Aeneid VIII.306-406
Aeneas gets a tour of Rome. I mean Pallantium. Venus gets nervous.
Then they all returned to the city, the sacred rites complete.
The king walked clothed with years, and kept Aeneas and his son
near him for company, lightening the road with various talk.
Aeneas marvelled and scanned his eyes about
eagerly, captivated by the place, and delighted
to enquire about and learn each tale of the men of old.
So King Evander, founder of Rome’s citadel, said:
“The local Nymphs and Fauns once lived in these groves,
and a race of men born of trees with tough timber,
who had no laws or culture, and didn’t know how
to yoke oxen or gather wealth or lay aside a store,
but the branches fed them, and the hunter’s wild fare.
Saturn was the first to come down from heavenly Olympus,
fleeing Jove’s weapons and exiled from his lost realm.
He gathered together the untaught race, scattered among
the hills, and gave them laws, and chose to call it Latium,
from latere, ‘to hide’, since he had hidden in safety on these shores.
Under his reign was the Golden Age men speak of:
in such tranquil peace did he rule the nations,
until little by little an inferior, tarnished age succeeded,
with war’s madness and desire for possessions.1
Then the Ausonian bands came, and the Siconian tribes,
while Saturn’s land of Latium often laid aside her name;
then the kings, and savage Thybris of vast bulk,
after whom we Italians call our river by the name
of Tiber; the ancient Albula2 has lost her true name.
As for me, exiled from my country and seeking
the limits of the ocean, all-powerful Chance
and inescapable fate settled me in this place,
driven on by my mother the Nymph Carmentis’s
dire warnings and my guardian god Apollo.”
He had scarcely spoken when advancing he pointed out
the altar and what the Romans call the Carmental Gate,
in ancient tribute to the Nymph Carmentis,
the far-seeing prophetess, who first foretold
the greatness of Aeneas’s sons, the glory of Pallanteum.
Next he pointed to a vast grove, which brave Romulus would restore
as a sanctuary, and the Lupercal, the Wolf’s Cave, under a cold cliff,
named in the Arcadian way for the wolf-god, Lycaean Pan.3
And he also pointed out the grove of sacred Argiletum
calling the place to witness, relating the death of Argus his guest.4
He leads him from here to the Tarpeian Rock5 and the Capitol,
now all gold, once bristling with wild thorns.
Even then the dreadful holiness of the place awed the fearful
country folk, even then they trembled at the wood and the rock.
“A god inhabits this grove,” he said, “and this hill with its leafy summit
(which god is unknown); my Arcadians believe they have seen
Jove himself, as his right hand has often shaken
his darkening shield and called up the storm clouds.
Moreover you can see in these two townships
with broken walls the memorials and relics of men of old.
Father Janus built this fort, Saturn that;
this was named the Janiculum, that the Saturnia.”
Talking among themselves they came to the house
of the impoverished Evander, and saw cattle here and there, lowing
where the Roman Forum and the fashionable Carinae would be.6
When they reached the house, Evander said: “Victorious Hercules
stooped to entering this doorway, this palace charmed him.
My guest, dare to scorn wealth and make yourself worthy too
to be a god: don’t be scathing about the lack of possessions.”
He spoke, and led mighty Aeneas beneath the confines
of his sloping roof, and allotted him a mattress
stuffed with leaves, and the pelt of a Libyan bear:
night fell and embraced the earth with her darkening wings.
Now Venus, a mother fearful, and not without reason in her mind,
troubled by the Laurentine threats and fierce uprising,
spoke to Vulcan, her husband, in their golden bridal chamber,
beginning this way, breathing divine passion into her words:
“I didn’t ask weapons of your skill or power, dearest husband,
nor any help for my poor people, while the Argive kings
destroyed doomed Troy in the war, her citadel fated
to fall to hostile flames: no, I didn’t want to exercise
you or your skills in vain, though I owed much indeed
to Priam’s sons, and often wept at Aeneas’s cruel suffering.
Now at Jove’s command he has set foot on Rutulian shores:
so I come likewise as a suppliant and ask arms of the power
sacred to me, a mother on behalf of her son. Thetis, Nereus’s
daughter, and Aurora, Tithonus’s wife, could move you with tears.7
See what nations gather, what cities, closing their gates,
are sharpening their swords against me, to destroy my people.”
She had spoken, and as he hesitated, the goddess caressed him
in a tender embrace on this side and on that in her snowy arms.
At once he felt the familiar flame, and that warmth he knew
penetrated him to the marrow and ran through his melting bones,
no differently than when, with a peal of thunder, a forked
streak of fire tears through the storm-clouds with dazzling light;
his partner felt it, delighted with her cleverness and conscious
of her beauty. Then old Vulcan spoke, chained by immortal love:
“Why do you seek instances from the past? Goddess, where
has your faith in me gone? If your anxiety then was the same,
it would have been right for me too to arm the Trojans then;
neither fate nor the almighty Father refused to let Troy stand,
or Priam live, ten years more. And so now, if war is your intent
and your mind is set on it, cease to doubt your powers, entreating
whatever care I can promise in my craft, whatever can be made
of iron and molten electrum, whatever fire and air can do.”
Saying these words he gave her a desired embrace and, sinking
onto his wife’s breast, sought gentle sleep in every limb.
Exim se cuncti divinis rebus ad urbem
perfectis referunt. ibat rex obsitus aevo,
et comitem Aenean iuxta natumque tenebat
ingrediens varioque viam sermone levabat.
miratur facilisque oculos fert omnia circum 310
Aeneas, capiturque locis et singula laetus
exquiritque auditque virum monimenta priorum.
tum rex Evandrus Romanae conditor arcis:
'haec nemora indigenae Fauni Nymphaeque tenebant
gensque virum truncis et duro robore nata, 315
quis neque mos neque cultus erat, nec iungere tauros
aut componere opes norant aut parcere parto,
sed rami atque asper victu venatus alebat.
primus ab aetherio venit Saturnus Olympo
arma Iovis fugiens et regnis exsul ademptis. 320
is genus indocile ac dispersum montibus altis
composuit legesque dedit, Latiumque vocari
maluit, his quoniam latuisset tutus in oris.
aurea quae perhibent illo sub rege fuere
saecula: sic placida populos in pace regebat, 325
deterior donec paulatim ac decolor aetas
et belli rabies et amor successit habendi.
tum manus Ausonia et gentes venere Sicanae,
saepius et nomen posuit Saturnia tellus;
tum reges asperque immani corpore Thybris, 330
a quo post Itali fluvium cognomine Thybrim
diximus; amisit verum vetus Albula nomen.
me pulsum patria pelagique extrema sequentem
Fortuna omnipotens et ineluctabile fatum
his posuere locis, matrisque egere tremenda 335
Carmentis nymphae monita et deus auctor Apollo.'
Vix ea dicta, dehinc progressus monstrat et aram
et Carmentalem Romani nomine portam
quam memorant, nymphae priscum Carmentis honorem,
vatis fatidicae, cecinit quae prima futuros 340
Aeneadas magnos et nobile Pallanteum.
hinc lucum ingentem, quem Romulus acer asylum
rettulit, et gelida monstrat sub rupe Lupercal
Parrhasio dictum Panos de more Lycaei.
nec non et sacri monstrat nemus Argileti 345
testaturque locum et letum docet hospitis Argi.
hinc ad Tarpeiam sedem et Capitolia ducit
aurea nunc, olim silvestribus horrida dumis.
iam tum religio pavidos terrebat agrestis
dira loci, iam tum silvam saxumque tremebant. 350
'hoc nemus, hunc' inquit 'frondoso vertice collem
(quis deus incertum est) habitat deus; Arcades ipsum
credunt se vidisse Iovem, cum saepe nigrantem
aegida concuteret dextra nimbosque cieret.
haec duo praeterea disiectis oppida muris, 355
reliquias veterumque vides monimenta virorum.
hanc Ianus pater, hanc Saturnus condidit arcem;
Ianiculum huic, illi fuerat Saturnia nomen.'
talibus inter se dictis ad tecta subibant
pauperis Evandri, passimque armenta videbant 360
Romanoque foro et lautis mugire Carinis.
ut ventum ad sedes, 'haec' inquit 'limina victor
Alcides subiit, haec illum regia cepit.
aude, hospes, contemnere opes et te quoque dignum
finge deo, rebusque veni non asper egenis.' 365
dixit, et angusti subter fastigia tecti
ingentem Aenean duxit stratisque locavit
effultum foliis et pelle Libystidis ursae:
nox ruit et fuscis tellurem amplectitur alis.
At Venus haud animo nequiquam exterrita mater 370
Laurentumque minis et duro mota tumultu
Volcanum adloquitur, thalamoque haec coniugis aureo
incipit et dictis divinum aspirat amorem:
'dum bello Argolici vastabant Pergama reges
debita casurasque inimicis ignibus arces, 375
non ullum auxilium miseris, non arma rogavi
artis opisque tuae, nec te, carissime coniunx,
incassumve tuos volui exercere labores,
quamvis et Priami deberem plurima natis,
et durum Aeneae flevissem saepe laborem. 380
nunc Iovis imperiis Rutulorum constitit oris:
ergo eadem supplex venio et sanctum mihi numen
arma rogo, genetrix nato. te filia Nerei,
te potuit lacrimis Tithonia flectere coniunx.
aspice qui coeant populi, quae moenia clausis 385
ferrum acuant portis in me excidiumque meorum.'
dixerat et niveis hinc atque hinc diva lacertis
cunctantem amplexu molli fovet. ille repente
accepit solitam flammam, notusque medullas
intravit calor et labefacta per ossa cucurrit, 390
non secus atque olim tonitru cum rupta corusco
ignea rima micans percurrit lumine nimbos;
sensit laeta dolis et formae conscia coniunx.
tum pater aeterno fatur devinctus amore:
'quid causas petis ex alto? fiducia cessit 395
quo tibi, diva, mei? similis si cura fuisset,
tum quoque fas nobis Teucros armare fuisset;
nec pater omnipotens Troiam nec fata vetabant
stare decemque alios Priamum superesse per annos.
et nunc, si bellare paras atque haec tibi mens est, 400
quidquid in arte mea possum promittere curae,
quod fieri ferro liquidove potest electro,
quantum ignes animaeque valent, absiste precando
viribus indubitare tuis.' ea verba locutus
optatos dedit amplexus placidumque petivit 405
coniugis infusus gremio per membra soporem.
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The “Golden Age,” a legendary time of agricultural richness and peace, may reflect the state of Italy when the Trojans get there; the wildness of the land is described positively until the Trojans do some ecological destruction (re: the stag), at least according to my professor.
The Lupercal here refers not to the festival*, but to the cave at the foot of the Palatine hill, where Romulus and Remus were said to have been suckled by a she-wolf as infants.
*footnotes written by a guy who thinks about Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar a lot
A street in ancient Rome; there’s a story that goes with it!
A cliff used as an execution site in Vergil’s time. Evander is, unknowingly, giving Aeneas a tour of the city he is responsible for founding.
The business center of Rome and one of its most exclusive neighborhoods, respectively.
This line, and this segment of the poem as a whole, is a direct reference to Iliad 18, in which Hephaestus (the Greek name for Vulcan) agrees to make new armor for Achilles at Thetis’s behest, after Patroclus loses it (and his life) to Hector. What was that thing the Sibyl said? I can’t remember. This particular scene may also be a reference to Hera’s seduction and deception of Zeus in Iliad 14; in both cases, a goddess uses her sexuality to win a victory for the mortals whose military trials she watches over.