The Aeneid (60 page)

                He who devised mankind and all the world smiled and replied:
830         ‘You are the true sister of Jupiter and the second child of Saturn,
                such waves of anger do you set rolling from deep in your heart.
                But come now, lay aside this fury that arose in vain. I grant
                what you wish. I yield. I relent of my own free will. The people
                of Ausonia will keep the tongue of their fathers and their ancient
                ways. As their name is, so shall it remain. The Trojans will join
                them in body only and will then be submerged. Ritual I will give
                and the modes of worship, and I will make them all Latins,
                speaking one tongue. You will see that the people who arise
                from this admixture of Ausonian blood will be above all men,
840         above the gods, in devotion and no other race will be their equals
                in paying you honour.’ Juno nodded in assent. She rejoiced and
                forced her mind to change, leaving the cloud behind her and
                withdrawing from the sky.

                This done, the Father of the Gods pondered another task in
                his mind and prepared to dismiss Juturna from her brother’s
                side. There are two monsters named Dirae born to the goddess
                
of the dead of night in one and the same litter with Megaera of
                Tartarus. The heads of all three she bound with coiling snakes
850         and gave them wings to ride the wind. These attend the throne
                of savage Jupiter in his royal palace, and sharpen the fears of
                suffering mortals whenever the King of the Gods sets plagues or
                hideous deaths in motion or terrifies guilty cities by the visitation
                of war. One of these Jupiter sent swiftly down from the heights
                of heaven with orders to confront Juturna as an omen. She flew
                to earth, carried in a swift whirlwind. Like an arrow going
                through a cloud, spun from the bowstring of a Parthian who
                has armed the barb with a virulent poison for which there is no
                cure, a Parthian, or a Cretan from Cydonia; and it whirrs as it
860         flies unseen through the swift darkness – so flew the daughter
                of Night, making for the earth. When she saw the Trojan battle
                lines and the army of Turnus, she took in an instant the shape
                of the little bird which perches on tombs and the gables of empty
                houses and sings late its ill-omened song among the shades of
                night. In this guise the monster flew again and again at Turnus’
                face, screeching and beating his shield with her wings. A strange
                numbness came over him and his bones melted with fear. His
                hair stood on end and the voice stuck in his throat.

870         His sister Juturna recognized the Dira from a long way off by
                the whirring of her wings, and grieved. She loosened and tore
                her hair. She scratched her face and beat her breast, crying:
                ‘What can your sister do to help you now, Turnus? Much have
                I endured but nothing now remains for me, and I have no art
                that could prolong your life. How can I set myself against such
                a portent? At last, at last, I leave the battle. Do not frighten me,
                you birds of evil omen. I am already afraid. I know the beating
                of your wings and the sound of death. I do not fail to understand
                the proud commands of great-hearted Jupiter. Is this his reward
                for my lost virginity? For what purpose has he granted me
880         eternal life? Why has he deprived me of the state of death? But
                for that I could at least have put an end to my suffering and
                borne my poor brother company through the shades. So this is
                immortality! Will anything that is mine be sweet to me without
                you, my brother? Is there no abyss that can open deep enough
                to take a goddess down to the deepest of the shades?’ At these
                
words, covering her head in a blue-green veil and moaning
                bitterly, the goddess plunged into the depths of her own river.

                Aeneas kept pressing his pursuit with his huge spear flashing,
                as long as a tree, and these were the words he spoke in his anger:
                ‘What is the delay now? Why are you still shirking, Turnus?
890         This is not a race! It is a fight with dangerous weapons at close
                quarters. Turn yourself into any shape you like. Scrape together
                all your resources of spirit and skill. Pray to sprout wings and
                fly to the stars of heaven, or shut yourself up and hide in a hole
                in the ground!’ Turnus replied, shaking his head: ‘You are fierce,
                Aeneas, but wild words do not frighten me. It is the gods that
                cause me to fear, the gods and the enmity of Jupiter.’ He said
                no more but looked round and saw a huge rock, a huge and
                ancient rock which happened to be lying on the plain, a boundary
900         stone put there to settle a dispute about land. Twelve
                picked men like those the earth now produces could scarcely lift it up
                on to their shoulders, but he caught it up in his trembling
                hands and, rising to his full height and running at speed, he
                hurled it at his enemy. But he had no sense of running or going,
                of lifting or moving the huge rock. His knees gave way. His
                blood chilled and froze and the stone rolled away under its own
                impetus over the open ground between them, but it did not go
                the whole way and it did not strike its target. Just as when we
                are asleep, when in the weariness of night rest lies heavy on our
910         eyes, we dream we are trying desperately to run further and not
                succeeding, till we fall exhausted in the middle of our efforts;
                the tongue is useless; the strength we know we have fails our
                body; we have no voice, no words to obey our will – so it was
                with Turnus. Wherever his courage sought a way, the dread
                goddess barred his progress. During these moments, the
                thoughts whirled in his brain. He gazed at the Rutulians and
                the city. He faltered with fear. He began to tremble at the death
                that was upon him. He could see nowhere to run, no way to
                come at his enemy, no chariot anywhere, no sister to drive it.

920         As he faltered the deadly spear of Aeneas flashed. His eyes
                had picked the spot and he threw from long range with all his
                weight behind the throw. Stones hurled by siege artillery never
                roar like this. The crash of the bursting thunderbolt is not so
                
loud. Like a dark whirlwind it flew carrying death and destruction
                with it. Piercing the outer rings of the sevenfold shield and
                laying open the lower rim of the breastplate, it went whistling
                through the middle of the thigh. When the blow struck, down
                went great Turnus, bending his knee to the ground. The Rutulians
                rose with a groan which echoed round the whole mountain,
                and far and wide the high forests sent back the sound of their
930         voices. He lowered his eyes and stretched out his right hand to
                beg as a suppliant. ‘I have brought this upon myself,’ he said,
                ‘and for myself I ask nothing. Make use of what Fortune has
                given you, but if any thought of my unhappy father can touch
                you, I beg of you – and you too had such a father in Anchises –
                take pity on the old age of Daunus, and give me back to my
                people, or if you prefer it, give them back my dead body. You
                have defeated me, and the men of Ausonia have seen me defeated
                and stretching out my hands to you. Lavinia is yours. Do not
                carry your hatred any further.’

940         There stood Aeneas, deadly in his armour, rolling his eyes,
                but he checked his hand, hesitating more and more as the words
                of Turnus began to move him, when suddenly his eyes caught
                the fatal baldric of the boy Pallas high on Turnus’ shoulder with
                the glittering studs he knew so well. Turnus had defeated and
                wounded him and then killed him, and now he was wearing his
                belt on his shoulder as a battle honour taken from an enemy.
                Aeneas feasted his eyes on the sight of this spoil, this reminder
                of his own wild grief, then, burning with mad passion and
                terrible in his wrath, he cried: ‘Are you to escape me now,
                wearing the spoils stripped from the body of those I loved? By
                this wound which I now give, it is Pallas who makes sacrifice of
                you. It is Pallas who exacts the penalty in your guilty blood.’
950         Blazing with rage, he plunged the steel full into his enemy’s
                breast. The limbs of Turnus were dissolved in cold and his life
                left him with a groan, fleeing in anger down to the shades.

Silvius
: According to Jupiter’s prophecy at 1.257-77, Rome is to be founded in four stages. Aeneas will build his city at Lavinium and live for three years. His son Ascanius Iulus will reign for thirty years and transfer the city to Alba Longa. After their descendants, the Alban kings, rule for three hundred years, Romulus (Quirinus), son of Mars and Ilia, will found his city at Rome. But here at 6.763, where Aeneas begins his survey of the Alban kings waiting in the Underworld, Ascanius, being still alive, is not in the parade, and the first to be mentioned is Silvius, a son of Aeneas not yet born.

Alban kings
:
Virgil offers five names to cover the years from about 1053 to 753
BC
.

Romulus
:
Romulus restored his grandfather Numitor to the throne which Numitor’s younger brother had usurped. Romulus then founded Rome in 753
BC
.

Caesar
: Julius Caesar, 102–44
BC
, adopted his grand-nephew Octavian as his son and heir.

Augustus
:
Name adopted by Octavian in 27
BC
.

(
Numa
): From the village of Cures, he gave Rome religion and laws. His traditional dates are 715–673
BC
.

Tullus
: Tullius Hostilius, the warrior king, 673–642
BC
.

Ancus
: Ancus Marcius, 642–617
BC
, here only appears as a king who courted popular favour.

Tarquins
: L. Tarquinius Priscus, 616–579
BC
, and L. Tarquinius Superbus, 534–510
BC
.

Brutus
: L. Junius Brutus led a rising against Tarquinius Superbus to avenge the rape of Lucretia. Later, as one of the first two consuls of Rome, in 510
BC
, he executed his own two sons who tried to restore the Tarquins. The rods and axes carried by the consuls signified their right to flog and execute. This passage alludes also to the other avenging Brutus who assassinated Julius Caesar in 44
BC
.

Decii
: P. Decius Mus, father and son of the same name, were famous
for self-immolation, each taking his own life to secure victory for Roman armies, the father in 340
BC
in the Latin War and the son in 295
BC
in battle against the Samnites.

Drusi
: Livia, wife of Augustus from 38
BC
till his death in ad 14, was a member of this notable Roman family.

Torquatus
: T. Manlius Torquatus led the Romans against the Gauls in 361
BC
, and in 340
BC
in the Latin War he executed his own son for disobeying orders in engaging and defeating an enemy champion.

Camillus
: M. Furius Camillus recovered not gold, but the standards said to have been the price of the Gaulish withdrawal from Rome in 390
BC
. This passage may also be read as an oblique tribute to Augustus, who, after long negotiations, recovered in 20
BC
the standards lost to the Parthians at Carrhae in 53
BC
.

(
Pompey
): Gnaeus Pompeius and Julius Caesar are the two spirits in gleaming armour. Caesar defeated Pompey at the battle of Pharsalus in 48
BC
.

(
Mummius
): L. Mummius sacked Corinth in 146
BC
.

(
Paullus
): L. Aemilius Paullus is here credited with the conquest of Greece for his defeat of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, at the battle of Pydna in 168
BC
.

Cato
: M. Porcius Cato, Cato the Elder, 234–149
BC
, was famed as the custodian of traditional Roman virtues.

Cossus
: A. Cornelius Cossus defeated Tolumnius, king of the Veientes, in single combat, perhaps in 246
BC
.

Gracchi
: Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus (died 133
BC
), and his brother Gaius Sempronius Gracchus (died 121
BC
), the two reforming tribunes, were members of this famous Roman family.