Aeneid VI.212-295

Aeneas enters the horrors. I mean the Underworld.

Meanwhile, on the shore, the Trojans were weeping bitterly

for Misenus and paying their last respects to his senseless ashes.

First they raised a huge pyre, heavy with cut oak and pine,

weaving the sides with dark foliage, set funereal cypress in front,

and decorated it above with shining weapons.

Some heated water, making the cauldrons boil on the flames,

and washed and anointed the chill corpse. They made lament.

Then, having wept, they placed his limbs on the couch

and threw purple robes over them, his usual dress.

Some raised the great bier, a sad duty,

and, with averted faces, set a torch below,

in ancestral fashion. Gifts were heaped on the flames,

of incense, foodstuffs, bowls brimming with olive-oil.

When the ashes collapsed and the blaze died, they washed

the remains of the parched bones in wine, and Corynaeus,

collecting the fragments, closed them in a bronze urn.

Also he circled his comrades three times with pure water

to purify them, sprinkling fine dew from a full olive branch,

and spoke the words of parting. And virtuous Aeneas

heaped up a great mound for his tomb, with the hero’s

own weapons, his trumpet and oar, beneath a high mountain,

which is called Misenus now after him, and preserves

his ever-living name throughout the ages.

This done, he quickly carried out the Sibyl’s orders.

There was a deep stony cave, huge and gaping wide,

sheltered by a dark lake and shadowy woods

over which nothing could extend its wings in safe flight,

since such a breath flowed from those black jaws,

and was carried to the over-arching sky, that the Greeks

called it by the name Aornos, that is Avernus, or the Bird-less.

Here the priestess first of all tethered four black heifers,

poured wine over their foreheads, and placed

the topmost bristles that she plucked, growing

between their horns, in the sacred fire as a first offering,

calling aloud to Hecate, powerful in Heaven and Hell.

Others slit the victim’s throats and caught the warm blood

in bowls. Aeneas himself sacrificed a black-fleeced lamb

to Night, mother of the Furies, and Earth, her mighty sister,

and a barren heifer to you, Persephone;

then he kindled the midnight altars for the Stygian King¹,

and placed whole carcasses of bulls on the flames,

pouring rich oil over the blazing entrails.

See now, at the dawn light of the rising sun,

the ground bellowed under their feet, the wooded hills began

to move, and, at the coming of the Goddess, dogs seemed to howl

in the shadows. “Away, stand far away, O you profane ones,”

the priestess cried, “absent yourselves from all this grove;

and you now, Aeneas, be on your way, and tear your sword

from the sheath: you need courage and a firm mind now.”

So saying, she plunged wildly into the open cave;

he fearlessly kept pace with his vanishing guide.

You gods, whose is the realm of spirits, and you, dumb shadows,

and Chaos, Phlegethon, wide silent places of the night,²

let me tell what I have heard: by your power, let me

reveal things buried in the deep earth and the darkness.

On they went, hidden in solitary night, through gloom,

through Dis’s empty halls and insubstantial kingdom:

like a path through a wood, in the faint light

under a wavering moon, when Jupiter has buried the sky

in shadow, and black night has stolen the colour from things.

Right before the entrance, in the very jaws of Orcus³,

Grief and vengeful Care have made their beds,

and pallid Sickness lives there, and sad Old Age,

and Fear, and persuasive Hunger, and vile Need,

forms terrible to look on, and Death and Pain:

then Death’s brother Sleep, and Evil Pleasure of the mind,

and, on the threshold opposite, death-dealing War,

and the steel chambers of the Furies, and mad Discord,

her snaky hair entwined with blood-wet ribbons.

In the centre a vast shadowy elm spreads its aged trunks

and branches: the seat, they say, that false Dreams hold,

thronging, clinging beneath every leaf.

And many other monstrous shapes of varied creatures

are stabled by the doors, Centaurs⁴ and bi-formed Scylla,

and hundred-armed Briareus⁵, and the Lernean Hydra⁶,

hissing fiercely, and the Chimaera⁷ armed with flame,

Gorgons⁸, and Harpies, and the triple bodied shade Geryon⁹.

At this, trembling suddenly with terror, Aeneas grasped

his sword and set the naked blade against their approach,

and, if his knowing companion had not warned him

that these were tenuous bodiless lives flitting about

with a hollow semblance of form, he would have rushed at them

and hacked at the shadows uselessly with his sword.

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Nec minus interea Misenum in litore Teucri

flebant et cineri ingrato suprema ferebant.

principio pinguem taedis et robore secto

ingentem struxere pyram, cui frondibus atris               215

intexunt latera et feralis ante cupressos

constituunt, decorantque super fulgentibus armis.

pars calidos latices et aena undantia flammis

expediunt, corpusque lavant frigentis et unguunt.

fit gemitus. tum membra toro defleta reponunt               220

purpureasque super vestis, velamina nota,

coniciunt. pars ingenti subiere feretro,

triste ministerium, et subiectam more parentum

aversi tenuere facem. congesta cremantur

turea dona, dapes, fuso crateres olivo.               225

postquam conlapsi cineres et flamma quievit,

reliquias vino et bibulam lavere favillam,

ossaque lecta cado texit Corynaeus aeno.

idem ter socios pura circumtulit unda

spargens rore levi et ramo felicis olivae,               230

lustravitque viros dixitque novissima verba.

at pius Aeneas ingenti mole sepulcrum

imponit suaque arma viro remumque tubamque

monte sub aerio, qui nunc Misenus ab illo

dicitur aeternumque tenet per saecula nomen.               235

His actis propere exsequitur praecepta Sibyllae.

spelunca alta fuit vastoque immanis hiatu,

scrupea, tuta lacu nigro nemorumque tenebris,

quam super haud ullae poterant impune volantes

tendere iter pennis: talis sese halitus atris               240

faucibus effundens supera ad convexa ferebat.

unde locum Grai dixerunt nomine Aornum.

quattuor hic primum nigrantis terga iuvencos

constituit frontique invergit vina sacerdos,

et summas carpens media inter cornua saetas               245

ignibus imponit sacris, libamina prima,

voce vocans Hecaten caeloque Ereboque potentem.

supponunt alii cultros tepidumque cruorem

succipiunt pateris. ipse atri velleris agnam

Aeneas matri Eumenidum magnaeque sorori               250

ense ferit, sterilemque tibi, Proserpina, vaccam;

tum Stygio regi nocturnas incohat aras

et solida imponit taurorum viscera flammis,

pingue super oleum fundens ardentibus extis.

ecce autem primi sub limina solis et ortus               255

sub pedibus mugire solum et iuga coepta moveri

silvarum, visaeque canes ululare per umbram

adventante dea. 'procul, o procul este, profani,'

conclamat vates, 'totoque absistite luco;

tuque invade viam vaginaque eripe ferrum:               260

nunc animis opus, Aenea, nunc pectore firmo.'

tantum effata furens antro se immisit aperto;

ille ducem haud timidis vadentem passibus aequat.

Di, quibus imperium est animarum, umbraeque silentes

et Chaos et Phlegethon, loca nocte tacentia late,               265

sit mihi fas audita loqui, sit numine vestro

pandere res alta terra et caligine mersas.

Ibant obscuri sola sub nocte per umbram

perque domos Ditis vacuas et inania regna:

quale per incertam lunam sub luce maligna               270

est iter in silvis, ubi caelum condidit umbra

Iuppiter, et rebus nox abstulit atra colorem.

vestibulum ante ipsum primisque in faucibus Orci

Luctus et ultrices posuere cubilia Curae,

pallentesque habitant Morbi tristisque Senectus,               275

et Metus et malesuada Fames ac turpis Egestas,

terribiles visu formae, Letumque Labosque;

tum consanguineus Leti Sopor et mala mentis

Gaudia, mortiferumque adverso in limine Bellum,

ferreique Eumenidum thalami et Discordia demens               280

vipereum crinem vittis innexa cruentis.

in medio ramos annosaque bracchia pandit

ulmus opaca, ingens, quam sedem Somnia vulgo

vana tenere ferunt, foliisque sub omnibus haerent.

multaque praeterea variarum monstra ferarum,               285

Centauri in foribus stabulant Scyllaeque biformes

et centumgeminus Briareus ac belua Lernae

horrendum stridens, flammisque armata Chimaera,

Gorgones Harpyiaeque et forma tricorporis umbrae.

corripit hic subita trepidus formidine ferrum               290

Aeneas strictamque aciem venientibus offert,

et ni docta comes tenuis sine corpore vitas

admoneat volitare cava sub imagine formae,

inruat et frustra ferro diverberet umbras.

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

1. Hades/Pluto

2. "Chaos” refers to the mythological personification of the pre-creation void, a divine figure of the Underworld; Phlegethon was one of the rivers of the Underworld, a river of fire.

3. personfication of the Underworld; so is “Dis,” which may also refer to the god Pluto

4. half-man, half-horse creatures

5. a hundred-armed giant

6. a many-headed monster from Lerna, a swamp near Argos; famously, hydras grow multiple new heads when decapitated

7. a monster with the head of a lion, the body of a goat, and the tail of a snake/serpent

8. monstrous women with snakes for hair

9. a three-bodied monster killed by Hercules