CC 302
Lecture 14 Images
Updated 10/20/08

Lecture 14: Vergil's Aeneid - an Epic about Rome

From Lecture 14: the Augustus Statue from Prima Porta:

Mars, Caelus (Sky God), Apollo, Diana, Mother Earth (Tellus), cornucopia

I. The uniqueness of Vergil's Aeneid; difficulty of conventional appreciation

a.

purpose; not an Augusteid

b.

Roman Odyssey-Iliad

c.

a complex epic about a complex subject; inversion of traditional heroism: Aeneas' first appearance (pp. 6-7)

d.

the Roman aspect: social responsibility (pietas)

II. The Aeneid as a product of its times: achievement and its cost

 Key line: "So hard and huge a task it was to found the Roman people (1.49; p. 4)
short translation: "No pain, no gain."

a. the ideal of Venus and Jupiter's prophecy (pp. 11-14); Antenor

armaque fixit Troia, nunc placida compostus pace quiescit
(lines 248-49 in LATIN! = lines 337-38 in transl.)

b. the end of the epic (p. 402); Turnus
c. death of the young: Marcellus in Book 6 (pp. 190-91); also (for you to look at):
Nisus and Euryalus in Book 9 (pp. 265-76); Pallas (pp. 309-12), Lausus and Mezentius (pp. 323-25) in Book 10

III. The Main Characters

1. Dido
a. her portrayal; similes on pp. 21 and 100
b. her motivation; her arguments with Aeneas (pp. 105-110);
role reversal: Aeneas meets Dido again in the underworld (pp. 175-176)
c. her tragedy; how defined

 

galinsky@mail.utexas.edu
10/20/ MMVIII