5—
Aeneas in Latium
The first part of Virgil's work deals with the events that begin with the capture of
Troy and lead up to Aeneas' arrival in Latium. The second part covers the events
that begin with that arrival and end with the moment when he finally secures his
kingdom in Italy. The two parts might appear to be equal in importance, but the poet
considered the second half to have greater spiritual significance, as he says in the
second proem: maior rerum mihi nascitur ordo , maius opus moveo (7.37f) [a graver
sequence of events open before me, and I now begin a grander enterprise]. The
predominantly peaceful experiences of the first half contrast with the predominantly
warlike ones of the second – dicam horrida bella [I shall tell of a ghastly war]; to
describe such things is the noblest task of the epic poet, in the same way that war is
the most important thing in the life of the individual and of the nation, and – we
should add – in the same way that the ancients regarded the Iliad as Homer's
outstanding masterpiece. And it was with the Iliad that Virgil had to compete in this
part of his epic.
I—
General Survey
1—
Condensation of the Material
Virgil's first task was to construct from the traditional material an overall scheme of
events, and to divide them into books. We have already discussed the form which he
gave to the story of the prodigia (ch. 2.2 above); now we must deal with his main
theme, the relations between Aeneas and the native population, and the battles. First,
however, we must briefly remind ourselves of the traditional version[1] so that we can
establish the principles according to which Virgil reshaped, developed and arranged
it.
172 Of the older versions of the story only that of Cato has survived to any extent. In
his account the events unfold as follows: (1) Latinus allots a portion of land to the
newcomers (Serv. on Aen . 11.316; fr. 8 Peter). (2) Trojan encroachment leads
to war, in which the Rutulians under Turnus are allied with the Latins; Latinus is
killed during the first encounter. (3) Turnus revives the war with the support of
Mezentius; Aeneas vanishes, Turnus is killed. (4) During a third battle, Ascanius
kills Mezentius in a duel (Serv. on 1.267; 4.620; 9.745; frr. 9, 10 Peter). In the later
versions, the Latins and Rutulians do not unite to fight the Trojans, nor is Latinus
killed as an enemy of Aeneas; rather, they stress the marriage of Aeneas with
Lavinia[2] and play down the opposition between the Trojans and the Latins as much
as possible. The most extreme example of this tendency is represented by the
tradition which is followed by such as Dionysius of Halicarnassus: this is his
schema (1.57f.):[3] (1) Aeneas settles without Latinus' permission on what is to
become the site of Lavinium, but makes friendly alliance with him, marries his
daughter, and helps him and his native troops to vanquish the Rutulians; the city of
Lavinium is completed. (2) After two years the Rutulians rise up again under the
leadership of the Latin aristocrat Turnus; they are beaten, but botlh Turnus and
Latinus are killed in the battle so that Aeneas now becomes sole ruler of the Trojans
and the native population. (3) After another three years comes a second war against
the Rutulians, who are supported this time by the Etruscans under Mezentius: Ae-
neas is killed, Ascanius succeeds as ruler. (4) Ascanius successfully continues the
war, Mezentius makes peace after the death of his son Lausus. Livy's account
173 (1.1-2) is very much the same: (1) Latinus, full of admiration for Aeneas' nobility
and spirit, allies himself with him (there is a brief mention of a variant, that the
alliance was preceded by a battle); Aeneas marries his daughter, and Lavinium is
founded. (2) Turnus, King of the Rutulians, who is betrothed to Lavinia, attacks the
allies and is beaten, but Aeneas is killed; from then on, peace reigns; nothing is said
of what becomes of Turnus and Mezentius. And there may have been other histor-
ians and antiquaries who put the scanty events that had become established in
tradition into a somewhat different pattern and order; the essentials will have re-
mained basically unchanged.
The first thing that Virgil needed to do was to condense his material. He com-
bines the three or four battles of the traditional version into one battle, which does
however include several clashes, and he compresses the events of several years into
a few days. The events follow closely one upon another without any interruption
that might divert the reader's attention. In the same way the author of the Iliad had
compressed a great deal of material which had originally been spread over several
years into the few days of the
Unity of time involved unity of action. In the traditional versions, the Trojan
successes are sporadic: first the Latins are won over and Lavinium is built, then the
Rutulians are beaten and Turnus is killed, then finally the Etruscans are beaten, and
Mezentius is either killed or surrenders; only then is the safety of the new settlement
assured. Virgil concentrates all this: Aeneas faces the Latins, Rutulians and Mezen-
tius simultaneously; the death of Mezentius, which in defiance of tradition occurs
before that of Turnus, is only a prologue to the duel in which Turnus is killed and
whereby all resistance is extinguished; Virgil takes care to let us know that from
now on the Latins too will be submissive to Aeneas' rule. Only at this point, that is
after Turnus' death, does Aeneas marry Lavinia and found his city: here too Virgil's
account is unique. This new chronology was the result of the need for concentration,
as was Virgil's conversion of the Latins into allies of the Rutulians, a detail in which
he departs from later tradition and returns to Cato; so, too, the alliance with the
native population occurs at the same time as the final consolidation of Trojan gains;
both are the prizes of the victory of Aeneas in the duel which brings the epic to its
end.
174 Thus on the relationship of the Latins with the Rutulians and the Trojans Virgil
agrees with Cato; he differs from him in that he separates King Latinus from his
subjects and does not involve him in the fighting. He needed to do this because,
unlike Cato, he made everything culminate in the marriage of Aeneas to Lavinia.
Virgil did not want Aeneas to drag his bride from her father by force of arms, let
alone make his way to her over her father's dead body. Instead, the king himself
gives his daughter to Aeneas in marriage, in obedience to a divine command, and
Aeneas is defending a just claim when he insists on the fulfilment of this contract.
Nor could Latinus be shown to break his word; but despite this Aeneas had to win
his bride in battle. That presented a real problem, and even if the solution which
Virgil chose is not perfect, we should at least realize that it is the result of careful
and mature consideration.
When the passionate lust for war runs amok and rages all around the aged king
Latinus so that he can no longer control it, he calls the gods to witness that he is only
yielding to force (7.591ff.); he allows the wild hordes to have their will, but he
himself refuses to have anything to do with the crime, foreseeing the vengeance that
it will bring: saepsit se tectis rerumque reliquit habenas [he barred himself within
his palace and resigned the reins of government]; Juno herself has to fling open the
gates of war, since the king refuses to do so, although it is normally his function. Of
course this does not mean that he totally abdicates his power – in that case he would
have had to appoint a successor, but there is no mention of this; nor does he
withdraw from his own people when he speaks to Aeneas, so Aeneas is quite
justified in considering him to have broken his promise ( rex nostra reliquit hospitia
et Turni potius se credidit armis [11.113] ['it was your king who abandoned his
guest-friendship with me and chose instead to rely on the arms of Turnus'], and
Latinus, for his part, as soon as he believes that the time has come to put an end to
war, summons a council of state and lays the proposals for peace before it
(11.234ff.). It is diplomatic acumen that makes him begin his speech by expressing
regret that he had not summoned his council before (302), and which leads him,
both in the presence of his nobles at this meeting and in the presence of Turnus later,
to take the responsibility for the war upon himself. This is constitutionally correct, in
so far as he did not persist in exercising his veto to the very end but allowed the
others to have their way; because he was still king while his people were fighting a
war, he can say of himself arma impia sumpsi (12.31) ['I wickedly went to war'],
175 although strictly speaking he had neither done so himself nor ordered the others to
do so, but had merely been too weak to impose his will. Psychologically it is exactly
right that at the crucial moment he is painfully convinced that it is impossible to
resist the pressure of the war-party (7.591), and that nevertheless he reproaches
himself afterwards for his weakness (11.471). But in fact it is such an extraordinary
state of affairs – an entire nation waging a war against the will of its king and
without his participation – and so difficult to portray in detail, that the precise nature
of the situation is of necessity less clear than it might be.[4] This also affects Latinus'
relationship with Turnus, particularly his attitude towards Turnus' claims to Lavinia.
These seem well-grounded at first glance: Turnus has commended himself both by
his personality (7.55) and by his services in the war against the Etruscans (423f.),
and he was under the protection of Amata – Virgil took this motif from tradition
(Dion. Hal. 1.64) and made good use of it; Latinus himself has shown no opposition
to the idea, so that his wife, although in deliberately ambiguous phrases (7.365) and
with a woman's carelessness for objective truth, can state that the king has already
entered into an agreement with Turnus. Before the warning omens the alliance had
seemed a safe prospect, as is clear from the words of Faunus thalamis neu crede
paratis (7.97) ['put no trust in any wedding which lies ready to hand']; but it is
176 equally clear that a formal bethrothal had not taken place, and that Latinus himself
does not feel that he was bound by one.[5] That is why, when Latinus thinks that
Aeneas' arrival is the event predicted by the oracle,[6] he does not hesitate to offer his
daughter to him: Aeneas sees this as the fulfilment of Creusa's prophecy. Turnus, on
the other hand, his senses confused by Allecto, feels it to be a shameful breach of
promise; the main purpose of war for him was to win back Lavinia. But since
Latinus, as we have just explained, has allowed the war to take place since he is too
old and weak to prevent it, it inevitably follows that he has allowed Turnus to court
his daughter again, and in these circumstances Turnus does indeed claim Lavinia as
his right (11.359), and, on the assumption that he is her suitor, he calls her father
socer (440) [father-in-law], as was the custom after a betrothal. Latinus himself is
conscious of the fact that by allowing the war to go ahead he has broken his promise
to Aeneas that he should marry Lavinia:[7] promissam eripui genero (12.30) ['I stole
177 the promised bride from her betrothed']; and yet, as things stood, he was in no
position to give either a negative answer to Aeneas, or a positive answer to Turnus.
The fact, which is tacitly recognized by both sides, that Lavinia will be the prize of
victory, is not explicitly stated until the foedus (12.192) [pact] that is concluded
178 before the decisive duel. All this would be much simpler and clearer if Latinus had
openly opposed Aeneas from the start, or if he had openly broken an earlier promise.
We are now in a position to see how difficult it was for the poet to get around these
two problems, and what sacrifices he had to make in his efforts to do so.
2—
Expansion
As we have seen, Virgil regarded the condensation of his material as one of his
principal tasks; on the other hand, there is one episode that is considerably ex-
panded. There were artistic reasons, and practical reasons too – i.e. political and
patriotic ones – for introducing everything that could be discovered about the ear-
liest period of Italian history into the framework of the Aeneid . One simple way of
doing this was for both sides to call upon all available allies and auxiliary troops.
The neighbouring communities could easily be represented as allies of the Latins
and Rutulians, and this provided Virgil with an opportunity to weave in many
legends about origins and foundations. But it also made it possible to include the
saga of Diomedes, still very much alive in South Italy, which could be used not only
to increase the prestige of the Trojans but also to introduce the particularly attractive
character of Camilla. The same device made possible Aeneas' alliance with Evan-
der, which is so very important for the political message of the poem, and his visit to
the future site of Rome, and, what is very significant symbolically, his assumption
of command over the original population of Rome's territory. Since Evander's
character, which was already well-established, was unsuitable for a heroic warrior,
and since he could hardly be presented as Aeneas' subordinate, his place was taken
by Pallas. According to a legend invented to explain the name of Palatium, Pallas
was a grandson of Evander (the son of his daughter Launa and Hercules) who had
died very young and was buried on the Palatine (Dion. Hal. 10.32.43); for obvious
reasons, Virgil turns him into Evander's son, and gives him a Sabine mother
(8.510); thus he represents the fusion of Greek and Italian stock. His early death,
taken from the legend, provides the poet with further useful motifs. Aeneas' journey
to visit Evander was important to Virgil in its own right; at the same time he has
worked it most skilfully into the narrative, using Aeneas' absence as a vital piece of
motivation corresponding to the wrath of Achilles. Less obvious, but still percep-
179 tible, are the reasons which led him to include the Etruscans among Aeneas' troops.
In Virgil's own time, the predominant tradition knew only of a battle fought by
Aeneas and Ascanius against the Etruscans under Mezentius; however, an earlier
tradition, reported by Timaeus, which unfortunately is preserved only in the obscure
phraseology of Lycophron,[8] said that Aeneas stayed at Agylla-Caere and made an
alliance with Tarchon and Tyrrhenus. Virgil combined the two: Mezentius remains
the Trojans' enemy, whereas the Etruscans are their allies, but – and this reveals
Virgil's pragmatic intention (i.e. using myth as historical propaganda) – they are
represented not as allies of equal standing but as under the command of Aeneas,
gens externo commissa duci (10.156) [they trusted themselves to the care of a
foreign leader], a leader who had been assigned to them by the will of the gods, as
revealed by the prophet. Thus in those ancient times fate had already decreed a
situation which was only to come about in reality after hard struggles throughout
many centuries, the subordination of Etruria to the control of the descendants of
Aeneas. From the point of view of the verisimilitude of the narrative it is an
advantage that the introduction of this episode considerably increases the forces at
Aeneas' disposal, so that we are not faced with the improbable story that a handful
of Trojans and Arcadians were able to overcome the united opposition of all the
other peoples of Italy. From an artistic point of view, Virgil makes full use of the
situation to enrich his narrative with new motifs. There is the catalogue of Etruscan
forces, which, as in the Iliad , follows that of their opponents, and is in form like the
catalogue of ships; Aeneas' journey by sea; the figure of the bold and resolute
cavalry-commander Tarchon; but above all there is the highly original charac-
terization of Mezentius and his relationship with his former subjects, a new creation
that results from the fusion of the two traditions, which necessitated separating
Mezentius and his son Lausus (whom Virgil also took over from the tradition) from
their fellow-countrymen.
The main source for the material in the battle-scenes was the Iliad . Virgil's
ambition was to create a new work by reshaping Homer's most effective motifs to
suit his purposes, and by enriching it with new situations, such as those in the
Camilla episode.
180
3—
Arrangement
If the second part was to be equal in length to the first, the poet had six books at his
disposal. In deciding what material should go into each book, he was mainly con-
cerned to avoid two pitfalls: shapelessness and monotony. He felt that these were
two major faults in the construction of the Iliad : on the one hand, the poet handles
the chronology quite recklessly, and the action darts here and there, apparently
following no set plan; on the other hand, the endlessly drawn-out descriptions of
fighting with their mindless repetitions which had held Homer's archaic Greek
audience spellbound would certainly have appealed to very few in Virgil's day.
Virgil gave the second part of his work a well-defined shape by using the same
methods that he had used in the first part: he allotted one self-contained piece of the
action to each book. Thus Book 7 covers the period from the arrival up to the
declaration of war; Book 8 contains Aeneas' visit to the site of Rome; Book 9 the
events that take place during his absence; Book 10 the first major battle; Book 11
the armistice and the cavalry battle; Book 12 the decisive battle. The books also fall
into three groups of two: 7 and 8, the preparations for the fighting; 9 and 10 leading
up to the first great conflict; 11 and 12 the events which culminate in the decisive
duel. Moreover, the division into books corresponds as far as possible with units of
time: 8 and 9 depict simultaneous events, centred on Aeneas in 8, on the Trojan
camp in 9; while 10, 11.225 to the end, and 12 each contain the events of one day.
The danger of monotony was greatest in Books 9 to 12, which contain the actual
battles. The conclusion and outcome of these battles were obvious as soon as Turnus
had been given the rôle of Aeneas' main opponent; his death had to be the decisive
event, and artistic logic demanded that he could not simply be killed 'in battle' as in
the tradition, but must be slain by the hand of Aeneas himself. The
[slaying] of Hector by Achilles was the model that must inevitably have imposed
itself on Virgil. Everything that preceded this crucial event could only serve to delay
it – the poet's problem was to elevate this series of delays into incidents that were
significant and interesting in their own right. The shaping of the whole of the second
half so that it would reach its climax in the duel between Aeneas and Turnus
entailed only one essential change: regardless of the tradition, Mezentius had to die
before Turnus; in all other respects Virgil was free to do as he wished. First, he took
181 advantage of the absence of Aeneas to allow the heroic figure of Turnus to shine
forth in all its unclouded glory, in this, too, taking on the rôle of Hector: the attempt
to burn the ships, the fighting at the wall, and the fighting at the camp – that is, the
three most important phases of the battles described in Books 12 to 15 of the Iliad –
provide the opportunity for this in the case of Hector, and while the spotlight is on
Turnus, the description of the general mêlée of the two armies is restricted to the
minimum, in order not to anticipate the later books. The incident in Book 10 of the
Iliad is skilfully adapted: the ill-fated venture of Nisus and Euryalus interrupts the
description of Turnus' exploits, which occupy the beginning and end of Book 9.
Before the fighting begins again in Book 10 the assembly of gods provides relief
(10.1-117): similarly, there are scenes with the gods at the beginning of Books 4, 8,
13, 15 and 20 of the Iliad . There follows in Book 10 the first actual battle, in which,
on the Trojan side, Pallas is killed by Turnus – this feat is eventually to cause his
own death, just like Hector's greatest achievement in Iliad 16 – while on the enemy
side, Lausus and Mezentius are killed; the fight between Aeneas and Turnus is
postponed by the phantom sent by Juno: this motif is taken from the end of Iliad 21.
Book 11 also begins with peaceful scenes in the camp and in the city; then comes
the second day of battle, in which Aeneas and Turnus play no part whatever; the
unique figure of Camilla appears in the foreground; the cavalry battle takes its own
distinctive course, and thus provides a contrast to Book 10.
Book 12 does not begin with scenes of battle either; the preparation for the duel
by negotiations in the city, the solemn treaty and its violation (these come from Iliad
3 and 4), then one more battle, which at last proves decisive (from Iliad 20 to 22).
Here, too, only a short section (257-310) is devoted to the general mêlée; Aeneas'
wound gives Turnus another opportunity for an aristeia (324-82); when Aeneas has
been healed (like Hector in Iliad 15) and appears on the battlefield, seeking Turnus,
Juturna's intervention causes another delay; only the attack on the city and Saces'
urgent appeal brings Turnus to face the enemy. Before the final scene, the resistance
of Juno on Olympus is at last overcome (791-842); then comes the decisive duel.
In this way Virgil did indeed succeed in keeping repetitions to the minimum, in
intermixing the inevitably similar scenes of battle wherever possible with scenes of
a different type, and in maintaining the tension right up to the end. He did so by
selecting and rearranging the traditional motifs, not one of which, however, was
simply retold: all of them, as we shall see, were refashioned in Virgil's own charac-
teristic manner.
182
II—
Allecto
1—
Allecto Personifying Discord
Virgil introduces the period of renewed sufferings that await Aeneas in his struggle
for Latium with scenes which deliberately parallel the corresponding scenes at the
beginning of the first part of the Aeneid . In each case, Juno is amazed and furious to
see the good fortune that her enemy enjoys, and pours out her emotions in a
soliloquy; in each case, she uses a minor divinity to destroy her enemy; in each case,
her command is immediately obeyed and disaster strikes. But because it is necessary
to increase the tension, and because this second and final attempt at revenge has to
have a more powerful effect, her plan has to be introduced in a way that is more
striking in every respect. This is ingeniously achieved in Juno's monologue: hatred
of the Trojans, disappointment at previous failures, her conviction that she has been
wronged and humiliated – all this is expressed in stronger terms than ever before.[9] It
is precisely because she foresees that her plans will inevitably come to nothing that
there are no bounds to her overwhelming desire to exact the greatest possible
vengeance while she still has the chance to do so. With the splendid antithetical
phrase flectere si nequeo superos , Acheronta movebo ['if I cannot change the will of
Heaven, I shall release Hell'], she enlists a more powerful ally than before. Instead
of the ruler of the winds, the peaceful Aeolus, who had been a guest at the table of
the Olympian gods, she summons a monster from the Underworld, hated not only by
the Olympians but even by the gods of the world below: Allecto, the Fury who
drives men mad. Instead of unleashing the powers of nature she unleashes furious
passion, the insanity of mortal men, which causes so much more harm than the
183 powers of nature ever can. It is war that is going to flare up, and Virgil and his
contemporaries knew very well what that meant. Hell knows no more fearful
plague; anyone who wants to shatter the sanctity of peace must be out of his mind.
Only those who share the total abhorrence of war felt by Virgil's contemporaries
can fully understand why the poet made it the work of Allecto. Thus the queen raves
lymphata (377) [in a reckless frenzy]; her companions have furiis accensae pectora
(392) [hearts ablaze with hysterical passion]; Turnus' lust for battle is scelerata
insania belli (461) [the atccursed lunacy of war]; and Tyrrhus reaches for his axe
spirans immane (510) [panting with savage rage]. So the mad tumult breaks out
almost simultaneously in three different places: Virgil has created a unity out of a
haphazard juxtaposition or unconnected series of events by means of the figure of
Allecto, so that they are converted into a carefully arranged sequence brought about
by the machinations of a single will.
However, Allecto is not really the personification of madness, but of discord, cui
tristia bella iraeque insidiaeque et crimina noxia cordi (325) [Allecto, who dearly
loves war's horrors, outbursting wrath, treachery and recriminations with all their
harms] and tu potes unanimos armare in proelia fratres , atque odiis versare domos
(335f.) ['You know well how to set brothers, united in love, at armed conflict one
against the other. You can wreck homes by hate']; her real work is the dissolution
and destruction of peaceful agreements: disice compositam pacem [shatter the pact
of peace which they have made] and when she has done her work she announces
perfecta tibi bello discordia tristi : sic in amicitiam coeant et foedera iungant (545–
6) ['Behold, you have your quarrel, and it has been securely ratified by horrors of
war. Now see if you can join them in friendship again and make them agree to
peace!']. Thus she is to a large degree the counterpart of Eris, who similarly appears
in Hesiod ( Theog . 225f.) as one of the daughters of Night (cf. virgo sata Nocte [331]
[maid, daughter of Night]), and whose destructive swarm of children may have been
in Virgil's mind when he wrote line 325 (quoted above). So she does not really
appear as a vengeful or punishing daimon : she is an Erinys to the extent that if she
succeeds in her work then madness will result (447, 570), and she is one of the deae
dirae (324) [dread goddesses], the sorores Tartareae (327) [Tartarean sisters], of
whom she is the most loathsome. Like the Erinyes, she carries whips and torches
(336), and has snakes for hair (cf. Discordia demens vipereum crinem vittis innexa
cruentis [6.280] [Strife the insane, with bloody ribbons binding her snaky hair].
Virgil may have drawn his inspiration for this creature from tragedy, in which, from
Aeschylus onwards, Erinyes and other such daimons had frequently appeared: thus
an author as early as Macrobius, in the remarkable passage in which he mocks all
these scenes, writes sparguntur angues velut in scaena parturientes furorem (5.17.3)
[there are snakes everywhere, as on the stage, giving birth to madness]. In surviving
tragedies, it is the figure of Lyssa in Euripides' Herakles who comes closest to
Allecto;[10] an even closer parallel may well have appeared in the attempts of post-
184 Euripidean tragedians to outdo Euripides. They will have supplied Virgil with the
basic colours for his picture: but the concept itself came from another source.
Postquam Discordia taetra Belli ferratos postis portasque refregit [when hideous
Discord burst apart the iron-bound doors and gates of War] wrote Ennius in his
Annales; Virgil deliberately echoes this in Belli ferratos rumpit Saturnia postis
(622) [the Saturnian queen burst apart the iron-bound gates of War]. It may well be
that Ennius also described how Discordia prepared the way for war, and that Virgil
is trying to outdo that description; but Discordia was too abstract for his taste, and he
preferred to use the well-established and graphically developed figure of the Erinys.
2—
Amata
Allecto's first victim is Queen Amata, who is driven insane by poison injected by
one of the snakes from Allecto's head. The snake, which is elsewhere no more than
a horrible attribute of the Erinyes, here becomes, as a poisonous reptile, a symbol of
consuming madness; it injects its poison in many different guises, just as Allecto
herself tot sese vertit in ora (328) [assumes so many countenances]. The immediate
result of Amata's madness is that she tries to induce her husband to act against the
will of the gods by means of a sophistic interpretation of the oracle. When this
attempt fails, and madness like a consuming disease forces its way even deeper into
her very spirit, the queen's collapse into insanity becomes clear to all: in crazed
delirium she rages through the cities of the land. And in her ecstatic state she roams
even further afield: she becomes a maenad and flings herself into the woods, taking
her daughter with her. It is not easy to say in what sense Virgil wishes his portrayal
of this
chi . . . evolat et natam frondosis montibus abdit quo thalamum eripiat
Teucris . . . 'euhoe Bacche ' fremens , solum te virgine dignum vociferans [she went out
into the forests in her flight, pretending that the power of Bacchus was upon
her . . . and she hid her daughter among leaf-clad mountains . . . to rob the Trojans of
their wedding. 'Ho, Bacchus!' she shouted, and 'None but you' she shrieked,
'deserves the maiden!']. Two things are clear, firstly that Amata is truly in the grip
of madness, not acting in a cold, calculating way and feigning madness after careful
consideration. Previously she had already been truly lymphata [frenzied], then maio -
rem orsa furorem [seized by an even wilder madness], and finally Virgil writes
185 talem . . . reginam Allecto stimulis agit undique Bacchi (404) [so fared it with the
queen, as Allecto goaded her now this way, now that and drove her by the Bacchic
power]. On the other hand, it is equally certain that in spite of this last phrase, and in
spite of the fact that the women are later said to be attonitae Baccho (580) [under the
shock of Bacchus], it is not a question of true Bacchic ecstasy: for how could
Allecto bring that about? After all, the Bacchi stimuli [goads of Bacchus] are not
hers to command. But Virgil does say explicitly s i m u l a t o numine Bacchi (385)
[pretending that the power of Bacchus was upon her], and just as the description that
follows is in many respects unmistakeably dependent on Euripides' Bacchae ,[11] so
too this phrase is very reminiscent of Pentheus' suspicion that the women are
gadding about
Dionysus] in the mountains: except that what was a false supposition in the Bacchae
is actually the case here. And in fact the words that Virgil uses, especially the
addition of her intentions in silvas evolat . . . quo thalamum eripiat Teucris taedasque
moretur (387f.) [she went out into the forests in her flight . . . to prevent the marriage
ceremony and to rob the Trojans of their wedding], support the view that Amata is
pretending to be acting in obedience to the command of Bacchus, rather than that
Allecto drove her to the delusion that she was possessed by Bacchus. Later, Virgil
writes stimulis agit undique Bacchi (405) [drove her now this way, now that, by the
goads of Bacchus]; this must be a case of
frenzy] here ascribed to the Fury from the Underworld, just as in Euripides' Trojan
Women (408) Apollo is said to
frenzy].[12]
Virgil's creation is quite idiosyncratic and can only be explained as an amalga-
mation of several concepts. At first, Allecto plays a rô1e similar to that of Lyssa in
Euripides' Bacchae (977), when she is called on by the chorus to incite the maenads
against Pentheus. There, too, madness sent by the powers of the Underworld is
involved in the action.[13] In Virgil, the god plays no part, although the rites are
186 performed in exactly the same way as, for example, in Euripides' Bacchae and in
the cult of Dionysus generally. In Virgil, Roman sensibilities are very evident: the
god Liber himself cannot desire any kind of dissolute maenadism, in which respect-
able upper-class matrons forget all morality and decency; that would be an abuse of
the name of the god, which would be a serious offence – hence maius adorta
n e f a s (386) [venturing a still graver sin] – which could only have been prompted
by insanity sent from Hadles. In a very similar way, the Bacchanalia, where genuine
ecstasy certainly did play a rôle, were once regarded in Rome as a criminal decep-
tion and banned by the magistrates.[14] But if the intention of Amata with her thiasi
[troops of Maenads] is to make it impossible for her daughter to marry, on the
grounds that she is dedicated to the god – taedas morari (388) [to prevent the
marriage ceremony] – this is reminiscent of another heroine who falsely claims to be
dedicated to the cult of Bacchus, and for much the same reasons: Laodameia, who in
Euripides' famous drama tried to evade marriage by a similar pretence: her thiasi
dolosi [groups of fraudulent maenads][15] may well have been in Virgil's mind.
Amata, however, does not persist in her deception; when the other matrons, in the
grip of the same madness, join her and she swings the pine-torch in their midst, in
her confused mental state she believes that she is carrying the marriage-torch in the
bridal procession, and she sings the marriage-song for her daughter and Turnus.[16]
187 But in the middle of her song (this is surely how repente [suddenly] in line 399 is to
be understood) she breaks off and calls on the women of Latium to join her in
resisting Latinus who is guilty of showing contempt for a mother's rights. The result
achieved by Amata, or rather by Allecto through Amata is twofold: first, Lavinia,
frondosis montibus abdita (387) [hidden amid leaf-clad mountains] and allegedly
dedicated to the gods, is temporarily taken out of Latinus' hands, and secondly, all
the women of the land have been mobilized in opposition to the marriage that he has
proposed, and this in its turn affects the male population: quorum attonitae Baccho
nemora avia matres insultant thiasis . . . undique collecti coeunt Martemque fatigant
(580) [from all sides there gathered the relatives of those women who, under the
shock of Bacchus, had gone prancing in frenzied bands about the trackless
forests . . . and they too clamoured incessantly for an appeal to Mars]. Possibly Virgil
was borrowing a Greek motif here and toning it down, with the result that it does not
achieve its full effect: it is conceivable that in some Greek work, an ecstatic move-
ment took hold of the women and they yielded to it
total abandon][17] and thereby provoked their menfolk to embark on a war. This would
be a development of the idea which Aristotle put forward to explain the remarkable
behaviour of Odysseus in Iliad 2.183: he ignores good manners so that the popula-
tion will be astounded and will turn to him, 'as they say that Solon behaved when he
wanted to gather the people together to persuade them to fight for Salamis'. The
incident to which Dümmler ( Kl . Schr . II [Leipzig, 1896] 405f.) rightly refers in this
context, the
have come even closer to the motif as we may suppose it was presented by Virgil's
source. Virgil himself seems to imply that the men are anxious to fight in order to
put an end to the women's disorderly and giddy behaviour. He has thus found an
ideal way of making the mad lust for war spread all over Latium; the women, who
are more susceptible to this infectious mania, are the agents whereby the men, who
are slower to be moved en masse , are all individually inflamed to resist Latinus'
plans. We can only regret that this ingenious piece of motivation is not treated very
clearly and fails to achieve its full effect.
3—
Turnus
Allecto has begun her fiendish work with the action which has the least immediate
impact, which needs the longest time to develop, and which at first only briefly
188 thwarts Latinus' plan by delaying its execution.[18] She now turns to Turnus, the real
motivating force behind the war. While he is asleep she comes to him in the guise of
the priestess of Juno, and goads him with words calculated to touch his sense of
honour and his manly pride; she herself mentions Juno, and claims that she is acting
on her orders. Turnus refuses; then the Fury is filled with anger, appears in her true
form and plants her torch in his chest: he wakes up, bathed in sweat, and from that
moment on the fire of hell burns in him. In this episode, too, Virgil has blurred the
clarity of the one motif by combining it with too many others. The appearance of the
dream-figure is based in the first instance on the dream of Penelope in the Odyssey
(4.795ff.), in which she is consoled by an
Athena and takes the form of her sister Iphthime. Penelope replies to her in her
dream, just as Turnus does (and that is what distinguishes this dream-narrative from
the others in Homer) and tells her about her worries: then the
been sent by Pallas Athena, the personal protectress of Telemachus, and that puts
Penelope's mind at rest.
[Pallas . . . who has sent me now to tell you these things]: Virgil has incorporated this
straightaway in Allecto's first speech to Turnus, with ipsa palam fari omnipotens
Saturnia iussit [the Saturnian Queen, the Almighty, had herself commanded me to
say this openly to you], and, in fact, Calybe, as Juno's priestess, could indeed have
received instructions from her in a dream:[19] though it does appear rather awkward
when we find that Turnus rejects this revelation and proceeds to appeal directly to
Juno himself, confident that she will not forget him. These lines have not been
completed, as is shown by the half-line 439; Virgil probably intended that Turnus
should go on to say that he did not believe in Juno's alleged warning, on the grounds
that she would not permit events to proceed as far as allowing his bride to be
withheld from him. This is followed by the mocking rebuke that inflames Allecto
189 with blazing anger. Formally, the final lines of Turnus' speech (443-4) are modelled
on Hector's farewell speech in the sixth book of the Iliad (490-2);[20] however, the
motif of rejecting a divine warning, and suffering a divine anger in consequence, is
derived from another source. In his Hymn to Demeter (42), Callimachus describes
how Demeter takes on the form of her priestess Nikippa,[21] and gives a friendly
warning to Erysichthon, who wants to fell her sacred tree; he dismisses her scorn-
fully, and then she reveals herself in her divine form and stature –
touched the heavens] – and utters fearful threats. Either Callimachus himself or
some very closely related source supplied Virgil with the motif. It probably goes
back to the dialogue between Helen and Aphrodite in Book 3 of the Iliad (386ff.),
although there are no close echoes of the Homeric passage in Virgil. However, the
result of the goddess' angry speech is the same in each case: Turnus, like Helen,
immediately does what he had at first refused to do. It is this reversal and the
increase in dramatic tension that it creates which caused Virgil to combine the motif
of Penelope's dream with the motif of Helen or Erysichthon, yet it cannot be denied
that the latter motif has no true psychological justification in this context. Whereas it
certainly contributes a good deal to the characterization of Helen, and of Erysich-
thon, that the former at first tries to avoid Paris, and that the latter very coarsely
repudiates the priestess' reprimand, this is not true in the case of Turnus: at most,
Virgil perhaps hoped to show that to start with he had been a peaceable character,
who had had no inclination whatever to enforce his claims with a mailed fist; but
that possibility seems to be excluded by the fact that he rejected the message simply
because he did not believe the truthful account given by Calybe.
190
4—
Ascanius:
War Breaks Out
Turnus commands his Rutulians to take up arms, in order to give Latinus a strong
warning against the newly-made alliance. However, a peaceful settlement was still
perhaps possible; Allecto knows that a breach can be healed if blood has not yet
been spilt, so she puts the finishing touches to her work by means of a third
intervention: Trojans and Latins are to come to blows. At the same time, there were
two reasons why the Trojans had to be made responsible for starting the dispute.
First, everything is arranged so as to pile as much tinder as possible around the
throne of Latinus, since that is where the flames of war are eventually to flare up and
blaze forth. However, Latinus' subjects can only demand that their king should
declare war if they feel that they themselves have been injured; if they were to begin
the war themselves, they would have no occasion or reason to be angry with the
foreign settlers and they would be in no position to come before the king demanding
revenge. Secondly, Virgil could not be indifferent to the fact that this gave him the
opportunity to respect the tradition, in so far as it existed, according to which the
casus belli was some form of encroachment by the new settlers, such as looting or
other incursions into Latin territory. Virgil is operating very skilfully when he makes
the offence committed by the Trojans as slight as he can, yet serious enough to
motivate the anger of the Latin country-folk. The country-folk: that is explicitly
emphasized several times (504, 521, 574), and apparently they are very different
from the city population that is stirred up by Amata (384); they are the uncivilized,
191 undisciplined[22] bands, who are always prepared to rush to help each other at the call
of the shepherd's horn, to drive off robbers and wild animals; it is these men, who
act on the impulse of the moment, passionately, and without mature reflection, who
are to strike the first blow.[23] But the injustice which incites them to retaliate in this
case is not any theft or wrongful raid, but an offence by an innocent offender,
Ascanius. Allecto brings it about that Ascanius, while out hunting, fatally wounds a
tame stag, which is the household pet of Tyrrhus' large and highly respected family,
although of course Ascanius has no idea that it is a privileged beast. It is significant
that Allecto does not dare to lay a finger on the boy himself, the darling of the gods;
she puts his hounds on the scent of the stag after she has 'flung madness upon them',
(rabiem obiecit [479-80]), as Artemis had once done to the hounds of Actaeon.
Ascanius, who is passionately devoted to hunting (which was regarded as a thor-
oughly Roman pursuit in Virgil's day), catches sight of the magnificent stag, and
possessed by an understandable longing for glory ( eximiae laudis succensus amore
[496]) takes aim. Tyrrhus' daughter Silvia is the first to see the wounded creature;
she immediately breaks into a loud lament and calls on the country-folk for help;
thus events are set in motion by a woman, who is much more liable to give way to
mindless grief than a man. Allecto then sees to it that the affair spreads far and wide
(505, 511). All this is undoubtedly Virgil's own invention. We ought not to look for
the motif of the ill-starred hunt in any historical version of the legend, since it is far
too Hellenistic in spirit. But the tame stag and its accidental death were perhaps
borrowed by the poet from the story of Cyparissus, which he knew from a Hellenis-
192 tic poem, as we learn from the combined evidence of Ovid[24] and Pompeian paintings
(especially Helbig 219 cf. Ovid Met . 10.113). I might almost go as far as to say that
we cannot fully comprehend Silvia's sorrow and anger and the other consequences
of the fatal arrow unless we know the sad outcome of the Cyparissus story: the
Hellenistic poet will have used every one of the many artistic devices at his disposal
to touch the reader's heart with the story of the boy's mortal grief. Virgil had to
respect the laws of epic and restrict himself to allusions, but he was still censured for
it: one ancient critic found the whole motif leve nimisque puerile [lightweight and
too childish] (Macrob. loc . cit .).
How first Silvia's menfolk come running in answer to her call, how Tyrrhus,
armed with his axe from his tree-felling, summons his troops, and how someone – it
must have been the Fury herself – raises the alarm by a blast on her horn – and
immediately men come pouring in from every direction – all this is vividly
described by Virgil; and, since Ascanius is apparently in danger, it is also clear why
the Trojan warriors immediately march out armed for battle – if it had been some
Trojan of no particular significance who was in danger, it would have been necess-
ary to supply some additional motivation to produce this effect. After that,
bloodshed is inevitable, and it comes as no suprise that the inadequately armed
country-folk are overcome by the Trojans, who are experienced fighters. Blood now
cries out for vengeance.
Thus Allecto brings her work to a climax, and Virgil has plotted its progress with
calculated artistry: Juno had pronounced sere crimina belli , arma velit poscatque
simul rapiatque iuventus (339f.) [sow in recriminations the seeds of war: in one
breath let their manhood want, demand and grasp their arms], and she can now
ascertain to her own satisfaction that stant belli causae (553) [motives for a war are
established]. Now that disaster is on its way, there is no need for further help from
the powers of darkness. Once discordia has sprung up between men, its own inner
nature forces it to erupt into war. The three separate streams of war-fever unite in
Latinus' palace, and the weak old man tries in vain to stem their flood; Allecto has
seen to it that he will be alone in his resistance, and the waves pass over him and
onward. The actual outbreak of war however still needs to be embodied in some
public action; Virgil therefore creates an episode out of something which may have
been no more than a figure of speech in Ennius (see above p. 149f): the opening of
the Belli portae [Gates of War]. By means of the descriptions of the temple, and a
solemn reference to the custom that is still observed (601ff.), the event is given the
importance that it requires; and since it is not Discordia (as in Ennius) but Juno
herself who flings open the gates, we are given the impression that, despite Allecto's
help, the war has been brought about by the goddess herself.[25]
193
III—
The Battles
Four books of the Aeneid , a third of the whole work, are devoted to descriptions of
fighting. The economy of the work required that they should be allotted a consider-
able amount of space. Aeneas has to be given an opportunity to display his heroism,
particularly because he needs rehabilitation after the defeat at Troy. Also, quite apart
from Aeneas himself, the history of Rome is one long story of battles and victories,
so Rome's prehistory must also tell magnificent tales of battles and victories. The
Iliad provided the prototype for heroic battles; Virgil could not even consider mak-
ing changes to this model, let alone rejecting it in favour of one of a quite different
type. However, the Iliad had also exhausted virtually every possible variation on this
theme (apart from a cavalry battle), and any attempt to think up new forms could
only have led to eccentricities. That is why Virgil keeps closer to Homer in these
descriptions than in any other part of his poem with the exception of the Funeral
Games. At the same time these descriptions are Virgilian through and through.
The difficulties that faced him are not to be underestimated. Virgil found vir-
tually no hints in the threadbare tradition to help him in his characterization of
individual warriors and had to rely almost entirely on his own imagination, although
he had to take care that his own inventions should not be recognizable as such. A
bold departure from the repertoire of characters established in the mythical tradition
would have clashed with the overall style. Any obtrusive fictions, or any introduc-
tion of obviously contemporary situations, would have spoilt the illusion that all this
was age-old material, hallowed by tradition. As for the action itself, that is, the
motivation and incidents of the battles, this could easily be adapted from Homer,
194 although great care had to be taken in so doing. Homer's audience loved battles and
could never hear enough about heroic single combat. It is clear that the poet himself
had a lively technical interest in the vicissitudes of spear-fights and sword-fights, the
wounds and different forms of death, and he could presuppose the same interest in
the audience for which he was reciting. Virgil's contemporaries had also lived
through wars enough, and the style in which they were fought was still comparable
with that described by Homer – we should remember that in Roman tactics, too, the
decisive factor was still the proficiency of the individual, not of the whole army; but
how few of those who heard or read Virgil had ever themselves carried a sword!
Above all, how remote Virgil himself was from the cut and thrust of the battlefield!
He thus found himself faced with the enormously difficult task of having to invent
his own characters, characters who moreover were designed with only one end in
view, namely to perform deeds to which neither Virgil's mind nor that of his public
could relate in any real way, except insofar as they aroused their general sympathy
for humanity.
Confronted with these difficulties, Virgil decided on the following guidelines: he
would concentrate the interest on the smallest possible number of characters, and by
careful use of Roman and national material, make the battle scenes as graphic as
possible and emphasize the overall human interest or psychological aspect of the
events. As for the composition, he decided to maintain the listener's interest by
means of constant variety and an energetic, dramatic pacing of the action.
1—
Types of Battle-Scenes
If we classify the types of battle scenes under various headings, we see at once that
the
man, is by far the largest category. Thus Book 9 is almost exclusively the aristeia of
Turnus; in Book 10 we have Aeneas in 310-44, Pallas' deeds and his death at the
hand of Turnus in 362-509, Aeneas again in 510-605 (606-88, the removal of
Turnus, is a later addition), Mezentius in 689-746, and his death from 755 to the end
(908), the latter being Aeneas' first decisive achievement. The battles in Book 11
(597-895) are for the most part (647-724, 759-867) the aristeia and death of Ca-
milla, interrupted by an exploit of Tarchon (725-58), and concluded by a description
195 (868-95) of the consequences of Camilla's death: the flight of the Latins and their
pursuit up to the walls of the city. Finally in Book 12 Tolumnius and the spear, and
the subsequent hand-to-hand fighting at the altar (257-310), is followed by the
wounding of Aeneas (311-23), and another aristeia of Turnus (324-82) and the
healing of Aeneas (383-440): then his sortie with his faithful companions, which
includes a few lines about their deeds (458-61), the attack by Messapus on Aeneas
and what might be described as a combined aristeia of Aeneas and Turnus (500-53),
up to Aeneas' attack on the city, which then leads to the decisive duel (554-696) that
rounds off the work (697-952). Thus the interest is concentrated on five characters:
Turnus, Aeneas, Pallas, Mezentius, Camilla; of these, only Turnus and Aeneas
appear in more than one book; two books (9 and 11) have only one main character
each. If we disregard the episodes concerning isolated feats performed by other
characters – Nisus and Euryalus in 9.176-502, Ascanius in 9.590-671, Tarchon in
9.725-59 – and if we ignore the few characters whose only function is to oppose the
main heroes and who are given some importance in order to magnify their aristeia –
Lausus in 10.791-832, Aunus in 11.699-724, Arruns in 11.759ff., and to a lesser
degree Pandarus and Bitias in 11.672-716, Halaesus in 10.411-25 – all that is left is
a few not very extensive passages which serve to give an impression of the general
fighting by naming the victors and the vanquished; and we may observe that Virgil
inflicts such a 'butcher's list' on his readers only once in each book: 9.569-89
(though 573-5 makes it belong in part to Turnus' aristeia ), 10.747-54 (also 345-61,
though this is rather different), 11.612-47 (though this includes the very general
description of the ebb and flow of battle in 618-35), and 12.458-61. And indeed, it is
only exceptionally that Virgil expands his narrative so as to give an account of an
actual duel (for example in Book 11, and again in 9.576-89, and in 12.287-310,
though that passage is not strictly comparable); otherwise it is merely a case of
listing names as in Iliad 6.29-36, followed on one occasion (9.576ff.) by a slightly
more detailed description of two fights, rather like Iliad 14.511ff., where the list is
followed by the very sketchy description of the killing of Hyperenor. On the other
hand, what is completely absent in Virgil, but fairly common in Homer, is what we
might call the 'chain of combats', where the poet tries to bring several single
196 combats fought by various heroes into some sort of relationship with one another –
as for example in Iliad 5.533ff.: Agamemnon kills Deikoon, the comrade of Aeneas,
and then his two brothers, who had joined the expedition against Troy out of loyalty
to the Atridae; Menelaus, later joined by Antilochus,
Menelaus and Antilochus then kill two Trojans; Hector
he avenges their death with that of two of the enemy; Ajax
them and strikes Amphius (cf. also, for example, 13.576-672, 14.440-507, 15.518–
91). Such series have a more tiring effect than plain, rapid lists, unless, at least,
famous heroes appear in them to lend interest; and few such heroes were available to
Virgil.
2—
Differences between Homeric and Roman battles. Cavalry. Chariots.
The Virgilian battle-scene, built up from a description of tactics and types of
weapon, is modelled faithfully on its Homeric prototype in all essentials, but con-
tains occasional touches which would give the Roman reader the feeling that these
are descriptions of battles fought by his own ancestors. There are many passages
where it is clear that Virgil has applied these touches above all in connection with the
native troops. Military ensigns are mentioned only in such phrases as signa sequi [to
follow the standards], while Turnus proclaims the beginning of the war by flying the
vexillum [flag][26] from the citadel. Virgil had introduced Misenus as trumpeter in
Books 3 and 6, in accordance with the tradition; he also explicitly says that he had
stood at Hector's side in that capacity (6.166f.). During the fighting the classica
[signals for battle] are often mentioned, given by tuba , bucina or cornu [trumpet or
horn], but without exception in passages which refer to Etruscans or Latins:[27] Virgil is
aware that trumpets were thought to have been invented by the Etruscans, and were
therefore unknown to Homeric warriors.[28]
197 Perhaps the most important difference between Virgil's battle-scenes and
Homer's is Virgil's introduction of cavalry. He did not hesitate to provide even the
Trojans with cavalry, probably because without it the lusus Troiae could not have
been presented as a tradition derived from their former homeland. Unfortunately we
do not know how the Roman antiquarians squared this with their knowledge that
there were no cavalry battles in Homer. It is for this reason that only isolated Trojan
cavalrymen are mentioned (Glaucus and Lades, 12.343; Thymoetes, 12.364;
Amycus 12.509), and none of them are generals, or come from the aristocracy.
Although Aeneas himself is depicted as riding on the march (8.552), he never
appears on a horse in battle. The actual cavalry in Aeneas' army are provided by his
allies,[29] Evander's Arcadians (8.518; 10.364) and Tarchon's Etruscans, who appear
again later in Book 11 as the real opponents of Camilla ( Tyrrhenos equites [504]
[Etruscan cavalry], Etruscique duces equitumque exercitus omnis [598] [Etruria's
chieftains and all the cavalry], Tusci [629] [Tuscans], Tyrrheni [733] [Tyrrhenians]),
although isolated Trojans also appear in this context (Orsilochus and Butes 690,
Chloreus 768). The Etruscan king Mezentius also used to ride away from the wars
on his battle-horse (10.859), and his son Lausus is called equum domitor (7.651)
[horse-tamer]. On the Latin side, too, it is the allies who constitute the main contin-
gent of cavalry, although the Rutulians (9.48 but cf. 7.793) and Latins (11.603) do
have a certain number. Turnus himself only rides, accompanied by selected compan-
ions, when he needs to reach the enemy camp as quickly as possible (9.47); he does
not ride into battle. Other mounted warriors include the Faliscans under Messapus,
son of Neptune and tamer of horses, whom the poet wishes to impress on our
imaginations as the cavalryman par excellence , in the same way that Turnus is the
outstanding chariot-fighter (10.354; 11.464, 518, 692; 12.295; equum domitor
[tamer of horses], one of Virgil's few stock epithets, is applied to him at 7.69; 9.523;
12.128); also the men of Tibur under Catillus and Coras (11.465, 519, 604), which,
as Servius on 7.675 rightly points out, is why they are compared with centaurs;
finally, and most strikingly, the Volscians led by the maiden warrior Camilla (7.804;
198 11 passim ), who eventually commands the combined Latin cavalry in the battle in
Book 11 (519).
As we have already said (p. 148), Virgil inserted this cavalry-battle between
Books 10 and 12 so as to vary the character of the fighting as well as that of the
combatants, and thus avoid the danger of monotony. The reader does indeed come
to the decisive battle in Book 12 with keener interest than if it had come immedi-
ately after the one in Book 10, which is of exactly the same kind and which involves
exactly the same people. However, so that Book 10 shall not anticipate the cavalry-
battle, Virgil has to invent the story that the Arcadians, because of the difficult
terrain, were compelled to fight on foot, and this also explains their initial defeat
(10.364); no similar motivation is necessary in the case of the Etruscans, since
obviously they cannot think of disembarking their horses during the fight to secure a
beachhead. Furthermore, the fact that their first task is to attack the enemy camp
may explain why the Latin cavalry, and Camilla, do not appear in Book 10,[30]
although it is not at all certain that Virgil himself deliberately motivated their late
appearance in this way.
For the cavalry-battle itself Virgil could no longer rely on his constant guide,
Homer. His account is none the worse for that. Of course we should not auto-
matically assume that everything is Virgil's free invention, for, just as there were
many paintings of Amazonomachies, so too there must have been many poetic
descriptions which included motifs which could be borrowed for Camilla's en-
counters: in 659ff. Virgil himself mentions the Amazons by the river Thermodon,
and Hippolyta and Penthesilea. However, it is unthinkable that Virgil used the
archaic epic, the Amazonis or the Aithiopis , as a source for his cavalry-battle; it is
improbable, in any case, that he had read these epics, as is shown by the fact that he
knows of Penthesilea, not as a horsewoman, but only as a woman who fought from a
chariot (seu cum se Martia curru Penthesilea , refert [11.661] [or else when martial
Penthesilea drives back in her chariot from war]), a conception which he must have
199 derived from mythographic compendia and illustrations; and this is further evidence
that the Amazons did not ride horses in the archaic epics.[31] But already in the
archaic period, certainly by the sixth century BC, the idea of the mounted Amazon
had been introduced and was never to disappear; but in the iconographic tradition
the opponents of the horsewomen, to the best of my knowledge, are always hoplites,
not horsemen as in Virgil; and it is this circumstance which gives his description its
individual colour. How the two armies first approach each other in orderly ranks,
then, when they are only a spear's cast apart, suddenly break ranks, and the leaders,
Tyrrhenus and Aconteus, charge each other's horses, so that one crashes to the
ground as if struck by lightning – that is described in as vivid and lively a manner as
the subsequent ebb and flow of the armies which leads up to the actual hand-to-hand
fighting. We see a wounded horse rear up and beat the air with its front hoofs (638);
a rider struggling to stay mounted on a wounded steed as it plunges to the ground,
and scrabbling for control of the reins; his companion tries to stop him falling, but
both receive fatal wounds (670); by skilful manoeuvring of her horse, Camilla
pursues an attacker (694); Tarchon pulls an opponent down from his steed, and,
holding him in front of him, tries to kill him with his own spear-point (741); here we
see an Etruscan, clad in animal skins and carrying a lightweight spear like a hunts-
man (677), there an armoured Trojan on an armoured steed (770); and scenes of
pursuit and flight of many different kinds (760, 780, 783, 814)[32] Thus our imagin-
ation has been carefully guided to visualize all the warriors as mounted, even when
this is not explicitly stated (666, 673, 675), and on the one occasion when Camilla,
tricked by the cowardly Ligurian, dismounts from her horse to answer a challenge to
200 fight on foot, then every reader who has been alert to the poet's intention will take it
for granted that she remounts her horse, which her companion has been holding
meanwhile (710), after this encounter (as is implied by 827), without this being
explicitly stated; on the contrary, if Camilla had continued to fight on foot, Virgil
would have had to say so explicitly.[33]
The war-chariot plays a much smaller part in the Aeneid than in the Iliad , partly
because it is used only on the Latin side. Virgil confines the chariot strictly to them,
presumably on the grounds that Aeneas and his followers will not have brought
chariots across the sea with them, whereas the auxiliary troops, the Arcadians and
Etruscans, form substantial chariot contingents. But even on the Latin side the
chariot is a distinction which the common soldier never enjoys; particularly in
Books 10 and 12 it is invariably linked with Turnus.[34]
Turnus leaps down from his chariot when he goes to confront Pallas (10.453),
drives to a duel the brilliant white horses, a gift from a goddess (12.83), mounts his
chariot when the fighting is renewed (326), and fights on, sometimes standing on the
platform of his chariot, sometimes getting off to confront his opponent (12.226-340,
355, 370-83); with the help of his swift horses, Juturna, who takes the place of
Metiscus as charioteer (468), takes him out of range of Aeneas, and he is able to
fight on for some time in the same way (511, 614ff.) until the news of the threat to
201 the city makes him leave his chariot at last so as to go and meet Aeneas face to face
(681). Thus the poet takes care that the picture of the king fighting from his chariot
is firmly impressed on our minds; he makes this effect more powerful by restricting
the use of chariots by others: for whereas his description of the Italian auxiliaries
leaves no doubt that he believed that the ancient Italian leaders normally made use
of chariots (7.655 Aventinus, 724 Halaesus, 782 Virbius, cf. also 9.330 Remus), in
Book 12 no chariot is mentioned other than that of Murranus, who is descended
from a long line of kings; in Book 10 the quadriga[35] (570) [four-horse chariot] of
Niphaeus and the pair that belong to Lucagus and Liger (575) bring variety into the
list of Aeneas' opponents; and Rhoetus fleeing in his chariot (399) interrupts the
enumeration of the warriors who fight Pallas on foot. Otherwise, no chariot can
compete with Turnus'. In these four exceptional cases, the chariot is not mentioned
arbitrarily, but serves to give an individual touch to the description of each man's
death.
3—
Weapons
The weapons in Homer are similar to those which Virgil attributed to early Rome. In
fact the weapons of Virgil's own time, too, were still basically the same, although by
then there had been great developments in the form of individual items. In his
descriptions of battle, Virgil was thus able to equip his men with the offensive
weapons of the Homeric warrior. For attack from a distance there were the long,
heavy throwing-lances and, if necessary, stones picked up from the ground (10.381,
415, 689; 12.531, 897); and for close combat the sword. In the parade of troops in
Book 7 he named a large number of weapons that were especially characteristic of
early Italy; but neither pilum , dolones , veru Sabellum [javelin, pikes, Sabine spit],
which are characteristic of Aventinus' men (7.664) nor the Oscans' aclydes (730)
202 [small clubs], thrown from leashes, nor their sickle-shaped swords, nor the Campa-
nians' cateiae (741) [boomerangs] are mentioned when it comes to the actual battle.
That is all the more remarkable when we consider the care which Virgil took to
achieve variety, at least in vocabulary, as for example in the great number of
synonyms that he uses for hasta [spear].[36] The only weapon which is really different
from the hasta is the hunting spear, sparus , which is mentioned only once (11.682).
Nor, while we are on this subject, are the peculiar pieces of armour and clothing that
are described in Book 7 ever mentioned again: the wolfskin galeri (688) [caps] and
the leather leggings (690), the Oscan cetra (732) [short shield], the Campanian cork
helmet and the crescent-shaped shield (742). Thus what we have here is antiquarian
material about ancient Italy juxtaposed with narrative based on the Homeric epics,
and Virgil makes no attempt to reconcile them, just as he felt no need to bring the
military leaders mentioned in Books 7 and 10 into the main body of his narrative.[37]
During the Latins' preparations for war, axes are sharpened (7.627, cf. 184); they
are not used in the fighting (for in 12.306 the axe that Alsus snatches up is the one
intended for slaughtering the sacrificial beast). Only Camilla and her companion
Tarpeia carry battle-axes (11.656, 696), like Amazons in the poetic tradition, and
similarly the sons of Hercules' companion Melampus are equipped with clubs.
There is only one occasion in the fighting where a non-Homeric, native Roman
weapon is mentioned: the falarica [heavy missile], with which Turnus kills the giant
Bitias (9.705); this illustrates at one and the same time the strength of the attacker,
who is able to hurl such a gigantic missile which is probably normally dropped from
above – like pila muralia [defensive pikes] – and also the gigantic size of his victim,
who could only be felled by a missile of this kind; the weapon itsellf had already
been given a place in epic by Ennius ( Ann . 544 Vahlen); the lightly aimed Praenes-
tines generally carry slings (7.686), like the Locrians of Ajax in Iliad 13.716;
archers are frequently mentioned (9.572; 10.754, Camilla 7.816; cf. 11.654,
Chloreus 11.773, Clusium and Cora 10.168); in the description of the battle both
203 slings and arrows, as in Homer, are mentioned in only a very few isolated passages
(the arrow shot at Aeneas, 12.319, modelled on Pandarus' arrow in Iliad 4.104f., an
arrow-wound, 12.651). But during the storming of the camp, Mezentius carries a
sling, since even the Roman legions resort to slings in such circumstances;[38] in
attack and defence the legionaries will have used bow and arrow, too, like Capys
(9.578) and Ascanius (9.621), Ismarus (10.140) and other defenders (9.665; 10,131).
When we come to protective armour we find the same situation. The complete
panoply of plumed helmet, breastplate, greaves and shield (as for example Aeneas'
armour 8.620, 12.430; and Turnus' 11.487) resembles both the Homeric, or Ionian,
and the Roman. If anything, as far as details are concerned, Virgil keeps rather
closer to the Homeric model, merely introducing one or two Italian national fea-
tures. The shield is carried on the left arm in battle; if this is cut off, it falls to the
ground (10.545); when Aeneas has finished looking in amazement at his new shield
and prepares to march out to battle, he lifts it onto his shoulder ( attolit umero , 8.731)
which must mean that he carries it by a strap across his back like the Roman
legionary on the march, and like Odysseus in Iliad 10.149:
[he put the shield around his shoulders]. The shield is round ( clipei orbem [10.545,
783; 12.925] [the circle of the shield]), and protects a man down as far as his groin
(10.588) or to mid thigh (12.926), and is large enough for its owner to be able to
crouch behind it ( se collegit in arma poplite subsidens [12.491] [he gathered himself
behind his armour, dropping down on one knee]) so as to allow a threatening spear
to hurtle past; Virgil must have imagined the shield of Idomeneus in Iliad 13.405 as
being a heavy, round shield of this kind:
body crouched]. Virgil does not generally distinguish between clipeus and scutum [a
round and oblong shield], and we must think of the scuta of the Trojans (8.93) as
including the so-called Argive round shields (for even the cavalry of Volcens are
called scutati [9.370] [equipped with scuta ]): but when the companions of Pallas
carry his body from the battlefield on a scutum (10.500) it must be a long shield (cf.
8.662 the scuta longa of the Gauls), for which this is the correct term, and it is worth
remembering that according to tradition (Plut. Romulus 21) it is a weapon of Sabine
204 origin. However, wooden shields are never mentioned by Virgil; he mentions bronze
as a material (10.336; 12.541); the shields of Aeneas (8.448: bronze, gold and iron)
and of Turnus (12.925) consist of seven layers of metal, just as the shield of
Homer's Ajax (
Achilles' marvellous shield at least five layers of metal. Homer's bull's hides (
Bitias (9.706) and the composite shields of leather and metal that belong to Pallas
and Mezentius: clipeum , tot ferri terga , tot aeris , quem pellis totiens obeat circum -
data tauri (10.482) [Pallas' shield, with all its layers of iron and bronze and the
many dense-packed coverings of bull's hide] (=
hide upon it], Iliad 20.276) and per orbem aere cavum triplici , per linea terga
tribusque intextum tauris opus (10.783) [through the shield's domed circle of triple
bronze, the layers of linen and the texture of three bull's hides]: Virgil's shields,
with their extra layers of iron and linen, are even tougher than Homer's, and, while
the iron needs no special explanation, perhaps scholars are right to remind us in
connection with the linen that this material was used in early Roman scuta [shields]
(according to Polybius' description, 6.23)[39] As for the bronze breastplate, lorica or
thorax (7.633; 10,337; 12.381), Virgil found no precise information in Homer; he
visualized it as the breastplate constructed of chain-mail and linked metal scales
(11.488) of his own time, which was strengthend by doubling the layer of scales
(duplici squama loricafidelis et auro [9.707] [the trusty corslet with its double layer
of golden scales]) or doubling, or even tripling, the chain-rings: bilicem loricam
(12.375) [two-leashed cuirass], loricam consertam hamis auroque trilicem (3.467)
[a corslet of hooked chain-mail and three-leash golden weave]. Such a triple chain-
mail tunic is so heavy that only a hero of extraordinary strength could wear it
(5.263): it is no doubt a story-teller's exaggeration.
Besides the warriors in full panoply, Virgil also has lightly-armed men, the
counterpart not of Homer's archers and slingers ( Iliad 13.716) but of the Roman
velites [light armed troops], i.e. they have no defensive armour, and the light parma
[buckler] instead of the clipeus , but they do carry a sword: thus the Trojan Helenor
ense levis nudo parmaque inglorius alba (9.548) [went lightly armed, with only a
bare sword, and with no tale of glory on his still unblazoned buckler], and the
Etruscan king's son Lausus, who, not yet strong enough for a full suit of armour,
wears only a tunic stitched with gold threads and likewise the parma , levia arma
minacis (10.817) [buckler, too light an armament for his defiant temper]; such a
tunica squalens auro (10.313) [tunic stiffened with gold] is elsewhere worn under
the breastplate just as the Homeric
plate]; however it is unlikely that Virgil realized that Homer too has inadequately
armed men who wear only a chiton and no breastplate. More frequently than Homer,
205 Virgil describes the special armour of individuals, not merely for the sake of a vivid
pictorial effect, but generally so as to add a particular touch of colour to the nar-
rative. We are told that the youthful Helenor (9.545) is equipped with only ense
nudo parmaque alba [a bare sword and unblazoned shield] so as to intensify our
sympathy for the despair which drives him to plunge into the midst of the foe a qua
tela videt densissima [where he saw the weapons cluster thickest]; again, we admire
Lausus' self-sacrificing action still more when we know how inadequately armed he
is to fight against an opponent clad in bronze armour (10.817). On the wall of the
camp stands the son of the Sicilian Arcens, wearing a richly embroidered purple
robe (9.582); he is killed and immediately Numanus mocks the Trojans by shouting
out a scornful phrase about their effeminacy: vobis picta croco et fulgenti murice
vestis [your garments are embroidered with saffron and ablaze with purple dye].
With purple crest and purple robe Acron towers above his men; his bride has
adorned him, and her love is the cause of his death: Mezentius sees the purple
splendour from afar and plunges into the midst of the foe, to kill the conspicuous
warrior (10.719). Haemonides, the priest of Apollo and Diana, wears, even in battle,
his priestly ribbons and his long priestly robe of gleaming white (10.537): just as
Haemonides is accustomed to sacrifice beasts to the gods, so Aeneas now sacrifices
[immolat ] him, but only after he has fled all over the battlefield forgetful of his
priestly dignity, and has stumbled and fallen. The gigantic Herminius, who is so sure
of his own invincibility that he leaves his blond head and his upper body unpro-
tected, is punished for his pride: his bare shoulder is struck by a spear (11.644).
Ornytus fights in hunter's garb, almost insolently, as if he were slaying wild ani-
mals; he pays with his own life for provoking Camilla's anger (11.677); but as for
Camilla herself, it is the splendidly colourful, gold-encrusted trappings of Chloreus'
horse, which she covets, that bring about her downfall (11.768). Virgil was writing
for a public which knew how to read between the lines; he never pedantically spells
out the implications of these subtle touches.
4—
Wounds, Death and Spoils
As for types of wounds, Homer provided Virgil with more than enough material;
indeed he very nearly exhausted every possible variation. Originality, of course, was
206 not Virgil's aim, but he does not abandon his independent approach even here. For
his first description of a wound in battle he invents something unusual:[40] Privernus is
lightly wounded, and throws aside his shield in a moment of foolish anxiety, to put
his hand to the wound; whereupon an arrow pins his hand to his left side and fatally
buries itself in his body (9.576). Several times (9.762, 10.700) hamstrings are cut,
something which, as it happens, is not found in Homer, although we do know that
poplites succidere [cutting of the hamstrings] was a wound which the Roman
legionaries particularly dreaded. But these unconventional details are much less
important than the general nature of Virgil's descriptive technique. The first dif-
ference from Homer to be observed is that Virgil as far as possible avoids describing
complicated wounds, and confines himself to the simplest and most obvious types.
One example will suffice to make this clear: let us compare their descriptions of
wounds to the head, which, with the chest, is the main target for an attacker. In
Virgil, helmet and skull are hewn through, so that the warm brain spatters over the
victim's face (11.696); forehead and jaws are split open with the stroke of a sword
or the blow of an axe (9.750; 12.307); a spear is driven through the helmet into the
temple (12.537) or the temple is hit by a sling-bolt (9.588); an arrow (9.633) or a
spear (9.418) goes right through the head, entering at the temple; a rock hits a man
full in the face (10.698) or smashes the head in from the front, so that splinters of
bone, with brain and blood adhering to them, fly around (10.415); spear (10.323) or
sword (9.442) enters a mouth opened wide in a shout. It is clear that Virgil was
seeking variety but avoiding detailed description as far as possible. Everything is
207 very much the same in the Iliad too, except that there a sword slashes the forehead
above the nose (13.615) or a stone shatters the eyebrows (16.734), so that the skull
breaks and the eyes fall out, or the spear pierces the nose by the eye, goes through
the teeth, cuts the tongue off and comes out under the chin (5.290), or goes into the
mouth and knocks out the teeth, so that blood is forced into the eyes and spurts out
of the mouth and nose (16.346), or under the eyebrows, so that the eyeball falls out,
and out through the nape of the neck (14.493), or, conversely, into the nape and out
through the teeth, cutting the tongue (6.73); also, by the ear (11.509), into the ear
(20.473), above the ear (15.433), beneath the ear (13.177), under the jaw and ear
(13.677 etc.). In some parts of the Iliad (specifically Books 5, 13 and 14 and to some
extent Book 16), the poet seems almost to enjoy describing these complex wounds,
as if it were some kind of sport. Virgil no doubt took offence at these detailed
accounts on the grounds that they were too much like technical medical descriptions
for the elevated style of epic. On the other hand, he often made an effort to make a
wound more interesting, not anatomically but from the point of view of ethos ; for
example, when Pharos opens his mouth to utter vain boasts, and a javelin comes
flying into it (10.322; cf. 9.442; 10.348); or when Alcanor has his right arm pierced
by the spear with which he was about to support his falling brother (10.338), or
when Hisbo, mad with rage over the death of his friend, leaps on Pallas, and Pallas
tumido in pulmone recondit (10.387) [buried his sword in his swelling lung]. A
brave warrior scorns to kill an enemy in flight, but meets him face to face, haud
furto melior , sed fortibus armis (10.735) [to prove himself a better man not by
trickery but by true valour]; this is why Camilla overtakes the steed of the fleeing
Ligurian, grabs his bridle, and faces him as she slays him (11.720). That is why the
noble warriors themselves are also killed through the chest (Turnus and Pallas,
Euryalus, Lausus and Camilla); but cruel Mezentius is deservedly wounded in the
groin first (10.785f.) and then stabbed in the throat (907). However, we are not told
where the treacherous arrow strikes Aeneas (12.318), nor does any song name the
archer; mortalin decuit violari volnere divom? (12.797) [was it fitting that a deity
should be outraged by a wound from a mortal man?]. To make it possible for
warriors in full armour to be wounded, Virgil, like Homer, often says that a power-
208 ful spear-thrust pierced through both shield and armour (10.336, 485) or, again like
Homer, that a careless movement left a man's chest or flank exposed (10.425;
12.374; cf. 11.667; 10.314), or that the enemy's weapon penetrated the gap between
helmet and armour (11.691; 12.381): it is not surprising that, since he is no more of a
pedant than Homer, he did not spell out every detail, and sometimes mentioned the
shield but not the armour. However, when Virgil describes Turnus' first wound
(12.924) and says that both shield and cuirass were pierced at the thigh, and then
Aeneas proceeds to plunge his sword into his breast (950) with no apparent diffi-
culty, we remember how carefully Homer dealt with an equally important event, the
death of Hector, making Achilles search out a vulnerable point: he strikes between
the helmet and the cuirass, where the shoulderbone meets the throat, in the gullet,
yet he does not sever the windpipe, so that, as the poet naïvely adds, the dying man
could still speak to his victorious foe ( Iliad 22.319ff.). To Virgil's mind, details of
this kind at such a moment would have robbed the incident of its pathos: therefore,
with the utmost simplicity and grandeur, he writes ferrum adverso sub pectore
condit (12.950) [he buried his blade full in Turnus' breast].
In that passage the fatal wound is described as briefly as possible. In other cases
it is not even mentioned. Of the two Trojans who escape with their lives when the
tower on the wall collapses (9.545), Helenor plunges into the midst of the foe, while
Lycus is attempting to climb the wall with the help of friends within when he is
pulled down by Turnus together with the parapet; obviously both men are killed and
the poet does not bother to say so; he was only interested in the two situations and
the contrast between them. Similarly, there is the incident where Tarchon pulls
Venulus off his horse, puts him in front of himself on his own horse, breaks off the
point of his spear and tries to find an unprotected place where he can thrust it home,
while his victim tries to fend off his right hand (11.741): the outcome of this struggle
is in doubt, but the poet loses interest in it at this point, because he was attracted
only by the opportunity that it gave him to describe an unusual situation. If Homer
had described any of these incidents he would have given much more factual detail;
his audience will have wanted to be satisfied that the foe was really dead, the one
thing which matters in an actual battle.[41]
209 The victor strips the weapons from the body of his opponent and regards these
spolia [spoils] as his greatest claim to fame. This practice is described both by Virgil
and by Homer: in this instance the national Roman tradition corresponded with the
Homeric one, and it was a Roman tradition to take the spolia opima (10.459) [spoils
of honour] from an enemy commander. Thus Arruns, who flees after he has mortally
wounded Camilla, forfeits both the spoils and the renown (11.790) and Diana carries
away her body and all her weapons with it; on the other hand, Euryalus takes spoils
from Rhamnes (9.359), the Rutulians take spoils from Euryalus and Nisus (450), and
there are many more scenes of this kind in the other battles. But here too what is
really important is something new, the poet's ethical sensibility: to adorn oneself
with plundered weapons is at best childish folly, as in the case of Euryalus, who
meets his death as a direct result of this folly, or else it is a matter of female vanity,
as in the case of Camilla (11.779); for a man it is wanton hybris (10.501) which will
be followed by well-deserved nemesis: it is Pallas' sword-belt that makes Aeneas
kill Turnus (12.941ff.). By contrast Aeneas, with humble pity, dedicates the spoils of
Haemonides (10.542) to Mars,[42] and constructs a tropaeum (11.5) [trophy] for Mars
out of Mezentius' weapons; he honours the proud spirit of Lausus by leaving his
weapons by the side of his body (10.827). Pallas vows to father Thybris that he will
hang the spoils of Halaesus on a holy oak (10.423). Perhaps Camilla intended to
dedicate Chloreus' gold weapons in the temple (11.778). Mezentius is too proud to
adorn himself with booty, and he despises the gods, so when he has killed Pallas, he
gives his weapons to Lausus (10.700); and Lausus is to be equipped with the
weapons that he expects to take from Aeneas, which the impious Mezentius envis-
ages as a kind of trophy to the god whom he invokes, his own right hand (10.773).
In any case, Virgil's warriors do not neglect their other duties for the sake of taking
210 spoils; they do not fight over them, as Homeric warriors so often do, nor does Virgil
think it seemly that a great hero should strip an enemy's body and carry off the
spoils himself. Aeneas delegates the job to Serestus (10.541), Messapus to his
soldiers (12.297). But the most important item of booty – and here Virgil differs
from Homer – is the balteus , the decorated sword-strap or sword-belt, strung across
the shoulder and richly decorated with phalerae [studs] and bullae [bosses]; this is
the only item which is mentioned when Rhamnes and Pallas are stripped of their
arms, and these are the two most significant instances in the poem.[43] Virgil's pref-
erence for a decorative piece of equipment rather than an actual weapon – for in
both these cases, the hero does not give a passing thought to the sword itself – surely
reflects contemporary attitudes.
5—
Characters
Homer's heroes do not really differ very much from each other on the battlefield;
they have no special traits of character. One may be stronger or more skilful or
quicker or braver than another: all these are attributes that affect the outcome of the
battle; it is exceptional for Homer to think of presenting a warrior as a human being
with his own individual character. But this was precisely what Virgil regarded as
important: even on the battlefield it is the purely human element that concerns him
most of all. Much that is relevant here has already been discussed: let us recapitu-
late. Aeneas is the ideal Roman man and Roman fighter: he is quick to acknowledge
magnanimity in an enemy (10.825), he can feel clementia (12.940) [clemency] even
towards his most bitter foe, he is a model of Roman virtus [manly valour] (and, in
true Roman fashion, prides himself on this, 12.435) and of moderatio [avoidance of
excess] (above p. 165), of fides (12.311) [honouring of solemn agreement] and of
iustitia (11.126) [justice], of pietas [dutifulness] towards the gods, and towards
Pallas, whose father has entrusted him to him, and who is his ally and his guest-
friend (10.516). It is only when he has to avenge the death of Pallas that the depth of
his sorrow makes him harsh, even scornful, towards his victims;[44] the thought of him
211 stifles any idea of mercy, and in the fury of his grief he kills Turnus despite all his
pleas. To have shown mercy on this occasion would have been a cowardly failure to
do what duty demanded.
His opponent Turnus[45] is his equal in strength and courage; but Aeneas has vis
temperata [controlled strength] while Turnus has vis consili expers [strength unac-
companied by judgement]; the gods deprive him of their support, although he, too,
piously respects them (9.24; 12.778). Above all, he is not fighting on behalf of his
people and their future, as Aeneas is, but is justifiably reproached for fighting to
defend his own personal claims, and it is immoral to provoke a war for reasons of
that kind.[46] It was Allecto who drove him to war: possessed by the Fury, he has lost
that clarity of vision and that self-control, without which boldness becomes mad-
ness; this works to the advantage of the Trojans, as we can see most clearly when he
is besieged in his camp and is so crazed with his rage to kill that it does not occur to
him to open the gate for his own men (9.760). He is animated by a lively sense of
honour (10.681; 12.645, 670), but this too expresses itself as an unhealthy type of
extravagance. The plain words spoken by the self-assured Aeneas contrast with
Turnus' loud boasts about his own strength and heroism (9.148; 11.393, 441;
12.360). He, too, respects the courage of the warrior he has slain (10.493); but he
does not possess the moderatio [self-control] to refrain from decorating himself with
spoils, and his elation in victory turns to crude barbarity when he cuts off the heads
of the men he has slain and decorates his chariot with them while they are still
dripping with blood (12.512). He does not stop to think before charging after Aeneas
(10.645), and declares himself ready for a duel as soon as he is challenged (11.434);
then, when he is taken at his word, he does not go back on it, in spite of the urgent
212 pleas of Latinus and Amata. However, it is not with calm resolve, but in a mood of
savage violence ( violentia [12.9], furiae [101] [madness]), that he prepares for the
fight, and it is a finely observed touch that immediately after this burst of feverish
excitement his courage ebbs away when he faces the decisive conflict (220).[47] The
danger is scarcely over when his rage for battle flares up again (325), but, not
altogether unwillingly and not altogether unconsciously, he allows his divine sister
to draw him away from Aeneas, until his former sense of honour slowly reawakens,
and he realizes that it is his duty to avenge his own people's suffering; this, together
with Saces' urgent appeal (653ff.), finally forces him to confront Aeneas: but now
his passions are running twice as high ( amens [622, 742] [crazed], amens formidine
[776] [crazed with fear], mixto insania luctu et furiis agitatus amor [667] [madness
and misery blending, love tormented by passion for revenge], hunc sine me furere
ante furorem [680] ['First, let me do this one mad deed before I die']) – and his fate
is sealed. As his enemy is already poising the fatal spear, Turnus snatches up a huge
rock, an ancient boundary stone, to fling at his opponent – Virgil here makes very
effective use of the Homeric contrast between the strength of his heroes, and
heavy, his knees give way as he tries to run, and the blood freezes in his veins – and
the stone falls short of its target. A striking symbol of Turnus' fate: he has set
himself a task which was too great for him, despite his enormous strength. He had
not been able to go calmly to meet his enemy in the final duel; neither can he face
death with a steady mind now. He does not sink so low as to beg for his life ( nec
deprecor [931] [I make no appeal]), but his last words express a fervent desire to
live, and to save his skin he is even prepared to give up his claim to Lavinia (936):
Virgil implies that anyone capable of that, has never been worthy either of her or of
the throne.[48]
213 The figure of Mezentius stands in sharp contrast to Turnus. According to the
tradition, he was contemptor divom (7.648) [scorner of gods]: he is said to have
demanded from the Rutulians the first-fruits which were usually dedicated to the
gods; this led the Latins to pray to Jupiter to grant them victory if he wanted the
first-fruits for himself, as hitherto, instead of letting Mezentius have them.[49] The
tradition also said that Mezentius' son Lausus fell in battle, and that this was the
essential reason that led the king to urge that peace should be made. Virgil was not
able to make use of the traditional example of the Etruscan king's godlessness –
because there was no occasion for Mezentius to make such a demand in the scheme
of his poem – but he adapts the motif skilfully to his own ends. Traditionally,
Mezentius demanded that the honours due to the gods be paid to himself. In Virgil
(10.773) his only gods are his strong right arm and the weapon it bears.[50] It is to
these that he addresses his prayers: he wants to adorn his son with the armour of his
dead enemy and thus erect as it were a tropaeum [trophy] to himself, which the
pious Aeneas eventually dedicates to the gods instead (see above p. 165); other
blasphemous utterances also characterize him as contemptor divom [scorner of
gods].[51] However, in his account of the Lausus incident, Virgil portrays a particu-
larly close relationship between father and son, and it was easy to develop this
relationship so that Mezentius' love for his son becomes the only vulnerable spot in
an otherwise granite character, and also to represent this love as reciprocal, and to
214 transform Lausus' death in battle into a voluntary self-sacrifice undertaken for the
sake of his father. So as to increase our pity for Lausus, the poet portrays him as a
shining, heroic figure, and thus he stands in sharp contrast to his father (7.654).
Moreover, Virgil, who had decided to introduce the Etruscans as Aeneas' allies (see
p. 146 above), had to present them as independent of Mezentius: he achieves this by
inventing the story that he is a cruel tyrant who has been expelled by his subjects
because of all his brutal acts. Virgil attributes to him stories which Aristotle, and
Cicero after him, had told about the cruel behaviour of Etruscan pirates (8.485).
Virgil further exploits the split between Mezentius and his own people by using it as
the third motif in the combats in which he takes part: they begin with the tyrant
being attacked in hate and fury by his own subjects (10.691f.) – this gives new life
to the Homeric simile of the boar encircled by huntsmen; they culminate in Mezen-
tius' cry of misery when he realises that Lausus' death is the punishment for his own
actions and for the first time regrets them because they have brought shame and
destruction upon his son (851); and they end when he is defeated and begs that his
body should be protected from the wrath of his own people (903ff.): here too we
have a characteristically Virgilian contrast with Hector's plea that his body should
be returned to his own people. It may perhaps seem surprising that Virgil has
refrained from illustrating Mezentius' cruelty by making him perform some atrocity
during the battle – that would have been easy for him, but effects of this kind were
alien to his artistic ideals, which completely rejected
viour]; it makes a difference whether the poet puts accounts of such behaviour in the
mouth of, for example, Evander or Achaemenides, or narrates it himself, thus setting
it directly before the reader's eyes. Nevertheless, it is no mere accident that Mezen-
tius plants his foot on his fallen foe while he is still alive, leaning on the spear which
has pierced the dying man (10.736); and certainly, although the plot does not
demand that Mezentius should order his men in the midst of the battle to raise the
paean that the Achaeans sang when they returned to camp after the death of Hector,
the picture of the triumphal song reaching the ear of the dying man has a powerful
emotional effect (10.738). Similarly, there is a deliberate contrast between Aeneas,
who does not take Lausus' weapons as spoil, and Mezentius, who threatens to ride
215 away from the battlefield with Aeneas' severed head on display among the bloody
spoils on his horse (862). Furthermore, Virgil has carefully contrasted what we
might call the nervous courage of the youthful Turnus with the unshakeable iron
calm of this giant with his grey hair and his long beard, who withstands attacks from
every side like a rock which remains steadfast amidst the storms that rage around it
(693), who has no fear even of Aeneas and prepares to confront him et mole sua stat
(771) [solid in his own great bulk], and who can be thrown off balance only by the
death of his beloved son. And whereas Turnus at the moment of his death is afraid
of dying and is prepared to concede defeat in exchange for his life, Mezentius
himself calls on his enemy to strike the fatal blow: life is not worth living if he is
vanquished, and even his battle-steed would scorn to submit to a Trojan master
(865).
Camilla, the maiden who rejoices in battle, swift of foot, tireless, resolute, with a
pride that is easily inflamed (11.686, 709) and an innocence in the face of cunning,
fearless and conscious of her duty even at the moment of her death (825), makes a
stronger impression on our imagination than perhaps any other character in Virgil.[52]
The clearest indication of her irresistible strength is that her enemies do not dare to
confront her face to face in open battle: one tries to escape from her by a ruse,
another kills her by throwing his javelin at her from the safety of a hidden position
and does not even dare to go near her after he has wounded her. But for all her
heroism she remains a woman, and feminine weakness brings her death:[53] coveting
the gleaming armour of Chloreus she forgets everything else and so falls victim to
216 Arruns, who has been lying in wait for her after trying in vain for so long to find a
weak spot: she is so completely intent on acquiring the dazzling prize that she is the
only one who does not see and hear the fatal javelin hurtling towards her; her
faithful Volscians see disaster approaching but cannot prevent it, and she sinks to
the ground before her women can catch her in their arms.
The counterpart of Aeneas, the ideal of the mature warrior, is Pallas the ideal
youth. We see his achievements; we see how by word and example he makes his
wavering troops stand firm; we recognize in the words that he utters his sense of
honour (10.371) and his habitual piety (421ff., 460f.) which relies on supernatural
help; at one and the same time we admire and deplore the youthful boldness of spirit
which leads him to accept Turnus' challenge, though Turnus is a warrior of over-
whelming strength, and he knows very well how much weaker he is (459, cf.
11.153, 174). For him the highest good is not life but victory and a glorious death
(450); he himself says so, Jupiter comforts the sorrowful Hercules with the same
idea (467ff.), and the same thought is enough to make his grief-stricken father pull
himself together (11.166ff.); better to die in victory than to live on in shame: it is
this conviction that assuages Aeneas' pity for Pallas' father (55). Pallas, sent out to
battle from the future site of Rome, is the first great sacrifice made on Italian soil in
the sacred name of Rome; he was fighting not only against the ancient enemies of
his native city (8.474, 569), but also for the sake of its glorious future (11.168). His
lifeless body is brought back to his father, dolor atque decus magnum (10.507) [a
source of bitter pain and of high pride] as the poet puts it with the brevity of a
graven epitaph; times without number Rome's sons will fall in battle, and she will
look on them with the same bitter pride. The lamentations which now rise up around
the body of Pallas are lamentations for the generations to come; so too is the solemn
pomp of his funeral; anyone who is not aware of this is welcome to make cheap
criticisms of the poet for his sentimentality.
Pathos of a very different kind is evoked by the story of Nisus and Euryalus. Here
again it is instructive to compare it with its source, the Doloneia (Book 10 of the
217 Iliad ). It is quite clear that both the broad outline and the details[54] are derived from
Homer; but it is equally clear that Virgil always tends to reshape his material into
something new. Instead of a long and tedious exposition – Homer takes 200 lines to
bring his commanders together for a consultation – Virgil concentrates on the main
characters:[55] the narrative begins with them and remains with them, while the coun-
cil of the Trojan leaders, to which they wish to gain admittance, is described in a few
lines only (9.224-30). Whereas in Homer we have an epic narrative that unfolds in
one steady sweep, in Virgil we find lively pathos, dramatic movement, a peripateia
[reversal of fortune] at the peak of success, an increase in tension leading to the final
revenge and death of Nisus. But the greatest contrast is between Homer's portrayal
of the deed performed by two bold and cautious heroes, where the reader is charmed
by the deed itself and its success, and Virgil's emphasis on the psychological
development to which the outward events are a mere accompaniment. It is in Nisus'
ambitious and adventurous spirit that the plan for the enterprise is born (186, 194);
Euryalus agrees with it (205f.) and his determination overcomes his friend's reserva-
tions. But it is precisely this ambition, which is the driving force for their bold
enterprise, that leads to their downfall. Even before they set out, they are already
intending not simply to perform their mission but also to return cum spoliis ingenti
caede peracta (242) [with spoils, after wreaking a havoc of slaughter]; they have
chosen a route which will bring them safely through the enemy's lines, but they give
way to the temptation to turn the enemy camp, where all are asleep, into a blood-
218 bath.[56] The bold deed is successful: Nisus is intelligent enough to restrain Euryalus'
childish lack of foresight (354), but not intelligent enough to deny him the pleasure
of adorning himself with booty from the men he has killed. As a result, he escapes
the enemy cavalry himself, but Euryalus pays the price of his hybris : the shining
helmet betrays him, the weapons he has looted weigh him down (384), and he falls
into enemy hands. When Nisus loses him and then sees that he has been captured by
the Volscian cavalry, his only thought is his desire to rescue his friend; he tries to
give him an opportunity to escape by throwing his spears to create a diversion, but
this is unsuccessful; when he sees his friend in mortal danger, he loses his head: he
throws himself forward amens (424) [madly] and begs them to kill him and spare his
friend. In vain: he can only avenge his friend's death and then, mortally wounded,
219 cast himself onto his body. Thus they both meet their deaths not because of external
circumstances, or because of their hatred of the gods, but because of their own
passions: sua cuique deus fit dira cupido? (185) [or do we all attribute to a god what
is really an overmastering impulse of our own?], as Nisus himself had said with
unconscious prescience. Their mistake[57] was that they both allowed themselves to be
carried away and gave precedence to other passions over their immediate duty; but
this mistake arose from noble impulses, and they paid for it with their lives. Who
will find fault with Virgil because he does not add a narrow-minded moralizing
epilogue,
deed], but gives full rein to sorrow and admiration?
6—
Structure
It only remains to look at the structure of the four great battle-descriptions. We shall
see that Virgil's main concern in the arrangement of the material in the individual
acts and scenes was the same as in the overall plan of the whole narrative of the war
(see pp. 146f. above): namely, above all to avoid what annoyed him even more than
us in so many comparable passages in the Iliad – the lack of organization, and the
arbitrary to-ing and fro-ing. His main aims at this level too were clarity of structure
and clarity of purpose.
First, where a large number of persons have to be listed, it will help the reader if
they are divided into groups. Virgil found precedents for this device in the Iliad[58]
220 and developed it systematically. This can be seen most clearly in the battle for the
camp in Book 9: first come the contrasting fates of two Trojans (545-68); then a
'scene of butchery'; when the first pair is mentioned each is allotted a single line,
which begins with his name:
Ilioneus saxo atque ingenti fragmine montis
Lucetium portae subeuntem ignisque ferentem (569-70)
[Ilioneus with a stone like some huge crag from a mountain (brought down)
Lucetius, equipped for fire-raising, advancing on a gate]; and then two pairs, with
only the victors characterized:
Emathiona Liger , Corynaeum sternit Asilas ,
his iaculo bonus , hic longe fallente sagitta (571-2)
[and Liger slew Emathion and Asilas Corynaeus; Liger had a sure aim with the
javelin and Asilas with the arrow flying from afar unseen]; then two more pairs,
without any characterization, but one is first victorious, then beaten:
Ortygium Caenens , victorem Caenea Turnus (573)
[next Caenus slew Ortygius, and Turnus Caeneus, in his moment of victory]; the
poet lingers on Turnus; first there are two pairs in one line:
Turnus Ityn Cloniumque , Dioxippum Promolumque (574)
[and Turnus slew Itys also, and Clonius, Dioxippus, Promolus – ]; thus up to this
point the account has become progressively more compressed[59] but now it expands
again with yet another pair, whose names come at the beginning and end of the line:
et Sagarim et summis stantem pro turribus Idan
[Sagaris and, as he stood in defence at the top of the turreted wall, Idas], and finally
221 two more detailed descriptions, the death of an attacker (576-80) and of a defender
(581-9). The Ascanius episode follows (590-671); then the pair Pandarus and Bitias
appear: they kill four men (864f.); their action is then avenged by Turnus killing
four in turn (696-702), and in addition Bitias and Pandarus themselves (703-55);
then Turnus, rampaging through the camp, kills first Phaleris and Gyges, Halys and
Phegeus; then four who are named in one line (797); finally, four more (768-79),
until at last the Trojan pair Mnestheus and Serestus put an end to the flight of their
men. We can see that throughout the entire account, with a few exceptions, there is
an emphasis, sometimes greater, sometimes less, on groups of two or four. The one
example that we have examined may suffice; the principle is not, in fact, carried
through so consistently in the following books. Rather different, although equally
striking in its symmetry, is the structure of the section from 12.500 onwards, which
narrates the achievements of Aeneas and Turnus in different parts of the battlefield:
the introductory lines (500-4) are followed by Aeneas (505-8), Turnus (509-12),
Aeneas (513-15), Turnus (516-37) – in other words the pattern is ABAB. Then
comes a simile illustrating the raging fury of the two heroes (521-8); then Aeneas:
Turnus (529-37), Turnus: Aeneas (538-41), i.e. the pattern is ABBA. The detailed
description of the death of a Trojan (542-7) (at whose hand is not stated) leads into a
brief general description of the battlefield (548-53), with which the section comes to
an end.
The pace of the narrative is different in each of the four books; but although
Virgil avoids monotony, he follows the same artistic principles in each case. This
will become evident from a rapid survey.
The storming of the camp in Book 9 begins with a general description (503-24),
in which the great contingents appear first: the Volscians, Trojans, Rutulians are
named, then other contingents are referred to by the names of their leaders Mezen-
tius and Messapus without any further details. These two provide the transition to
Turnus, who is placed emphatically in the foreground by means of the poet's appeal
222 to the Muses (525-9). Turnus begins by destroying one main tower; two Trojans
escape from the collapsing debris, of whom he captures one and pulls down part of
the wall in doing so (530-66). This leads to a fiercer onslaught by the attackers,
which is countered with equal energy by the defenders. This is where Virgil places
the scene of butchery that we have just discussed (p. 171); it reaches its climax with
Turnus' exploits (up to 575) and concludes with two accounts of individual incidents,
of which the last, as we have seen on p. 171 above, prepares the way for the
Ascanius episode (up to 658). Ascanius' success and the manifest support of the
gods gives new heart to the opposing Trojan forces (to 671), among whom Pandarus
and Bitias are the boldest: they open the gate, and kill the men who rush in; the
Trojans even advance out into the open (to 690). In doing so, they disobey Aeneas'
explicit orders (42): and at this point, the moment of the Trojans' greatest success, a
vigorous reversal begins with Turnus' assault. Those who have advanced furthest
from the camp fall at his hand; then he kills Bitias at the gate itself. The Trojans
retreat, Turnus is shut inside the camp as a result of the carelessness of Pandarus,
whom he kills (the combat between the two is given prominence by Parndarus'
attack and by their two speeches; it is depicted as the culmination of Turnus'
exploits); blind panic seizes the camp. But Turnus (see p. 166 above), in his mad
thirst for slaughter, misses his chance to destroy the entire Trojan army, and al-
though he does kill large numbers as they retreat or are taken by surprise, yet he
cannot keep going for long single-handed. As soon as the Trojan leaders hear of the
situation, and Mnestheus' speech brings the panic-stricken men to their senses, they
attack him with closed ranks (788). He is finally forced to retreat, although reluc-
tantly and making further assaults as he does so. Juno withdraws her support, which
had protected him at the moment of greatest danger (745) and until now had in-
creased his strength. When he leaps fully-armed into the Tiber and is safely reunited
with his own men, his retreat constitutes another heroic achievement.
To summarize: the narrative leads gradually towards Turnus; it first shows him
performing an important feat, after which it leaves him occasionally, only to return
to him in a most natural way each time, and finally is totally concentrated on him.
He is the centre of interest, and yet we are given not just a picture of him, but of the
whole battle. Moreover, Virgil devotes the greatest care to maintaining the conti-
223 nuity of the narrative. One of the best ways of achieving this is to mention how the
exploits of some individual hero affect the army as a whole, and how this in turn
gives rise to further brave deeds by individuals. Furthermore: the narrative does not
progress in a straight line, as for example if Turnus had been shown gaining an
uninterrupted series of successes; on the contrary, his first successes provoke a
counter-offensive from the Trojans, which he has to overcome, and the conclusion is
brought about by another counter-offensive. Finally: the narrative is not related at
one constant pitch, nor does it rise and fall arbitrarily, but in a carefully planned
series of crescendos; and every time that the action reaches a climax, there is a
peripeteia . Because of the nature of the plot, the most powerful effect cannot be
reserved for the final scene, so Virgil gives the end of the episode an unusual form,
and avoids a serious anticlimax by creating a final upsurge of interest. There is no
repetition whatever of any individual motifs or incidents. One passage which is
really a digression, and is characterized as such by the mass of detail lavished on its
telling, is Ascanius' shot (9.590ff.); but this treatment is justified by its importance
for the plot[60] and it is integrated into the main narrative by many fine threads that
link it to what has gone before and what is to come.
These qualities stand out even more clearly if we compare this scene with the
corresponding section of the Iliad , although the Battle at the Wall ( Teichomachia ,
Book 12) is one of the most unified and self-contained parts of the work. It begins
with a very detailed account of Hector's strange plan to drive his chariot across the
ditch in front of the wall, until he is dissuaded by the sensible advice of Polydamas.
The whole scene merely serves as a preparation for Asios' exploit: for he drives his
224 chariot, not however over the ditch to the wall, but to an open gate, which he could
obviously have reached just as easily had he been fighting on foot. This gate is
defended by the two Lapiths who were taken over by Virgil and integrated into the
main action. In Homer we leave this part of the battlefield without learning what
becomes of Asios. The other Trojans swarm over the ditch, after Hector has over-
ridden Polydamas' scruples arising from his interpretation of the portent of the
eagle. Sarpedon's attack on the wall is described in detail, and Homer says that
without him the Trojans would not have succeeded in forcing an entry into the
camp. However, we do not see them doing so: instead, after Sarpedon has pulled
down part of the parapet and tried in vain to climb the wall, Hector uses a boulder to
smash the wall open in a completely different place – something that he could have
done anyway at the start. In the following books, 13 and 14, Homer's narrative is
much more disjointed. Virgil was compelled by the nature of his subject-matter to
invent and to compress. He could not allow the enemy to rush in all at once, as in
Homer, since the Trojans' movements are always restricted by the fact that there are
too few of them to risk an open battle. Besides, he wanted to avoid anticipating the
large-scale fighting that he will have to describe several times later on; so, since
Aeneas is absent, he uses this episode as an opportunity to establish Turnus' charac-
ter from the start in its true light. He therefore depicts him as the only one to enter
the camp and escape from it again unscathed.[61] It was not possible to combine this
episode with an attack on the ships: Virgil has separated the Battle at the Wall from
225 the Battle at the Ships ( Epinausimache ) and made the incident which corresponds to
the latter occur on the previous day.[62]
The structure of the battle-scenes in Book 10 is a good deal more complicated.
Here Pallas and Mezentius have to fall in battle, Turnus and above all Aeneas have
to take their proper place in the foreground, but they cannot be allowed to meet in
combat, since that would anticipate the decisive duel. Virgil begins with the
renewed attack on the camp and the desperate plight of the few defenders within
(122); then he describes Aeneas' voyage and the Etruscan ships, including a cata-
logue of them; Cymodocea informs Aeneas about the situation of his men, and we
learn at the same time that the Arcadian cavalry and some of the Etruscans have
advanced by land and have already taken up their appointed position.[63] Our attention
is focussed on the situation on land, so that we can fully appreciate the effect of
Aeneas' arrival. The Trojans are the first to catch sight of him, the enemy are
bewildered by their joyful cries and fresh courage until, turning round, they see that
the ships have already reached the shore. Turnus is not discouraged, but now (285)
he has to form a second front with the greater part of his troops. Then Aeneas and
his men disembark, and there is a battle at the ships, which, as is only to be
expected, involves a series of daring deeds performed by Aeneas. Virgil feels that he
should explain why Aeneas does not encounter Turnus in battle immediately; it must
however be admitted that his motivation seems somewhat contrived.[64] While Aeneas
226 is engaged in his successful encounters,[65] the enemy commanders, Clausus, Ha-
laesus and Messapus, arrive. The fighting comes to a standstill, and then ebbs and
flows indecisively for a long time ( anceps pugna diu [359] [the fight is long in
balance]): this allows us to leave this part of the battlefield.
The poet takes us to another position, to the aforementioned Arcadians and
Pallas:[66] here begins the action which leads by a logical progression to the final
catastrophe of Book 10. In the first place, Pallas has to die. To kindle our sympathy,
he is given his own aristeia , which, apart from its immediate consequences, causes
the Arcadians to call a halt to their retreat (397, 402f.) and even to force their way
forward again (410): here the action begins to turn against Pallas, with the successes
of Halaesus, whose defeat forms the climax and crown of Pallas' aristeia , and who
therefore needs to be characterized as a heroic figure by being given a series of
successes. This is the ideal moment to introduce Lausus in a neat piece of plot-con-
struction
one of his victims to be mentioned by name, but all that is needed is that Lausus
should bring the struggle against Pallas to a halt again (431) – he would not, of
course, be able to maintain his position for long without Turnus, who at this point
strikes down Pallas, after all his great deeds; in an epilogue (501-9) the poet gives
this event special emphasis and refers to the effects that it will have on the distant
future, since it is an exception to Virgil's usual practice in having no immediate
consequences for Turnus. The news of Pallas' death sets Aeneas' anger most furi-
227 ously ablaze. We left him engaged in an inconclusive struggle; now he forces his
way forward in victory. The second list of his feats, which starts at this point,
represents a higher level of achievement than the first (as we have already pointed
out, p. 166 above). It comes to a close with the most detailed account, that of the
death of the two brothers Lucagus and Liger. The result is that the Trojans have
broken through the encircling ring of besiegers, and relieved Ascanius and his men
(604). Aeneas' next task ought to have been to wreak vengeance on Turnus (514);
the duel could not be postponed any longer, but it would have served no purpose had
it been described here. That is why Turnus is lured away from the battlefield by a
mirage of Aeneas sent by Juno, and carried back to his native city. In his place,
Mezentius steps into the foreground and performs a succession of feats which brings
the counter-offensive to the height of its success; his last feat, the killing of Orodes,
which is celebrated by the paean, concludes the description of his achievements. In
the scene of butchery that follows (747-54) it is almost always the Latins who are
the victors, and they seem to have more or less equalled Aeneas' achievements ( iam
gravis aequabat luctus et mutua Mavors funera [755f.] [now Mars pressed heavily
on both sides and gave equal share of anguish and equal exchange of death to both]).
The moment for the decisive duel between Aeneas and Mezentius has arrived. A
new start with a new description of the terrifying Mezentius prepares us for the
importance of this last combat (762). The episode does not develop in a straightfor-
ward manner. When Lausus sacrifices himself, and thus allows his wounded father
to retreat in safety, a decisive outcome seems to have been frustrated; but it is
Lausus' death that brings Mezentius back into the battle. Melancholy and tired of
life, he mounts his trusty steed, and when it collapses, mortally wounded, he is
trapped under it and is at the mercy of his opponent's sword. This is the most
effective scene in the book, and it brings it to an end; there is not another word about
the further course of the battle or of the day. Every sympathetic reader will of course
realize that once the chief commanders of the Latins, Turnus, Halaesus, Lausus and
Mezentius have all been removed from the scene and the beleaguered Trojans have
broken out, then the fate of the day has been decided; but Virgil would have stated
this explicitly only if he had been a historian, or a poet who cared more about factual
accuracy and the satisfaction of pedantic readers than the effect that his work would
have on his readers' emotions.
The complex structure of this first great battle stands in sharp contrast to the
simple cavalry intermezzo of Book 11. This is basically Camilla's aristeia ; but, in
228 order to provide a general engagement of the troops as a background for her
exploits, this is described, first in detail as it gradually breaks out, then with em-
phasis on individual figures – Orsilochus on the Trojan side, Catillus on the Latin
side; and this provides the transition to Camilla, the most distinguished of the
warriors. But she too appears first within a general description (648-63), to allow the
reader to imagine the context in which her individual exploits will take place in the
following scenes: two introductory lines (646f.) arouse our attention. There follows
her actual aristeia , which ends with her boldest and mightiest deed, which further-
more is described in the greatest detail: it is the crown of her success. In the manner
now familiar to us, the counter-offensive then supervenes: Tarchon's speech and
bold action,[67] and the consequent revival of the fallen morale of his men (758), one
of whom, Arruns, now conceives the plan of slaying Camilla without facing her in
the open. Her own carelessness, the causes of which have already been discussed
(p. 169), gives him his opportunity: Camilla is slain (759-835). The action up to this
point, that is, the whole of the battle in which Camilla is involved, is framed by two
scenes in which the gods appear. Beforehand, Diana presents Opis with a bow and
arrow, to avenge the death of her beloved Camilla (533-96); afterwards, Opis carries
out the mission by laying Arruns low (836-67). Clearly this framing arrangement
deliberately marks off the story of Camilla as a separate section, although it does
contain threads that link it with what has gone before and what is to come. For, of
course, the poet cannot end at this point, with the death of Camilla. We still need to
be told what has happened to Turnus since Juno lured him from the battlefield. His
rapid return (which rescues Aeneas from great danger) is motivated by the success
of the Trojans, and the greater their success, the more plausible is this motivation.
There follows an extremely lively description of the pursuit of the Latin cavalry,
229 their annihilation beneath the city walls, and the battle at the gates (868-95). This
also forms an effective counterpart to the description of the arrival of the armies at
the beginning (597-607). Furthermore, the arrival of the armies was immediately
preceded by the account of Turnus' departure from his camp (522-31); so too the
final scene of the battle is immediately followed by the account of Turnus' return to
his camp (896-902). A description of the new situation brought about by the cavalry
victory brings the book to a close. The Trojan camp is no longer far away on the
bank of the Tiber, but under the city walls. The Trojans have moved from defence to
attack.
The last book begins with Turnus' decision to fight a duel, and ends with this
duel and Turnus' death. The poet uses all the means at his disposal to delay this
outcome and at the same time maintain the interest of the reader. The first retarda-
tion is brought about by Latinus and Amata, and – unintentionally – by Lavinia; it is
soon overcome and it is irrevocably decided that the duel shall take place (1-112).[68]
But already, while the people are gathering where the oaths are to be sworn, Juno's
230 speech to Juturna paves the way for another retardation; and when the oaths have
been sworn Turnus' own behaviour[69] and its effects on the Rutulians who are
standing near him cause Juturna to intervene; she causes the restlessness to spread to
the Laurentines and the Latins;[70] the ambiguous omen of the eagle transforms hostile
feelings into action; Tolumnius, the augur,[71] throws the first spear and strikes one of
nine brothers; the other eight are understandably eager to avenge him, the Lauren-
tines advance against them, while the Trojans, Etruscans and Arcadians come to the
aid of the brothers. Thus gradually everyone finds himself in the grip of the re-
kindled rage for battle, and a tumultous struggle develops around the altar. Aeneas
still believes that he can control it, but he is wounded by an arrow from the bow of
an unidentified archer. Now that Aeneas has withdrawn, there is nothing to prevent
the battle beginning.
It is certainly true that Pandarus' shot in Book 4 of the Iliad is the prototype of
Tolumnius' shot. Modern Virgilian critics agree on this, but seem to think that this
leaves nothing more to be said about Virgil's use of his model. On the contrary, I
think that this incident provides an unparalleled opportunity to gain a true under-
standing of the nature of Virgil's skill in adapting the work of his predecessor. In
Homer, Aphrodite removes Paris from the field of battle when he is at the mercy of
Menelaus; Menelaus searches everywhere for him, in vain; and none of the Trojans,
231 even, can say what has become of him; they wish that they could, since they all
loathe him as much as grim death itself. Agamemnon then demands that the duel
shall be regarded as concluded, and the condition satisfied (end of Book 3). Mean-
while, however, Athena has come disguised as Laodocus to Pandarus (there is a
detailed description of the scene in Olympus that leads up to this), and has advised
him to shoot at Menelaus: this would earn him the gratitude and respect of all the
Trojans, and of Paris above all. The foolish Pandarus is soon ready: there are
extremely graphic descriptions of the bow, the preparations for the shot, and of the
shot itself. Thanks to the intervention of Athena, Menelaus is only wounded, not
killed; we are told in great detail exactly how he is wounded. Then comes a long
speech by Agamemnon to Menelaus, but the latter reassures him and says that he is
in no real danger, the herald is sent to the doctor and delivers his message; the
doctor arrives, extracts the arrow from the wound, and applies healing herbs which
his father had been given by the friendly Cheiron. Meanwhile, the Trojan troops are
advancing. Agamemnon, for his part, goes round the troops to give them advice and
encouragement (his great
lines), then the armies meet in battle. How vividly and vigorously Homer describes
all the external aspects of this narrative, both visible and audible! He gives us
enough details to try to reconstruct Pandarus' bow and Menelaus' intricate armour;
we hear the vibration of the bow, the twang of the string, and the arrow whistling
through the air; we see it strike its target and the blood stain Menelaus' thigh, shin
and calf with its purple flow; but how little about the emotions and -– Virgil would
no doubt have added – how tediously the narrative drags itself forward, and how
badly its details are motivated! Homeric critics of our own day [1903] have been
driven to the hypothesis that originally the
[duel between Paris and Menelaus] had nothing to do with the
[violation of the truce], and that many other inconsistencies are to be attributed to
later authors and redactors. Virgil, however, was a practical critic, not a critic of
history. In Homer, all the Trojans and their allies, including Pandarus and his
Lycians, hate Paris like hell itself, and yet, in order to gain Paris' gratitude, Pandarus
is prepared to shoot his treacherous arrow, and the Lycians are prepared to protect
him with their shields while he does so. And once the shot has hit its mark, no-one
thinks for another moment of honouring the truce; instead of stoning Pandarus, the
232 Trojans advance in battle-order, and Agamemnon, instead of trying to appeal to his
troops' sense of honour, orders them to fight against them. The assembly on
Olympus, the conversation between Agamemnon and Menelaus, the treatment by
the doctor, Agamemnon's tour of the camp to encourage his men, are, according to
modern literary theory, delaying devices characteristic of early epic, but in Virgil's
view they disturbed and interrupted the main flow of the narrative. That is why he
placed the decisive scene on Olympus before this episode, and the healing of Aeneas
and the advance of the Trojan leaders and their troops after it. He is most careful to
describe the motives which led to the actual breaking of the truce.[72] We see the
Latins becoming gradually more and more antagonistic towards the duel, until the
interpretation of the omen by an apparently well-qualified augur brings their emo-
tions to a head; we see the stages which lead gradually to the outbreak of fighting,
and Aeneas trying in vain to enforce the terms of the treaty, until his absence
inspires Turnus, too, with fresh courage; after which, of course, it is impossible to
call a halt. Thus in Virgil all the emphasis is placed on the dramatic development of
the action, and its psychological motivation. Virgil has retained only two lines out of
all the detailed descriptions in Homer, those which describe the exact place where
Gylippus was hit by Tolumnius' spear.
While Aeneas is away from the battlefield, it is important that the action should
not stand still. The gap is occupied by Turnus' deeds (324-82), recounted in an
elevated style which is suitable for the heightened emotional mood of the narrative
as it approaches its conclusion. Whereas in Book 9 we saw Turnus fighting on foot,
against heavy odds, and in Book 11 emerging victorious from a duel, now he drives
his chariot across the field like the God of War himself, destroying all before him.
The structure of the scene is somewhat different from those which we have exam-
ined so far. The main stress is laid on the single combat in the middle of the scene
(346-61), which is given special prominence by the speech of Turnus – en agros et
quam bello Troiane petisti Hesperiam metire iacens ; haec praemia qui me ferro
ausi temptare ferunt : sic moenia condunt (359-61) ['See Trojan! Lie there, and
measure your length in the fields of our Western Land which you sought to gain by
war. This is the prize which they win who dare to make test of me by the blade; this
is how they establish their walled city'] – words addressed to Eumedes, but in fact
aimed at Aeneas. This combat is framed by two lists of names (341-5 and 362-4),
233 which in turn are framed by two general descriptions of the irresistible force of
Turnus as he storms against the foe (328-40 and 365-70): the death of Phegeus, who
throws himself in vain against Turnus' horses, and is dragged along and finally
crushed by the chariot (371-82), serves as an illustration of Turnus' triumphal
progress.[73] There is no climax leading up to the end in this case, because Virgil
cannot begin to describe the reversal of Turnus' fortunes so early in the book.
While the exploits of Turnus keep the action moving, Virgil is able to describe
the treatment of Aeneas' wound without giving the impression of holding up the
narrative. Virgil has combined the situation of Hector in the Iliad (15.236ff.), whose
strength is renewed by Zeus and Apollo so that he is able to return to the battle, and
motifs taken from the healing of Menelaus by Machaon in Iliad 4.192ff., of Eurypylus
by Patroclus in 11.842ff. and of Glaucus by Apollo in 16.508ff., and has combined
them in such a way that here too the simple epic narrative becomes excitingly
dramatic. Iapyx tries in vain to pull the arrow from the wound: all the skills at his
command seem ineffectual; already the roar of the battle is coming closer, clouds of
dust are darkening the air, enemy missiles are already falling into the midst of the
camp: then Aphrodite comes to his aid – not with her own hands, but by pouring
drops of the sap of a miraculous herb into the water, and now Iapyx, who bathes the
wound with this water, unaware of its new quality, suddenly succeeds: the arrow
comes away in his hand, the blood clots and the pain vanishes; there is now nothing
to prevent Aeneas from returning to the fight, and his reappearance on the scene
together with his faithful friends immediately changes the nature of the situation
(447,463). His mind is fixed on Turnus – it looks as if the duel is going to take place
immediately, but then comes the final retardation, Juturna's attempt to take Turnus
away where Aeneas cannot reach him, by assuming the appearance of his charioteer
Metiscus. Still Aeneas pursues him, and him alone – for he still cannot bring himself
to disregard his side of the foedus [treaty] – until Messapus' attack makes it im-
possible for him to observe it any longer (496). Then come the interwoven aristeiai
of Aeneas and Turnus which we have already analysed (p. 172). The artistic purpose
of this unusual structure is clear. From the beginning of the fighting until the end,
the two main opponents are gradually brought closer to each other. In Books 8 and 9
234 they had both been in action in totally different areas. In Book 10 they were fighting
in the same battle, but did not meet or have anything to do with each other, apart
from their mutual longing to fight. In Book 12 we have been hearing about Aeneas
and Turnus alternately, first at fairly long intervals, but now in rapid succession. All
this conspires to create the illusion of an ever stronger magnetic attraction between
the two heroes, which must inevitably lead them to a final collision.
The poet handles the action in such a way that Turnus is spared the humiliation of
being overtaken by Aeneas and therefore compelled to fight, or simply being slain
by him. Strong motivation needs to be provided to lead him to the decision to fight
the duel that he has avoided for so long – Virgil takes this opportunity to dispose of
Amata, the chief opponent of the new alliance, something which, for artistic reasons,
had to occur before the end of the work – but finally Turnus' better self gains the
upper hand, he goes forth to meet his opponent of his own free will, and the great
final scene of the epic can at last begin.
The duel between Hector and Achilles in Iliad 22, which was the prototype for
the final duel in the Aeneid , is described in three scenes; first, Hector's flight and
pursuit; second, after the weighing of their souls and as a result of Athena's inter-
vention, each hero throws his spear but misses; third, the close combat: Hector
attacks with his sword, Achilles wounds him fatally with his spear. The first scene
also includes the conversation between Zeus and Athena which decides Hector's
fate. (This, of course, grossly contradicts the weighing of the souls.) Virgil has
preserved the individual elements of this narrative, but he has changed their order
and transformed them in many ways – although in this case, of course, where his
predecessor had created a magnificent and unified composition, disfigured only by
trivial interpolations, Virgil could not give his art as much free rein as elsewhere.
Virgil, like Homer, presents the duel in three phases, after he has brought the
scene vividly before our eyes by describing the mood of the spectators (704-9).[74]
First, after each hero has cast his spear once,[75] we have a long, indecisive sword-
fight; then the interlude, which contains Jupiter's weighing of their fates (725-7).[76]
235 The second phase begins when Turnus' sword breaks,[77] so that there is nothing he
can do but take to his heels; this guarantees his safety for a while, since, because of
his wound, Aeneas cannot run as fast. While Aeneas is struggling in vain to pull his
spear out of the tree-trunk, Juturna returns Turnus' sword to him, Venus helps
Aeneas with his spear, and they come face to face again, armed for another fight. So
the decision has been deferred yet again. But then, because Juturna has returned
Turnus' sword, Jupiter intervenes: his remonstrations cause Juno to renounce her
enmity at last, and peace between Trojans and Latins is decreed in heaven. It is
remarkable that in this passage Virgil uncharacteristically interrupts the course of
the action with a long interlude on Olympus, although he is careful to mention a
motive for this passage, which relieves the tension of battle – adsistunt contra
certamina Martis anheli (790) [they stood facing each other again, panting, but
ready for combat under the rule of Mars] – and is essential for another reason too:
the assuagement of Juno's anger has to be postponed until the last possible moment,
since once this final cause of delay – which is in fact the only one left – has been
overcome, the action must inevitably come to a close. Juno's anger opened the
poem, and her reconciliation has to end it; what follows, the death of Turnus, is only
her resignation made manifest in the world of mortals. But Virgil has taken care to
make it clear that this intermezzo is no mere technical necessity, but that it is also
essential for the furtherance of the plot: up to this point, all the prophecies have
spoken only of the rule of Aeneas and his family: now we hear that not only Troy
but Latium too will come into its own within the new alliance: we gain the im-
pression that Juno's efforts and struggles have not after all been completely wasted.
The despatch of the Dira [dread Daimon] begins the third and final scene. Juturna
leaves her brother; Turnus freezes with fear; he realizes that the gods are against
him. He no longer dares to fight with the sword: Juturna's final attempt to help her
brother has been in vain. Finally, he tries to hurl the great boulder, and fails; while
236 he looks about him in desperation, he is struck by his opponent's spear and thrown
to the ground. Hector speaks his last words as he dies, and he is concerned only with
the disposal of his body: but Virgil does not cease to strive for dramatic tension to
the very end of the poem: there is one more glimmer of hope for Turnus as Aeneas
considers the possibility of sparing his life. But that glimmer is extinguished when
the sight of Pallas' sword-belt reminds the victorious Aeneas of his duty to avenge
his death – ast illi solvuntur frigore membra , vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub
umbras (951-2) [and Turnus' limbs relaxed and chilled; and the life fled, moaning,
resentful, to the shades].