Up to XIX century scientists considered events described by Homer in his well-known poems «The Odyssey» and «The Iliad» as myth. They were sure that the city Troy had never existed, and therefore there wasn’t its siege as well. It was thought that all these events were phantom of Greek’s rich imagination, and poems by themselves were marked down as mythology.
However, in 1822 in German was born Heinrich Schliemann. In childhood he read Homer’s poems and was charmed by them. Schliemann was sure these stories were based on real events. He got a dream to exhume ancient ruins on the site of Troy and find the city described by Homer.
When he grew up he went into business and worked hard to gather wealth needed for carrying out excavations. He was studying history in order to have required knowledges. Everything went exactly as he planned. Schliemann grew rich, studied archeology and Greek. Finally, in 1868 he went to Turkey.
On the Northwest coast of Asia Minor was the Hill of Hissarlik. As thought Schliemann after studying «The Iliad» there were hidden the ruins of the ancient city.
He started excavations here in 1870 and find ruins not only one but several cities which were built one above other. He compared the describing in «The Iliad» with one of the cities. Now nobody doubt that Troy did existed.
In 1876 Schliemann began excavations on the ground of Mycenae and find traces of strong town with powerful defensive walls. As a result of work of Schliemann and another German archaeologist Dernfeld knowledge about the time of the Troy War and before it was augmented noticeably.
P.S. Schliemann was buried in Greece.
P.S.S. His son name was Agamemnon. (Its Greek name which bore the king of Mycenae whose golden mask was discovered by Heinrich Schliemann in 1876)
P.S.S.S. Honestly, your first thought was about Homer Simson?))