Troy

Made famous in the epic poems of Homer, Troy was a once-legendary city located in modern day Turkey. Best known for being the site of the Trojan War, ancient Troy was a strongly fortified city that stood on a hill near the river Scamander. Its coastal location allowed it to be a naval power, and nearby plains provided excellent land for farming. Troy was long considered by many to be the stuff of myth until it was first excavated in the 1870s by Heinrich Schliemann, who discovered that there were actually numerous cities on the site, which over the years had been built on top of one another. Although it was once a towering seat of power, the modern-day Troy excavation site is said to be relatively unimpressive, the result of years of digging and frequent looting by tourists.