The Ancient Roman World Lecture 12 Vergil’s Aeneid 4: Dido http://www.bridgemanart.com/asset/5960/Roman-4th-century-AD/Mosaic-pavement-from-the-Roman-villa-at-Low-Ham-i Dido and Aeneas • love story in epic poetry • historical • poli@cal • amatory – passion of neoterics • tragedy – influence of Greek (and Roman) tragic models ! Dido as tragic vic@m ! Tragic love affairs: parallels in tragedy, e.g. Euripides Hippolytus ! Dido as tragic vic@m ! ‘So heavy was the cost of founding the Roman race.’ Aeneid 1.33 Other vic@ms: • Turnus • Creusa • Pallas • Amata Dido and Aeneas: a love story in epic poetry Dido - historical parallels: Carthage, Cleopatra The Mee&ng of Dido and Aeneas by Nathaniel Dance-Holland (1766) hp://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpain@ngs/pain@ngs/the-mee@ng-of-dido-and-aeneas-117768 http://ocw.nd.edu/classics/history-of-ancient-rome/lectures-1/the-last-days-of-the-republic-octavian-antony-and Carthage economic control of the Mediterranean Carthage/Sicily/ Italy Three Punic Wars: 264-241, 218-201, 149-146 BCE http://www.phoenician.org/carthage_hannibal_barca.htm Punic, Sidonian, Tyrian = Carthaginian hp://www.uncg.edu/cla/maps/mediterranean.htm Ancient Phoenicia = Lebanon Dido’s death: the personal dimension " Anna: To think…you could be so cruel as to lay yourself down here to die without me. It is not only yourself you have destroyed, but also your sister and your people, their leaders who came with you from Sidon and the city you have built. (Aen. 4.682-5) " ! Dido’s death: foreshadowing history • Dido’s dying curse (Aen. 4.622-29) • ‘You must pursue with hatred the whole line of his descendants in @me to come.’ (4.622-3) [pp.100-1) • ‘my unknown avenger’ = Hannibal • Afermath: panic ‘It was as though the enemy were within the gates and the whole of Carthage or old Tyre were falling " with flames raging and rolling over the roofs of men ! and gods.’ (Aen. 4. 669-71) Dido and Cleopatra, Phoenicia and Egypt Mark Antony & Cleopatra VII http://ocw.nd.edu/classics/history-of-ancient-rome/lectures-1/the-last-days-of-the-republic-octavian-antony-and Giovanni Ba<sta Tiepolo The banquet of Cleopatra (1743–44) hp://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/learn/schools-resources/art-start/image-bank/giambasta-@epolo Naonal Gallery of Victoria Cleopatra’s extravagance There have been two pearls that were the largest in the whole of history; both were owned by Cleopatra, the last of the Queens of Egypt… [Cleopatra bets Antony that she can spend 100,000 on one meal]… In accordance with previous instruc@ons the servants placed in front of her only a single vessel containing vinegar, the strong rough quality of which can melt pearls. She was at the moment wearing in her ears that remarkable and truly unique work of nature. Antony was full of curiosity to see what in the world she was going to do. She took one earring off and dropped the pearl in the vinegar, and when it was melted swallowed it....With this goes the story that, when that queen who had won on this important issue was captured, the second of this pair of pearls was cut in two pieces, so that half a helping of the jewel might be in each of the ears of Venus in the Pantheon at Rome. Pliny Natural History 9.119-121 Cleopatra in the Aeneid • The Bale of Ac@um: Aeneid 8.685-8, 696-708 • ‘the greatest outrage of all, his [Antony’s] Egyp@an wife’ (688) Eastern queens: Dido and Cleopatra ‘But the queen had long been suffering from love’s deadly wound’ (4.1) Dido as regina: 4.133, 283, 295, 334, 504, 586 Cleopatra: ‘In the middle of all this the queen (regina) summoned her warships’ (8.698) Dido as host • fellow refugee - hospes • hospium • Dido’s speech to the Trojans:1.562-79 – ‘safe under my protec@on…do you wish to seWle here with me on an equal foo@ng,’ – ‘Trojan and Tyrian shall be as one in my eyes’ Dido as host – ‘safe under my protec@on…do you wish to seWle here with me on an equal foong,’ – ‘Trojan and Tyrian shall be as one in my eyes’ – Aeneas’ gratude: 1.597-605 – Poli@cal alliance? http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2010/nov/08/ancient-world-rome Dido as a refugee in North Africa • Iarbas • -> relaonship with Carthaginians as poli@cal alliance: 4.198-219 • Aeneas ‘as master’ breaks alliance Dido - pawn of the gods? • Cupid’s visit: 1.558-722 • ‘he began gradually to erase the memory of Sychaeus, trying to turn towards a living love, a heart that had long been at peace and long unused to passion.’ • univira • amor and furor - ‘doomed Dido’ (1.748) • Venus and Juno plot ‘marriage’ (4.90-128) • primordial wedding -> Dido’s culpa • loses interest in pudor and fama http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/didomosaic5.jpg Aeneas the city builder • Dido creates Carthage • But post-coniugium Dido abandons city • Aeneas as consort and builder (4.259-65) [N.B. ‘Tyrian purple’] Claude Lorrain Aeneas and Dido in Carthage (1675) http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Claude_Lorrain_-_Aeneas's_Farewell_to_Dido_in_Carthago_-_WGA05017.jpg Dido and Aeneas • who can deceive a lover? (4.295) • ‘I beg you by our union, by the marriage we have begun’ (4.317) • ‘Nor have I ever offered you marriage’ • ‘It is not by my own will that I search for Italy’ • 4.393: pius Aeneas • 4.441-49 oak tree in storm simile hWp://www.bridgemanart.com/asset/497298/Roman-4th-century-AD/Dido-and-Aeneas-embracing-from- the-mosaic-pavemen?search_context=%7B%22url%22%3A%22%5C%2Fsearch%5C%2Far@st%5C %2FRoman-4th-century-AD%5C%2F19026%3Fpage_num%3D2%22%2C%22num_results%22%3A %22123%22%2C%22search_type%22%3A%22creator_assets%22%2C%22creator_id%22%3A %2219026%22%2C%22item_index%22%3A122%7D Dido’s passion • What were your feelings, Dido, as you looked at this? (4.409) – direct address in epic • 4.459ff. frenzy – visions, hears voices – ‘She would be like Pentheus in his frenzy…or like Orestes…[with] the avenging Furies’ – ‘overwhelmed by grief and possessed by madness’ (furor 4.501) -> suicide http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/didomosaic6.jpg Dido’s passion • furor – 91 & 101: Juno describes Dido’s amor - ‘passion’, ‘madness’ – 433: D. begs for ‘respite for my anguish’ – Witchcra (505-21) • invokes gods of Underworld: Erebus, Chaos, Hecate Dido’s rhetoric and deceit – 532-53: Weighing up op@ons: leave with Aeneas, pact with Numidians, war vs. Trojans? – vocabulary of betrayal: • A betrayed her • D betrayed Sychaeus • ends with curse • final betrayal: Anna & pyre Dido’s death • Final, proud speech • difficult death • Anna’s reproach • Juno’s pity (eventually) - sends Iris – ‘since she was not dying by the decree of Fate or by her own deserts but pi@ably and before her @me’ (4.696-7) • Dido’s death c.f. Turnus (bk.12) • ‘Phoenician Dido’ in the Underworld (6.450-76) – c.f. Ajax/Aias in Odyssey 11.543-67 Dido’s suicide from 5th c. edi@on of Aeneid (Vacan) http://library.nd.edu/medieval/facsimiles/learnlat/vervat/39v40r.html .