2—
Hector's Appearance
Up to this point, Aeneas had been recounting events which he and his fellow-
citizens had experienced together, in which he had not himself played a leading rôle.
In the scene centred on the wooden horse and in those that follow, he is generally no
more than just one of the Trojans, included whenever they are mentioned. During
the night of terror, however, every man is thrown on his own resources, and now
Aeneas embarks on the account of his own personal experiences, and does not
digress from them thereafter.
The appearance of Hector to Aeneas in a dream (268-97) has no immediate
consequence, and is never alluded to again. From a superficial point of view, it
might therefore appear pointless; whereas in reality it is of great significance in
preparing for the following scenes. This is not only because it begins the description
of the night of slaughter with a scene full of pathos that graphically summarizes the
26 essentials of what is to follow, and at one stroke puts the reader into the right frame
of mind for hearing about these events.[34] Perhaps even more important than this
artistic purpose is the need to present Aeneas' attitude to these events in the right
light from the beginning. Even before the hero is in a position to act, he, and still
more the reader, needs to be convinced that the fate of Troy has been decided, and
therefore that not even Aeneas with all his energy and courage can avert this fate. It
is also necessary to prepare the reader to accept the way in which Aeneas deserts his
city, instead of staying to perish with it; and this desertion needs to be presented not
as the faint-hearted flight of a man concerned only to save his own skin, but as a
way of carrying out an act of pious duty towards the sacred images, the Penates of
Troy, for whom he must provide a new, secure home. I am inclined to believe that
Virgil started from this abstract requirement. It would be impossible to meet this
requirement more successfully than Virgil has done by introducing the vision of
Hector. Hector is able to fulfil this function better than any man alive, better than
any other of the Trojan dead. If Hector advises Aeneas to give up all attempts at
resistance, we know that resistance really is of no avail. If Hector urges flight, flight
cannot be dishonourable. It is possible that Virgil was influenced by the memory of
the appearance of Achilles in the
the fleet set sail; moreover, it is certain that in the details of the description Virgil
was purposely echoing the appearance of Homer at the beginning of Ennius' Annals ,
the most famous dream vision in Roman literature, and at the same time Paris'
words to Hector's corpse in Ennius' tragedy; but these borrowings do not in any
way mar the unity of his conception. And it is characteristic of Virgil's creative
method that he was not satisfied with attaining the abstract goal that he had in mind,
27 but that the scene has blossomed into a significance of its own, and developed
motifs not required by the action, but poetically valuable in themselves: the pathos
in the appearance of Hector, intensified by the memory of his days of splendour,
Aeneas' pity and the dream-like confusion of his thoughts. In this way the scene
gains significance over and above its value within the context.[35]
Hector's words are short and clear, as befits the man. He releases Aeneas from
his duty towards his former fatherland, points him towards his new duty and his new
homeland; fuge [flee], the heart of the message, is practically his first word. But
when this fuge is followed by teque his eripe flammis [and escape from these
flames], then that too must somehow be significant. In the whole course of the
narrative from now on, it is striking how deliberately Virgil emphasizes the burning
of the city: the houses of Deiphobus and Ucalegon are already on fire (310), Panthus
speaks excitedly of the incendia (327, 329) [fires], as does Aeneas (353) and the
Greek Androgeus (374);[36] everywhere there are the flames as well as the enemy to
terrify them (337, 431, 505, 566, 600, 632, 664, 705); scarcely have Aeneas and his
family left their house when it flares up in a sheet of flame (758-9). In short, the
reader's imagination is constrained again and again to envisage the conquered city
of Ilium as a sea of flames: it is burning as soon as the Greeks have broken in, it
collapses at the moment that the city is finally captured (624), and it is from the
smoking rubble of the sanctuaries that the plunderers loot whatever is left for them
to pillage. This does not correspond at all with the traditional version: in that, the
Greeks do not set fire to the city until just before their departure;[37] in Euripides (Tro .
1260) Talthybius orders men to go into the city to start fires while the captured
women make their way to the ships. This is comparable with Aeschylus' version,
where Clytaemnestra imagines the victorious Greeks no longer starving in the damp,
28 cold camp on the plain but resting their weary limbs in the comfort of the palaces of
Troy (Agam . 334). I do not know who was the first to paint this striking picture of
the battle among the flames of Troy; it may have been the man who first made the
flames retreat before Aeneas as he fled.[38] This was, in my opinion, invented merely
for the sake of effect; the earlier version is the more probable, since, if you think
about it, the Greeks had no reason to start a fire which might be as disastrous to
themselves as to their enemies, and which would consume not only houses and
temples but also the booty.[39] This innovation (probably Hellenistic) suited Virgil's
purpose admirably; that is why he has deliberately emphasized it, preparing for it in
Hector's words, not primarily for the sake of effect (although the splendid, terrifying
picture of the burning city must have appeared vividly before his eyes)[40] but above all
for the sake of the story. As a result the Trojans have to fight not only against mortal
enemies but also the power of the elements, against which all resistance is in vain;[41]
this means that it is not the sacred city of Pergamon, with its mighty towers, that
Aeneas has to leave, but a smoking heap of rubble and ashes. That is why, when he
returns to the conquered city, he has to see his own house, from which he rescues his
father and son, in flames (757), and has to see the sacred adyta (764) [shrines], whose
gods he carries with him, on fire. Fuit Ilium [Ilium is finished]: this is intended to make
his departure easier, and to enable the patriotic reader to sympathize with his decision.