Troy,
at the time of the Trojan War, near 1,200 BC., occupied the length
of Yugoslavia’s Adriatic coast and off-shore islands, between
Sibenik Bay in the north and Boka Kotorska in the south, and extended
inland, along the valley of the Neretva river, perhaps as far
as Sarajevo (what today are roughly —if you will—
the republics of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina).
The visitor of Troy cannot fail noticing two striking aspects
of this region’s natural geographical accidents. On the
one hand, is the patently maritime nature of life along its intricately
indented coastline, peppered with islands here and there, and,
on the other, the eminently agrarian nature of life along beautiful
and fertile valleys between the ridges of stark and arid mountains.
Troy’s privileged geographical situation, and the combination
of these two ways of life—maritime and agrarian—lent
Troy enormous geopolitical strength, for, not only did it draw
ample sustenance from the bountiful valley of the Neretva, it
also possessed control of the Adriatic sea-lanes with access into
and out of Europe, as well as trade-routes into the Danubian basin
and the Aegean Sea.
Troy—understood in a political sense as a federation of
tribes—evolved, it would seem, during the Bronze Age from
periodic foreign influxes into the region which gradually mingled
with autochthonous cultures. So it was that the Troes—a
collective term for a number of tribes—coexisted with a
number of other tribes—apparently, of local stock—which,
by the Fall of Troy and beginning of the Iron Age, became collectively
known as Illyrians. How the intricate relationship between Troes
and Illyroi came about is difficult to explain, yet, that these
two ethnic groups were intimately associated may be seen in the
name of Dardanus, founder not only of the royal house of Troy,
but also the eponymous ancestor of the Dardani, an Illyrian folk,
and in that of Kadmos, who was not only father of the Kadmeioi,
a Trojan folk occupying the environs of Thebe, but also the father
of Illyrus, eponymous ancestor of the Illyrians.
The catalogue of Trojan Forces [Abroad]—a
listing of the various contingents that defended Troy from the
Danaan onslaught (II, 816 – 877)—shows that Troy held
an intimate dialogue with diverse peoples along the Italian Peninsula.
Though Troy had no definitive borders, one could say that these
communities abroad represented a physical extension of Troy, thus
the story of Paris visiting Sparta and eloping with Helen seethes
with intrigue, since Sparta was a district in the environs of
the Laguna Veneta, in the very heart-land of territory held of
old by the Paphlagones … furthermore, Helen was an Argive,
and Argos was Pelasgian, albeit now held by Hellenes and Myrmidones,
likewise in the very heart-land of territory held by the Akhaioi.
What were Pelasgians—Indo-European new-comers into the Mediterranean
Basin—doing in Akhaian territory? The answer must be that
they were holding on to sources of iron-ore on the western coasts
of Italy, and Sardinia. One cannot doubt—only Herodotus
could— that the Paris-Helen affaire was a legitimate casus
belli, for, underscoring this incident is that of overt aggression
by Akaioi on Pelasgoi in retaliation of Pelasgoi interference
in Akhain territories...
There is still
one element wanting to coalesce the story of the Trojan War:
|
