Vergil

This paper analyses the intertextual relations between some passages of the Medea cento and Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica, a relationship mediated by Virgil’s Aeneid, the poetic langue of Hosidius’ cento. The
numerous Virgilian allusions in the Argonautica, later reused in the cento, are probably a Hosidius’ rereading of the Argonautica based on the use of the same Virgilian lines. The hypothesis is, then, that Hosidius rereads, through the use of Virgil’s poetic langue, not only some Aeneid’s characters under the light of the Medea myth, but also some elements and aspects of Valerian characters, based on the economy of allusion.

Cet article propose de voir à quoi correspond, dans l’Antiquité, la catégorie d’ « épopée didactique » (ou « poésie didactique »), couramment utilisée par les savants modernes pour rendre compte d’œuvres comme les Travaux et les jours, le De rerum natura ou encore les Géorgiques, en opposition avec la catégorie d’« épopée narrative » (ou parfois simplement d’« épopée »), qui comprendrait les poèmes d’Homère, l’Énéide, etc. Une enquête anthropologique et pragmatique montre que la catégorie de « poésie didactique » n’existait pas chez les Anciens. Dans un deuxième temps, on essaie de voir à quel moment on commence à parler de « poésie didactique ».

Anchises’ speech (Aen. 6,724-751) synthesizes, in twenty-eight verses, the great themes of the cosmos (724-727), the animated beings (728-732), the soul imprisoned in the body (733-738), the destiny of the souls (739-751). The synthesis is obtained by means of a carefully designed structure: the different parts are proportionate to each another, and are linked through internal references. In the analysis of Anchises’ speech I use the weaving images (warp, weft, meshes). The warp consists of the various threads of the speech (corresponding to the themes of the main sections: cosmos, animated beings…), while the weft is the main
thread, consisting of internal references and of verbal and conceptual parallels.

From antiquity to the eve of the modern era, rulers of Western empires inspired hero worship by proclaiming their divine origins. In this fascinating original study, Marie Tanner presents the history of the emperor's mythic image and its continuing influence on Western political thought. She shows that these pretensions to divinity were based on the Trojan legend and the myth of Rome as developed in Vergil’s Aeneid and that later Christian emperors expanded these claims by tracing their lineage not only to the pagan gods but also to the priest-kings of the Old Testament. Through this amalgam of heritages each successive Holy Roman emperor proclaimed that he was the last descendant of Aeneas, destined to yield the terrestrial rule of Rome to Christ and thereby inaugurate millennial peace.

By examining a wide range of literary, artistic, and historical sources plus a corpus of new illustrations, Tanner discovers remarkable chains of evidence for this process, one that culminates with the Renaissance Hapsburgs who imbued the holiest symbols of the faith with dynastic meaning as they attempted to consolidate all priestly and secular powers in their grip. On these foundations Philip II of Spain, son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and the first monarch to rule the four known continents, created a new concept of absolute monarchy that shaped the principles of modern statecraft and determined the dominant form of government in Europe for the next two centuries.

This paper analyzes Vergil’s representation of militant wo¬men in the Aeneid in cross-cultural compari-son with contemporary discourses about female combatants in the Middle East. I draw on recent femi-nist work in conflict studies, which has argued that contemporary journalism and scholarship rely on two stereotyped discourses to interpret female militancy: the “vacant womb” and the “deviant womb.” I argue that Vergil employs these same narratives to “maternalize” female combatants, representing women’s violence in maternal terms, as either a product or a perversion of motherhood. I conclude that this rhetorical strategy serves to marginalize and depoliticize female combatants by reinscribing violent women in the domestic and maternal sphere.

In this article, the variants of the Toledo Bibl. Capit. Ms. 102-2 manuscript are analysed. These variants do not coincide with those of Vergil’s Aeneid, which are more recent. Some of the referred lines are explained by means of critic and literary comments and notes.

O gênero épico tinha por objetivo mais nobre a preservação de histórias contadas por gerações e nessas histórias, narradas por versos cantados – elemento antigo para memorização –, preservavam os nomes de heróis, pais fundadores, espaços míticos, cotidiano antigo, pensamentos arcaicos, buscava-se preservar o máximo de um contexto ao qual os ouvintes já não faziam mais parte ou, notavam resquícios de um tempo que não conheceram. Foi a escrita que eternizou, na melhor das hipóteses, todo esse elemento épico que estava por ameaça constante do esquecimento.

This discussion outlines the poetical features of style and narrative technique which contribute to Virgil's psychological characterisation and considers the role of audience response - in terms of reception, intertextuality and ideology - in determining Virgil's characterisation.

In my paper I examine the use of Sibylline Books during Augustus' reign. I discuss the role of the Sibyl as well as the collection attributed to her in terms of cultural changes and cultural paraphrases. According to my opinion the prophetess had mainly cultural, not ritual significance. I argue for treating the interventions onto corpus of official Sibylline Books made by Augustus in the category of creating the new cultural identity for the inhabitants of the Empire.

In this essay on Virgil's Aeneid, I explore the role of memory and historical consciousness as the basis for the general formation of the epic and the outcome of the interpersonal events between Aeneas and Dido, and Aeneas and Turnus. More specifically, I argue that the image on the shield of Aeneas forged by Vulcan is the key to understanding the imagery and story arc of Virgil's grand epic.

La Eneida se ha prestado, desde la Antigüedad hasta nuestro mismo
tiempo, a lecturas que, cuando menos, podemos considerar peculiares o extrañas. La pretensión de que el gran poema virgiliano pueda contener mensajes ocultos y atemporales no deja de ser una tentación para algunos de sus lectores, cuyo entusiasmo los lleva, a veces, a sobreinterpretar ciertos pasajes, a manipular los textos, o, incluso, a proponer una nueva intención de toda la obra virgiliana. De esta forma, el asunto que hemos elegido, «La cara oculta de la Eneida», nos lleva a ensayar una rica y variada reflexión acerca de los modos de pensar y de encontrar significados ocultos en un texto clásico que, sin llegar a ser sagrado, contiene enseñanzas valiosas y ejemplares.

I will concentrate on the following sources of public opinion in favour of Sextus Pompeius, which may be less obvious but are no less important:
1. letters from exiled people in Sicily
2. the persistence of a permanent daily memory not only of his father’s deeds, but also of Sextus’ connection with the ocean: Pompey’s domus rostrata, standing up in the centre of Rome
3. political literature, aimed at several audiences, and created by two freedmen of Pompey, through anonymous epigrams and an anonymous poem preserved in the Appendix Vergiliana.

The noticeable analogies between the funeral laments of Anna and Juturna in the Aeneid have been often explained as a means of linking the sisters of the two main Aeneas’ opponents. But the common features of the two passages (and their differences) become more clear if we trace back them to the tradition of the historical funeral lament, already included in the Iliad and used by Virgil to represent nature and feelings of these two sad characters.

Framing the mission of Aeneas in the underworld, Palinurus’
disappereance in the waters of the Sirens at the end of Aeneid 5 and Circe’s indirect appearance at the beginning of Aeneid 7 mark the last stages of the Trojan hero’s journey. In both cases Vergil deviates and distances himself from Homer, excluding the Sirens and Circe from the narration. The aim of the article is to consider Circe’s and the Sirens’ ambiguous exclusion from the official plot of the Aeneid through a gender-informed perspective. While formally discrediting the figures of Circe and the Sirens, the author invites the reader to glimpse their presence beneath the surface of the text. If these characters, who stand for a problematic model of femina sapiens, lose body and voice, their figures are conveyed through symbols, and they end up embodying two complementary ways of reading Vergil’s epic: intertextuality
(the Sirens) and semiotics (Circe).

Esta obra trata acerca del mayor poeta de Roma, pero también sobre el
valor que tiene la gran literatura a la hora de enseñarnos a saber quiénes
somos. Recorre, en primer lugar, los aspectos biográficos e históricos de
Virgilio, repasando el misterio que supone, en gran medida, su vida y la
huella que de su persona puede encontrarse dentro de su obra. En la segunda parte, se aborda la singular cuestión del mito del poeta, a quien la Edad Media convirtió en mago y talismán, hasta que Dante recuperó su esencial condición de maestro y guía. La tercera y última parte del libro repasa someramente, ayudándose de ejemplos significativos, la historia de la recepción de Virgilio desde el Renacimiento hasta el mismo siglo XXI. En esta parte, veremos cómo las nuevas estéticas van renovando y recreando la lectura del poeta, desde la serenidad renacentista y el desengaño barroco hasta el moderno simbolismo o la propia posmodernidad. Este libro constituye, asimismo, un intenso viaje sentimental por Italia que comienza en Mantua y termina en Nápoles.

Augustus’ success in implementing monarchical rule at Rome is often attributed to innovations in the symbolic language of power, from the star marking Julius Caesar’s deification to buildings like the Palatine complex and Forum Augustum to rituals like triumphs and funerals. This book illumines Roman subjects’ vital role in creating and critiquing these images, in keeping with the Augustan poets’ sustained exploration of audiences’ role in constructing verbal and visual meaning. From Vergil to Ovid, these poets publicly interpret, debate, and disrupt Rome’s evolving political iconography, reclaiming it as the common property of an imagined republic of readers. In showing how these poets used reading as a metaphor for the mutual constitution of Augustan authority and a means of exercising interpretive libertas under the principate, this book offers a holistic new vision of Roman imperial power and its representation that will stimulate scholars and students alike. (forthcoming with Cambridge University Press, spring 2018)

This paper will examine the claims of the excudent alii ('others will hammer out') priamel of Aeneid 6.847–53 within the immediate context of the parade's end, where Marcellus, parading the spolia opima, is used to exemplify the claims made about ne and speculative arts belonging to the Greeks, and war and the arts of empire to the Romans. It will be shown that certain, highly specic memories of the elder Marcellus are cued by the priamel that run directly counter to Anchises' claims. The paper will look at how these claims are spoken in character, and driven by specic narrative motives, and it will relate the mismatch of exemplied to exemplier to certain larger patterns within the Aeneid of things being left unsaid only to stand out all the more by being left unsaid. The paper concludes with a speculative essay on the necessary reductions and revisions that go into the making, and reading, of culturally instrumentalized monuments.