Since my report of the 4th of this month I have continued the excavations with the utmost energy, but I am now compelled to stop the works this evening, for my three foremen and my servant, who is also my cashier, have been seized by the malignant marsh-fever, and my wife and I are so unwell that we are quite unable to undertake the sole direction throughout the day in the terrible heat of the sun. We shall therefore leave our two wooden houses and all our machines and implements in charge of a watchman, and to-morrow we shall return to Athens.
The admirers of Homer, on visiting the Pergamus of Troy, will find that I have not only laid bare the Tower on the south side, along the whole breadth of my trench, down to the rock upon which it stands, at a depth of 14 meters or 46½ feet, but that by my excavations on the east and west I have uncovered it considerably further, without having found its end. On the contrary, upon the east side, where it is 40 feet broad, and seems even to be broader still, I found the ruins of a second storey, of which, however, as far as I can at present judge, four broad steps have been preserved.[207] On the western side it is only 9 meters or 30 feet in breadth, and on this side there extends to the north an enormous wall, the thickness of which I have not been able to ascertain. The fact of my not having been able to carry these new excavations down to the primary soil, but only to a depth of 11 meters (36½ feet) is owing to the brittle nature of the walls of rubbish and ruins round about the Tower, which, as anyone may convince himself, consist of red ashes and of stones calcined by the heat, and which threatened at any moment to fall in and bury my workmen.
[Illustration: No. 155. A Trojan Terra-cotta Vase, with an Ornament like the Greek _Lambda_ (8 M.).]
[Illustration: No. 156. Curious Terra-cotta Vessel in the shape of a Mole (Tower: 7 or 8 M.).]
Upon the Tower, and more especially in the long oval depression on the top of it, and upon the steps I found two copper Trojan lances, several arrow-heads in the primitive form of thick pegs, from above 1 inch to nearly 2 inches long, which were fastened at the end of the shaft; further, an arrow-head 2½ inches in length, made of silex, and in the form of a pointed double-edged saw; then several copper and silver nails with round heads, which may have served as clothes-pins; further, great quantities of bones, masses of fragments of Trojan pottery of a brilliant red and black, and a number of vases and pots more or less well preserved. Among them is a pretty brilliant red vase nearly 10 inches high, filled with the bones of a sea-fish. This vase (found in an urn, which was unfortunately broken to pieces) has two small handles, and on two sides an ornament in the form of the Greek letter _Lambda_, but with circular ends.[208] Three other vases of a similar form, and with exactly the same decorations, were found upon the Tower. Two other vases of the same form, and with very similar decorations, were found at depths of 26 and 20 feet. I also found upon the Tower an exceedingly curious vessel nearly 6 inches in length, exactly the shape of a mole, and with three feet; it can also be placed so that the snout of the animal is lowest and serves as a foot; the orifice is in the tail, which a large handle connects with the back. I also found there a splendid Trojan vase, of a brilliant black colour, 15¾ inches high, which was unfortunately completely broken, but I have all the pieces of it, and consequently shall be able to restore it. Besides these, a Trojan pot, and a globular vessel with the above-mentioned decoration of a rounded lambda. I likewise saved, in an almost perfect condition, an exceedingly interesting red jug, above 9 inches high, quite round below and with a neck more bent backwards than I have ever found it in such vessels. I further found there a Priapus and a very pretty bird’s egg made of fine marble, many small terra-cotta whorls with the usual symbols of double and treble crosses, six suns, four or five double or treble rising suns, or stars, in the circle round the central sun; also one article where four 卐 form a cross round the sun, and the rest of the space is filled with stars. Further, a few small vessels with suspension rings were found also on the Tower, as well as 25 very ordinary earthen plates, which have been turned by the potter, whereas all the other articles appear to have been made by the hand without a potter’s wheel; about half of the plates were got out uninjured.