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THE

EDINBURGH MAGAZINE,

AND

LITERARY MISCELLANY.

MARCH 1820.

ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE TOPOGRA-
PHY OF TROY, WITH A REVIEW

WRITERS.

videt Iliacas ex ordine pugnas, Bellaque jam fama totum vulgata per or

bem.

zerland. The effect produced on the spectator here depends in a very slight

66

OF THE OPINIONS OF PRECEDING degree on the absolute importance of the events connected in his memory with the scene before him, but almost entirely on the depth and force of the impression made on his mind by those treasures of thought, and fancy, and sentiment, in which the genius of the poet or historian has enveloped them. Distinguished writers thus elevate the least attractive scene into a realm of wonders," and bestow a share of their own immortality on objects and events without any natural worth or dignity. It is a distinction which belongs to the places celebrated in the ancient histories of Greece and Rome, that the interest they excite extends to the whole civilized world. It is not even necessary that the events from which such places derive their importance should be real. The lake Avernus is as anxiously visited by the curious as the field of Canne; and the village of Wyoming will probably attract more travellers in future times than the town of Hohenlinden. When the scene described and the writer who describes it belong to ancient periods, a new source of interest is created. Time gives a sort of sublimity to actions and characters, as distance does to objects, by blending the real with the imaginary. Comprehending very imperfectly the manners and circumstances of the ages when the illustrious men of antiquity lived, imagination fills up the void of knowledge, and completes their portraits from a few simple outlines. In doing this, we divest them of those frailties and defects which seem to spring

REMARKABLE events communicate a portion of that interest which they themselves possess to inanimate objects accidentally associated with them. In every country there are places which, from their connection with great achievements or illustrious characters, have become a sort of consecrated ground, to which pilgrims resort under the influence of feelings of national gratitude, or impelled by the desire to honour virtue and genius, without regard to the distinctions of age or country. Scenes and objects possessing no intrinsic beauty or importance, thus come to surpass in interest the most sublime of Nature's works. The traveller might pass over the fields of Runimede, Bannockburn, or Marathon, without observing a single feature worthy to engage his thoughts for an instant. But the moment the name is pronounced, a magical influence is shed over the landscape, fancy peoples every rock, and hillock, and brook, with imaginary forms, and the most inconsiderable objects are surveyed with an intense feeling of interest. Thousands in the remotest parts of Europe, under the influence of such feelings, have hurried on to view the vestiges of Roman power, and the scenes of Roman achievement in Italy, without stopping to contemplate the magnificent scenery of Swit

from the different constitution of mo- reasonable bounds, there is do doubt dern society; we magnify their vir- that others, dreading the censures of tues and talents, by ascribing to them this stern philosophy, have affected greater energy; and, in a word, we an indifference and an incredulity embody our own ideas of what is which they did not feel. After risking grand and beautiful in their charac- their lives among robbers, and halfters. These beings, placed as it were savage Turks, and the leopards of on the confines of real and ideal ex- Mount Ida, in exploring the Troad, istence, uniting to the mind's eye the they have ridiculed those as dreamers truth of the one with the beauty of and enthusiasts who expected to find the other, are wonderfully adapted to any considerable resemblance between captivate the imagination. We dwell the poet's topography and the preon their powers and virtues with de- sent face of the country. Others who light; we ascribe a dignity beyond have engaged in topographical renature to their actions; and a sort of searches upon places memorable in sanctity to those scenes which have ancient history, to shield themselves been honoured by their presence. from ridicule, have given out that Perhaps the insecurity of which the their object was to elucidate the text mind is conscious when indulging of ancient authors. But if their lasuch sentiments, makes it doubly bours were confined to this object, anxious to seize any circumstance they would terminate within very which may connect these half imagi- narrow limits. Of Homer's poetry it nary beings with the realities of our may be truly said, that all that is own existence. Hence, partly the most valuable in it, its imagery and pleasure we feel in contemplating the sentiment, its pictures of ancient places where great men have lived, mauners, and portraits of individual the armour they have worn, the ob- character, may be understood and enjects they have handled or used, and joyed without any knowledge of the in looking at the scenes on which scene of his story. It is much better their eyes have been accustomed daily to acknowledge at once that our obto dwell. ject in visiting Rome or Athens, Thermopylæ, or the Troad, is not to correct our notions of geography, but to gratify feelings deeply implanted in our minds, and entwined with our earliest and strongest associations. It is the delight we feel in the pursuit which induces us to engage in it, without inquiring whether we ought to be delighted or not; and poetry produces too many illusions of all sorts, to render this either singular or ridiculous. Since the course of our education and early studies nourish an enthusiasm for the classic authors and classic periods, those pursuits ought not to be deemed useless which afford gratification to so great a number of enlightened men whose minds have received this direction. It is the overflowings of the enthusiasm excited by their works which chiefly induce us to attach importance to the places visited or described by the illustrious ancients,-to the most trifling relics of their private life, and to every object or scene which recalls them strongly to our thoughts. We do not think meanly of the Spaniard who travelled from his own country to Italy on purpose to see Livy, and who would not take a pretty long journey to see such

No ancient writer certainly has been the object of so much of this curious idolatry as Homer. Many cities contended for the honour of his birth; sages and legislators have honoured his works as the most perfect of human productions; and conquerors stopped in their career of conquest to contemplate those fields and rivers to which he has given such an imperishable celebrity. At the present day his works are, perhaps, more studied, and better understood, than in the days of Virgil or Strabo; and though ages have revolved since then, the interest felt in every circumstance connected with them has suffered no abatement. Instead of expressing surprise, therefore, at the numbers who have visited and written upon the Troad, we rather wonder that a spot hallowed by so many sublime associations has been so long neglected. Yet though the 1esearches of some travellers have revived an interest in the subject, we cannot assure ourselves that it will be lasting. Philo sophy interposing with the question of cui bono, denounces such pursuits as useless and puerile. And if enthusiasm has transported some beyond

1920.]

Topography of Troy.

a man as Shakespeare or Washington, though it would be foolish to expect that this would throw any light on the writings of the one, or the actions of the other? So long as men admire great actions and illustrious characters will these feelings endure; and so long will the enthusiasm of minds enlightened and warmed by ancient lore, brave peril, disease, and floods, to visit the hallowed soil of Greece and Rome.

Yet to the remnants of thy splendour
past

Shall pilgrims pensive, but unwearied,
throng;
Long shall the voyager, with the Ionian

blast,

Hail the bright clime of battle and of song. Long shall thine annals and immortal tongue

Fill with thy fame the youth of many a
shore;

Boast of the aged,-lesson of the young,
Which sages venerate, and bards adore,
As Pallas and the muse unveil their awful

lore.

Where'er we tread 'tis haunted holy ground,

No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould,
But one vast realm of wonder spreads a-
round,

And all the muse's tale seems truly told,
Till the sense aches with gazing to behold
The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt
upon.

We do not mean to enter into the
question which has been stirred as to
the reality of the Trojan war, because
we think nothing but a wanton spirit
of scepticism, or a love of paradox, has
raised a doubt upon the subject. Gre-
cian history and poetry are so full of
allusions to it, that, perhaps, there is
no event of a date prior to authentic
records established by such a variety
of evidence. It is, indeed, the fulness
and variety of this evidence which
has occasioned its reality to be ques-
tioned. The vast number of reports
and traditions found in different and
distant countries respecting the war,
certainly prove that some real and
signal event must have given birth to
them; and their inconsistency with
one another, which has made some
regard the whole as fictions, is nothing
more than might be expected, since
scarcely any fact relating to those
times has come down to us without
being disfigured by fables.

197

It seems extraordinary that so much difficulty should be experienced in identifying the scene of the Trojan war. Homer was scarcely less celebrated among the ancients as a geographer than as a poet. His allusions to different countries and towns have been found to convey such accurate descriptions of their situation, appearance, and limits, that three or four cases are cited by ancient writers of questions respecting a disputed territory being settled by a reference to his works. Having been so correct in such subordinate points, we should expect, at least, equal truth and fidelity in the description of the leading

There is not

natural features of the scene of his
great poem; especially as he was born
and lived (according to the most pro-
bable accounts) in the neighbourhood.
Besides, it is difficult for those who
have read his works carefully to be-
lieve that his local details and inci-
dents are fictitious.
only an air of extreme simplicity and
artlessness about him, but the whole
texture and management of his poem
rather induces the belief that he took
the facts purely as he found them,
either from a simple love of truth, or
because the traditions were too recent
and distinct to admit of his changing
them for poetical effect. The minute
manner in which he marks circum-
stances of space and time in cases
where it is neither essential to his plan,
nor contributes to the embellishment
of his poem; and the consistency of
his numerous details, a consistency
only discovered by minute and care-
ful research, and, therefore, certainly
undesigned, all shew that the poet did
not invent incidents and local circum-
stances to answer his purpose, but
that his work, when "stripped of his
poetical embellishments, is a consist-
ent narrative of events related accord-
ing to the order of time and place,
when and where they happened."
His machinery, indeed, throws an air
of fable over his narrative, but we
have little doubt that in this also he
only adhered to the traditions current
among those for whom he wrote.
These two circumstances afford, per-
haps, the best criteria for judging of
the time when the poet lived. His
fabulous machinery shews, most pro-
bably, that he did not live among

* Wood's Essay on Homer, p. 223.