6.5 Virgil’s Latin Epic
Classics—that’s the tradition of Greece and Rome, right? Well, what about the Romans? In Chapter 5, we learned that Rome absorbed Greek realms into their empire but allowed Greek arts and culture to all but conquer them. What about Roman writers? Did they copy Classical Greek models?
Well, yes. Roman writers did far more than copy the Greeks. Still, they did translate and retell Greek myths in Latin, the language of Rome. This is why Classical gods and heroes so often come down to us with a Greek and a Roman name: Odysseus/Ulysses, Athena/Minerva, Aphrodite/Venus and many, many more.
In about 19 BCE, the Roman poet Virgil composed an epic which parallels the journey of Ulysses/Odysseus. This time, however, the hero is a Trojan prince wandering away from his city’s ruin.
Virgil. (19 BCE) The Aeneid.
Translated by John Dryden. (1697).
from Book 1
Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc’d by fate,
And haughty Juno’s[1] unrelenting hate,
Expell’d[2] and exil’d, left the Trojan shore.
Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore,
And in the doubtful war, before he won
The Latian[3] realm, and built the destin’d town;
His banish’d gods restor’d to rites divine,
And settled sure succession in his line,
From whence the race of Alban fathers[4] come,
And the long glories of majestic Rome.
O Muse! the causes and the crimes relate;
What goddess was provok’d, and whence her hate;
For what offense the Queen of Heav’n[5] began
To persecute so brave, so just a man;
Involv’d his anxious life in endless cares,
Expos’d to wants, and hurried into wars!
[1] Juno: Roman name for Hera, wife of Zeus/Jove, the god who reigned over other gods on Mount Olympus.
[2] Expelle’d: i.e. expelled. John Dryden’s translation was composed in careful iambic pentameter, a pattern of 10 syllables per line, the even syllables generally being stressed. 17th Century poets would dutifully use apostrophes to signal portions of words which should not be pronounced, thus enhancing the regularity of the meter.
[3] Latian: i.e. Latin. Our translation was printed in the 17th Century at a time when English spelling was highly irregular—more so than it is today.
[4] Alban fathers: the Alba Longans were a tribe of Latins who lived near Rome and in time produced many prominent members of the Patrician aristocracy.
[5] Queen of Heaven: again, Juno/Hera, the queen goddess in the Greek pantheon on Olympus.
Virgil’s famous opening lines emulate the epic tradition of invoking the blessing of the poetic muse. Like Ulysses, Aeneas faces a grueling journey, a wandering, calamitous voyage of seven years. As Ulysses’ way is obstructed by the hostility of Neptune/Poseidon, the god of the sea, Aeneas is beset by the hatred of Juno/Hera, Queen of the Greek pantheon of gods believed to reside on Mount Olympus.
Unlike Ulysses, however, Aeneas is destined for more than a mere homecoming. The Aeneid is a cultural and political Origin Story, an attempt to enhance Rome’s prestige by associating its founding with the Homeric luster of Greece. The narrative asserts that Trojan Prince Aeneas has been instructed by a prophecy to found a city which will one day rule the Mediterranean world.
Virgil’s famous opening lines emulate the epic tradition of invoking the blessing of the poetic muse. Like Ulysses, Aeneas faces a grueling journey, a wandering, calamitous voyage of seven years. As Ulysses’ way is obstructed by the hostility of Neptune/Poseidon, the god of the sea, Aeneas is beset by the hatred of Juno/Hera, Queen of the Greek pantheon of gods believed to reside on Mount Olympus.
After the invocation and exposition, the tale begins, as traditional epics do, in media res, i.e. in the middle of things. The Trojans have been shipwrecked on the Libyan shore near the city of Carthage (today, Tunisia). They are given shelter by Dido, the legendary Queen of Carthage who falls in love with Aeneas as he tells her of the fall of Troy and the sufferings of the Trojans’ journey. Dido falls in love with Aeneas who is tempted to remain with her in Carthage. Jupiter/Zeus sees the danger to the fate of Italy and sends Mercury/Hermes, the messenger of Olympus, to remind Aeneas of his duty:
from Book IV
Then thus, with winged words, the god began,
Resuming his own shape: “Degenerate man,
Thou woman’s property, what mak’st thou here,
These foreign walls and Tyrian tow’rs to rear,
Forgetful of thy own? All-pow’rful Jove,
Who sways the world below and heav’n above,
Has sent me down with this severe command:
What means thy ling’ring in the Libyan land?
If glory cannot move a mind so mean,[1]
Nor future praise from flitting pleasure wean,
Regard the fortunes of thy rising heir:
The promis’d crown let young Ascanius wear,
To whom th’ Ausonian[2] scepter, and the state
Of Rome’s imperial name is ow’d by fate.”
Aeneas informs Dido that, as much as he owes her, he must obey the dictates of the Gods and go on to Italy. Appalled, Dido begs him to remain with her.
Unmov’d he holds his eyes,
By Jove’s command; nor suffer’d love to rise,
Tho’ heaving in his heart; and thus at length replies:
“Fair queen, you never can enough repeat
Your boundless favors, or I own my debt;…
This only let me speak in my defense:
I never hop’d a secret flight from hence,
Much less pretended to the lawful claim
Of sacred nuptials, or a husband’s name.
For, if indulgent Heav’n would leave me free,
And not submit my life to fate’s decree,
My choice would lead me to the Trojan shore,
Those relics to review, their dust adore,
And Priam’s ruin’d palace[1] to restore.
But now the Delphian oracle commands,
And fate invites me to the Latian lands.
That is the promis’d place to which I steer,
And all my vows are terminated there. …
Fair queen, oppose not what the gods command;
Forc’d by my fate, I leave your happy land.”
Dido’s love turns to loathing:
“False as thou art, and, more than false, forsworn!
Not sprung from noble blood, nor goddess-born,
But hewn from harden’d entrails of a rock! …
Faithless is earth, and faithless are the skies!
Justice is fled, and Truth is now no more!
I sav’d the shipwrack’d exile on my shore;
With needful food his hungry Trojans fed;
I took the traitor to my throne and bed. …
I rave, I rave! A god’s command he pleads,
And makes Heav’n accessary to his deeds.
[1] Priam’s ruined palace: i.e. the ruins of the royal palace of King Priam in Troy.
As she watches the Trojan ships sail away, Dido yields to despair:
Begins at length the light of heav’n to hate,
And loathes to live. Then dire portents she sees,
To hasten on the death her soul decrees: …
Sleep fled her eyes, as quiet fled her mind.
Despair, and rage, and love divide her heart;
Despair and rage had some, but love the greater part. …
“What shall I do? what succor can I find? …
“Must I die,” she said,
“And unreveng’d? ‘T is doubly to be dead!
Yet ev’n this death with pleasure I receive:
On any terms, ‘t is better than to live.
These flames, from far, may the false Trojan view;
These boding omens his base flight pursue!”
She said, and struck; deep enter’d in her side
The piercing steel, with reeking purple dyed:
Clogg’d in the wound the cruel weapon stands;
The spouting blood came streaming on her hands.
Her sad attendants saw the deadly stroke,
And with loud cries the sounding palace shook.
Distracted, from the fatal sight they fled,
And thro’ the town the dismal rumor spread. …
Thrice Dido tried to raise her drooping head,
And, fainting thrice, fell grov’ling on the bed;
Thrice op’d her heavy eyes, and sought the light,
But, having found it, sicken’d at the sight,
And clos’d her lids at last in endless night.
 |
| Henry Fuseli. (1781). Death of Dido. Oil on canvas. |
So Dido dies in despair, her body raised atop a funeral pyre. Ulysses and Penelope knew the song of love; Dido reaped the bitter harvest of love’s heartbreak. But Dido’s final curse has historical consequences:
“If so the Fates[1] ordain, Jove commands,
Th’ ungrateful wretch should find the Latian lands,
Yet let a race untam’d, and haughty foes,
His peaceful entrance with dire arms oppose: …
Let him [Aeneas] see his friends in battle slain,
And their untimely fate lament in vain;
And when, at length, the cruel war shall cease,
On hard conditions may he buy his peace. …
These are my pray’rs, and this my dying will;
And you, my Tyrians,[2] ev’ry curse fulfil.
Perpetual hate and mortal wars proclaim,
Against the prince, the people, and the name. …
Now, and from hence, in ev’ry future age,
When rage excites your arms, and strength supplies the rage
Rise some avenger of our Libyan blood,
With fire and sword pursue the perjur’d brood;
Our arms, our seas, our shores, oppos’d to theirs;
And the same hate descend on all our heirs!”
Carthage, the city which the legendary Queen Dido founded, became the capital of a great northern African power which rivaled Rome for control of the Mediterranean Sea. Romans and Carthaginians fought a series of brutal wars from 264 to 146 BCE. After a series of losses, Romans finally conquered Carthaginian forces and destroyed the city. Over a century later, Virgil spins a mythical tale accounting for the wars and for the Roman triumph, the key to Roman success in establishing control of the entire Mediterranean.
Dryden’s Heroic Verse
For many centuries, students in traditional schools learned Latin by reading Virgil and other great authors. For the rest of us, translations are necessary for all these Classics.
Our excerpts are from a 1697 translation by John Dryden. Now, though his language challenges our 21st Century ears, we can read it as an independent composition by a premier poet of the English 17th Century.
Let’s take a moment to follow the first step of our process for reading poetry: read the poem aloud, listening for rhythms. Try it with that last bit, Dido’s curse on Aeneas and the people of Rome. Read aloud and listen.
Rhythm always involves patterns of repetition. What rhythms do you hear? I’ll bet you can hear the Rhymes—the repeated sounds at the ends of the lines. Notice the pattern: every two lines rhyme.
Heroic Couplets: an English verse form associated with 18th Century translations of classical epics. It accommodates long, flowing passages with rhymed pairs of lines that avoid breaking down into stanzas.
In English poetry, Rhyme Schemes often define Stanzas. But an Epic is very, very long, too long for a stanzaic scheme. The rhyming Couplets connect the verses without slowing things down or breaking the flow.
Now, Heroic Couplets also observe a disciplined Meter. Each line contains 10 syllables with a rising beat: ta-DA ta-DA ta-DA ta-DA ta-DA (Iambic Pentameter). We’ll have more to say about Meter as we go along.
As we wrap up, let’s just notice that rhythm leads to thematic Signification. Consider these rhyming pairs: foes/oppose, slain/in vain, cease/peace, will/fulfill, etc. Can you see how these pairs of words support the connections between the lines? Sound always leads us to sense and Signification!
Vital Questions
Why do we have to read all this stuff about dead people?
Are you wondering about that? Well, think of them as you think of The Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones. One can lose oneself in the exotic, ancient worlds of Ulysses, Oedipus, Lysistrata, Dido, and Aeneas. And one can find in those tales some pretty amazing human themes that readers of every age can connect with.
Of course, every culture spins out mythic traditions. What’s so special about this one? Indeed, there is good reason to question the Euro-centric bias which privileges the Greco-Roman tradition. Nevertheless, the Classical traditions of Greece and Rome have shaped much of our Euro-American world and its ideologies.
Context
In terms of European art, knowledge of Classical mythic traditions opens the portal to an enormous amount of reference in the work of painters, sculptors, and writers. Did you notice the many names of gods and heroes identified through footnote citations? All pop up repeatedly in art after about 1400 CE. Be ready for such references as we explore the rebirth of the Classical in Module 4.
Content
Classical literature is essentially mythic in its orientation. Epics dramatize interactions between humans and the gods, and also between gods who quarrel with each other in ways that seem all too petulantly human. Tragedies draw deeply on the traditions of oracles and prophesies. Comedies are less high minded and often satirize mythic ostentation. Yet it is important to see the human stories at the core of these narratives. Ulysses and Penelope, Dido and Aeneas—these characters’ fates may be manipulated by the gods, but their loving passions boil down to some pretty human themes, themes that parallel our readings in Module 2.
Form
Perhaps the most important formal takeaways from this chapter involve core structural concepts of narrative, all analyzed by Aristotle 4,500 years ago:
Epic: a narrative of characters of a higher type. With action not limited to a single time frame
Drama: presenting “characters as living and moving before us”
1st Person narrative: poets speaking in their “own persons”
3rd Person narrative: poets taking on “another personality” (in Greek the persona, or mask)
Tragedy: a narrative or drama that inspires pity and fear when an admirable character is brought to grief when a tragic flaw leads to a logical sequence of catastrophic events
Comedy: a narrative or drama focused on humorously defective people, often of the lower classes, whose antics do not lead to serious pain or catastrophe
Plot: a non-random sequence of story events that follow a structure of cause and effect
Character: participants in story events known by their thoughts and actions
Think about these concepts. I’ll bet you can see them in your favorite novels, fantasies, graphic novels, movies, and episodic narratives!
References
Fuseli, H. (1781). Dido [Painting]. Cambridge, MA: Yale Center for British Art. AN B1976.7.184 Jstor https://www.jstor.org/stable/community.15709825
Virgil. (19 BCE) The Aeneid. Trans John Dryden. (1697). Internet Archive https://classics.mit.edu/Virgil/aeneid.html
in the Euro-American tradition of education and scholarship, the study of the art, literature, and thought of ancient Greece and Rome (Latin)
a mythic tale which provides a framework for comprehending the development of some aspect of the heavens, the world, or human ways of living
Latin for In the middle of things. Epics in the Greek tradition conventionally began with an invocation to the divine Muse, or inspiring goddess and then jumped into the action well along in the narrative, thus requiring flashbacks to explain earlier events.
within a poem, a repeated pattern of sounds that end lines, defining stanzaic boundaries and shaping a poem’s themes. Designated for analysis by letters: e.g. a-b-a-b, in which a-lines and b-lines end in rhyming words.
a division of the poem rather like a prose paragraph. Stanzas are labelled according to their number of lines and are often, but not always, defined by rhyme schemes.
an extended, mythic narrative celebrating the trials and triumphs of heroes exemplifying a culture’s treasured values and orienting its origins
a verse stanza of 2 lines, often ending in a rhyme
a disciplined pattern of sound units throughout the lines of a poem. In English verse, meter is found in the number and a pattern of stressed and un-stressed syllables in a line
an English pattern of Meter in which each line contains 10 syllables with a rising beat: ta-Da -a-Da-ta-Da-ta-Da-ta-Da.
a secondary level of thematic meaning that opens up beyond the immediate subject of art or literature. E.g. the keys held by the figure of St. Peter in a Christian icon signify Christ’s promise that Peter would hold the keys to heaven and earth (Matthew 6.19).
A) an aesthetic valuing clarity, order, balance, unity, symmetry, and dignity, usually honoring a cultural tradition associated with some golden age of the past. B) in the Euro-American tradition, a reference to the works, styles, and themes of Greek and Roman antiquity.