Aeneas

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This article is about the Greco-Roman hero. For other uses, see Aeneas (disambiguation).
Aeneas
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    Aeneas flees burning Troy, Federico Barocci, 1598 (Galleria Borghese, Rome, Italy)

    In

    romanized: Aineíās) was a Trojan hero, the son of the Trojan prince Anchises and the Greek goddess Aphrodite (equivalent to the Roman Venus).[2] His father was a first cousin of King Priam of Troy (both being grandsons of Ilus, founder of Troy), making Aeneas a second cousin to Priam's children (such as Hector and Paris). He is a minor character in Greek mythology and is mentioned in Homer's Iliad. Aeneas receives full treatment in Roman mythology, most extensively in Virgil's Aeneid, where he is cast as an ancestor of Romulus and Remus. He became the first true hero of Rome. Snorri Sturluson identifies him with the Norse god Víðarr of the Æsir.[3]

    Etymology

    Coinage of Aenea, with portrait of Aeneas. c. 510–480 BCE.

    Aeneas is the

    Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite
    when Aphrodite gives him his name from the adjective αὶνóν (ainon, "terrible"), for the "terrible grief" (αὶνóν ἄχος) he has caused her by being born a mortal who will age and die.[a][4] It is a popular etymology for the name, apparently exploited by Homer in the Iliad.[5] Later in the Medieval period there were writers who held that, because the Aeneid was written by a philosopher, it is meant to be read philosophically.[6] As such, in the "natural order", the meaning of Aeneas' name combines Greek ennos ("dweller") with demas ("body"), which becomes ennaios or "in-dweller"—i.e. as a god inhabiting a mortal body.[7] However, there is no certainty regarding the origin of his name.

    Epithets

    In imitation of the Iliad, Virgil borrows epithets of Homer, including: Anchisiades, magnanimum, magnus, heros, and bonus. Though he borrows many, Virgil gives Aeneas two epithets of his own, in the Aeneid: pater and pius. The epithets applied by Virgil are an example of an attitude different from that of Homer, for whilst Odysseus is poikilios ("wily"), Aeneas is described as pius ("pious"), which conveys a strong moral tone. The purpose of these epithets seems to enforce the notion of Aeneas' divine hand as father and founder of the Roman race, and their use seems circumstantial: when Aeneas is praying he refers to himself as pius, and is referred to as such by the author only when the character is acting on behalf of the gods to fulfill his divine mission. Likewise, Aeneas is called pater when acting in the interest of his men.[8]

    Greek myth and epos

    Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite

    Venus and Anchises by William Blake Richmond (1889 or 1890)

    The story of the birth of Aeneas is told in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, one of the major Homeric Hymns. Aphrodite has caused Zeus the king of the Gods to fall in love with mortal women. In retaliation, Zeus decided to put a desire over her heart for the mortal Prince Anchises, who is tending his cattle among the hills near Mount Ida. When Aphrodite saw him, she was immediately smitten. She adorns herself as if for a wedding among the gods and appears before him. He is overcome by her beauty, believing that she is a goddess, but Aphrodite identifies herself as a Phrygian princess. After they make love, Aphrodite reveals her true identity to him and Anchises fears what might happen to him as a result of their liaison. Aphrodite assures him that he will be protected and tells him that she will bear him a son to be called Aeneas. However, she warns him that he must never tell anyone that he has lain with a goddess. When Aeneas is born, Aphrodite takes him to the nymphs of Mount Ida, instructing them to raise the child to age five, then take him to Anchises.[4] According to other sources, Anchises later brags about his encounter with Aphrodite, and as a result is struck in the foot with a thunderbolt by Zeus. Thereafter he is lame in that foot, so that Aeneas has to carry him from the flames of Troy.[9]

    Homer's Iliad

    Louvre
    (F 118)

    Aeneas is a minor character in the Iliad, where he is twice saved from death by the gods as if for an as-yet-unknown destiny but is an honorable warrior in his own right. Having held back from the fighting, aggrieved with Priam because in spite of his brave deeds he was not given his due share of honor, he leads an attack against Idomeneus to recover the body of his brother-in-law Alcathous at the urging of Deiphobus.[10] He is the leader of the Trojans' Dardanian allies, as well as a third cousin and principal lieutenant of Hector, son and heir of the Trojan king Priam.

    Aeneas's mother

    Pergamos for healing. Even the Sea God Poseidon, who usually favors the Greeks, comes to Aeneas's rescue after he falls under the assault of Achilles
    , noting that Aeneas, though from a junior branch of the royal family, is destined to become king of the Trojan people.

    Bruce Louden presents Aeneas as an archetype: The sole virtuous individual (or family) spared from general destruction, following the

    Bibliotheca explains that "... the Greeks [spared] him alone, on account of his piety."[12] Heinrich Schliemann wrote that it seemed "extremely probable that, at the time of Homer's visit [to the Troad], the King of Troy declared that his race was descended in a direct line from Æneas."[13]

    Other sources

    The Roman mythographer

    Dictys of Crete
    .

    Roman myth and literature

    Aeneas and Anchises

    The history of Aeneas was continued by Roman authors. One influential source was the account of Rome's founding in

    Ab Urbe Condita by Livy (probably dependent on Quintus Fabius Pictor, fl. 200 BCE), and Gnaeus Pompeius Trogus (now extant only in an epitome by Justin
    ).

    Virgil's Aeneid

    Venus as Huntress Appears to Aeneas, by Pietro da Cortona

    The

    Penates
    , the statues of the household gods of Troy, and transplanted them to Italy.

    Several attempts to find a new home failed; one such stop was on Sicily, where in Drepanum, on the island's western coast, his father, Anchises, died peacefully.

    Aeneas tells Dido about the fall of Troy, by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin

    After a brief but fierce storm sent up against the group at

    Jupiter (who was Zeus in this version) and Venus to remind Aeneas of his journey and his purpose, compelling him to leave secretly. When Dido learned of this, she uttered a curse that would forever pit Carthage against Rome, an enmity that would culminate in the Punic Wars
    . She then committed suicide by stabbing herself with the same sword she gave Aeneas when they first met.

    After the sojourn in Carthage, the Trojans returned to Sicily where Aeneas organized

    funeral games
    to honor his father, who had died a year before. The company traveled on and landed on the western coast of Italy. Aeneas descended into the underworld where he met Dido (who turned away from him to return to her husband) and his father, who showed him the future of his descendants and thus the history of Rome.

    Aeneas defeats Turnus, by Luca Giordano, 1634–1705. The genius of Aeneas is shown ascendant, looking into the light of the future, while that of Turnus is setting, shrouded in darkness

    Latinus, king of the Latins, welcomed Aeneas's army of exiled Trojans and let them reorganize their lives in Latium. His daughter Lavinia had been promised to Turnus, king of the Rutuli, but Latinus received a prophecy that Lavinia would be betrothed to one from another land – namely, Aeneas. Latinus heeded the prophecy, and Turnus consequently declared war on Aeneas at the urging of Juno, who was aligned with King Mezentius of the Etruscans and Queen Amata of the Latins. Aeneas's forces prevailed. Turnus was killed, and Virgil's account ends abruptly.

    Other sources

    the twin sons Romulus and Remus suckling off of a she-wolf

    The rest of Aeneas's biography is gleaned from other ancient sources, including Livy and Ovid's Metamorphoses. According to Livy, Aeneas was victorious, but Latinus died in the war. Aeneas founded the city of Lavinium, named after his wife. He later welcomed Dido's sister, Anna Perenna, who then committed suicide after learning of Lavinia's jealousy. After Aeneas's death, Venus asked Jupiter to make her son immortal. Jupiter agreed. The river god Numicus cleansed Aeneas of all his mortal parts and Venus anointed him with ambrosia and nectar, making him a god. Aeneas was recognized as the god Jupiter Indiges.[16] It's also been stated that Prince Aeneas is the ancestor to the founders of Rome, the twin brothers Romulus and Remus; the two orphan boys who are seen suckling from a she-wolf.[1]

    English mythology

    The Brut Chronicle tells the story of Britain's settling by Brutus of Troy, son of Aeneas. Belief in this story was once widespread, but by the time of the Renaissance had begun to fade.[17]

    Further reading

    • One surviving version of the Brut Chronicle is a late Middle Ages manuscript, known as the St Albans Chronicle.[18]

    Medieval accounts

    High King (Yfirkonungr) Priam called Troan and travels to distant lands, marries the Sybil and got a son, Tror, who, as Snorri tells, is identical to Thor. This tale resembles some episodes of the Aeneid.[20]
    Continuations of Trojan matter in the Middle Ages had their effects on the character of Aeneas as well. The 12th-century French Roman d'Enéas addresses Aeneas's sexuality. Though Virgil appears to deflect all homoeroticism onto Nisus and Euryalus, making his Aeneas a purely heterosexual character, in the Middle Ages there was at least a suspicion of homoeroticism in Aeneas. The Roman d'Enéas addresses that charge, when Queen Amata opposes Aeneas's marrying Lavinia.[21]

    Medieval interpretations of Aeneas were greatly influenced by both Virgil and other Latin sources. Specifically, the accounts by Dares and Dictys, which were reworked by the 13th-century Italian writer

    Pearl Poet and other English writers get the suggestion[22] that Aeneas's safe departure from Troy with his possessions and family was a reward for treason, for which he was chastised by Hecuba.[23] In Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (late 14th century) the Pearl Poet, like many other English writers, employed Aeneas to establish a genealogy for the foundation of Britain,[22] and explains that Aeneas was "impeached for his perfidy, proven most true" (line 4).[24]

    Family and legendary descendants

    Aeneas and the god Tiber, by Bartolomeo Pinelli

    Aeneas had an extensive family tree. His

    Brutus.[30]

    Character and appearance

    Dido and Aeneas, from a Roman fresco, Pompeian Third Style (10 BCE – 45 CE), Pompeii, Italy

    Aeneas's consistent epithet in Virgil and other Latin authors is pius, a term that connotes reverence toward the gods and familial dutifulness. There is significant scholarly debate, however, over the degree to which this epithet is genuine within the poem, and to what extent its deployment by Virgil is sarcastic.

    In the Aeneid, Aeneas is described as strong and handsome, but neither his hair colour nor complexion are described.[31] In late antiquity however sources add further physical descriptions. The De excidio Troiae of Dares Phrygius describes Aeneas as "auburn-haired, stocky, eloquent, courteous, prudent, pious, and charming. His eyes were black and twinkling".[32] There is also a brief physical description found in the 6th-century John Malalas' Chronographia: "Aeneas: short, fat, with a good chest, powerful, with a ruddy complexion, a broad face, a good nose, fair skin, bald on the forehead, a good beard, grey eyes."[33][34]

    Modern portrayals

    Literature

    Aeneas appears as a character in William Shakespeare's play Troilus and Cressida, set during the Trojan War.

    Aeneas is a major character in Christopher Marlowe's play Dido, Queen of Carthage.

    Aeneas and

    broadside ballad called "The Wandering Prince of Troy". The ballad ultimately alters Aeneas's fate from traveling on years after Dido's death to joining her as a spirit soon after her suicide.[35]

    In modern literature, Aeneas is the speaker in two poems by Allen Tate, "Aeneas at Washington" and "Aeneas at New York". He is a main character in Ursula K. Le Guin's Lavinia, a re-telling of the last six books of the Aeneid told from the point of view of Lavinia, daughter of King Latinus of Latium.

    Aeneas appears in

    Helikaon
    .

    In Rick Riordan's book series The Heroes of Olympus, Aeneas is regarded as the first Roman demigod, son of Venus rather than Aphrodite.

    Will Adams' novel City of the Lost assumes that much of the information provided by Virgil is mistaken, and that the true Aeneas and Dido did not meet and love in Carthage but in a Phoenician colony at Cyprus, on the site of the modern Famagusta. Their tale is interspersed with that of modern activists who, while striving to stop an ambitious Turkish Army general trying to stage a coup, accidentally discover the hidden ruins of Dido's palace.

    Opera, film and other media

    Lea Desandre performs an aria from Purcell's Dido and Aeneas with Les Arts Florissants in 2020

    Aeneas is a title character in

    Metastasio's immensely popular[36] opera libretto Didone abbandonata. Canadian composer James Rolfe composed his opera Aeneas and Dido (2007; to a libretto by André Alexis
    ) as a companion piece to Purcell's opera.

    Despite its many dramatic elements, Aeneas's story has generated little interest from the film industry.

    Guerra di Troia (The Trojan War). Reeves reprised the role the following year in the film The Avenger, about Aeneas's arrival in Latium
    and his conflicts with local tribes as he tries to settle his fellow Trojan refugees there.

    Giulio Brogi, portrayed as Aeneas in the 1971 Italian TV miniseries series called Eneide, which gives the whole story of the Aeneid, from Aeneas escape from to Troy, to his meeting of Dido, his arrival in Italy, and his duel with Turnus.[37]

    The most recent cinematic portrayal of Aeneas was in the film Troy, in which he appears as a youth charged by Paris to protect the Trojan refugees, and to continue the ideals of the city and its people. Paris gives Aeneas Priam's sword, in order to give legitimacy and continuity to the royal line of Troy – and lay the foundations of Roman culture. In this film, he is not a member of the royal family and does not appear to fight in the war.

    In the role-playing game

    Ventrue Clan
    .

    in the action game Warriors: Legends of Troy, Aeneas is a playable character. The game ends with him and the Aeneans fleeing Troy's destruction and, spurned by the words of a prophetess thought crazed, goes to a new country (Italy) where he will start an empire greater than Greece and Troy combined that shall rule the world for 1000 years, never to be outdone in the tale of men (the Roman Empire).

    In the 2018 TV miniseries Troy: Fall of a City, Aeneas is portrayed by Alfred Enoch.[38] He also featured as an Epic Fighter of the Dardania faction in the Total War Saga: Troy in 2020.[39]

    Depictions in art

    Scenes depicting Aeneas, especially from the Aeneid, have been the focus of study for centuries. They have been the frequent subject of art and literature since their debut in the 1st century.

    Villa Valmarana

    The artist Giovanni Battista Tiepolo was commissioned by Gaetano Valmarana in 1757 to fresco several rooms in the Villa Valmarana, the family villa situated outside Vicenza. Tiepolo decorated the palazzina with scenes from epics such as Homer's Iliad and Virgil's Aeneid.[40]

    Aeneas Introducing Cupid Dressed as Ascanius to Dido, by Tiepolo (1757).
    Venus Appearing to Aeneas on the Shores of Carthage, by Tiepolo (1757).
    Mercury Appearing to Aeneas, by Tiepolo (1757).
    Venus and Vulcan, by Tiepolo (between 1762 and 1766).

    Aeneas flees Troy

    Flight of Aeneas from Troy, by Girolamo Genga (between 1507 and 1510).
    Aeneas and his Father Fleeing Troy, by Simon Vouet (c. 1635).
    Pierre Lepautre
    (c. 1697).
    Aeneas fleeing from Troy, by Pompeo Batoni (c. 1750).

    Aeneas with Dido

    Rutilio Manetti
    (c. 1630)
    The Meeting of Dido and Aeneas, by Nathaniel Dance-Holland (1766)
    Landscape with Dido and Aeneas, by Thomas Jones (1769)
    Dido meeting Aeneas, by Johann Heinrich the Elder Tischbein (3 January 1780)

    Family tree

    See also

    Notes

    1. ^ "His name will be Aineias [Aeneas], since it was an unspeakable [ainos] akhos that took hold of me – grief that I had fallen into the bed of a mortal man." (Nagy 2001, 198–99)

    References

    1. ^ "Aeneas". Merriam-Webster. 2015. Retrieved 2015-07-14.
    2. ISBN 978-0-19-973428-3
      .
    3. ^ a b The Prose Edda of Snorri Sturlson Translated by Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur [1916] Prologue II at Internet Sacred Texts Archive. Accessed 11/14/17
    4. ^ a b Nagy, Gregory, trans. (2001) Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, edited by C. Dué Hackney. Houston: University of Houston.
    5. ^ Andrew Faulkner, The Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite: Introduction, Text, and Commentary (2008) p. 257
    6. ^ Desmond, Marilynn (1994), Reading Dido: Gender, Textuality, and Medieval Aeneid. pp. 85–86.
    7. ^ John of Salisbury, Polycraticus 8.24–25; Bernard Sylvestris of Tours, Commentum supra sex libros Eneidos Vergilii
    8. ^ Parry, Milman (1971), The Making of Homeric Verse: The Collected Papers of Milman Parry, edited by Adam Parry. p. 169
    9. ^ Virgil, Aeneid
    10. ^ Homer (2019) [1999]. The Iliad. Translated by Samuel Butler. transcribed by A. Haines – via Project Gutenberg.
    11. ^ Louden, Bruce (2006). Aeneas in the Iliad: The one just man. 102nd Annual Meeting of Classical Association of the Middle West and South (CAMWS) (abstract).
    12. Apollodorus. Frazer, James G. (ed.). Epitome. Tufts University
      . V, 21.
    13. ^ Schliemann, Heinrich (1875). Troy and Its Remains: A Narrative of Researches and Discoveries Made on the Site of Ilium, and in the Trojan Plain. London: John Murray. p. 19. Retrieved 21 March 2025.
    14. ^ Hyginus, Fabulae 115.
    15. JSTOR 3288552
      .
    16. ^ Titus Livius. The History of Rome (Rev. Canon Roberts, trans.), Vol. I, J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd., London, 1905
    17. ^ Rastell, Johannes (1529). The pastyme of people. in chepesyde at the sygne of the mearemayd next to pollys gate.
    18. ^ The St Albans Chronicle. 1400.
    19. ^ Edda Snorra Sturlusonar GUÐNI JÓNSSON bjó til prentunar. Prologus 2
    20. ^ The Prose Edda of Snorri Sturlson Translated by Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur [1916] Prologue III at Internet Sacred Texts Archive. Accessed November 14, 2017
    21. S2CID 251026783
      .
    22. ^
      ISBN 9780198114864
      .
    23. ^ Colonne, Guido delle (1936). Griffin, N. E. (ed.). Historia destructionis Troiae. Medieval Academy Books. Vol. 26. Cambridge: Medieval Academy of America. pp. 218, 234.
    24. ISBN 9780393930252. In Marie Boroff's translation, edited by Laura Howes, the treacherous knight of line 3 is identified as Antenor
      , incorrectly, as Tolkien argues.
    25. Vergil Aeneid
      7.1–4
    26. Vergil, Aeneid
      1983 1.267
    27. ^ C.F. L'Homond Selections from Viri Romae p.1
    28. ^ Romulus by Plutarch
    29. ^ Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities I.70.4
    30. ^ Charles Selby Events to be Remembered in the History of Britain pp. 1–2
    31. JSTOR 269615
      .
    32. ^ Dares Phrygius, History of the Fall of Troy 12
    33. ^ Lowden, John. Illuminated prophet books: a study of Byzantine manuscripts of the major and minor prophets Penn State Press, 1988, p. 62
    34. ^ Malalas, Chronography 5.106
    35. ^ English Broadside Ballad Archive, ballad facsimile and full text
    36. ^ William Fitzgerald "Vergil in Music" in "A Companion to Vergil's Aeneid and its Tradition" Joseph Farrell, Michael C. J. Putnam eds, p.344 : "Metastasio's Didone Abbandonata was set over eighty times in the period between 1724 and 1824"
    37. ^ "Eneide". La Repubblica (in Italian). 2022-09-23. Retrieved 2025-03-27.
    38. ^ "'Troy: Fall Of A City': Bella Dayne, Louis Hunter & More Join BBC/Netflix Epic". Deadline. March 30, 2017. Retrieved April 1, 2017.
    39. ^ "Total War Troy: Aeneas guide – bonuses, faction units, builds". Game Guides – Game Pressure.
    40. ^ Michael Collins, Elise K. Kirk ed. Opera and Vivaldi p. 150

    Sources

    Further reading

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         		Succeeded by
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