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• Homer's First Battle Supplication and the End of Virgil's Aeneid

  53-66

  Lee Fratantuono

  Views:

  172

  One of the less appreciated literary influences on the Virgilian depiction of Aeneas' decision to slay Turnus at the end of the Aeneid is the first battle supplication scene in Homer's Iliad, the encounter of Adrestus with Menelaus and Agamemnon. Close consideration of Virgil's response to the Homeric scene sheds light on the poet's concerns in his presentation of the choice his Trojan hero Aeneas confronts in light of Turnus' appeal. Acrostics at the end of the Aeneid invite further reflection.

• Virgil’s Dido and the Death of Marcus Antonius

  351-356

  Lee Fratantuono

  Views:

  151

  Virgil’s account of the death of Dido at the end of Aeneid IV has been the subject of an appreciably extensive critical bibliography. What has not been recognized to date has been the influence of the tradition of the suicide of the former triumvir Marcus Antonius on Virgil’s depiction of Dido’s demise.

• The Ambiguous Arms of Aeneas

  37-42.

  Lee Fratantuono

  Views:

  150

  Virgil subtly connects the scene of Dido’s discussion with her sister Anna about the new Trojan arrival Aeneas, and the later first arrival of the Trojans in Latium. By a careful corre-spondence between the two passages, Virgil portends the dark amatory rationale behind the sub-sequent outbreak of war in Italy