Ok, even if the good folks of the Straight Dope Message Board Dead Languages Society haven’t finished reading Aeneid VIII yet, I thought I would post a comment or two anyway. So uncork the claret and put on the smoking jackets, 'coz here we go!
I am hoping that this bit will sustain a few day’s worth of discussion, at least while I am gone. Please also let me know if the website, located here, is unsatisfactory.
I’d like to draw your attention to one particular episode: the Cacus story. Evander points to a cave and tells a long, meandering tale of the murder of Cacus, a dark, foul beast, by the hero Hercules. I’ll leave you to your own impressions of the literary quality of this digression.
However, I propose this: WTF is the point, as it were, of this tale? Here are some levels to be considered.
[ul]
[li]Sheer entertainment: everyone loves gory monster stories, and everyone loves Hercules.[/li][li]Aetiology: the study of beginnings, origins. By linking a Roman site with a great figure of Greek mythology, Vergil fuses the origin of Rome with a mighty and respected Greek myth, thus legitimizing Rome as a cultural superpower on par with Greece.[/li][li]Politics. Hercules is the might and law of Rome who defeats the brutal beast and establishes his rule. Rome, like Hercules, is a great pacifier.[/li][/ul]
These levels of interpretation are all pretty straightforward. Anyone may elaborate on them as he/she wishes. However…there are problems.
Consider the character of Hercules. What words are used to describe him? How does he behave? Does he kill Cacus heroically? Does he really make a good symbol for the Roman rule of law?
If not…do you really think that Vergil, essentially writing the Roman national epic, is really being subsersive?
Talk amongst yourselves! I hope there is plenty of heated argument, or at least enough to keep the fires burning until I come back!
I read it through once, and am about halfway through again. The first time was for absorption, now I’m trying to get a perspective glance at it.
I did use the translation at the Perseus site provided.
Here’s my thoughts so far…
The imagery is fairly standard to me, but I suspect that that’s because Virgil helped SET the standards for heroic imagery in our culture.
:sheer academic puffery to follow, not a cite in the lot:
Most of the later authors of heroic-type verse/literature would’ve read Virgil, and be influenced by him. Aside from the occasional outbreak of what’s come to be known as Stephen King syndrome, he tells a good story. I can see audiences hanging on to his every word…y’know, waiting for the next scroll to be published/recital to be held.
The words used to describe Hercules, “avenging”, “wrathful”, “heroic” to me, help put the proper spin on a morally ambiguous situation. Basically, this dude drops out of the sky and raises holy (pun intended) hell with Cacus, without ensuring that yep, those were his cows. No investigation. No opportunity for restitution or anything else. The language used to describe Cacus - “brutal”,“graceless” and “monster”, leave us no doubt as to what side we are supposed to be on. Early spin doctoring…wonder what Cacus’ side had to say about it.
I think it symbolized Roman law very well, both what the Romans would’ve wanted to think and it’s actuality. Romans would’ve wanted to believe that swift justice was achievable, and in clear black and white thenkyew. However, it was frequently shortsighted, and a little too drastic for my decadent modern sensibilities. I don’t remember details about Roman legal proceedings, except that bribing witnesses seemed common… :shameless hint for exposition on this subject:
I don’t think Virgil was being deliberately subversive by using this. It would’ve served the purpose of connecting the Romans with the Greeks, adding legitimacy to their claims. Some of the imagery and stories of ancient days are pretty graphic and brutal, but that is only in our eyes. Torturing a thief to death then would’ve been applauded.
In this case, in Virgil’s time, the overwhelming over-reaction to the theft of a few cows would’ve reinforced the idea of the rule of law. Even the gods enforced it. “Look, he STOLE stuff and deserved anything he got! Doesn’t matter WHY he did it, or anything else. He stole, and has gotta pay.”
How’s that? Can I still play?
I was waiting and waiting for this thread, but I must have missed it the first time around. Now I’m going to have to read book viii again.
Maeglin, I have your LINGUARUM MORTUARUM COLLEGIUM page bookmarked. It would be helpful if you could include links to the active SDMB thread (this one at the moment).
Wonderful remarks! Naturally, in order to keep the fires stoked, I will have to disagree politely.
This, of course, is true. However, Vergil uses the language very, very creatively. It is virtually impossible to convey this in a translation, so you are just going to have to take my word for it. It is really a revolutionary piece of writing, but it sounds cut and dried in English.
**:sheer academic puffery to follow, not a cite in the lot:
[/quote]
Well, I think we can all forgive you. We’re here to do some puffing, not write dissertations.
I would say so. The Aeneid has been a standard school text for the past 2000 years, though his importance has sadly dwindled lately.
Perhaps. But I would prefer to read them as purely ironic. Vergil appropriates the exact same words used to describe Agamemnon, Achilles, Odysseus, and other great heroes and slaps them on Hercules, who is pretty much a pea-brained twit. I see Vergil as a poet who is extremely sensitive to the nuance that every word conveys. I don’t think he would have labeled Hercules as heroic since he obviously isn’t if there weren’t a compelling reason.
You are absolutely right. We are supposed to be rooting for Hercules. But doesn’t rooting for him make you at least slightly uncomfortable? I mean, do you really root for the United States when we drop bombs on small countries? We may be right, but it still makes us feel uncomfortable. I cannot believe that Vergil wasn’t perfectly aware of what he was doing.
I can’t argue with your impressions of Roman law, since I don’t remember it all that well myself.
Perhaps subversive is not the correct word. But do you really believe that the Aeneid is a straightforward propaganda piece, and that Vergil is not in the least bit ambivalent about utter Roman supremacy and the imperial way of life?
Will someone please explain the significance of cow stealing to me? Why does (exaggerating, but only slightly) every epic in every culture include a cattle interlude (or in the case of the Irish sagas, consist entirely therof)? Is it just my modern sensibilities (which are apparently shared by tisiphone), or did the authors also think that cownapping is awfully petty for myth (not to mention that cows are inherently funny, as established by another recent MPSIMS thread)? Is there an accepted theory (based on, I don’t know, fertility, famine, wealth, change from nomadic society to permanent settlements) on why cattle are so important?
This is all half baked Kathryn knowledge…correct me if I’m wrong.
Cattle were currency, expencive food crop and generally status symbols.
Stealing cattle is pretty symbolic of stealing power. “Ha, ha look, you have a little herd!” It sounds pretty prankish now, but its slightly akin to someone stealing the Statue of Liberty. Its taking something that represents wealth, power, glory, and personal pride. It also makes you look stupid because someone rode onto your lands and herded off your cows, and you were too weak to stop them.
Think high school and the rival team managed to implode your stadium.
Yeah, what Medea’s Child said. About cows, that is. Overall, ancient ideas of justice could be pretty hideous. To us, anyways. They did not place quite the same value on human life as we do. Buddhists, and Jainists can just not go there, we’re not talking about you.
For modern parallels to the cow-stealing, see here.
I’m still working on my beautifully worded reply to the rest.
I believe you. I have read enough translations of different texts to be able to wish I could read them in the originals. It bugs me because it is almost impossible to accurately translate multi-level puns and ‘in’ jokes, and you miss soooo much of the flavor and nuance. Like watching a subtitled film with a bunch of native speakers of whatever language is used in the film. Everbody else is practically peeing themselves, and you’re wondering why that sentence was in any way funny. So many languages, so little time…and so few resources.
Well sure. But I think I’m going to need to read more of his work before I can comment, because I want to see how he refers to Hercules elsewhere. It could very well be a subtle commentary on the glorification of might…
However, considering the times, wasn’t Hercules seen as heroic precisely because of his feats of strength and courage? His mortality was represented by his hasty temper and penchant for booze, and he was regarded as heroic for accepting the consequences and attempting to atone. Brains weren’t a neccessary part of the equation for a hero, if one was sufficiently brave and strong.
Yes, but our morality is different. We are looking at it through lenses tinted by our own beliefs. While the situation is morally ambiguous to us, it may not have been to the ancient Romans. As I said, different values… Things we would consider atrocities now simply gained you respect, and other belligerent sorts tended to take notice and leave you alone.
Absolutely I do not believe it was a straightforward propaganda piece. This was to be The National Epic, the Roman version of the Mahabharata or Poetic Edda. What I’m wondering about now is about the cult of Hercules, and how that might have influenced Vergil’s decision to devote so much time to him. Were they a political force of any sort?
And to get a better idea on how Vergil viewed Rome, I need to finish reading the whole thing. It is hard for me to say too much more on this with just this refreshment to go on. Oh, well, okay, so I started the skimming through the Commentary links too, but I haven’t finished.
Jeez, I feel edjumacated already. My brother just walked in and asked what I was doing, so I told him.
Oooh, excellent link, tisiphone, because the article contains the startling phrase, “armed pastoralists.” Is that great for a Vergil thread, or what?
Roman justice may have been heavy-handed as far as punishments go, and there is no way I will be defending Roman imperial sensibilities or public entertainments. Nonetheless, authors like Vergil were concerned with “what is good and what makes us human.” So, if cow rustling is just a game of “my herd’s bigger than your herd,” then I think that Vergil (and other epic writers) would see this for the pettiness that it is, and that means that he is subtly ridiculing those who’s only concern in life is to play this game. I’m NOT sure that ridicule is always intended, however, which is why I still think there may be some other meaning there that I’m missing.
Now that I’ve started thinking about this, I have to add that John Ford’s westerns, also about cattle thievery, bring this theme to modern American mythology. His cattle rustlers are mostly dumb, evil and opposed to the forces of order. (I’m also singing in my head, “Oh the farmer and the cowman should be friends.” Aaack!)
Anyway, thanks for the discussion on this and please forgive the hijack, Maeglin. I have read book viii and will try to come back later to actually contribute to the thread.
I would just like to make some general remarks about what I do remember from my studies on Roman law. It is very easy to jump to the conclusion that the Romans were cruel and barbaric by reading their traditional laws, especially the [url=“http://www.humanities.ccny.cuny.edu/history/reader/romanlaw.htm”]Twelve Tables[/ur;]. The punishment for virtually ever crime is torture or death.
However, do not be misled. Though the Romans were quite legalistic on the whole, they followed the letter of their laws certainly no more than we do today. It was extremely common for a sentence of death to be, for example, commuted to a moderate fine. In order to determine the nature of justice in Roman society, it is necessary to examine not only the laws themselves but how they were implemented.
Furthermore, Roman law was essentially a self-help system. If you couldn’t drag your opponent’s ass into court by yourself, then it was not going to happen. Keep that in mind when you evaluate relative Roman savagery. In my opinion, I have found ancient justice to be extremely, extremely enlightened. It is not for nothing that virtually all of our modern case law is based, to some degree, on the Justinian Code.
Well, I don’t want to answer this question authoritatively. We could start examining texts about Hercules after this one and see for ourselves.
I believe this is inconsistent with Roman poetry as a whole. I also think that our morality, to a large degree, is not a whole lot different. Romans certainly had different mores, but that is hardly surprising. There was a greater degree of institutionalized violence in Roman society, to be sure. But beyond that, I am quite certain that they were capable of seeing the same shades of gray that we are. Vergil, in my opinion, does not glorify violence on the whole. In the Eclogues he shows with poignancy the destruction brought upon his home by violence. Not the violence of an enemy horde, but the violence perpetrated by the proscriptions.
My inclinations tell me that the cult of Hercules was extremely weak when the Aeneid was written. It was not for no reason that Augustus worked so hard to restore traditional religion in Roman life. It had fallen very, very far since the early Republic.
I think that Vergil essentially tells of the founding and rise of Rome using the story of Hercules. Rome suffered the reigns of bloody, tyrannical kings before the Republic arose. I think that V is essentially likening the reign of the kings to Hercules: strong, brutal, and generally unlikable. But you have to root for them to some degree, since they represent Rome, after all. Perhaps Hercules is Rome before the rise of law and custom.
Ok…time to vote. Who else wants to read the entire Aeneid? I’m surely up for it.
HumbleServant
Glad to have you with us! Like [n]tisiphone**, you make excellent points.
Indeed. You just hit the nail right on the head.
Hmm…so there are perhaps undercurrents of ambiguity about politicians and other public figures, who play “the game” in order to maximize their own power and importance. This is definitely a new level of interpretation to this passage.
The reason I asked about the cult of Hercules, is I read an article on the cult of the Vestals in this month’s Archaeology Today that was pretty cool. The Vestals were barely mentioned in my old Western Civ classes.
Come to think on it, taking that article into account, if the Vestals were so important to Rome, why didn’t Vergil base the founding more around them?
On Hercules the figure… I always mentally compared him to Chu Chulainn, Beowulf, and other tragically flawed heroic figures that don’t come immediately to mind. Chu Chulainn also had a temper problem IIRC - that’s what got him his position as the ‘Hound of Culann’, and he wasn’t terribly bright either. Beowulf didn’t demonstrate a lot of intelligence (though more than his supporting cast), his big deal was strength, stubbornness, compassion, and generosity. Again, IIRC.
Jason and Theseus seemed to rely on women to provide their brains. Without Medea or Ariadne(?) they would’ve been screwed…IMHO, of course.
MMMMyeah, okay. I’ll agree. A person of Vergil’s education and sophistication wouldn’t have missed that, and been quite capable of using the concept to underscore his uneasiness with Roman policy. It could even be a comment on the tendancy of some men to seek quick, glorious and violent solutions to issues that actually require thought, planning, and empathy.
Sorry again for the cow stuff–here is an attempt to actually contribute to the thread.
Let’s talk about gods. In this very short book, Vergil mentions at least 12 (quick skim count) gods, not to mention “a god we know not.” Some of them in my translation are given Roman names (Juno) while some of them keep their Greek names (Jove). After the discussion of Hercules above, I on this read noted the contrast between Juno (Aeneas’ special sacrifice of the white sow–not bull–is made to her) and Hercules (whose worshippers wear ritual animal skins and offer animal entrails and flowing blood–rather barbaric, huh?). Also, note that Cacus was Vulcan’s son, but Venus prevails upon Vulcan to help Aeneas (who is aligned with the Evander who worships Hercules, who killed Cacus). I don’t for a minute believe that Vergil believed in the actual personified existence of all of these gods with overlapping powers and inconsistent levels of interest in human affairs. On the other hand, he does not reject the gods outright (insulting Menzentius as a contemnor of the gods). So what do the gods do for Vergil in this book? Does he think it is impossible to do a narrative of the origins of any culture without providing gods? Are they necessary to give Rome a mandate for rule? Are they merely symbolic of the fate which gave the area long periods of chaos and change before Aeneus? Usually, I agree with Maeglin that authors like Vergil are not different than us (human concerns have NOT changed just because time has passed), but our lesser familiarity with the symbolism attributable to each of the myriad of gods referenced may well cause us problems here–we may have learned about the Greek and Roman gods, but we don’t instantaneously and easily recognize all of the references Vergil may have had in mind.
At about the 27th line of book viii, we have what I think is one of the most lovely (in translation at least) descriptions of human intelligence I have ever seen (paraphrasing): “Aeneus’ quick mind moved from facet to facet of the problem, glancing like a flicker of light on a bowl of water and dancing on the roof.” I love that.
Does anyone know what type/breed of cow was typical in Vergil’s time? I want to properly imagine Hercules waling on Cacus as the 8 cows (which look like what?) stand by chewing their cud, plaintively mooing and generally being really stupid. ::insert further apologies for my cow fixation here:)::
Those are pics of two of the oldest Italian cattle breeds. No luck finding a pic of the Greek Shorthorns. These are probably pretty close, though.
And I would say that morality has too changed. It is no longer acceptable in our society to expose excess infants, it is (apparently) no longer acceptable to wear fur, and the death penalty for anything, up to and including serial murder, seems to be losing favor with the public. We also find slavery to be morally reprehensible, and to the Romans, it was a fact of daily life.
I will be back to the OP in a day or so, things are kinda busy for the thoughtful, well-researched and supported post I have in mind. When I remember what it was…
First, the presence of the divine is absolutely essential in the genre of epic. Vergil was extremely conscious of the ancient ideas of genre: his work blends epic dignity, scope, and themes with Alexandrian precision and magnificence of language. You simply do not write an epic without the pantheon of gods.
Furthermore, a crucial aspect of Augustus’ moral program was the revitalization of traditional Roman religion. A divine presence in the Roman national epic creates continuity between contemporary Rome and its murky past. While this is not exactly a mandate, as it were, it does add to an aura of legitimacy.
Your last point is for me the most interesting. I have done some research into the ancient ideas of fate and fortune, usually called tyche in Greek. To make a long story short, I believe that the gods considered as fortune also creates continuity with contemporary Rome. Rome in 19 BC had undergone vast social and political changes of a nearly unparalleled degree. If anything, Vergil creates something of a past history roughly based on contemporary change and weaves it into a grand social myth. It’s almost as if he were saying: “Hey, don’t worry about all the change and chaos that is happening now. It’s all happened before, part of the usual ebb and flow of the world.”
If anything, the gods are personification of the different aspects of fortune.
That’s what erudition’s all about. If you are confused by a reference, call up Homer on the Perseus Site and do a word search. You never know what might come up.
Glad you noticed it. It’s one of my favorite metaphors in the entire Latin language.
As for your cow query, tisiphone dealt with it in true Doper fashion.
Of course. No one will argue with that. I just believe that there is more continuity than discontinuity.
A practice which Republican Romans considered extremely barbaric.
…because there are alternatives. Romans didn’t have Gore-Tex.
This might be true. Yet the rate of executions in the USA is rising.
We came upon this great revelation barely more than 100 years ago. I wouldn’t say this distances us tremendously from the Romans.
tisiphone!!! You got me cow pix!!! What a beautiful gesture–may your posts never kill another thread and may all of your OPs generate at least 20 replies. Now I can imagine properly.
I agree that slavery is one of the most difficult ancient world issues–why aren’t there voices condemning it? With all the excellent, thoughtful writers to choose from, the only anti-slavery texts I can recall are those lamenting slavery from a slave’s perspective (I’m thinking of the Babylonian exile in the Bible). Since slavery often resulted from defeat in war, it was not limited by class or race (as it unhappily was in the US), and the fact that it could ensnare anyone by chance should, it seems to me, have made it an obvious candidate for introspection and criticism. Anyone know what the first recorded principled attack on slavery was?
Hey, Maeglin, you expect erudition from someone who only bats .500 on spelling Aeneas’ name? ::banging head on keyboard::
My brother just walked in and asked what I was doing, so I told him.