Odyssey In Book 9 Of The Aeneid

The ideal virtue in Roman culture was piety, also known as pietas. Pietas had three components: duty to your country, duty to your family, and duty to the gods. When a person followed these guidelines in Ancient Rome, they were considered to have piety. Throughout Aeneas’ journey, the three components to pietas are demonstrated by actions taken by Aeneas’ character. In the epic poem, The Aeneid, the idea of pietas is central to the epic, opposing the Greek ideal of furor, or passionate desire/senseless fury. In this essay, I will analyze the moments in the epic that demonstrate how Aeneas uses these three components of pietas, and how this epic celebrates the shift from Greek ideals to Roman ideals.

The function of prophecy manifests itself in many ways in the Aeneid. Throughout the epic, prophecies and omens act as the agents behind Aeneas fulfilling his destiny as well as providing clear social commentary on the dawn of the Roman Empire under Emperor Augustus. Even though not all of the prophecies and omens included in the epic come to pass in literary terms, Virgil’s inclusion of prophecy is of paramount importance for driving the plot forward. In this essay I will discuss the function of both internal and external prophecy and the effect these prophecies have on both the characters in the epic and the enjoyment of the reader from The Roman Empire until the present day.

Virgil has dramatically depicted the animosity between Rome and Carthage through the unfortunate and disastrously fated romance between Dido, queen and widow of Carthage and Aeneas. This is done both by vilifying Aeneas and exposing his character flaws to mutually illustrate both Aeneas’s human and Roman characteristics. This is also accomplished through the downfall of Troy, consequently, bringing his compatriots’ apprehensions and worries to the audience’s forethought. Aeneas reciprocates Dido’s affections and allows her to assume that they are a wedded couple, which as her sister Anna’s insistence that wedding Aeneas would not only have been to her benefit but to her people as well. At which point the gods then declare that Aeneas must leave Dido post haste to complete his conquest, guilting and coerces Aeneas into prompt action by means of using Aeneas’s son’s future and filial duty as the motivator.

The epic poem The Aeneid, by Vergil adapts scenes, similes, and characters from the Odyssey written by Homer. The works of both authors include the simile of Artemis/Diana. Other characters do overlap in some of Vergil's scenes for instance, Aeneas and Odysseus encounter Cyclops. Both authors also reference the scene of the underworld. Although, Virgil adapts similarities from Homer's epic, each encounter has noticeable comparisons and/or differences. Vergil presents the epic of the Aeneid with a different purpose. At the beginning of the Aeneid, Aeneas leaves his home with other Romans after the Trojan War. Homer starts his epic with Odysseus wanting to return home form Troy.  The motives that guide each character differ from one another. Homers the Odyssey is more of the journey of a man longing to be home again, after the trojan war has ended. His actions are somewhat selfish at times. Virgil's main character Aeneas is driven by more of a scene of duty to the gods, because he is instructed to help build Rome for future generations.

Aeneid can never be mentioned without the mention of the theme of conflict and violence; the theme is a centerpiece in the creation of the narrative of the epic poem. We see violence and conflict right from the start of the poem to the end. The extensive use of conflict and violence throughout the body of the poem resonates with the saying that peace and liberation can only be achieved through violence and conflict. Aeneas who was destined to become an ancestor to the Roman community had to pay a hefty price to attain the title. The price was meted to him in the form of conflict and violence he encounters throughout his

He quickly becomes comfortable in Carthage and is quite content to stay when the gods tell him he must leave because Aeneas’s destiny is not to settle in Carthage, but in Italy. Aeneas is able to leave, reluctantly, and continue with his destiny to found Rome in Italy. Even though Aeneas blunders in his travels, he is

Ovid, one of Rome’s most prominent poets is an important source that modern day classicists use to determine the values and beliefs of the Roman people.

A clearer example of Virgil's use of myth to influence Roman readers' views on situations relevant to their time, is the use of "the second half of the ‘Aeneid' as a pre-enactment of the Social War" in Italy. The Social War would still have remained fresh in many Romans' minds and so even without any outside influence, many would have probably already been hoping for peace and calm. The echo of the Social War in the battles at Latium would have only refreshed many readers' already existent desire for a life without conflict. Aeneas is eventually successful in ending his war and bringing about a temporary peace. In book six, he is shown the spirits

In the poem, Virgil says that all Romans ought to have two certain virtues: he must remain a pious Roman citizen, and he must remain loyal to the Roman race. In Virgil’s poem, he uses Aeneas as a portrayal of not only a roman hero, but also as the ideal Roman citizen.

“The Aeneid” and “The Iliad” are relatively two different epics that were written decades apart. However, they have their similarities. These are two epics with the fate of two heroes. In the epic “The Aeneid,” the readers follow the journey of a man named Aeneas who is a Trojan refugee who journeys from his homeland of Troy to find Rome for the generations of the future. “The Iliad” is a story of the Trojan War and the hero of the story Achilles. Achilles was one of the bravest soldiers of the Greek army, but he was just as vain as he was brave. Both heroes showed a great amount of heroic actions throughout their perspective epics. Aeneas kills the Latin warrior Turnus and ventures away from his burning Troy to find Rome and prepare it for the future generations to come. Achilles fights for the Greeks which eventually results in him dying a hero’s death.

Virgil was irrefutably one of the most accomplished writers of ancient Rome, as is reflected in his verse, and so it would be incorrect to categorise The Aeneid as purely propaganda commissioned by Caesar Augustus. In a time following Rome’s civil wars, Caesar Augustus had to do all he could to promote peace and the golden age his rule would bring to Rome and so Augustus commissioned Virgil, among others, to write the glory his reign would bring into verse. The Aeneid provided a rich cultural and divine background for Rome as well as a story of the city’s establishment that traced back to the times of Odysseus and Achilles, the golden age of Greece, and the legendary events of the

By the time of Augustus, the Samnites were allied of Rome and the name disappeared, to be replaced by the secutor (pursuer), the class in which Commodus compteted. The secutor usually was matched against the more nimble retiarius who was armed with a trident and a net to ensnare the opponent, and protected only by a should piece (galerus) on the left side. Fittingly, they sometimes fought against the heavily armed murmillo whose helmet had a fish-like crest. They, in turn, usually competed against the thraex who carried a scimitar (sica) and a small square shield, or hoplomachus, who fought with a small round shield, and carried a lance and short straight sword. Because of the smaller shields, both wore long greaves. Often, protective

Virgil’s presentation Aeneid has similar undertones of plots, themes, and concepts to the Iliad and the Odyssey. The two most prominent themes and concepts are fate and fulfillment. Although there are several ways to compare the three stories, the common theme of all three is fate. Fate is seen throughout the Iliad and the Odyssey several times and creates a link to the Aeneid. Within this passage it reiterates the original fated end of Aeneas. Therefore, this passage reuses and adapts the connection of fate to the other Homeric epics. The Aeneid uses themes and concepts from the previous model to show that the story is based off of them.

During the time the Aeneid was written in the 20s BCE, the first Roman emperor, Augustus, established his new regime after the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra (IBTauris.com). The change in regime influenced the Aeneid, as it both criticized and praised its government. In a time that was ridden with war and bloodshed, Augusts Caesar brought peace and control to the empire which led Virgil to celebrate his rule by alluding Aeneas to Augustus (cedarcrest.edu). According to IBTauris, The Aeneid influenced future epics, both in Latin and modern European languages, celebrating kings and emperors, or tracing legendary and historical foundations. For example, Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, a romance epic which gives poetic form to the ideology of the British Protestant state under its queen Elizabeth I, is heavily indebted to the Aeneid’s influence. As

The Aeneid, is a Roman Epic Poem written by Virgil which tells the tale of Aeneas who was the ancestor of the founders of Rome. Aeneas is thrust into a journey similar to Odysseus’s from The Odyssey, as he and his follows try to reach Italy to found Rome. Despite not always wanting to, Aeneas follows his fate and the will of the gods and is thought of as a hero for it. Since he puts the prophecy above his own self, Aeneas fulfills the moral qualities that a hero should have.