Aeneid III.294-395

Aeneas runs into a few old friends.

Here a rumour of something unbelievable greeted our ears:

Priam’s son, Helenus, reigning over Greek cities,

having won the wife and kingdom of Pyrrhus, Aeacus’s¹ scion,

Andromache, being given again to a husband of her race.

I was astounded, and my heart burned with an amazing passion

to speak to the man and learn of such events.

I walked from the harbour, leaving the fleet and the shore,

when, by chance, in a sacred grove near the city, by a false Simois²,

Andromache was making an annual offering, sad gifts

to Hector’s ashes, and calling his spirit to the tomb,

an empty mound of green turf and twin altars she had sanctified,

a place for tears. When she saw me approaching and recognised,

with amazement, Trojan weapons round her, she froze as she gazed,

terrified by these great wonders, and the heat left her limbs.

She half-fell and after a long while, scarcely able to, said:

“Are you a real person, a real messenger come here to me,

son of the goddess? Are you alive? Or if the kindly light has faded,

where then is Hector?” She spoke, and poured out her tears,

and filled the whole place with her weeping. Given her frenzy,

I barely replied with a few words, and, moved, I spoke disjointedly:

“Surely, I live, and lead a life full of extremes: don’t be unsure,

for you see truly. Ah! What fate has overtaken you, fallen

from so great a husband? Or has good fortune, worthy enough

for Hector’s Andromache, visited you again? Are you still

Pyrrhus’s wife?” She lowered her eyes and spoke quietly:

“O happy beyond all others was that virgin daughter

of Priam, commanded to die beside an enemy tomb

under Troy’s high walls, who never suffered fate’s lottery,

or, as a prisoner, reached her victorious master’s bed!

Carried over distant seas, my country set afire, I endured

the scorn of Achilles’s son, and his youthful arrogance,

giving birth as a slave: he, who then, pursuing Hermione,

Helen’s daughter, and a Spartan marriage, transferred me

to Helenus’s keeping, a servant to a servant.

But Orestes, inflamed by great love for his stolen bride,

and driven by the Furies for his crime³, caught him

unawares and killed him by his father’s altar.

At Pyrrhus’s death a part of the kingdom passed, by right,

to Helenus, who named the Chaonian fields, and all

Chaonia, after Chaon of Troy, and built a Pergamus,

and this fortress of Ilium, on the mountain ridge.

But what winds, what fates, set your course for you?

Or what god drives you, unknowingly, to our shores?

What of the child, Ascanius? Does he live and graze on air,

he whom Creusa bore to you in vanished Troy?

Has he any love still for his lost mother?

Have his father Aeneas and his uncle Hector roused

in him any of their ancient courage or virile spirit?”⁴

Weeping, she poured out these words and was starting

a long vain lament, when heroic Helenus, Priam’s son,

approached from the city with a large retinue

and recognised us as his own, and lead us, joyfully,

to the gates, and poured out tears freely at every word.

I walked on, and saw a little Troy, and a copy of the great

citadel, and a dry stream, named after the Xanthus,

and embraced the doorposts of a Scaean Gate.⁵

My Trojans enjoyed the friendly city with me no less.

The king received them in a broad colonnade:

they poured out cups of wine in the centre of a courtyard

and held out their dishes while food was served on gold.

Now day after day has gone by, and the breezes call

to the sails, and the canvas swells with a rising Southerly:

I go to Helenus, the seer, with these words and ask:

“Trojan-born, agent of the gods, you who know Apollo’s will,

the tripods, the laurels at Claros⁶, the stars, the language

of birds, and the omens of their wings in flight,

come, speak (since a favourable oracle told me

all my route, and all the gods in their divinity urged me

to seek Italy and explore the furthest lands:

only the Harpy, Celaeno, predicts fresh portents,

evil to tell of, and threatens bitter anger

and vile famine) first, what dangers shall I avoid?

Following what course can I overcome such troubles?”

Helenus, first sacrificing bullocks according to the ritual,

obtained the gods’ grace, then loosened the headband

from his holy brow, and led me, anxious at so much

divine power, with his own hand, to your threshold, Apollo,

and then the priest prophesied this, from the divine mouth:

“Son of the goddess, since the truth is clear, that you sail

the deep blessed by the higher powers (so the king of the gods

allots our fates and rolls the changes, so the order alters),

I’ll explain a few things of many in my words to you,

so you may travel foreign seas more safely, and can find

rest in an Italian haven: for the Fates forbid Helenus

to know further, and Saturnian Juno denies him speech.

Firstly, a long pathless path, by long coastlines, separates

you from that far-off Italy, whose neighbouring port

you intend to enter, unknowingly thinking it nearby.

Before you can build your city in a safe land,

you must bend the oar in Sicilian waters

and pass the levels of the Italian seas in your ships,

the infernal lakes, and Aeaean Circe’s island.

I’ll tell you of signs: keep them stored in your memory.

When, in your distress, you find a huge sow lying on the shore,

by the waters of a remote river, under the oak trees,

that has farrowed a litter of thirty young, a white sow

lying on the ground, with white piglets round her teats,

that place shall be your city, there’s true rest from your labours.

And do not dread that gnawing of tables in your future:

the fates will find a way, Apollo will be there at your call.”

---

Hic incredibilis rerum fama occupat auris,

Priamiden Helenum Graias regnare per urbis               295

coniugio Aeacidae Pyrrhi sceptrisque potitum,

et patrio Andromachen iterum cessisse marito.

obstipui, miroque incensum pectus amore

compellare virum et casus cognoscere tantos.

progredior portu classis et litora linquens,               300

sollemnis cum forte dapes et tristia dona

ante urbem in luco falsi Simoentis ad undam

libabat cineri Andromache manisque vocabat

Hectoreum ad tumulum, viridi quem caespite inanem

et geminas, causam lacrimis, sacraverat aras.               305

ut me conspexit venientem et Troia circum

arma amens vidit, magnis exterrita monstris

deriguit visu in medio, calor ossa reliquit,

labitur, et longo vix tandem tempore fatur:

'verane te facies, verus mihi nuntius adfers,               310

nate dea? vivisne? aut, si lux alma recessit,

Hector ubi est?' dixit, lacrimasque effudit et omnem

implevit clamore locum. vix pauca furenti

subicio et raris turbatus vocibus hisco:

'vivo equidem vitamque extrema per omnia duco;               315

ne dubita, nam vera vides.

heu! quis te casus deiectam coniuge tanto

excipit, aut quae digna satis fortuna revisit,

Hectoris Andromache? Pyrrhin conubia servas?'

deiecit vultum et demissa voce locuta est:               320

'o felix una ante alias Priameia virgo,

hostilem ad tumulum Troiae sub moenibus altis

iussa mori, quae sortitus non pertulit ullos

nec victoris heri tetigit captiva cubile!

nos patria incensa diversa per aequora vectae               325

stirpis Achilleae fastus iuvenemque superbum

servitio enixae tulimus; qui deinde secutus

Ledaeam Hermionen Lacedaemoniosque hymenaeos

me famulo famulamque Heleno transmisit habendam.

ast illum ereptae magno flammatus amore               330

coniugis et scelerum furiis agitatus Orestes

excipit incautum patriasque obtruncat ad aras.

morte Neoptolemi regnorum reddita cessit

pars Heleno, qui Chaonios cognomine campos

Chaoniamque omnem Troiano a Chaone dixit,               335

Pergamaque Iliacamque iugis hanc addidit arcem.

sed tibi qui cursum venti, quae fata dedere?

aut quisnam ignarum nostris deus appulit oris?

quid puer Ascanius? superatne et vescitur aura?

quem tibi iam Troia—                                                  340

ecqua tamen puero est amissae cura parentis?

ecquid in antiquam virtutem animosque virilis

et pater Aeneas et avunculus excitat Hector?'

talia fundebat lacrimans longosque ciebat

incassum fletus, cum sese a moenibus heros               345

Priamides multis Helenus comitantibus adfert,

agnoscitque suos laetusque ad limina ducit,

et multum lacrimas verba inter singula fundit.

procedo et parvam Troiam simulataque magnis

Pergama et arentem Xanthi cognomine rivum               350

agnosco, Scaeaeque amplector limina portae;

nec non et Teucri socia simul urbe fruuntur.

illos porticibus rex accipiebat in amplis:

aulai medio libabant pocula Bacchi

impositis auro dapibus, paterasque tenebant.               355

Iamque dies alterque dies processit, et aurae

vela vocant tumidoque inflatur carbasus Austro:

his vatem adgredior dictis ac talia quaeso:

'Troiugena, interpres divum, qui numina Phoebi,

qui tripodas Clarii et laurus, qui sidera sentis               360

et volucrum linguas et praepetis omina pennae,

fare age (namque omnis cursum mihi prospera dixit

religio, et cuncti suaserunt numine divi

Italiam petere et terras temptare repostas;

sola novum dictuque nefas Harpyia Celaeno               365

prodigium canit et tristis denuntiat iras

obscenamque famem), quae prima pericula vito?

quidve sequens tantos possim superare labores?'

hic Helenus caesis primum de more iuvencis

exorat pacem divum vittasque resolvit               370

sacrati capitis, meque ad tua limina, Phoebe,

ipse manu multo suspensum numine ducit,

atque haec deinde canit divino ex ore sacerdos:

'Nate dea (nam te maioribus ire per altum

auspiciis manifesta fides; sic fata deum rex               375

sortitur voluitque vices, is vertitur ordo),

pauca tibi e multis, quo tutior hospita lustres

aequora et Ausonio possis considere portu,

expediam dictis; prohibent nam cetera Parcae

scire Helenum farique vetat Saturnia Iuno.                380

principio Italiam, quam tu iam rere propinquam

vicinosque, ignare, paras invadere portus,

longa procul longis via dividit invia terris.

ante et Trinacria lentandus remus in unda

et salis Ausonii lustrandum navibus aequor               385

infernique lacus Aeaeaeque insula Circae,

quam tuta possis urbem componere terra.

signa tibi dicam, tu condita mente teneto:

cum tibi sollicito secreti ad fluminis undam

litoreis ingens inventa sub ilicibus sus               390

triginta capitum fetus enixa iacebit,

alba solo recubans, albi circum ubera nati,

is locus urbis erit, requies ea certa laborum.

nec tu mensarum morsus horresce futuros:

fata viam invenient aderitque vocatus Apollo.’               395

---

Find the glossary for Aeneid Daily here; subscribe to receive daily posts.

1. Achilles’ father’s father, and Pyrrhus’s great-grandfather.

2. A river at Troy, which here has been reproduced/rebuilt—as my professor says, “precisely what Aeneas has been trying to do,” except the gods won’t let him. My professor also said that this section makes him think of the Las Vegas monument ripoffs.

3. Yes, that Orestes. The crime noted here is the murder of his mother, Clytemnestra, who previously killed his father, Agamemnon, a story told in the Oresteia.

4. Andromache’s own son, likely around the same age, was killed in the siege of Troy on Odysseus’s orders.

5. Quoth the professor: “Every time I read this, I have this extremely vivid image of Las Vegas.”

6. A Greek sanctuary containing a temple of Apollo.