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THE QUEST –
The Search for Troy
John Morritt's
Travels 1794-1796 (Hardcover - 1 Mar 2010)
Robert D. Morritt
Availability
There is one matter that the
author, present day, Robert D. Morritt would like to clear up. A person
associated with the British School of Archaeology recently smugly asked how
the author was related to John Sawrey Morritt  and caused to a third party an intonation that the present
day Morritt was ‘using’ this as a ploy to obtain some satisfaction of sorts.
Robert D. Morritt would like to make it absolutely 100% clear that he is not
a direct descendant of John Sawrey Morritt, who had ‘no issue’ and left his
property and possessions to his nephew in his will.)
How it came about that the present day ‘Morritt’ became to
write about the latter day ‘Morritt’ was that in 1958, as a young student,
he received an ‘A’ from his headmaster
for an essay devoted not to a Morritt, but solely to Heinrich Schliemann and had no idea until
many years later that a “John Morritt” had visited the probable site (then)
of Troy. In the late 1960’s with the
new knowledge of John Morritt and his letters back home to his family on his
search for Troy, it was considered appropriate by Robert D. Morritt to
recognize him within the present book. The discovery of John Morritt was an
eerie and most unusual co-incidence. Robert Morritt abhors ‘name-dropping’
and false associations and emphatically and has expressed the desire that
this be voiced ‘up front’. to vindicate himself from future cynics.[1]
That being said, since Robert
Morritt quotes John Morritt’s social commentaries and descriptions of his
travel that are related to the site of Troy, this was included to give the atmosphere
of the Georgian era.
John Morritt started on his
‘Travels'. He used Pausanias (died 180 A.D.) writings as his guide, also
accounts of the area by a Monk, Cyriac of Arcona) who was traveling in the
area in the 1440’s (A.D.) John Morritt visited the Troad with a book by Lechevalier. He was well equipped for his trip, fresh
from University, with a taste for literature, art and antiquities; well read
in both Latin and Greek.Morritt then located the site of Troy, until then it
existed only in legend. Frank Calvert
used Morritt’s notes and introduced the site to Schliemann.
The book includes I give
details of the excavations and early descriptions in the area by Lechevalier.
The early work at Hissarlik by Frank Calvert, the thoughts of Charles Grote,
also Dorpfeld and bring the reader into the 20th. century with the work by
Carl Blegen of the University of Cincinnatti( 1932-1938)and more recently the
work of Archaeologist Manfred Korfmann of Tubigen University; using modern
techniques..
Note[1] Robert D. Morritt has an original copy of his essay
available if required to refute any aspersions to that of ‘name dropping’.
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