but as he is the principal hero and main subject of an entire poem, the Eneid, which bears his name, it may be proper to keep him in reserve: I proceed, therefore, having now explained many of the Greek and Trojan characters, to make a few observations upon Troy itself. In addition to the puzzle arising from this place having two names, Troy and Ilium, it is certain that there is nothing in which the poet has shewn so much subtlety as in his endeavours to disguise what or where this place was: far from giving its real name, he has called it Kano-Iλlov 8× ovoμaoTW; the Greeks also, in a like sense, he has called Δυσώνυμοι, in 6 11. 255, Δυσώνυμοι υίες Αχαιών, and in like manner for the same purpose of dis guise, Virgil, in describing Æneas's armour, speaks of clypei non enarrabile textum, 8 Æn. 625. That the ruins of a town or village of the name of Troy should be found in the Troad of Asia Minor; that there should be two springs of water there, one warm and the other cold; that the country should possess its yov, εpivεov, and иaλλaxλwvv, as different travellers have con vinced the public by their narratives and drawings, proves nothing as to any ulterior objects the poet might have had in view, in the composition of the Iliad; for the scene of every fable must be laid somewhere, and when that scene is once chosen, it is indispensable that all the parts of it should be drawn consistent with truth and with each other. But the scene which, after the town in the Troad, seems to have been secondarily pointed to in the Iliad, was the whole of Egypt, as the late Mr. Bryant was near discovering, who thought that Troy lay somewhere in Egypt; and in this sense I derive the name of Icy from λus, mud, with reference to the mud of the Nile, the main cause of the ancient wealth and fertility of that country. The words To Iov spoken of Thersites (who, it may be remembered, represents the negro race of Africa at large), 2 Il. 216, Αισχιςος δε ανηρ υπο Ιλιον ήλθε, imply that Iov (if the geographical position of the negroes be considered) was situated above or to the northward of their district in Africa: and the same words in 2 Il. 673, in speaking of Νιρευς (who, as was said above, represents the same race), lead to the same conclusion. So again the words Ιλιον είσω, in 1 II. 71, Και νηεσσ' ηγησατ' Αχαιων Ιλιον είσω, make it probable, that in Etna or Stromboli's serving as a landmark for ships sailing Ιλιον είσω, Ιλιον was situated, in part at least, on the borders of the Mediterranean: so also the words προτι Ιλιον, εντοσθεν πολιος, and the like, wherever used, will be found applicable to Ægypt in particular, or Africa in general. The following lines afford additional proof of this statement, and at the same time tend to fix some other positions which lie in the neighbourhood of Ιλιον ; 2 Il. 811, Εςι δε τις προπαροιθε πόλεως αιπυια κολώνη Αθανατοι δε τε σημα πολυσκαρθμοιο Μυρίνης. Βγ αιπνια κολώνη, elsewhere called by a proper name Kaλλxλwn, I understand the high, beautiful mountains of Syria and Phoenicia, which border the east end of the Mediterranean, and then the words προπαροιθε πολεως will be referable to Ægypt, before, or at the head of which these mountains lie: wediw and wepidpouos will allude to the plain of the sea on one side of these mountains, and to that of the Desert of Arabia on the other; and the last line refers obviously to the myriads of locusts, which have in all ages infested Syria and Phoenicia, like so many furies (Mupvis, quasi pupio Epivvues). This last suggestion may even fix the position of Episov itself, to be, in part at least, the Desert of Arabia, from the sands of which come those locusts (in a poetical view, furies, pues); and further, as Epivɛov means in one sense, and is commonly translated a figtree, it may tend to prove what I have said above of Arabia and Africa together considered as yov, a fig. And as there is a position oиоπ, sometimes mentioned with Episov, as in 22 Il. 145, Ο δε παρα σκοπιήν και ερινεον ηνεμόεντα, I take occasion to notice that it may possibly refer to those high mountains before mentioned, in general, or perhaps to one of them in particular, Mount Carmel, from whence the prospect into the Mediterranean, if I remember right, is described as very extensive. The Trojan Wall, or Texos, I apprehend to be the Isthmus of Suez, between the Mediterranean and the Arabian Gulph; and the Tupyos Mεyas, or bulwark mentioned in the following lines concerning Andromache, 6 II. 386, I take to be the country of Arabia at large, which has the shape of a bastion, with its salient angle situate in the neighbourhood of Moka, by the Straits of Babelmandel. Αλλ' επι τουργον εβη μεγαν Ιλίδ, ενεκ' ακόσε Τειρεσίαι Τρώας μέγα δε κράτος είναι Αχαιών, Η μεν δη προς τείχος επειγομένη αφικάνει, Μαινόμενη εικνια The comparison of Andromache, in this passage, to a person insane, μanoμam exvid, alludes, without doubt, to the agitation of the whirlpools in the Persian Gulf, mentioned above, in the extract |