how do you explain the death of Turnus at the
> end of book 12? That was an act that could have been avoided if Aeneas had
> shown the clementia of either Caesar or Augustus, yet he did not- perhaps it
> is the battle within Aeneas to conquer himself. I have great problems
> equating Aeneas with augustus because of this last passage-
..."tune hinc spoliis indute meorum
eripiare mihi? Pallas te hoc volnere, Pallas
immolat et poenam scelerato ex sanguine sumit,"
hoc dicens ferrum adverso sub pectore condit
fervidus. ast illi solvuntur frigore membra
vitaque cum gemitu fugit indignata sub umbras.
..."[will you] [hence] [in the spoils] [clothed] [of my friends]
[be snatched] [from me]? [Pallas] [thee] [with this] [wound],
[Pallas]
[sacrifices] [and] [this penalty] [your accursed] [from] [blood]
[takes],"
[this] [saying] [his sword] [his hostile] [within] [breast]
[he hides]
[glowing]. [but] [his] [are relaxed] [with cold] [limbs]
[and his life] [with] [a groan] [fled] [indignant] [to]
[the shades].
to me the most wonderful thing about this passage, and you can tell me
if i am wrong, is that we cannot really know who dies in the last line.
we know that turnus is killed, but there is nothing in the language to
say that the subject is not aeneas. this is what it means to be a hero
for vergil...man is but a tool of history. the aeneas of book one is in
this final scene once and for all dispensed with. can't you picture
aeneas standing over turnus, his sword lately plunged in turnus' breast,
and all of the sudden...stasis. he thinks back to who he was; the aeneas
of book one could never have been so ruthless. rage. more and more of
aeneas descriptions are identical with those of turnus as the poem is
drawn towards this climactic ending, where aeneas kills turnus, but in
some way assumes the soul of turnus, offending and banishing his own.
for one final moment, the aeneas of book one is still holding on, but
seeing what he has done, hoc dicens, in a sort of profound despair,
vitaque cum genitu fugit indignata sub umbras.
this would take care of the concern that 'this could have been avoided
if aeneas' anything.... aeneas, qua aeneas, is no more. thus, as you
say, it is a 'battle to conquer himself', but significantly an unwitting
one. or rather, it is a battle for the force of history to make aeneas
conquer himself. or a battle for aeneas to hold on to his vita in the
face of such a demanding history.
now i am going to push the boundaries of possibility. you may think i
have already pushed them too far, and as i have said, this is sophomoric
presumption. i have a love for vergil's art, and i want to know what it
means, so this is what i think--whosoever in their wisdom can help me,
please do.
in some way, perhaps, aeneas not so much takes on the spirit of turnus,
but the force of history becomes him. have you noticed how more and more
aeneas is described in terms of his armor? arma virumque cano... by the
end the arms are the man. the man is the arms. or rather, the man
dissolves into the arms--he loses himself. when aeneas is fleeing troy,
he has anchises on his shoulder, and is running along side of achates,
creusa behind them. he carries the past on his shoulders, takes the
future by the hand, but leaves the present [creusa] behind. later he
tries to rescue the creusa, finds her shade, cannot embrace it. this is
what it means to be a hero, this is the cost of that kind of
immortality: you cannot embrace the present. carry the past, make
providence for the future. aeneas? aeneas who? aeneas is dead. you ARE
invincible history--all arms.
-matthewspencer
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