavated items, they could confirm that Liang En's inference was correct. There was not only one layer of ruins in this place.
Because as they continued to dig downward, they discovered that there were far more underground ruins than they imagined. With the help of professional machinery, they dug to a depth of more than ten meters and dug out at least three layers of ruins.
The most striking of these household objects is the painted pottery wheel, a tool used for weaving, and the fact that it can be found in many strata suggests that the Troy area had a long tradition of sheep farming.
Therefore, in addition to horses, Troy may also export wool, spun yarn, and textiles. At the same time, these things will also decorate the various palaces in Troy with brilliance, but the fragility of these things makes it difficult for them to be preserved to this day.
But compared with these things, their biggest gain is that they excavated the ruins of the city wall, and the ruins of the city wall are now located on a section of a hillside.
The ruins that have been discovered are located on the northern hills of a plateau, the north side of which is extremely steep and slopes all the way to the Dumriksu River, which is the swampy valley of the Simois River mentioned in Homer's epic poem.
Obviously this is a standard method of building fortifications based on terrain, which can reduce the workload as much as possible while obtaining the best defense effect.
For Liang En and the others, this meant that they only had to spend a little effort to clean up the dirt and sand attached to part of the city wall, and they could observe some details of the city wall.
Because of this, after a brief discussion, everyone quickly focused on this section of the city wall and concentrated their efforts to clear a cross-section of about 1m.
After the cleanup work began, they discovered that the layer of soil was not thick. The thickest part was only 1m, and the thinnest part was even less than a palm wide.
The most important thing is that this place is close to a steep cliff, so they don't need to carry it at all after breaking through the soil. Gravity can help them do it all.
After a day of cleaning work, what appeared in front of them was a 12m-high city wall, which was only the remaining part of the ancient city wall.
Of course, the 12 meters here does not mean that the entire city wall was really built to a height of 12 meters or even 15 meters in ancient times, but the result of the foundations rising after the ancient buildings were stacked layer by layer.
Apparently, when those ancient people built the city, they often chose to push over and fill in the ruins, and then built new buildings on the smoothed rubble.
This is a normal thing to do: cities are built on mountains, and clearing the rubble requires a lot of manpower and material resources. It is better to just flatten and compact it.
Moreover, these compacted ruins can not only expand the buildable area on the mountain, but are also as strong as the original mountain itself mixed with soil and rocks, or even better.
This cross-section can tell a lot about the differences between the productivity of residents here and the construction techniques of the buildings in different eras.
For example, according to what Liang En and his team found, the bottom 4 meters of the city wall are made of earth, or raw earth bricks that were directly dried in the shade, and the top 8 meters are made of stone, which reflects the gradual transformation of the city wall from a civil structure to a stone one. The process of transformation.
But there are also differences between stones. The stones at the bottom from 3000 BC were uneven in size because cutting tools had not been invented at that time. The stones at the top layer from about 1200 BC were cut very square and almost the same size. .
This also reflects the changes of the times, especially the huge changes in productivity. At the same time, Liang En and the others can also infer from the size of this city wall that this should be the most important city in the surrounding area at that time.
Unlike the stone walls that Europeans are more accustomed to, the ancient cities on the Anatolian Peninsula preferred to build walls of wood and compacted earth.
However, as the westernmost region of Asian civilization and a famous international trade port city, it will naturally be affected by various influences from Europe, such as stone city walls.
However, considering the huge manpower and material resources required for such a city wall, the cities that can build such a city wall are often the most populous, prosperous, and core cities in a region.
"I feel more and more now that this place is Troy." Nelson said beside Liang En while cleaning the dirt covering the wall.
"You see, the location of this city is completely consistent with the records in the epic. At the same time, the size of the entire city is more consistent with the wealthy city of Troy in the records."
"How did you judge it?" Liang En looked at Nelson with some surprise. He was sure that this place was Troy because it had memories from another world, but Nelson definitely didn't know this.
"It's simple, because the size of this city speaks volumes." Nelson stopped what he was doing and pointed at the towering wall in front of him.
"A place where such a city wall can be built cannot be just an ordinary gathering place. If the local geographical location is taken into account, the identity of the city can be easily determined."
"What you said makes sense, but it's difficult for people to make accurate judgments with just such a city wall." Liang En nodded slightly after listening to Nelson's words.
"I think we at least need to dig out more things and find more evidence, so everyone may have to work hard for a while."