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• Acrostic Conversation: Horace, Ode I 18

  67-100

  Neil Adkin

  Views:

  184

  This article argues that gamma-acrostical disce in Horace’s Ode I 18 (ll. 11–15) alludes to the land-confiscatory acrostics recently identified in Virgil’s Eclogues (I 5–8; VI 14–24; IX 34–38). Horace has carefully signposted his acrostical intent. Virgil himself interfaces with this Horatian cryptography by means of other acrostics of his own. The result is an ‘acrostic conversation’.

• 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

• Sinon on his “pal” Palamedes (Virgil, Aeneid II 81-104)

  151–165

  Neil Adkin

  Views:

  64

  Sinon’s speech to the Trojans falsely represents him as Palamedes’ friend. The present article endeavours to show how in this connection Virgil avails himself of etymology.

• Lucius Brutus of Rome and Cypselus of Corinth

  27–44.

  Ádám Rung

  Views:

  79

  The story of Lucius Brutus, the founder of the Roman Republic has often been analysed as a historical story, somewhat mythicised, and embellished by literary tropes; and some have also interpreted it as primarily a myth, historicised by a later Roman culture more interested in the exemplary than in the marvelous. Starting out in the latter tradition, this article explores a connection that has been hinted at from antiquity, and has been analysed from the historical and historiographic perspective to some extent, but has not been interpreted in detail as a connection between two myths: the numerous parallels that the story of Brutus and the Tarquins, as told by Virgil, Livy and Ovid, has to the saga of the aristocratic Bacchiad and the tyrannical Cypselid families of early Corinth, as told by Herodotus and Aristotle. The newly discovered parallels (and the re-examination of the known ones) between these stories also invite the reader to reflect on the ways they might have evolved, their political and cultural functionality and on the complex interplay between myth and history.

• Quis est nam ludus in undis? (Virgil, Eclogue IX 39-43)

  43–58

  Neil Adkin

  Views:

  115

  The undis-acrostic that has recently been discovered in Eclogue IX 34-38 has proved problematic. The present article argues that the acrostic’s point is the etymology of litus as the place where these “waves” do not “play” (39: ludus), but “strike” (43: feriant for synonymous but exceedingly scarce lidant). This acrostic is accordingly hot-potato politics, since it pertains to the land confiscations round Virgil’s “wave”-begirt Mantua. The poet also provides endorsement in the form of an unidentified onomastic.

• Acrostic shit (Ecl. IV 47-52)

  21–37

  Neil Adkin

  Views:

  190

  The cacata-acrostic (Ecl. IV 47-52) is considered accidental, as being inconsistent with the dignitas of this “Messianic” Eclogue. It is however possible to demonstrate that Virgil employs such acrostics on other occasions with the object of undercutting such political panegyric. The intentionality of this cacata-acrostic is further buttressed by clues in the lines it spans as well as by winks tipped in other parts of the poem. Pointers to this acrostic are also embedded in the foregoing third Eclogue, especially in the section devoted to Pollio, dedicatee of Eclogue IV. Problematic passages in both these Eclogues are elucidated by the presence of the cacataacrostic.

• 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.

• Hoc nemus ... habitat deus (Verg. Aen. 8, 351-352). : Presence des dieux dans la campagne virgilienne: qui sont les di agrestes?

  73–82

  Charles Guittard

  Views:

  70

  In the pastoral landscapes of the Geogics (particularly in this poem’s opening invocation), in the Eclogues, and in some descriptions of the Aeneid, for example when Aeneas visits the site of Rome with Evander (Verg., A. VIII 306-368), gods are present in nature, in the wild space, in the fields ; and the Roman feels the presence of undefined divinities. The pastoral and agricultural themes include many gods of the countryside and of agricultural life; Virgil calls them agrestum praesentia numina (G. I 10). This paper will focus on such divinities as Faunus, Pan and Silvanus. Links have been established between these divinities by way of interpretatio, especially between Faunus and the Greek god Pan. Faunus is present in the religious calendar of Rome (Lupercalia); the worship of Silvanus is also well attested in the Roman world. The concept of di agrestes, well attested in Virgil’s works, helps us to define a special category of gods, living in a special area, between civilization and wild space. Some of these divinities combine human and animal features.

• „Read the edge”: Acrostics in Virgil’s Sinon Episode

  45–72

  Neil Adkin

  Views:

  174

  Virgil’s famous Sinon episode at the start of Aeneid II contains four hitherto unidentified acrostics. Examination of these particular instances sheds light on Virgil’s acrostical practice in general.