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1 VIRGIL and ROME a Lecture to the Virgil Society, January 1978 by R.D

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1 VIRGIL and ROME a Lecture to the Virgil Society, January 1978 by R.D 1 VIRGIL AND ROME A lecture to the Virgil Society, January 1978 by R.D. Williams Virgil's Aeneid tells the story of events more than a thousand years before the poet's own time: Aeneas was a contemporary of the Homeric heroes whose deeds are told in the Iliad and the Odyssey - a contemporary of Agamemnon and Achilles, of Priam and Hector, of Odysseus: indeed his voyage through the Greek seas took place about the same time as that of Odysseus. Yet the poem itself was always regarded as a patriotic exposition of the greatness of the Roman Empire which came into being in Virgil's lifetime. In this lecture I should like to consider the methods which Virgil uses to make his poem operate on two time-scales, the dramatic date of (say) 1184 B.C. and the Roman date of between 30 and 20 B.C. And I shall want to consider also the impression which Virgil aims to give of what the Roman Empire was all about, whether it was really going to inaugurate a new Golden Age or whether it had inherent flaws which were bound to vitiate the idyllic image. I shall talk about the Romanness of this Trojan story under three headings: first, prophecies of the future given in speeches by the gods or by Anchises in the underworld or in pictures on the divinely-made shield of Aeneas; secondly, references to the beginnings or the causes of well-known aspects of Roman life in Virgil's time; thirdly, the adumbration in Trojan times of Roman virtues. Aeneas has to step out of the old heroic world into a new world which will lead eventually to the Roman Empire. How must you behave to be the first Roman? Under my first heading - divine prophecies etc. - come the four most explicitly national and patriotic passages of the poem, as well as many other shorter indications of Rome's future glory. The first of these is Jupiter's prophecy in Bk 1. 257f., delivered to his daughter Venus when she complains that things Eire going very badly for Aeneas, contrary to what she had understood was fated. Jupiter unfolds the book of fate for her, giving a serene picture of Rome's great future - his ego nec metas rerum nec tempora pono: imperium sine fine dedi. 'To them I set no bounds in space or time; I have given them rule without end'. He briefly sketches the events at Lavinium and Alba Longa which will lead to the foundation of Rome by Romulus, and from Roman history proper he selects only two events: the first the conquest of Greece, of Agamemnon's Mycenae, by the Romans, and the second the advent of a Caesar whose empire will be bounded only by Ocean and whose fame will reach the stars. This is Augustus Caesar (not Julius Caesar as some commentators have wrongly thought - see my 2 edition of Aeneid 1-6, note on 1.286), and under him war will be a thing of the past and the personified figure of Wicked Discord (Furor impius) will be for ever enchained. There are two particular points to be noticed about this happy prophecy of Rome's future greatness: the first is that it comes very early in the poem, in the midst of narrative filled with disasters, narrative based very closely on Homer's Odyssey 5-8 - it is the first completely unHomeric part of the poem; and the second is that unlike many prophecies later in the poem it does not form part of the plot, it does not guide or motivate Aeneas for the simple reason that he does not hear it - it is delivered in heaven to Venus. These two aspects put enormous stress on the passage; firstly it embodies the principal difference between Homer and Virgil, illustrating the non-Horaeric concept of a fixed long­ term destiny for mankind based on the will cf fate; and secondly,,as there is no structural need for it, its presence is all the more noticeable. The passage is here entirely because Virgil wanted it here, not at all because it serves the plot of events. And the reason why he wanted it here was so that its serene optimism should be remembered through the trials and dangers of the subsequent narrative, when so many disasters occur that we wonder whether the Roman mission is possible, or even - as when Dido kills herself - whether it is desirable. This passage lingers in the memory through all the tragedies of the poem. I pause a little longer on this passage: what does Jupiter promise in addition to world-wide dominion? First and foremost, peace - peace after conquest, after the wars to end wars - aspera turn positis mitescent saecula bellis. He says that the Romans will be rerum dominos gentemque togatam: 'lords of the world' and then ’a nation of peace', wearing the toga, an emblem of civilian life. Secondly Aeneas will have founded for his Trojan exiles not only a city (moenia) but a way of life (mores: that is to say, a civilised - a moral - way of life). Thirdly justice will be administered by Fides (Good Faith), Vesta (Goddess of the family) and Romulus and Remus together, the brothers united again after their fratricidal strife. Fourthly Augustus will eventually be deified. These ideas give us already, thus early in the poem, a picture of the nature of the Roman mission - first to conquer the world and then civilise it - that is to say spread a civilised way of life (mores), justice (jura), good faith, (fides), a respect for family life (Vesta) among those whom she conquers. And all this is to be achieved because of right relationship with the gods, because of a proper relig­ ious attitude which will eventually lead to the acceptance of Augustus after his death as a god himself. So much for my first passage: my next.is the longest patriotic exposition of all, the description by Anchises of the ghosts of future Roman heroes waiting in the underworld to be born - if, and only if, Aeneas fulfils his mission. This time the passage is closely linked with the plot: structurally it is made possible because of the theory of reincarnation expounded just before it, and its effect upon Aeneas is of the most decisive kind. During his journey through the underworld before it he had been gloomy, backward-looking, regretful; after it Anchises has 'fired him with a love for the glory to come1 - incenditque animum famae venientis amore (6.889). It provides the impetus for Aeneas1 much greater resolution and confidence j.n the second half of the poem. We see first the kings of Alba, then as a climax Romulus, then as a further climax - out of chronological order - Augustus himself. At this point Anchises breaks off to ask his son whether there will be any more hesitation: Aeneas does not reply, but we can reply for him. In the second half of the pageant we return to chronology with the Roman kings after Romulus, and there follows a roll-call of famous Roman names - Brutus, Camillus, Caesar and Pompey, the Scipios, Cato, and many more. The general tone of this list of people is still triumphant and optimistic, but as is so sypical of Virgil there are disquieting moments, very markedly with Caesar and Pompey, as Romans destroy each other in civil war, but also with Brutus, who puts his sons to death for conspiring against the state. In Livy (2.5) this is presented as a triumph for Roman discipline and devotion to duty, but in Virgil it is seen as tragic and Brutus is described as infelix. This note of disquiet continues in the pendent to the pageant when the ghost of the young Marcellus is portrayed; he was marked out as a probable successor to Augustus, but died in his teens. Roman glory has its sorrows too, and the malevolent power personalised in Juno in the poem will continue to operate long after Juno has been won over. What else do we learn from this passage of Virgil's conception of Rome's mission? It is summed up by Anchises in perhaps the most famous lines of the Aeneid (847-853) where he concedes to the Greeks supremacy in sculpture, oratory and pure science but retains for the Romans the art of government - tu regere imperio populos Romane memento; and again the twofold nature of the mission is stressed in the phrase pacique imponere morem: 'to crown peace with civilisation'. I do assure you that paci is the right reading, not pacis (see Austin's edition of Aeneid 6 , a d l o c .).. Morem is in the sense of the plural mores, rather unused in Latin but Virgil has the same meaning in the singular in Aen. 8. 316 quis negue mos neque cultus erat - a barbarous people who had 'no moral way of life nor culture'. To this is now added the idea of mercy - parcere subiectis: one thinks of how Julius Caesar prided himself on his dementia. Other qualities which are praised in the course of this pageant (apart from military ones which are frequent) are pietas (the special Roman virtue, as I shall illustrate later from Aeneas) - this is a quality given to the Alban king Silvius Aeneas and to Marcellus; religion (Numa, sacra ferens), leges (Numa), simplicity (Fabricius, parvo potentem; 4 Regulus, sulco serentem), fides (Marcellus, prisca fides). What I have been wanting to emphasise to you is that in these previews of Rome set within the Homeric plot Virgil aims not merely to convey glory, but also some idea of what he considered glory to consist in: military might, certainly - how could any Roman think otherwise? - but also mores, leges, iura, dementia, fides, religio, pietas.
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