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The Meaning of the Aeneid: A Critical Inquiry Part II Homo Immemor: Book VI and Its Thematic Ramifications
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 July 2014
Extract
The Sixth Aeneid is the noetic core of the poem. It is the centre of the Aeneid, and the centre not only of the narrative movement of the poem but also (and more significantly) of the poem's thematic movement, of its exploration, development and analysis of the ideas and issues experientially presented in the narrative. It is what one might call a ‘meta-book’, that is to say, a book which provides a commentary upon other books and which, in so doing, furnishes the reader with a framework of judgment and evaluation with which to interpret and to understand the noetic content of the poem. It is important therefore that the analysis advanced in Part I of this study be conjoined with a relatively detailed consideration of the Sixth Aeneid and an examination of some of its more significant thematic ramifications.
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References
1. Ramus i.l (1972), 63–90.
2. Once again I should like to express my gratitude to Mr G. J. Fitzgerald and Miss H. Pope of Monash University for their critical assistance.
3. For a discussion of I,459ff. see Part 1,74–75.
4. Aeneas leaves Troy in order to save his family (see esp. 11,559–63,596–98,635–36); he leaves Carthage (partly at least and probably primarily) in order to fulfil his personal obligations to Anchises and Ascanius (IV,274–76,351–55); he leaves Sicily again to fulfil his personal obligation to Anchises, but also in order that he may meet him once more (V,722ff.). Note that in the last mentioned instance Virgil focusses the reader’s attention upon the personal nature of Aeneas’ motivation by underlining the way in which Aeneas is unable to act upon Nautes’ sound advice (V,700–20, esp. 719–20) until told to do so by his father (in a very personal appeal, see 724–25) and given the further personal incentive of a meeting with him in Elysium. Aeneas then acts straight away (extemplo, 746).
5. As, for example, by Warde Fowler, W., The Religious Experience of the Roman People (London, 1911), 419Google Scholar, Mackay, L. A., ‘Three Levels of Meaning in Aeneid VI’, TAPA Ixxxvi (1955), 184Google Scholar, and Otis, B., Virgil: A Study in Civilized Poetry (Oxford, 1964), 306ffGoogle Scholar. But see Camps, W. A., ‘The Role of the Sixth Book in the Aeneid’, Proc. Virg. Soc. vii (1967–68), 26ffGoogle Scholar.
6. Though of course this is not the only level. For a discussion of the significance of the Aeneas-Dido liaison in Book IV for the evaluation of Aeneas’ mission see Part I, 76–78.
7. For affirmative answers to these questions see Warde Fowler, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 419ff., Otis, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 290ff. and ‘Three Problems of Aeneid 6’, TAPA xc (1959), 166–70, and Anderson, W. S., The Art of the Aeneid (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1969), 58Google Scholar. Camps, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 28, adopts the unusual (and, as I hope to show, untenable) position of denying that ‘the experience of Book 6 is conceived by the poet as having any effect at all upon his character’.
8. Although the light-dark antithesis between Elysium and Hades has been generally overestimated by the commentators—see, e.g., Anderson, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 58–59.
9. On pacique bnponere morem see Williams, R. D., ‘The Sixth Book of the Aeneid’, G&R xi (1964), 61–62Google Scholar, who discusses succinctly and well both the meaning of the phrase and the correctness of the reading.
10. By Book VIII the less overt ideological declaration of the shield is all that the Romanized Aeneas requires to maintain and confirm him in his mission.
11. For the relationship of this ideology to contemporary political postures see Res Gestae, 3: bella terra et mari civilia externaque toto in orbe terrarum suscepi victorque omnibus superstitibus civibus peperci. externas gentes quibus tuto ignosci potuit, conservare quam excidere malui. (Wars civil and foreign, on land and on sea, I undertook, and in my hour of victory I showed mercy to all citizens who survived. The foreign tribes who could be pardoned with safety, I preferred to keep in existence rather than extinguish.)
12. Answered in the affirmative by Otis, B., ‘Virgil and Clio’, Phoenix xx (1966), 59–75CrossRefGoogle Scholar, who maintains that Virgil regarded Roman imperium as justified by ‘its civilizing, peace-giving mission: pacts importere morem. The Iliadic Aeneid illustrates the httmanitas, the rejection of violence, which the great moral of the “Show of Heroes” implicitly demanded’ (69). But see ‘1. The Ideology-Reality Dichotomy’ in Part I, 65–74.
13. In my analysis of the Daedalus reliefs I was helped by H., Miss Pope’s interesting discussion of them in her unpublished dissertation, ‘Vergil and the Individual in History’ (Monash University, 1969Google Scholar).
14. As, e.g., by Prescott, H. W., The Development of Virgil’s Art (Chicago, 1927), 266Google Scholar: ‘The description halts the action, or, rather, fills an interval of time in the action, without itself contributing to the action in any way.’
15. They also foreshadow Aeneas’ ultimate future; for the lessons of the past which they convey go unlearned (see below).
16. Cf. Otis, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 284–85, Segal, C. P., ‘Aetermmt per saecula nomen, The Golden Bough and the Tragedy of History: Part 1, Arion iv (1965), 643ffGoogle Scholar., and Anderson, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 55–56. The objection of Eichholz, D. E., ‘Symbol and Contrast in the Aeneid’, G&R xv (1968), 110–11Google Scholar, that the reliefs cannot be a symbol of Aeneas’ past because ‘Aeneas is not moved by them’, can hardly be thought to be strong. It assumes that a character’s failure to recognize something as a symbol of his experience entails that the poet does not intend the reader to construe it as such. Such an assumption is patently false. Nor is it at all clear that ‘Aeneas is not moved’ by the reliefs; miserum (‘piteous it is’, 21) seems to reflect the sympathy of both craftsman and spectator.
17. Indeed there are close echoes in Virgil’s account of Dido in Book IV of Catullus’ portrait of Ariadne in Carmen 64. For a bibliography on this question see Anderson, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 115, n. 8.
18. For the association of the labyrinth with the underworld see Jackson, W. F.Knight’s famous study, Cumaean Gates (Oxford, 1936Google Scholar). Cf. also Fletcher’s, F. edition, Virgil Aeneid VI (Oxford, 1941Google Scholar), ad loc. and Enk, P. J., ‘De labyrinthi imagine in foribus templi Cumani insculpta (Vergilii Aen. VI 27)’, Mnemosyne (ser. 4) xi (1958), 322–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
19. Cf. Pöschl, V., Die Dichtkunst Virgils 2 (Vienna, 1964), 258–60Google Scholar (149–50 in Seligson, G.’s translation of the first edition, The Art of Vergil, Ann Arbor, 1962Google Scholar), Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 643–45, and Anderson, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 55–56. Eichholz, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 111, surprisingly contends that the similarity between Daedalus and Aeneas is restricted to their both being exiles.
20. Contrast Zarker, J. W., ‘Aeneas and Theseus in Aeneid 6’ CJ lxii (1967), 221Google Scholar: ‘Daedalus, however, has no apparent relationship either to the rest of Book 6 or to the Aeneid as a whole.’ Zarker’s own thesis that ‘On these panels Vergil would seem to be presenting to Aeneas and his companions in the person of Theseus an example for admiration and emulation’ (222) is totally at odds with the sorts of detail the poet chooses to emphasize.
21. Cf. Putnam, M. C. J., ‘Aeneid 7 and the Aeneid, AJP xci (1970), 429Google Scholar, who also observes this.
22. See n. 79 below.
23. Contrast Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 644: ‘Yet here appears the major difference between Daedalus and Aeneas: Aeneas does leave the past behind.’
24. Most important here of course are the iuvenes ‘sacrificed’ by Aeneas (see esp. tmmolet, X,519, immolat, X,541, XII,949) in ‘retribution’ (cf. poenas, VI,20 with poenam, XII.949) for the death of the iuvenis/puer, Pallas. It is to be noted however that these particular immolations are but an instance of one of the most prominent themes of the battle-books of the Aeneid—the loss incurred by the sacrifice of the young. See Part I, 78–81 and 90, n. 86.
25. See Part I, 70.
26. A useful summary and discussion of some of the main lines of interpretation up until 1959 can be found in Otis, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 173ff. Otis’ own interpretation that Aeneas’ ‘Hades vision is a dream and a “false dream” in the sense that it is not to be taken as literal reality’ (176) invites as little acceptance as the views which he criticizes. Falsa can hardly mean ‘symbolically true’, as Otis wishes to contend. For a similar view to that of Otis see Williams, op. cit. (n. 9 above), 62. Other recent writers on the subject include Segal, C. P., ‘Aeternum per saecula nomen, The Golden Bough and the Tragedy of History: Part II’, Arion v (1966), 62–66Google Scholar, whose theory of the ‘different orders of reality’, viz. ‘awareness and action’, fails to acccount for the force of falsa and the semantic repercussions of the allusion to Homer, and Anderson, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 61–62, whose observation, ‘Whatever he meant, Vergil definitely sets us thinking’ (62), can scarcely be considered helpful —cf. the analogous ‘unhelpfulness’ of Clausen, W., ‘An Interpretation of the Aeneid’, HSCP lxviii (1964), 147Google Scholar: ‘I have a sense, which I cannot quite put into words, that Virgil was not merely telling the time of night’ (reprinted in Commager, S. [ed.], Virgil [Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1966], 88Google Scholar). More reasonable attempts at the passage are those of Bray, J. J., ‘The Ivory Gate’, in M. Kelly (ed.), For Service to Classical Studies: Essays in Honour of Francis Letters (Melbourne, 1966), 55–69Google Scholar, and Putnam, op. cit. (n. 21 above), 428–29, esp. n. 35.
27. The limitations of Servius as a commentator are well discussed by Williams, R. D., ‘Servius—Commentator and Guide’, Proc. Virg. Soc. vi (1966–67), 50–56Google Scholar.
28. If I seem to be labouring the obvious, it is because the obvious has been almost universally ignored.
29. Aeneas’ conduct during the indoctrination scene and in Book VI as a whole are examined in more detail below.
30. Part I, 87–88, n. 41.
31. Cf. the disastrous gleam from the helmet of Messapus (refulsit, ‘flashed back’, IX,374) which leads to the deaths of Euryalus and Nisus— the helmet’s brilliance is again referred to at the end of the episode (nitentem, ‘shining’, IX,457). And note also the death-serpent-gleam association in the description of the murderous Pyrrhus in Book II (coruscus, ‘gleaming’, 470; nitidus, ‘shining’, 473; micat, ‘flashes’, 475). For a discussion of Aeneas’ furor in the final scene of the Aeneid and its consequences for the ideology-actuality issue see Part I, 73–74.
32. For a discussion of the collapse of the pietas/furor antithesis in Book XII see Part I, 69–74. A similar collapse of course occurs in Virgil’s account of the Aeneas-Dido liaison in Book IV. Concerning the subiecti/superbi antithesis: can the war in Latium be described as a war against superbi?
33. The parallelism between the deaths of Marcellus and Icarus is well noted by Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 55–56.
34. See Part I, 78–81, and 89, nn. 69 and 71.
35. Cf. Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 63: 'The founder of a new city and eventually of an empire should not think too much of the individual dissolution that, in one sense, negates all human endeavor.’ Segal however fails to connect this observation with the theme of distraction in the Sixth Aeneid.
36. Segal’s contention (ibid., 39) that at the conclusion of the Deiphobus scene Aeneas feels ‘the pressure of his purpose’ seems to have little support in the text. Aeneas has virtually to be dragged away by the Sibyl. This is realized by Otis, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 296, who squares this incident with his own interpretation of Aeneid VI by construing the colloquy with Deiphobus as ‘idle reminiscence’!
37. The popular view—see Otis, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 168, (n. 5 above), 297–98, and Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 40–41—that the Tartarus section of Book VI illustrates the basic moral structure of the world ignores (inter alia) the following two points: 1. The basic morality of Tartarus is conveyed to Aeneas second-hand-he is not allowed personally to witness the justice in operation; 2. It is conveyed to Aeneas verbally by the Sibyl, the priestess of the dissembling god, Apollo (see 343ff.)— a priestess who enshrouds truth in darkness (obscuris vera involvens, 100).
38. Cf. Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 649: ‘The god’s [Apollo’s] prophecy is fulfilled in the barest, cruellest terms.’
39. The only other occurrence of this epithet in classical Latin seems to be Ovid, Met. XV.703. For the Sibyl’s association with Apollo see also 35,77,101,628.
40. This theme of deception is crucial to an understanding of Book VI. Apollo, the Sibyl, Anchises—all deceive Aeneas.
41. See ‘4. Homo Immemor: Aeneas and the Inevitability of Human Failure’.
42. Camp’s ostentatiously simplistic thesis (op. cit., n. 5 above, 26) that ‘the doctrine of reincarnation is brought in simply to introduce in its turn the pageant of Roman heroes’ ignores the relevance of the reincarnation motif to Aeneas’ psychological development. Cf. Cartault, A., UArt de Virgile dans PEneide (Paris, 1926), 476Google Scholar. Otis, on the other hand (op. cit., n. 7 above, 169, n. 5 above, 301), sees that there is relevance but misconstrues it.
43. Discussed below in ‘4. Homo Immemor: Aeneas and the Inevitability of Human Failure’.
44. Contrast Otis, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 179, and Dudley, D. R., ‘A Plea for Aeneas’, G&R viii (1961), 59Google Scholar—two recent exponents of the common but misleading view that for Aeneas Anchises’ revelation ‘changes the world and brings hope instead of dispair’ (Dudley, 59).
45. Not an exaggeration—see, for example, 806–07. Williams, op. cit. (n. 9 above), 59–60, rightly notes that 806–07 are important, but ignores the significance of Aeneas’ failure to reply to Anchises’ question.
46. See Part I, 82–85.
47. The destructive nature of famae venientis amor is observed also by Putnam, op. cit. (n. 21 above), 412, who comments that in Book VII Virgil ‘warns that any search for jama may mislead even to the point of bringing death’. It is also worth noting the parallelism between famae venientis amor (889) and the ripae ulterioris amor (‘passion for the further bank’, 314) felt by the pitiful horde of souls clamouring to be ferried to the other side of the Styx. Both passions are delusive; both lead to horror, suffering and pain.
48. There is of course no difficulty in reconciling Aeneas’ love for his father and his desire to see him with his slow rate of progress through Hades. His response to the suffering of those he encounters is indicative of the same profoundly personal values exhibited by his filial amor and pietas.
49. Williams, op. cit. (n. 9 above), 56, wrongly translates tua pietas of 687–88 as ‘your sense of mission’. The pietas here, as elsewhere in Book VI (cf. also 176 and 232), has as its object another human person. In 687–88 the person concerned is of course Aeneas’ father, Anchises, as the phrase, exspectata parent! (‘which your father counted upon’, 687), which Williams curiously ignores, indicates.
50. Both geminas and auro (significantly repeated at XI,75) seem specifically chosen here because of their association with death and destruction. For the destructive connotations of auro see the discussion of the Daedalus pictures above and that of the golden bough below; for those of geminas see Part I, 87–88, n. 41.
51. For Aeneas’ conduct of the war in Latium see Part I, 66ff. On Aeneas’ behaviour in the early part of Book XI (esp. 39ff.)—which in a sense constitutes an exception to this ‘disregard’—see Part I, 89–90, n. 74, and further below.
52. See below in ‘3. The Promises of Empire: Fama and the Golden Bough’ and ‘4. Homo Immemor: Aeneas and the Inevitability of Human Failure’.
53. Discussed in Part I, 74–75.
54. Even Anderson, W. S. in his valuable study, ‘Vergil’s Second Iliad’, TAPA Ixxxviii (1957), 17–30Google Scholar, concludes disappointingly: ‘It is he [Aeneas] who has honour and victory on his side in the combined roles of Achilles, Menelaus, and Agamemnon’ (30). Cf. also Mackay, L. A., ‘Achilles as model for Aeneas’, TAPA Ixxxviii (1957), 11–16Google Scholar, and Williams, R. D., ‘Virgil and the Odyssey’, Phoenix xvii (1963), 266–74CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 273. Much more to the point are the comments of Nethercut, W. R., ‘Invasion in the Aeneid’, G&R xv (1968), 84Google Scholar n. 2, 86–87,95.
55. See, e.g., Norden, E., P. Vergilius Maro Aeneis Buch VI 3 (Stuttgart, 1927Google Scholar), ad loc, Fletcher, op. cit. (n. 18 above), ad he, and Anderson, op. cit. (n. 54 above), 19.
56. See Part I, 83–84.
57. For Pyrrhus as ‘Achilles reborn’ see Knox, B. M., ‘The Serpent and the Flame: the Imagery of the Second Book of the Aeneid’, AJP lxxi (1950), 394–95Google Scholar (reprinted in Commager, op. cit., n. 26 above, 137–38). Note especially Knox’s comment: ‘Only the worst of the father is reborn in the son’ (395).
58. See Part I, 75
59. See, e.g., Williams, R. D.’ edition, Aeneidos Liber Quintus (Oxford, 1960), xiii–xviGoogle Scholar, and ad 109,110f.,129,132,137–8,144–7,163,188f.,282f.,284,324,325,327f., et passim.
60. See Part I, 70.
61. Ibid.
62. Contrast D. R. Dudley’s view, op. cit. (n. 44 above), 59, that throughout the second half of the Aeneid Aeneas is ‘calm and confident—almost too much so, perhaps, and much less interesting than the fallible Aeneas of the first six books’. Strangely on p. 52 of his article Dudley reproaches critics for not reading the Aeneid from beginning to end. Dudley is by no means alone; cf. Duckworth, G. E., ‘Fate and Free Will in Virgil’s Aeneid’, CJ li (1955–56), 358Google Scholar, and even Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 48. See further in Part I, 67ff.
63. See Part I, 68–69, and 89–90, n. 74.
64. Ibid., 74–81.
65. As will be obvious, my discussion of the aeternwn nomen owes much to the excellent analysis of Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 636ff.
66. Ibid., 638.
67. Ibid., 649 and 657, n. 38.
68. Ibid., 653: ‘Parumper is the vital word.’
69. Otis’ view, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 292, that the Palinurus episode provides Aeneas with a ‘lesson in both divine law and divine clemency, in the inexorability and the justice of fate’ ignores the emphatic cruelty of Palinurus’ plight, the inherent melancholy of the episode itself, and the thematic consequences of parumper.
70. On the significance of this clause see Fraenkel, E., ‘Some Aspects of the Structure of Aeneid VII’, JRS xxxvi (1945), 2Google Scholar, Reckford, K. J., ‘Latent Tragedy in Aeneid VII,l-285’, AJP lxxxii (1961), 254Google Scholar, Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 56ff., and Putnam, op. cit. (n. 21 above), 411–12.
71. For a fuller discussion of the Nisus-Euryalus excursus see Part I, 65–66, 78–79.
72. See, e.g., Ascanius’ aristeia in Book IX,590–663, at the conclusion of which Ascanius has to be restrained from fighting, ‘eager though he was for battle’ (avidum pugnae, 661).
73. Important in this connection is Aeneas’ address to his son in Book XII (435–40) —the only words which he speaks to Ascanius in the poem. The tone of moral righteousness which pervades the speech ought not to blind the reader to (a) the corrupting dextera-praemia association and the deluded assumption that the praemia (‘rewards’) are worth the labor (‘toil’), and (b) the inherently disastrous nature of Aeneas’ recommendation that the heroic exempla of himself and Hector be not so much learned from as imitated. Significantly the only advice which Aeneas immemor gives to his son in the poem is an injunction to repeat the heroic mentality of the past.
74. The imagery is indeed so pervasive that illustration is unnecessary.
75. The two most perceptive and valuable discussions of the bough are those of Brooks, R. A., ‘Discolor Aura: Reflections on the Golden Bough’, AJP lxxiv (1953), 260–80Google Scholar (reprinted in Commager, op. cit., n. 26 above, 143–63), and Segal, op. cit. (16 and 26 above). A convenient summary of some of the extensive, if not always highly relevant, literature on this topic can be found in Kresic, S., ‘Le Rameau D’Or chez Virgile’, EMC xii (1968), 92–102Google Scholar.
76. Cf. Servius ad VI,136: ramus enim necesse erat ut et unius causa esset interitus: unde et statim mortem subiungit Miseni (‘For it was necessary for the bough to be the cause of one death; wherefore immediately he juxtaposes the death of Misenus’). See also Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 622: ‘The order of the narrative suggests that Misenus’ life is in a sense the price of the bough, as Palinurus’ life in Book V is the price of Aeneas’ arrival in Italy.’
77. For a more detailed discussion of the bough’s contradictory properties see Segal, op. cit. (n. 16 above), 624–34.
78. This particular symbolism is reinforced in the case of the golden bough (a) by the juxtaposition of Aeneas’ seizure of the bough with the funeral of Misenus and the allusion to his aeternum nomen (note especially how Aeneas’ snatching of the bough and the mention of Misenus’ aeternum nomen are the culminating points of their respective episodes—190–211,212–35), and (b) by the bough’s transcendence of death—like the aeternum nomen the bough has a lifeless immortality. The linking of gold with fama is of course a common, popular association.
79. Gold is in fact by far the most prominent metal in the shield’s ‘indescribable fabric’ (non enarrabile textum, VIII,625)—cf. VIII,655,659,661,672,677; the only other metals to be mentioned in the account at 625ff. are silver (655,673), bronze (675) and iron (701). Gold is also the only metal used to denote the shield after the fulsome delineation of Book VIII—cf. X,243 and 271. The ‘goldenness’ of the shield would be enhanced by the obvious allusion to the golden shield presented to Augustus in 28/27 B.C. by the Senate and People of Rome (see Part I, 86, n. 26). The golden shields of both Aeneas and Augustus are patent symbols of fama.
80. For the importance of the serpent image in the Aeneid see Part I, 82ff.
81. For the significance of geminus see ibid., 87–88, n. 41. Even if the appearance of two birds is a common motif in folk-tales concerned with the testing of heroes —see Norden, op. cit. (n. 55 above), ad loc, and Segal, C. P., ‘The Hesitation of the Golden Bough: A Reexamination’, Hermes xcvi (1968–69), 77Google Scholar (and note that the amount of ancient evidence, as opposed to Norden’s ‘heimatlichen Märchenpoesie’, is very small indeed)—Virgil’s use of the term, geminae (190), for ‘two’ with reference to the doves and his repetition of it in the expression, gemina arbore (203), still requires explanation.
82. On the brightness-destruction association, see the discussion of the ivory gate above, and n. 31.
83. Fletcher’s comment, op. cit. (n. 18 above), ad loc, that ‘cunctari never implies active resistance’ cannot be sound; see, e.g., the description of Palinurus at V,856 (cunctanti).
84. For the sexual associations of ‘plucking’ flowers, trees, etc. see Segal, op. cit. (n. 81 above), 79, n. 2. Note especially the transparent connotations of refringit, which means normally ‘breaks open’. The portrayal of Aeneas as avidus (‘desirous’, 210) intensifies the sexual implications of his act.
85. On Lavinia see esp. VII.53 and XII,67ff., and also VII,72,318,362,389,XI,479. On Camilla and Juturna see Part I, 80 and 90, n. 75, and 87, n. 39.
86. Ibid., 70–71. This notion of Aeneas as the destroyer of the pastoral world is of course reinforced by the ‘deer episodes’ of Books VII and XII (see Part 1,81–82), by the emotive attention given in Book XI to the exploits and death of Camilla (a potent, if ambiguous, symbol of the pastoral vitality and freedom of early Italy—see Part 1, 80 and 90, n. 77), and by Juturna’s own ‘pastoral’ associations (XII.139–40). See also VII.750–60 (the foreshadowed death of Umbro), X,550–60 (the slaying of Tarquitus) and XII.451–58 (Aeneas‘ return to battle). The dissolution of the idyllic, Arcadian world of Pallas and Evander consequent upon Aeneas’ intrusion into it (VIII,102–584,XI,29–99, esp. 67–71, and 139–81) is perhaps the most conspicuous and carefully delineated instance of this motif.
87. See above in ‘2. Ideology and the Individual: Distraction and Aeneas Immemor’.
88. For ‘dull corporeal existence’ and ‘perverse’ I am indebted to the translation of Day Lewis, C., The Eclogues, Georgics and Aeneid of Virgil (Oxford, 1966Google Scholar).
89. It cannot be accidental that the only other occurrence (apart from the two cited here) of the expression, dira cupido, in the Aeneid is in reference to the ‘burning’ desire for fama experienced by Nisus and Euryalus in Book IX (185). Their dira cupido, like that of the souls destined for reincarnation, involves the suspension of the intellect, that is to say, is indicative of a thoroughgoing mental blankness; and, like the soul’s longing for the light lucis, VI,721), the youths’ desire for fama is for something dazzling but illusory (for the brightness-deception association, see the discussion of the ivory gate above). The use of one of the Dirae as Aeneas’ auxiliary in his final victory (XII,845ff.—see Part I, 72) may well be intended to reinforce the analogy between Aeneas immemor and the animae immemores and to draw the reader’s attention to the dira cupido for glory (famae venientis amor, VT.889) with which he is inflamed and by which he is being driven. The expression, dira cupido, also occurs at Georgics 1,37, where, as in the Aeneid passages, it is the perverseness of the desire in question which is being underscored.
90. Cf. Goelzer, H. and Bellessort, A., Virgile Enéide (Paris, 1925Google Scholar), ad loc: ‘Ce mot d’Enée est un des plus amers qui soient tombés d’une bouche humaine.’ See also Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 45.
91. Cf. Anderson, op. cit. (n. 54 above), 17.
92. See the discussion above in ‘1. Ideology and Actuality: Daedalus and the Ivory Gate’.
93. See Part I, 68, and 88, n. 50. Anderson’s comment, op. cit. (n. 54 above), 29, that ’it would contradict the tendency of the Trojan theme in I-V to show Aeneas once again playing the role in which we saw him in Il’ seems to me to reveal a fundamental misunderstanding not only of the function of the Trojan theme itself, but also of Aeneas’ conduct in the second half of the poem.
94. See Part I, 70, and above in ‘2. Ideology and the Individual: Distraction and Aeneas Immemor’. The cyclical movement of the poem is observed also by Poe, J. P., ‘Success and Failure in the Mission of Aeneas’, TAPA xcvi (1965), 334Google Scholar.
95. Contrast Venus’ avoidance of her son’s embrace at 1,402–9.
96. Although it is of course possible to construe rerum with either ignarus or imagine, or (preferably) with both, the word-order dictates that the primary construction is rerum ignarus—despite Conington, J. and Nettleship, H., P. Vergili Maronis Opera, Vol III3 (London, 1883Google Scholar), ad loc.
97. For res Romanae, unlike the imago, will give no cause for joy. Cf. Dudley, op. cit. (n. 44 above), 60. Not that the imago is unequivocally ideological. There are a number of features of the shield which serve to undermine its overt ideology: e.g., the reference to the immoral (sine more) Sabine rape (VIII,635), the horrific description of the death of Mettus (VIII,642–45), the sinister portrayal of Augustus (VIII,678–81: note especially the fire imagery, and the ‘serpent’ epithet, geminas—cf. the geminos anguis that await Cleopatra [VIII.697], and cf. also the fiery arrival of Aeneas at the scene of battle in Book X, 260–75), and the sympathetic tableau of the defeated Cleopatra (VIII,709–13: note its thematic and verbal parallelism with the fate of the tragic Dido—cf. VIII,709 with IV,644). Nor is the fact that the maker of the shield is the ‘Fire-Lord’ (ignipotens, VIII,414,423,628,710,X,243) itself devoid of menace.
98. Cf. Camps, W.A., An Introduction to Virgil’s Aeneid (Oxford, 1969), 45ffGoogle Scholar.
99. See, e.g., Mackay, L. A., ‘Hero and Theme in the Aeneid’, TAPA xciv (1963), 163Google Scholar: ‘The divine machinery of the Aeneid not only seems, but is, imposed on an otherwise already adequate human motivation.’ Cf. also Duckworth, op. cit. (n. 62 above), 358.
100. Amata’s furor over Aeneas’ arrival and the actions to which this gives rise (VII,341ff.) are an obvious example. Note how Virgil is keen to draw attention to Amata’s own psychological motivation (344–45) at the very same time as he presents her as a victim of Allecto (346ff.), Amata’s course of conduct is both (a) in accord with her own personal response and motives and (b) forced upon her. She cannot help what she does; but what she does is the product of her own psychological response to the circumstances which confront her.
101. Cf. Otis, op. cit. (n. 7 above), 167: ‘the book’s central concern [is] with Aeneas and the spiritual processes at work in his psyche.’ See also id., op. cit. (n. 5 above), 306–12, Mackay, op. cit. (n. 5 above), 184, Williams, op. cit. (n. 9 above), 48, and Segal, op. cit. (n. 26 above), 61.
102. It is thus a much more ‘profoundly pessimsitic work’ than even Poe, op. cit. (n. 94 above), recognizes.
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