The Aeneid is a Latin epic written by Virgil in the 1st century BC that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who traveled to Italy where he became the ancestor of the Romans.
The Aeneid is an epic poem of twelve books, in conscious imitation of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. It makes use of the dactylic hexameter meter of Homer, a meter better suited to Greek but which Virgil raised to the height of its Latin form.
The hero Aeneas was already a subject of Roman legend and myth; Virgil took the disconnected tales of Aeneas' wanderings, his vague association with the foundation of Rome and a personage of no fixed characteristics other than a scrupulous piety, and fashioned this into a compelling nationalist epic that at once tied Rome to the legends of Troy, glorified traditional Roman virtues, and legitimated the Julio-Claudian dynasty as descendants of the founders, heroes, and the gods of Rome and Troy.
The Aeneid is one of a small group of writings from Latin Literature that has traditionally been required for students of Latin. Traditionally, after reading the works of Julius Caesar, Cicero, Ovid and Catullus, students would then read the Aeneid. As a result, many phrases from this poem entered the Latin language, much as passages from Shakespeare and Alexander Pope have entered the English language. One example is from Aeneas' reaction to the painting of the Sack of Troy: sunt lacrimae rerum et mentem mortalia tangunt-"the actions of mankind move us to tears and touch our heart" (Aeneid I, 462).
Virgil's poem tells the adventures of Aeneas from his escape from Troy with his son Iulus after its sack, (illustration, left) his wanderings through the Mediterranean region, and his final arrival in Italy where he becomes the ancestors of the Roman people.
The most famous episode of this work is when he is driven by a storm to the coast of Africa, where he meets Dido, queen of Carthage, a city which has only recently been founded and which will later become Rome's greatest enemy. However that lies in the far future; the Trojans are welcomed hospitably and at a banquet given in their honour, Aeneas recounts the tale of the sack of Troy and of their escape from it. During the Trojan visit, Dido and Aeneas fall in love, but the Roman gods insist he fulfill his destiny and he has to depart. Her heart broken, Dido commits suicide by burning herself on a pyre. Looking back from the deck of his ship, Aeneas sees its smoke and knows its meaning only too clearly. However Destiny calls and the Trojan fleet sails on to Italy.
They eventually land and further adventures ensue. Aeneas descends to the underworld through an opening at Cumae, where he speaks with his father Anchises and has a prophetic vision of the destiny of Rome. He marries Lavinia, the daughter of the king of the Latini, and her rejected suitor Turnus, king of the Rutuli, challenges Aeneas to a duel in which Turnus is slain.