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NOTES ON THE AENEID.*
Tór poem is entitled the Aeneid because it describes the fortunes of Aeneas. In writing it, Virgil, who possessed an eminently religious mind and an earnest patriot. ism, aimed not only to secure to himself a higher poetic fame, but also to exalt the glory of Rome, and to bring his countrymen back to that traditional reverence for their religion which had in former ages given the nation its wonderful strength of character.
Ille—Martis. The authenticity of these four lines is doubtful. If they were written by Virgil, which is by no means improbable, they were not designed as the beginning of the epic, but only as a kind of inscription or epigraph. There is also some uncertainty about the construction of the sentence. Peerlkamp supposes an ellipsis at the end, something like this: quan vereor ut vires tanto operi sufficiant. Others supply sum with ego, and connect horrentia Martis with arma, thus : Ille ego sum, qui modulatus sum -et coegi-at nunc horrentia Martis arma virumque cano. The latter is the construction generally adopted. I have preferred, however, to place the words by themselves, and to translate them as a complete sentence, thus : I, that poet who formerly tuned my song with the slender pipe, and, coming forth from the woods, taught the neighboring fields to obey the husbandman, however eager for harvests—a work acceptable to tillers of the soilyet now describe the horrors of war. Opus ; the work is that expressed in modulatus sum and coegi. Dico or cano must be understood with horrentia Martis.
* ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE Notes.-Gr. refers to Andrews and Stoddard's Latin Grammar, revised edition. Z., Zumpt's Latin Grammar. E., Eclogues. G., Georgics. Numbers alone refer to tho Aeneid. Comp., Compare.
The storm at sea, the landing of Aeneas near Carthage, and his reception at the palace of Dido.
1-7. In the opening passage the subject and plan of the work are indicated. Aeneas, his wanderings by sea and land, and his wars in Italy. In multum et terris jactatus et alto we have the subject of the first six books of the work, which thus far resembles tho Odyssey; in multa quoque et bello passus we have that which is embraced in the last six books, in which the poet describes battles and single combats like those of the Iliad.
1-2. I sing of arms and the man who first, by fate an exile, came from the coast of Troy to Italy and the Lavinian shores. Qui. In prose the relative stands uniformly at the beginning of its clause, except occasionally when placed after prepositions. We shall find it very often in poetry, as here, out of its proper place.- -Primus. · The sense of the word here is: primo, in the first place, in the beginning; i. e. in the very beginning of Roman tradition. This accords with Heyne's interpretation, and it is more natural than any other which has been proposed. Primus as an adjective is very frequently substituted for the adverb primum or primo; see Gr. $ 205, R. 15, (b); Z. $ 686. It is used precisely thus in viii. 319. There, as the first event in the history of Latin civilization, Saturn is said to have come from Olympus: primus (primo, in principio) venit ab Olympo: here, in the passage before us, as the earliest tradition in Roman history, Aeneas is said to have landed in Latium. It is thus that the old Roman chronicle begins (see Livy I. 1) with the story of Aeneas, as the first fact to be recorded: Jam primum omnium satis constat-Aeneae, sq. Aenons therefore stands in Virgil's mind, not less than in that of the historian, as the first or earliest of the Roman line; the true founder of the nation. If the poet means, as some understand him, that Aeneas was the first Trojan who came to Italy, and Latium, he necessarily implies that some other Trojans arrived there AFTER him, as well as that none reached Italy before him. We may say, indeed, with Forbiger and others, that no Trojan did reach Italy before Aeneas, because Antenor did not settle in Italy proper, but in Cis- Alpine Gaul, which was not included in Italy before the time of Augustus; but though this would remove the inconsistency between this passage and the statement about Antenor, below, 242, there would still remain the question, if we take primus in its relative sense, what Trojan came to the Italian peninsula AFTER Aeneas? It is therefore probable that Virgil in using the term primus here had no thought of Antenor, or of any difference between Italy proper and his own country of Cis-Alpine Gaul, and was really instituting no comparison whatever between Aeneas and the other voyagers who might have settled in Italy either before or after bim.- -2. Italiam; for ad Italiam. Nothing is more common in poetry than the omission of prepositions both before the accusative and ablative; the case itself being made thus to express the relation which in prose would be indicated by the preposition. This will be found especially frequent where the relation of to, from, or in is to be indicated. Gr. § 237, R. 5, (c); § 254, R. 3; $ 255, R. 3, (b); Z. § 401; $ 481, 2d paragraph. — Fato profugus; a wanderer by fate. Thus is presented at the very beginning, as Thiel well remarks, the idea of the supremacy of fate, which gives unity to the Aeneid; the idea that the web of human affairs is spun out and finally developed under the direction of that higher power which controls the world.
Lavina ; for Lavinia, which also occurs in many editions. The phrase Lavinian shores, restricts the sense of Italiam; he came not only to Italy, but to Latium, or the Lavinian shores of Italy; comp. below, 569. -3. Ille; the pronoun is expressed here in order to recall the subject more vividly ; quidem is usually joined with it in this sense; see Gr. § 207, R. 21; Z. $ 744. The English seldom translates ille when so introduced; comp. ix. 479.- -Jactatus and passos are taken by the best commentators as participles, though often hitherto understood as verbs in the perfect indicative. The proper translation is: having been afflicted, or after having been afflicted.- -4. Superum; for superorum, which is equiva. lent to deorum, Gr. § 53 ; Z. $ 51. By the expression vi superum, nothing more is meant than vi divina, by power divine, referring to the violence of Juno alone; the genitive plural being merely equivalent to an adjective.
Saevae. In poetry adjectives and genitives are arbitrarily separated from the substantives to which they belong; Madvig, § 474, b.- -Memorem; relentless; that forgets not.- -5. Quoque; join with multa passus; et, with bello; in war also having suffered much besides ; much tried in war, as well as in his wanderings and sojournings by sea and land.
-Dam conderet ; while he was founding; while he was achieving those things which enabled him to found Lavinium. Dum, in the sense of while or so long as, is sometimes joined with the subjunctive, when it denotes the purpose or thought of the doer or speaker. See Madvig, $ 360, obs. 2; comp. x. 800.
-6. Inferret deos; and brought his gods into Latium; Virgil's aim is to present Aeneas as a deeply religious character, who is heroic in war, yet always controlled by duty towards the gods.-Latio. The dative instead of the accusative with in; comp. v. 451, Gr. § 225, iv. R. 2.- -Unde is equivalent to ex qua re ; from the fact that Aeneas suffered and did thus, originated the Latin race, Alba, and Rome. For the position of unde see note on qui, 1.- -Latinum. Livy says (L. 1, c. 1), that Aeneas united the aborigines and the Trojans under the common name of Latins.-. Altae. Rome, like many cities of Italy, was built on elevated ground, for greater security from attack. See view of Praeneste, page 549.
8-11. The invocation to the muse.
8. Quo nomine lacso; what divine purpose being thwarted? referring to Juno's favorite plan of making Carthage the mistress of the world. For another example of numen in the sense of will, or purpose, See v, 56. Others render these words: her divinity being violated in what respect (quo)? and others again: what divinity being injured? But Juno has already been mentioned in 4, and there can be no question as to what deity was in. iured. If the leading verb, impulerit, had immediately followed the ablative absolute here, we should have had the passive form of the verb, impulsus sit : having thwarted what divine wish (of hers) was the man compelled, &c.; but the following, quid dolens, why grieving, led the poet to substitute the active form, impulerit. Another reading of the above passage is : quo numine laesa.
-9. Deum; for deorum.- -Volvere casus; to pass through vicissitudes. The incidents of life, like time itself, are conceived of as moving in a round or circle; hence turning, or circling, so many chances, is only a bold expression to signify, passing through a series of misfortunes. The infinitive here is poetic for ut volveret. -11. Impulerit. Gr. § 265; Z. $ 552. —Animis. Gr. $ 226; Z. § 420.-Irae; wrath, or wrathful passions ; see Gr. 98; Z. $ 92, n. 1, at the end.
12-33. The reply to the questions addressed above to the muse. The present occa. sion for the hostility of Juno towards Aeneas, is her apprehension for the fate of Car. thage, which is destined to be overthrown by the future Rome (12–22); besides this, she remembers the war she has just conducted against Troy, and the causes of the resentment which occasioned that war are still rankling in her mind ; namely, (1) the origin of the Trojan race through Dardanus from Jupiter and Electra ; (2) the choice of the Trojan Ganymede to be cup-bearer of the gods instead of Juno's daughter, Hebe; (3) the decision (judicium) of the Trojan prince, Paris, by whom the golden apple was awarded to Venus, in preference to Juno and Minerva. The poet disregards the historical order of these events.
12. Urbs antiqua. Carthage was ancient with reference to the time of Virgil, not to the time of Aeneas. In fact it did not yet exist in the time of Aeneas, but the poet is allowed to take large liberties with chronology.
-Tyrii. The founders of Carthage and their descendants are termed indifferently by Virgil Phenicians, Sidonians, Poeni, or Tyrians. With tenuere, supply quam; which Tyrian colonists inhabited. Gr. 8 206, (5); comp. below, 530. -13. Contra. For prepositions placed after their cases,