Trojan Treasures on Display

The Gold of Troy:

Searching for Homer's Fabled City

By Vladimir Tolstikov and Mikhail Treister

Harry N. Abrams

239 pp., $54

Until recently, one of archaeology's most intriguing finds - the Trojan treasures - were held in Soviet-style secrecy at a Moscow museum while the rest of the world speculated on their whereabouts.

Now they can be seen at the Puskhin State Musuem of Fine Arts in Moscow, or in the museum's catalog: a $54 deal that meticulously details 259 items from the Trojan treasure trove held by the musuem.

Among the adornments are diadems, earrings, bracelets, pins, and pendants of gold, which Heinrich Schliemann (see review below) unearthed in 1868 and called "Priam's Treasure," after the Iliad's Trojan king. Pieces of pottery are also included. The objects - which date from 2600 to 2450 BC - disappeared from a bunker near a Berlin zoo in 1945. Their existence was not publicly acknowledged until 1992.

Pushkin curators Vladimir Tolstikov and Mikhail Treister list the specifications in great detail. The objects are reproduced in full color. "We have waited for this exhibition for a long time - too long," writes Irina Antonova, the museum's director in the catalog's preface. "Undoubtedly it should have been shown many years ago."

*Suman Bandrapalli is on the Monitor staff.