However, he places his personal emotions aside to go complete his fate, part of which includes the marriage to Lavinia.
Of course, one of the greatest character conflicts in the play is between Turnus and Aeneas. The general assumption was that Turnus and Lavinia would wed. Not only was Turnus the most eligible of her suitors, but the queen wished for their alliance, as well:
Fir'd with her love, and with ambition led,
The neighb'ring princes court her nuptial bed.
Among the crowd, but far above the rest,
Young Turnus to the beauteous maid address'd.
Turnus, for high descent and graceful mien,
Was first, and favor'd by the Latian queen;
With him she strove to join Lavinia's hand,
But dire portents the purpos'd match withstand (Virgil).
The dire portents are, of course, what fate has decreed for Aeneas and Lavinia.
However, her father Latinus learns that the gods wish her to marry Aeneas, instead. Like Aeneas, Latinus is a pious man, and he seeks to find out what he should do with his daughter. The answer is alarming to him:
Here, for the gods' advice, Latinus flies,
Off'ring a hundred sheep for sacrifice:
Their woolly fleeces, as the rites requir'd,
He laid beneath him, and to rest retir'd.
No sooner were his eyes in slumber bound,
When, from above, a more than mortal sound
Invades his ears; and thus the vision spoke:
"Seek not, my seed, in Latian bands to yoke
Our fair Lavinia, nor the gods provoke.
A foreign son upon thy shore descends,
Whose martial fame from pole to pole extends.
His race, in arms and arts of peace renown'd,
Not Latium shall contain, nor Europe bound:
'T is theirs whate'er the sun surveys around."
These answers, in the silent night receiv'd,
The king himself divulg'd, the land believ'd:
The fame thro' all the neighb'ring nations flew,
When now the Trojan navy was in view (Virgil).
This causes a major conflict for her father. The prophecy not only specifically prohibits him from trying to marry Lavinia to Turnus, it discourages him from trying to find any Latian spouse for her. Furthermore, its lets him know that Latium will be unable to contain Aeneas if he chooses to go to war rather than permit the marriage. However, he understands the role of fate:
But pond'ring future things of wondrous weight;
Succession, empire, and his daughter's fate.
On these he mus'd within his thoughtful mind,
And then revolv'd what Faunus had divin'd.
This was the foreign prince, by fate decreed
To share his scepter, and Lavinia's bed;
This was the race...
" Finally, Lantinus seals Aeneas's fate as a future Latin by commenting on how the Trojan will bring peace. The king states, "peace is made when I behold him here." Aeneas's being welcomed with genuine warmth into Latinus's home and homeland signal a tremendous transformation in the title character of the poem. Aeneas is no longer just a Trojan, and he is no longer a Trojan without a homeland. Now
..denies her semi-divine status as the daughter of Leda and Jupiter and secures her in the patriarchal hierarchy by referring to her as daughter of Tyndareus" (Bond pp). It is his mother, Venus, who stops him, telling him that the disaster is not Helen's fault and that he has other duties and priorities, reminding him to his senses and helping him to pass his first test of placing duty before
Aeneas' detachment differ from Rama's? The French philosopher Simone Weil once wrote that, "There is no detachment where there is no pain. And there is no pain endured without hatred or lying unless detachment is present too." In the Aeneid and Ramayana a central issue is how each text's protagonist detach themselves from the consequences of their actions. The greatest juxtaposition can be seen in how the two men respond
AENEID Aeneas is said to possess spiritual or godlike qualities that make him fit his role as a hero and destined founder of Rome. Critics see this achievement as proceeding both from his destiny and his own actions. He is the son of the Trojan mortal, Anchises, and the goddess of beauty and love, Venus, and as such, enjoys special protection, while remaining mortal. His most outstanding quality is his respect and
Thematic Comparison: Divine Intervention in Homer & Virgil Both works decently portray the horrors of warfare, and (albeit it in a reverent fashion) place the blame for this horror soundly at the feet of the gods. However while in Homer this intervention is largely capricious and relatively unmotivated, in Virgil's work it takes on a more motivated and historical turn in which the gods may actually be seen as working to
Aeneas was also supposed to take with him some cattle for sacrifice, but they were to be sacrificed to the underworld gods. In the Odyssey, Odysseus is supposed to seek out Teiresias, seer of the dead, who could instruct him on how to find his way home. He was supposed to sacrifice the sheep and make a drink offering to the dead, but was not to allow them to partake
Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.
Get Started Now