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The Sea of Prophecies in Virgil's Aeneid

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The Sea of Prophecies in Virgil's Aeneid View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Dadun, University of Navarra The Classical Quarterly http://journals.cambridge.org/CAQ Additional services for The Classical Quarterly: Email alerts: Click here Subscriptions: Click here Commercial reprints: Click here Terms of use : Click here AEQVOR: THE SEA OF PROPHECIES IN VIRGIL'S AENEID M. Pilar García Ruiz The Classical Quarterly / Volume 64 / Issue 02 / December 2014, pp 694 - 706 DOI: 10.1017/S0009838814000159, Published online: 20 November 2014 Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0009838814000159 How to cite this article: M. Pilar García Ruiz (2014). AEQVOR: THE SEA OF PROPHECIES IN VIRGIL'S AENEID. The Classical Quarterly, 64, pp 694-706 doi:10.1017/S0009838814000159 Request Permissions : Click here Downloaded from http://journals.cambridge.org/CAQ, IP address: 159.237.12.32 on 21 Nov 2014 Classical Quarterly 64.2 694–706 © The Classical Association (2014) 694 doi:10.1017/S0009838814000159 AEQVOR: THE SEA OF PROPHECIES IN VIRGIL’S AENEID* I. INTRODUCTION In a well-known article, Hodnett pointed out that Virgil emphasizes the peacefulness and quiet of the sea, its immensity and limitlessness, in contrast to the view articulated by the Roman poets of the Republic, which presents the sea as deceptive and fearsome.1 Among the many terms used in the Aeneid to denote the sea, aequor stands out precisely because it is the term most frequently used by Virgil in place of the word mare.2 Aequor is a poetic term, a derivation of the adjective aequus, whose primary mean- ing connotes any form of flat surface. In Republican times, the term was used in a num- ber of figurative senses, moving from ‘the flatness of the land’ to ‘the surface of the sea’, and thus coming to mean ‘the calm sea’. Both Varro and Cicero observe that the word aequor used in reference to the sea pertained to the language of poets;3 in fact, the first instances of the term in prose coloured by its poetic use date to the work of Seneca the Elder.4 The image of the sea as a simile or metaphor for ‘plain’ or ‘flat surface’ probably comes from Homer. In Latin poetry, the image is found in the work of Ennius, only a few examples of which are extant,5 and in Lucretius, who also used the term aequor in a simile. For Lucretius, aequor denotes a sea that is calm at first, before being troubled by the buffeting of the wind.6 Deployed in a tentative way in the Eclogues and the Georgics,7 the sea begins to play a more prominent role in the Aeneid, the story of the adventures of the Trojan hero, where aequor displaces other terms that denote the sea. We can trace 90 instances of aequor used in a marine sense in the three works; 75 of these uses occur in the Aeneid,8 55 of which are to be found in the first six books, covering Aeneas’ wander- ings, and 20 in the second half of the narrative. * I am grateful to V. Cristóbal, C. Castillo, J.B. Torres, E. Reinhardt, and particularly to the anonymous CQ reviewer and to this journal’s editor, B. Gibson, for advice that clarified the argument. My interest in aequor is due to one of my students, N. Alvarez Castro, who wrote a essay on ‘Aequor: its presence in similes in the Aeneid’. Some data were taken from there and are used with her consent. 1 M.P. Hodnett, ‘The sea in Roman poetry’, CJ 15 (1919), 67–82, at 71, recently echoed by J. Luque Moreno, Mare nostrum: reflexiones sobre el léxico latino del mar (Granada, 2011), 17. 2 In terms of frequency of use, aequor is followed by mare, pelagus, fluctus, pontus, altum, fretum, uada, salum, sal, etc.; see H.H. Warwick, A Virgil Concordance (Minneapolis, MN, 1975). 3 Varro, Ling. 7.1–2, 23; Cic. Acad. 2 (cited by Non. 65.2). 4 A. Ernout and A. Meillet, Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine: histoire des mots (Paris, 1959); G. Aricò, s.v. aequor,inEnciclopedia Virgiliana 1.37–8. 5 Enn. Ann. 124, 505 Skutsch. 6 Lucr. 1.8; 2.1, 375–6, 766, 772, 781; 3.1002; 4.411; 5.266, 388, 1227; 6.440, 621, 623, 634. 7 Verg. Ecl. 9.57 : Et nunc omne tibi stratum silet aequor; G. 3.201: ille uolat simul arua fuga simul aequora uerrens; G. 3.359: nec cum | praecipitem Oceani rubro lauit aequore currum. 8 Virgil’s work includes a total of 110 uses of the word aequor, used most commonly to mean ‘sea’ (90 instances), with 20 uses referring to the ‘flatness of the land’. AEQVOR 695 The use of aequor and other metaphorical terms such as altum, fluctus, and sal, and of Greek loan words such as pelagus and pontus, has been read as a requirement of uar- iatio in expression: sonorous and evocative terms, κύρια ὀνόματα,9 used instead of the common noun.10 However, metrical necessity should not be overlooked as a selection criterion in this regard: the spondee aequor and the dactylic forms aequore and aequora are easier to combine for the purposes of prosody than the derivative forms of the word mare such as maria.11 Furthermore, a lexical-stylistic reason for the use of aequor in a figurative sense should also be noted: by using aequor to mean a ‘smooth sea’, the poet implies that the sea is calm, thus setting aside other terms such as altum, pelagus, and pontus, which connote the danger, mystery, or uncertainty often associated with the image of the ocean.12 However, a close reading of the passages in which aequor occurs in the Aeneid discloses that the metaphor has at times been lexicalized and simply denotes the sea as such. Perhaps the word functions as a metaphor only in certain contexts or selection criteria other than those set out above may underlie its use. The issue requires more wide-ranging study. My reading of the passages in which the word aequor occurs appears to reveal a heretofore undiscovered pattern in Virgil’s poem, which comprises the core of the argu- ment pursued in this paper: a series of interlinked scenes in which, through religious language and in the form of prophecies, Aeneas progressively discovers the main ele- ments of his destiny. Each scene involves an announcement made to him by the gods: the Trojans have to cross a sea (referred to as aequor, without exception) and are also given a promise of lands, arua, awaiting them on the far side of the sea.13 These repeated instances amount to more than formulaic repetition; they comprise an ordered sequence in the form of a short narrative.14 The textual coherence of these scenes, as well as the meaning and function of the term aequor in them, is explored below. II. AEQUOR IN THE PROPHECIES IN THE AENEID15 1. Creusa prophesies to Aeneas a long voyage leading to a happy landing (2.780–2) Just as he is about to set out from Troy, Aeneas is told for the first time through Creusa about how the expedition will go and what the final destination of the voyage is to be: 9 M. Leumann, ‘La lingua poetica latina’, in A. Lunelli (ed.), La lingua poetica latina (Bologna, 1974), 131–78, esp. 174–5. 10 Quint. Inst. 8.3.16. 11 Ancient critics drew attention to this criterion, above all in relation to dactylic poetry: Cic. De or. 202; Quint. Inst. 1.6.2; Serv. Ecl. 5.36. 12 R.G. Tanner, s.v. mare,inEnciclopedia Virgiliana 3.371–2; A. Borgo, s.v. pelagus, pontus,in Enciclopedia Virgiliana 4.4–6, 206–8. 13 These texts represent sixteen examples of aequor and constitute the basis for the present article. 14 On the difference between repetitions as compositional units and formulaic repetition as a form of transfer and the so-called tibicines, see W. Moskalew, Formular Language and Poetic Design in the Aeneid (Leiden, 1982), 73–80, 112. 15 Prophecies that do not contain the promise of a voyage and a land have not been included in this study: 1.257–96 (Jupiter to Venus); 2.289–95 (Hector to Aeneas); 3.94–8 (Apollo to Anchises in 696 M. PILAR GARCÍA RUIZ longa tibi exsilia et uastum maris aequor arandum, et terram Hesperiam uenies, ubi Lydius arua inter opima uirum leni fluit agmine Thybris. (2.780–2)16 Long exile is your lot, a vast stretch of sea you must plough; and you will come to the land of Hesperia, where amid the rich fields of husbandmen the Lydian Tiber flows with gentle sweep. What does uastum maris aequor arandum mean? How is one to find a Lydian river in a Western land? Certainly, to Aeneas himself Creusa’s language must sound riddling and oracular. Throughout the poem, and thanks to the fulfilment of prophecies, the hero will find answers to his perplexity. The shade of Creusa17 forewarns Aeneas of a tiring voyage, a ‘long exile’ in which ‘you must plough a vast stretch of sea’. The phrase maris aequor echoes the formulas used by Ennius and Lucretius: ponti/maris/campi aequor.18 At the same time, aequor arandum is an expression of Virgil’s own making, a beautiful image that harks back to the poet’s voice in the Georgics, which views the length and trials of the mission ahead through the eyes of a farm labourer. The dangers of storms and sea monsters to befall him in the future are overlooked here.
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