# The Aeneid, Book 3: The Wanderings: False Starts, Misread Signs, and a Father's Death

Aeneis · Publius Vergilius Maro · The Wanderings

The Trojans wander: Thrace, Delos, Crete, the Harpies, Buthrotum and the Cyclops' shore. Anchises dies in Sicily.

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/aeneid/3. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/aeneid/3.json. Audio: https://audio.1732studios.com/aeneid/<line id>.m4a.

**1** Postquam res Asiae Priamique evertere gentem  
After it pleased the powers above to overturn the state of Asia and Priam's

**2** immeritam visum Superis, ceciditque superbum  
undeserving race, and proud Ilium fell,

**3** Ilium, et omnis humo fumat Neptunia Troia,  
and all Neptune's Troy lies smoking on the ground,

**4** diversa exsilia et desertas quaerere terras  
to seek out scattered places of exile and lands empty of men

**5** auguriis agimur divom, classemque sub ipsa  
we are driven by the auguries of the gods; and a fleet, under

**6** Antandro et Phrygiae molimur montibus Idae,  
Antandros itself and the mountains of Phrygian Ida, we labor to build,

**7** incerti, quo fata ferant, ubi sistere detur,  
not knowing where the fates are carrying us, where we may be allowed to stop,

**8** contrahimusque viros. Vix prima inceperat aestas,  
and we gather our men. Summer had barely begun,

**9** et pater Anchises dare fatis vela iubebat;  
and father Anchises was ordering us to give our sails to the fates;
> Fatis stands in for the winds: The normal idiom is dare vela ventis, 'to give sails to the winds'. Here fatis, 'to the fates', fills the slot the winds usually take. Anchises orders the sails given over to fate rather than to weather.

**10** litora cum patriae lacrimans portusque relinquo  
when weeping I leave behind the shores of my country, its harbors,

**11** et campos, ubi Troia fuit: feror exsul in altum  
and the plains where Troy once stood: an exile, I am borne out to the deep

**12** cum sociis natoque Penatibus et magnis dis.  
with my comrades, my son, my household gods, and the great gods.

**13** Terra procul vastis colitur Mavortia campis,  
Far off a land of Mars is worked, its plains running wide,

**14** Thraces arant, acri quondam regnata Lycurgo,  
Thracians plow it, once under the rule of harsh Lycurgus,

**15** hospitium antiquum Troiae sociique Penates,  
an old guest-friend of Troy, its household gods in league with ours,

**16** dum Fortuna fuit. Feror huc, et litore curvo  
while Fortune lasted. Here I am carried, and on a curving shore

**17** moenia prima loco, fatis ingressus iniquis,  
I lay out my first walls, having entered on them under unkind fates,

**18** Aeneadasque meo nomen de nomine fingo.  
and out of my own name I shape the name Aeneadae.
> A place name coined here: Aeneadae elsewhere in the poem means 'the followers of Aeneas'. Here Aeneas uses it to name his new settlement, coining a place name from his own name. We keep the Latin form, Aeneadae, for the city he names after himself.

**19** Sacra Dionaeae matri divisque ferebam  
I was bringing offerings to my mother, the child of Dione, and to the gods

**20** auspicibus coeptorum operum, superoque nitentem  
who favor a work begun; and to the high king of the sky-dwellers

**21** caelicolum regi mactabam in litore taurum.  
I was cutting down a glossy bull on the shore.

**22** Forte fuit iuxta tumulus, quo cornea summo  
There happened to be a mound nearby, and on the crown of it cornel

**23** virgulta et densis hastilibus horrida myrtus.  
thickets and a myrtle bristling with close-set shafts.

**24** Accessi, viridemque ab humo convellere silvam  
I came up, and as I tried to wrench the green growth out of the ground,

**25** conatus, ramis tegerem ut frondentibus aras,  
meaning to roof the altars over with leafy boughs,

**26** horrendum et dictu video mirabile monstrum.  
I see a thing dreadful and strange even to say.

**27** Nam, quae prima solo ruptis radicibus arbos  
For the first sapling that comes up from the soil, its roots torn,
> A pronoun answers the clause: The sentence opens with a relative clause, quae prima arbos vellitur, 'the tree first torn up', before naming its subject. Latin supplies huic, a dative pronoun, for the main clause to hang on. English must pull the tree out of the clause to read smoothly.

**28** vellitur, huic atro liquuntur sanguine guttae,  
drips at the break with black blood

**29** et terram tabo maculant. Mihi frigidus horror  
and fouls the earth with gore. An icy shuddering shakes

**30** membra quatit, gelidusque coit formidine sanguis.  
my limbs, and my blood clots cold with terror.

**31** Rursus et alterius lentum convellere vimen  
Again I go on to wrench out the tough shoot of a second,

**32** insequor, et causas penitus temptare latentis:  
to probe deep after the causes hiding there:

**33** ater et alterius sequitur de cortice sanguis.  
and from the bark of the second too a black blood follows.

**34** Multa movens animo nymphas venerabar agrestis  
Turning much over in my mind I prayed to the country nymphs

**35** Gradivumque patrem, Geticis qui praesidet arvis,  
and to father Gradivus, who guards the Getic fields,

**36** rite secundarent visus omenque levarent.  
to bless the sight with the proper rite and lighten the omen.

**37** Tertia sed postquam maiore hastilia nisu  
But after I go at a third set of shafts with a greater effort,

**38** adgredior, genibusque adversae obluctor harenae—  
wrestling on my knees against the sand that resists me,

**39** eloquar, an sileam?—gemitus lacrimabilis imo  
(am I to speak, or say nothing?) a groan that brings tears is heard
> Two subjunctives ask what to do: Both verbs are present subjunctive, asking not what will happen but what the speaker should do: 'am I to speak, or to stay silent?'. Aeneas breaks off his own narration to ask whether he can go on with it.

**40** auditur tumulo, et vox reddita fertur ad auris:  
from deep in the mound, and a voice comes back to my ears:

**41** “Quid miserum, Aenea, laceras? Iam parce sepulto;  
“Why do you tear at a wretched man, Aeneas? Spare me now, I am buried;

**42** parce pias scelerare manus. Non me tibi Troia  
spare dutiful hands the crime. Troy did not bear me
> Pius applied to Aeneas's hands: pias is the feminine accusative plural of pius, 'dutiful', agreeing with manus, 'hands'. Polydorus asks Aeneas to spare his own dutiful hands the crime of tearing further at the mound.

**43** externum tulit, aut cruor hic de stipite manat.  
a stranger to you, nor does this gore run out of a stock of wood.

**44** Heu, fuge crudelis terras, fuge litus avarum:  
Ah, get away from a cruel country, get away from a greedy shore:

**45** nam Polydorus ego; hic confixum ferrea texit  
for I am Polydorus; here an iron crop of weapons pinned me down

**46** telorum seges et iaculis increvit acutis.”  
and covered me, and grew over me in sharp javelins.”
> A field of iron spears: seges means a field of standing grain. Vergil calls the mass of spears buried in Polydorus's body a seges, a crop, with the sharp javelins, iaculis acutis, as its stalks.

**47** Tum vero ancipiti mentem formidine pressus  
Then indeed, my mind pressed by a dread that cut both ways,

**48** obstipui, steteruntque comae et vox faucibus haesit.  
I froze; my hair stood up, and my voice stuck in my throat.

**49** Hunc Polydorum auri quondam cum pondere magno  
This Polydorus, once, with a great weight of gold,

**50** infelix Priamus furtim mandarat alendum  
unlucky Priam had sent in secret to be brought up

**51** Threicio regi, cum iam diffideret armis  
by the king of Thrace, when he had lost faith in the arms

**52** Dardaniae, cingique urbem obsidione videret.  
of Dardania and saw his city ringed by siege.

**53** Ille, ut opes fractae Teucrum, et Fortuna recessit,  
That man, when the Teucrians' power was broken and Fortune drew back,

**54** res Agamemnonias victriciaque arma secutus,  
took up Agamemnon's cause and the arms that were winning,

**55** fas omne abrumpit; Polydorum obtruncat, et auro  
and burst every bond of right: he cuts Polydorus down and seizes the gold

**56** vi potitur. Quid non mortalia pectora cogis,  
by force. To what do you not drive the hearts of men,

**57** auri sacra fames? Postquam pavor ossa reliquit,  
accursed hunger for gold? When the shaking had left my bones,
> Sacer can mean accursed: sacer usually means consecrated, set apart for a god. A thing set apart from ordinary use can also be cursed, and that older sense fits here: auri sacra fames, 'accursed hunger for gold'.

**58** delectos populi ad proceres primumque parentem  
to the chosen chiefs of the people, and to my father first,

**59** monstra deum refero, et quae sit sententia posco.  
I report the gods' portents, and I ask what their judgment is.

**60** Omnibus idem animus, scelerata excedere terra,  
All are of one mind: to get clear of a criminal land,

**61** linqui pollutum hospitium, et dare classibus austros.  
to leave a guest-welcome defiled, and to give the fleet the south winds.

**62** Ergo instauramus Polydoro funus, et ingens  
So we hold Polydorus' funeral over again, and a great

**63** aggeritur tumulo tellus; stant Manibus arae,  
weight of earth is heaped on the mound; altars stand for the Shades,

**64** caeruleis maestae vittis atraque cupresso,  
made mournful with dark blue fillets and black cypress,

**65** et circum Iliades crinem de more solutae;  
and the women of Ilium about them, hair loosed after the custom;

**66** inferimus tepido spumantia cymbia lacte  
we bring bowls foaming with warm milk

**67** sanguinis et sacri pateras, animamque sepulchro  
and dishes of hallowed blood, and we lay the soul to rest

**68** condimus, et magna supremum voce ciemus.  
in the grave, and call to him a last time with a great cry.

**69** Inde, ubi prima fides pelago, placataque venti  
Then, when the sea can first be trusted, and the winds

**70** dant maria et lenis crepitans vocat Auster in altum,  
give quiet water, and a soft rustling South Wind calls us to the deep,

**71** deducunt socii navis et litora complent:  
my comrades haul the ships down and fill the shores:

**72** provehimur portu, terraeque urbesque recedunt.  
we are carried out of harbor, and the lands and the cities draw back.

**73** Sacra mari colitur medio gratissima tellus  
A holy land, most welcome, lies out in mid-sea,

**74** Nereidum matri et Neptuno Aegaeo,  
dear to the mother of the Nereids and to Aegean Neptune,

**75** quam pius arquitenens oras et litora circum  
which the dutiful bearer of the bow, as it drifted around coasts
> Apollo called pius here: arquitenens, 'bow-bearer', names Apollo; pius, 'dutiful', is the same adjective the poem elsewhere gives Aeneas. Apollo anchored the floating island of Delos, Ortygia, because his mother, Latona, gave birth to him there.

**76** errantem Mycono e celsa Gyaroque revinxit,  
and shores, bound fast to lofty Myconos and to Gyaros,

**77** immotamque coli dedit et contemnere ventos.  
and granted it to be lived on unmoved, and to hold the winds in contempt.

**78** Huc feror; haec fessos tuto placidissima portu  
Here I am carried; most peaceful, it takes us in worn out

**79** accipit: egressi veneramur Apollinis urbem.  
in a safe harbor: we land, and pay reverence to Apollo's city.

**80** Rex Anius, rex idem hominum Phoebique sacerdos  
King Anius, king of the people and priest of Phoebus at once,

**81** vittis et sacra redimitus tempora lauro,  
his temples bound with fillets and with the sacred bay,

**82** occurrit; veterem Anchisen adgnovit amicum.  
runs to meet us; he knew Anchises for an old friend.

**83** Iungimus hospitio dextras, et tecta subimus.  
We join right hands in guest-friendship, and go in under his roof.

**84** Templa dei saxo venerabar structa vetusto:  
I was making my prayer at the god's temple, built of old stone:

**85** “Da propriam, Thymbraee, domum; da moenia fessis  
“Give us a home of our own, god of Thymbra; give walls to the weary,

**86** et genus et mansuram urbem; serva altera Troiae  
and a line, and a city that will stand; keep safe a second Pergamum

**87** Pergama, reliquias Danaum atque immitis Achilli.  
of Troy, the leavings of the Danaans and of merciless Achilles.

**88** Quem sequimur? Quove ire iubes? Ubi ponere sedes?  
Whom do we follow? Where do you bid us go? Where set our seat?

**89** Da, pater, augurium, atque animis inlabere nostris.”  
Give a sign, father, and come gliding into our hearts.”

**90** Vix ea fatus eram: tremere omnia visa repente,  
I had barely said it: all at once everything seemed to shake,

**91** liminaque laurusque dei, totusque moveri  
the god's doorway and his bay tree, and the whole mountain

**92** mons circum, et mugire adytis cortina reclusis.  
around us to move, and the cauldron to bellow as the shrine came open.

**93** Submissi petimus terram, et vox fertur ad auris:  
We sink down and take the ground, and a voice reaches our ears:

**94** “Dardanidae duri, quae vos a stirpe parentum  
“Hardy sons of Dardanus, the land that first bore you

**95** prima tulit tellus, eadem vos ubere laeto  
from your fathers' stock, that same land will welcome you back

**96** accipiet reduces. Antiquam exquirite matrem:  
to a glad breast. Search out your ancient mother.

**97** hic domus Aeneae cunctis dominabitur oris,  
Here the house of Aeneas will be lord over every coast,

**98** et nati natorum, et qui nascentur ab illis.”  
and his children's children, and those who shall be born from them.”

**99** Haec Phoebus; mixtoque ingens exorta tumultu  
So Phoebus; and a huge gladness broke out, mixed

**100** laetitia, et cuncti quae sint ea moenia quaerunt,  
with an uproar, and every man asks what those walls are,

**101** quo Phoebus vocet errantis iubeatque reverti?  
where Phoebus is calling the wanderers and bidding them go back.
> Reported speech turns direct: The sentence begins as indirect speech, with the subjunctive vocet after a verb of asking, then closes with a question mark as though the words were spoken aloud. Latin lets the reported question end like a direct one.

**102** Tum genitor, veterum volvens monumenta virorum,  
Then my father, turning over the records of men long dead,

**103** “Audite, O proceres” ait “et spes discite vestras:  
“Hear me, chiefs,” he says, “and learn what you may hope for.

**104** Creta Iovis magni medio iacet insula ponto;  
Crete, the island of great Jove, lies in the middle of the sea;

**105** mons Idaeus ubi, et gentis cunabula nostrae.  
Mount Ida is there, and the cradle of our race.

**106** Centum urbes habitant magnas, uberrima regna;  
They live in a hundred great cities, the richest of kingdoms;

**107** maximus unde pater, si rite audita recordor,  
from there our chief forefather, if I remember the story rightly,

**108** Teucrus Rhoeteas primum est advectus in oras,  
Teucer, first sailed to the shores of Rhoeteum

**109** optavitque locum regno. Nondum Ilium et arces  
and chose the site for his kingdom. Ilium and the towers

**110** Pergameae steterant; habitabant vallibus imis.  
of Pergamum did not yet stand; they lived down in the valleys.

**111** hinc mater cultrix Cybeli Corybantiaque aera  
From there the Mother who keeps Cybelus, and the Corybants' bronze,

**112** Idaeumque nemus; hinc fida silentia sacris,  
and the grove of Ida; from there the trusted silence of her rites,

**113** et iuncti currum dominae subiere leones.  
and the lions that went yoked under our lady's car.

**114** Ergo agite, et, divom ducunt qua iussa, sequamur;  
Come then, and let us follow where the gods' orders lead;

**115** placemus ventos et Gnosia regna petamus.  
let us appease the winds and make for the realm of Cnossus.

**116** Nec longo distant cursu; modo Iuppiter adsit,  
It is no long run off; only let Jupiter stand by us,

**117** tertia lux classem Cretaeis sistet in oris.”  
and the third dawn will set our fleet on the shores of Crete.”

**118** Sic fatus, meritos aris mactavit honores,  
So he spoke, and killed at the altars the honors that were owed:

**119** taurum Neptuno, taurum tibi, pulcher Apollo  
a bull to Neptune, a bull to you, beautiful Apollo,
> Narration turns to address the god: For half a line the third-person narration shifts into direct address, pulcher Apollo, 'beautiful Apollo', before returning to report. Vergil uses this shift, called apostrophe, only where a debt is owed, here a promised bull.

**120** nigram Hiemi pecudem, Zephyris felicibus albam.  
a black beast to Storm, a white one to the West Winds that bring luck.

**121** Fama volat pulsum regnis cessisse paternis  
Rumor flies that a prince has been driven out and has given up his father's

**122** Idomenea ducem, desertaque litora Cretae  
kingdom, Idomeneus; that the shores of Crete lie deserted,

**123** hoste vacare domos, sedesque adstare relictas.  
the houses empty of any enemy, the abandoned seats standing ready.

**124** Linquimus Ortygiae portus, pelagoque volamus,  
We leave the harbors of Ortygia and fly out over the open water,

**125** bacchatamque iugis Naxon viridemque Donysam,  
past Naxos, its ridges wild with Bacchus, and green Donysa,

**126** Olearon, niveamque Paron, sparsasque per aequor  
Olearos, and Paros white as snow, and the Cyclades strewn

**127** Cycladas, et crebris legimus freta consita terris.  
across the sea, and we thread straits thick-sown with land.
> Straits described as planted: consita is the passive participle of conserere, 'to sow' or 'to plant'. Vergil applies it to freta, 'straits', in the phrase freta consita terris, 'straits sown thick with lands', naming the many islands of the Cyclades.

**128** Nauticus exoritur vario certamine clamor;  
A sailors' shouting goes up in a scramble of rivalry;

**129** hortantur socii: “Cretam proavosque petamus!”  
my comrades urge each other on: “For Crete, and our forefathers!”

**130** Prosequitur surgens a puppi ventus euntis  
A wind rising astern follows us as we go,

**131** et tandem antiquis Curetum adlabimur oris.  
and at last we glide in to the ancient coast of the Curetes.

**132** Ergo avidus muros optatae molior urbis,  
So, in my eagerness, I labor at the walls of the city I had wanted,

**133** Pergameamque voco, et laetam cognomine gentem  
and I call it Pergamea, and urge a people glad of the name

**134** hortor amare focos arcemque attollere tectis.  
to love their hearths and lift a citadel of roofs.

**135** Iamque fere sicco subductae litore puppes;  
By now the ships were nearly all hauled up on the dry shore;

**136** conubiis arvisque novis operata iuventus;  
the young men were taken up with new marriages and new fields;

**137** iura domosque dabam: subito cum tabida membris,  
I was giving them law and houses: when suddenly, wasting the body,

**138** corrupto caeli tractu, miserandaque venit  
the whole tract of sky gone foul, there came a pitiable

**139** arboribusque satisque lues et letifer annus.  
blight upon the trees and the sown crops, and a season that carried death.

**140** Linquebant dulcis animas, aut aegra trahebant  
Men were letting go of the sweet breath of life, or dragging their sick

**141** corpora; tum sterilis exurere Sirius agros;  
bodies about; then Sirius went on burning the fields to barrenness;
> A bare infinitive for past action: exurere is a plain infinitive standing where a finite past tense would normally go: 'then Sirius to burn the fields'. This historic infinitive has no tense of its own; the surrounding narrative supplies the past time, and it marks a stretch of continuous action.

**142** arebant herbae, et victum seges aegra negabat.  
the grass dried out, and a diseased crop refused us food.

**143** Rursus ad oraclum Ortygiae Phoebumque remenso  
Back to the oracle of Ortygia, and to Phoebus, remeasuring

**144** hortatur pater ire mari, veniamque precari:  
the sea, my father urges me to go, and to beg for pardon:

**145** quam fessis finem rebus ferat; unde laborum  
what end he brings to our worn-out fortunes; where he tells us

**146** temptare auxilium iubeat; quo vertere cursus.  
to look for help in our labors; where to turn our course.

**147** Nox erat, et terris animalia somnus habebat:  
It was night, and over the earth sleep held all living things:

**148** effigies sacrae divom Phrygiique Penates,  
the sacred images of the gods, the Phrygian household gods,

**149** quos mecum a Troia mediisque ex ignibus urbis  
which I had carried out with me from Troy and from the middle

**150** extuleram, visi ante oculos adstare iacentis  
of the city's fires, seemed to stand before my eyes as I lay

**151** in somnis, multo manifesti lumine, qua se  
asleep, plain in a flood of light, on the side where the full

**152** plena per insertas fundebat luna fenestras;  
moon was pouring itself through the fitted windows;

**153** tum sic adfari et curas his demere dictis:  
and then they spoke, and took my cares away with these words:

**154** “Quod tibi delato Ortygiam dicturus Apollo est,  
“What Apollo would tell you if you were carried to Ortygia,

**155** hic canit, et tua nos en ultro ad limina mittit.  
he sings here; and see, he sends us to your own door unasked.

**156** Nos te, Dardania incensa, tuaque arma secuti,  
We followed you and your arms when Dardania burned,

**157** nos tumidum sub te permensi classibus aequor,  
we measured the swelling sea beneath you in your ships,

**158** idem venturos tollemus in astra nepotes,  
and we, the same, will raise your descendants to come up to the stars

**159** imperiumque urbi dabimus: tu moenia magnis  
and give empire to your city. Build great walls for the great,
> Two forms of magnus paired: magnis and magna are two case forms of the same adjective, magnus, 'great', one describing the walls and one the people, set across the line break. Latin can place them next to each other with nothing between; English must separate them.

**160** magna para, longumque fugae ne linque laborem.  
and do not lay down the long labor of your flight.

**161** Mutandae sedes: non haec tibi litora suasit  
Your home must be changed. It was not these shores the Delian
> Gerundive states an obligation: Mutandae is a gerundive, a verbal adjective, agreeing with sedes, 'home', and carrying the sense of 'must be': 'a home to be changed'. There is no finite verb in the sentence; the obligation is stated in the adjective alone.

**162** Delius, aut Cretae iussit considere Apollo.  
pressed on you, nor did Apollo order you to settle on Crete.

**163** Est locus, Hesperiam Grai cognomine dicunt,  
There is a place the Greeks call Hesperia by name,

**164** terra antiqua, potens armis atque ubere glaebae;  
an ancient land, strong in arms and in the richness of its soil;

**165** Oenotri coluere viri; nunc fama minores  
Oenotrian men worked it; now the report is that their descendants

**166** Italiam dixisse ducis de nomine gentem:  
have called the nation Italy, after the name of a leader.

**167** hae nobis propriae sedes; hinc Dardanus ortus,  
That is our own home. From there Dardanus rose,

**168** Iasiusque pater, genus a quo principe nostrum.  
and father Iasius, the founder our line comes from.

**169** Surge age, et haec laetus longaevo dicta parenti  
Get up, then, and gladly carry these words to your aged father,

**170** haud dubitanda refer: Corythum terrasque requirat  
with nothing in them to doubt: let him look for Corythus and the lands

**171** Ausonias; Dictaea negat tibi Iuppiter arva.”  
of Ausonia. Jupiter refuses you the fields of Dicte.”

**172** Talibus attonitus visis et voce deorum—  
Thunderstruck by such sights and by the voice of gods,

**173** nec sopor illud erat, sed coram adgnoscere voltus  
and that was no drowse: I seemed to know their faces there in front of me,

**174** velatasque comas praesentiaque ora videbar;  
their veiled hair, their features present in the room;

**175** tum gelidus toto manabat corpore sudor  
and then a cold sweat came out over my whole body,

**176** corripio e stratis corpus, tendoque supinas  
I snatch my body off the bedding, and I stretch upturned

**177** ad caelum cum voce manus, et munera libo  
hands to heaven with a cry, and pour unmixed offerings

**178** intemerata focis. Perfecto laetus honore  
on the hearth. The rite finished, glad of it, I make

**179** Anchisen facio certum, remque ordine pando.  
Anchises certain of the thing, and lay the matter out in order.

**180** Adgnovit prolem ambiguam geminosque parentes,  
He knew the doubled descent, the two ancestors,
> A lineage called doubtful: ambiguam, 'doubtful' or 'double', describes prolem, 'the descent', tracing to two ancestors, geminos parentes, on either side of the family. The Trojan line ran to Teucer of Crete on one side and Dardanus of Italy on the other, and Anchises had followed the wrong one.

**181** seque novo veterum deceptum errore locorum.  
and that a new mistake about old places had taken him in.

**182** Tum memorat: “Nate, Iliacis exercite fatis,  
Then he says: “Son, worked over by the fates of Ilium,

**183** sola mihi talis casus Cassandra canebat.  
Cassandra alone used to sing me such turns as this.

**184** Nunc repeto haec generi portendere debita nostro,  
Now I recall that she foretold these things as owed to our line,

**185** et saepe Hesperiam, saepe Itala regna vocare.  
and often called out Hesperia, often the Italian kingdoms.

**186** Sed quis ad Hesperiae venturos litora Teucros  
But who would have believed that Teucrians would come to Hesperia's

**187** crederet, aut quem tum vates Cassandra moveret?  
shores, or whom in those days would the prophetess Cassandra move?

**188** Cedamus Phoebo, et moniti meliora sequamur.”  
Let us give way to Phoebus, and take the warning and follow the better road.”

**189** Sic ait, et cuncti dicto paremus ovantes.  
So he speaks, and we all obey his word, cheering.

**190** Hanc quoque deserimus sedem, paucisque relictis  
This settlement too we abandon, and leaving a few behind

**191** vela damus, vastumque cava trabe currimus aequor.  
we give sail, and run the vast level in a hollow beam of wood.
> The ship named by its wood: trabe, 'beam' or 'log', names the ship by the single piece of timber it is built from, cava, 'hollow'. Vergil uses this old, plain figure for a ship throughout the poem.

**192** Postquam altum tenuere rates, nec iam amplius ullae  
After the ships had the deep, and no land

**193** adparent terrae, caelum undique et undique pontus,  
showed any longer, sky on every side, on every side sea,
> Undique repeated around the line: undique, 'on every side', appears twice, once for caelum, 'sky', and once for pontus, 'sea', with the adverb effectively in the middle of the pair. There is no verb in the clause; sky and sea alone fill it.

**194** tum mihi caeruleus supra caput adstitit imber,  
then a blue-black rain-cloud took its stand above my head,

**195** noctem hiememque ferens, et inhorruit unda tenebris.  
carrying night and storm, and the water shuddered into dark.

**196** Continuo venti volvunt mare, magnaque surgunt  
At once the winds roll the sea over, and great swells

**197** aequora; dispersi iactamur gurgite vasto;  
rise; scattered, we are flung about on a huge whirl of water;

**198** involvere diem nimbi, et nox umida caelum  
storm clouds wrapped the daylight away, and a wet night took

**199** abstulit; ingeminant abruptis nubibus ignes.  
the sky from us; the fires double as the clouds break open.

**200** Excutimur cursu, et caecis erramus in undis.  
We are shaken off our course, and wander in waves we cannot see.

**201** Ipse diem noctemque negat discernere caelo,  
Palinurus himself says he cannot tell day from night in that sky,

**202** nec meminisse viae media Palinurus in unda.  
nor remember the way, out in the middle of the water.

**203** Tris adeo incertos caeca caligine soles  
For three whole suns, in a blind fog,

**204** erramus pelago, totidem sine sidere noctes.  
we wander at sea, and as many nights without a star.

**205** Quarto terra die primum se attollere tandem  
On the fourth day land at last seemed for the first time to lift,

**206** visa, aperire procul montis, ac volvere fumum.  
to open mountains far off, and to roll up smoke.

**207** Vela cadunt, remis insurgimus; haud mora nautae  
The sails come down, we rise to the oars; without pause the crews

**208** adnixi torquent spumas et caerula verrunt.  
strain and churn the foam and sweep the blue.

**209** Servatum ex undis Strophadum me litora primum  
Saved out of the waves, I am taken in first by the shores

**210** accipiunt; Strophades Graio stant nomine dictae,  
of the Strophades; the Strophades stand named by a Greek name,

**211** insulae Ionio in magno, quas dira Celaeno  
islands in the great Ionian sea, where dreadful Celaeno

**212** Harpyiaeque colunt aliae, Phineia postquam  
and the other Harpies live, since the house of Phineus

**213** clausa domus, mensasque metu liquere priores.  
was shut against them and they left their earlier tables in fear.

**214** Tristius haud illis monstrum, nec saevior ulla  
No grimmer monster than these, no more savage plague

**215** pestis et ira deum Stygiis sese extulit undis.  
or wrath of the gods ever lifted itself out of the Stygian water.

**216** Virginei volucrum voltus, foedissima ventris  
Girls' faces on birds, a most filthy running of the belly,
> Proluvies names a discharge: proluvies means a flowing-out or discharge, here of the belly, ventris. The word is medical and literal: the Harpies foul food rather than attack with force, which the surrounding lines make explicit.

**217** proluvies, uncaeque manus, et pallida semper  
hooked hands, and mouths forever pale

**218** ora fame.  
with hunger.

**219** Huc ubi delati portus intravimus, ecce  
When we were carried in here and entered the harbor, look,

**220** laeta boum passim campis armenta videmus,  
we see fat herds of cattle at large over the fields,

**221** caprigenumque pecus nullo custode per herbas.  
and a goat-born flock among the grass with nobody watching it.
> An old compound for goat-born: caprigenum, 'goat-born', is a compound adjective of a kind favored by early Latin poets, built the same way as the poem's own Troiugena, 'Troy-born'. It describes pecus, 'the flock', grazing unwatched.

**222** Inruimus ferro, et divos ipsumque vocamus  
We rush in with the sword, and we call the gods, and Jove himself,

**223** in partem praedamque Iovem; tum litore curvo  
to a share of the plunder; then along the curving shore

**224** exstruimusque toros, dapibusque epulamur opimis.  
we heap up couches, and feast on the rich meat.

**225** At subitae horrifico lapsu de montibus adsunt  
But all at once, dropping in a horrible swoop out of the mountains,

**226** Harpyiae, et magnis quatiunt clangoribus alas,  
the Harpies are on us, beating their wings with a great clangor,

**227** diripiuntque dapes, contactuque omnia foedant  
and they tear the food apart, and foul everything with their unclean

**228** immundo; tum vox taetrum dira inter odorem.  
touch; then a dreadful voice out of the vile stench.

**229** Rursum in secessu longo sub rupe cavata,  
Again, in a long recess beneath a hollowed cliff,

**230** arboribus clausi circum atque horrentibus umbris,  
closed in all around by trees and by bristling shadow,

**231** instruimus mensas arisque reponimus ignem:  
we lay the tables out and put fire back on the altars:
> Mensa means table and meal: mensa can mean both the table itself and the meal set on it. instruimus mensas, 'we lay the tables', keeps that double sense active before Celaeno's curse depends on it a few lines later.

**232** rursum ex diverso caeli caecisque latebris  
again out of another quarter of the sky, out of hiding we cannot see,

**233** turba sonans praedam pedibus circumvolat uncis,  
the loud pack wheels about the prey on hooked feet

**234** polluit ore dapes. Sociis tunc, arma capessant,  
and fouls the meal with its mouth. Then I give the order: arms, take them up,
> A quoted order inside the report: arma capessant, 'let them take up arms', is a subjunctive clause giving the order itself, set inside the sentence before edico, 'I command', the verb that reports it. Latin can place the words of the order ahead of the statement that it was given.

**235** edico, et dira bellum cum gente gerendum.  
and that war must be waged with the dreadful race.

**236** Haud secus ac iussi faciunt, tectosque per herbam  
They do exactly as they are told, and lay swords hidden

**237** disponunt enses et scuta latentia condunt.  
through the grass, and stow their shields out of sight.

**238** Ergo ubi delapsae sonitum per curva dedere  
So when the birds had swooped down and made their noise along the curving

**239** litora, dat signum specula Misenus ab alta  
shore, Misenus from a high lookout gives the signal

**240** aere cavo. Invadunt socii, et nova proelia temptant,  
on hollow bronze. My comrades charge, and try a new kind of battle:

**241** obscenas pelagi ferro foedare volucres:  
to hack with iron at the foul birds of the sea.

**242** sed neque vim plumis ullam nec volnera tergo  
But they take no force upon their feathers and no wound

**243** accipiunt, celerique fuga sub sidera lapsae  
on the back, and slipping off in swift flight up under the stars

**244** semesam praedam et vestigia foeda relinquunt.  
they leave the half-eaten meal behind them, and their foul tracks.

**245** Una in praecelsa consedit rupe Celaeno,  
One of them, Celaeno, settled on a rock high above,

**246** infelix vates, rumpitque hanc pectore vocem:  
an ill-boding prophetess, and breaks this voice out of her breast:

**247** “Bellum etiam pro caede boum stratisque iuvencis,  
“War, is it, on top of the butchery of our cattle and our bullocks laid low,

**248** Laomedontiadae, bellumne inferre paratis,  
sons of Laomedon, is it war you are making ready to bring,

**249** et patrio Harpyias insontis pellere regno?  
and to drive innocent Harpies out of their father's kingdom?

**250** Accipite ergo animis atque haec mea figite dicta,  
Take these words of mine into your minds, then, and fix them there,

**251** quae Phoebo pater omnipotens, mihi Phoebus Apollo  
which the all-powerful father foretold to Phoebus, and Phoebus Apollo

**252** praedixit, vobis Furiarum ego maxuma pando.  
to me, and I, the greatest of the Furies, lay open to you.

**253** Italiam cursu petitis, ventisque vocatis  
You are making for Italy, and with the winds called up

**254** ibitis Italiam, portusque intrare licebit;  
you will reach Italy, and you will be let into its harbors;

**255** sed non ante datam cingetis moenibus urbem,  
but you will not ring the city given you with walls

**256** quam vos dira fames nostraeque iniuria caedis  
until a dreadful hunger, and the wrong done in killing us,

**257** ambesas subigat malis absumere mensas.”  
forces you to gnaw your tables and eat them down with your jaws.”
> Eating the tables themselves: mensas, 'tables', again carries its double sense of the table and the food on it; in camp the 'table' could be a flat round of bread. absumere, 'to consume entirely', is the curse: they will eat their tables down to nothing.

**258** Dixit, et in silvam pennis ablata refugit.  
She spoke, and was lifted off on her wings and fled back into the wood.

**259** At sociis subita gelidus formidine sanguis  
But my comrades' blood stiffened cold with a sudden

**260** deriguit; cecidere animi, nec iam amplius armis,  
dread; their spirits fell, and now no longer with weapons

**261** sed votis precibusque iubent exposcere pacem,  
but with vows and prayers they bid us sue for peace,

**262** sive deae, seu sint dirae obscenaeque volucres.  
whether these are goddesses, or dreadful and filthy birds.

**263** Et pater Anchises passis de litore palmis  
And father Anchises, palms spread wide from the shore,

**264** numina magna vocat, meritosque indicit honores:  
calls the great powers and proclaims the honors that are owed:

**265** “Di, prohibete minas; di, talem avertite casum,  
“Gods, hold off these threats; gods, turn such a fall away,

**266** et placidi servate pios!” Tum litore funem  
and in your calm keep the dutiful safe!” Then he orders the cable

**267** deripere, excussosque iubet laxare rudentes.  
torn from the shore, and the sheets shaken out and let run.

**268** Tendunt vela Noti; fugimus spumantibus undis,  
The South Winds stretch the sails; we run over foaming water,

**269** qua cursum ventusque gubernatorque vocabat.  
wherever the wind and the helmsman were calling our course.

**270** Iam medio adparet fluctu nemorosa Zacynthos  
Already wooded Zacynthos shows out of mid-water,

**271** Dulichiumque Sameque et Neritos ardua saxis.  
and Dulichium and Same, and Neritos steep with rock.

**272** Effugimus scopulos Ithacae, Laertia regna,  
We get clear of the cliffs of Ithaca, the kingdom of Laertes,

**273** et terram altricem saevi exsecramur Ulixi.  
and curse the land that nursed savage Ulysses.
> Ulixes is the Latin Odysseus: Ulixes is the Latin form of the name the Odyssey gives as Odysseus. Aeneas uses the Latin name here, saevi Ulixi, 'savage Ulysses', cursing him rather than quoting Homer's poem about him.

**274** Mox et Leucatae nimbosa cacumina montis  
Soon the cloud-covered peaks of Mount Leucate open to view,

**275** et formidatus nautis aperitur Apollo.  
and Apollo, whom sailors fear.

**276** Hunc petimus fessi et parvae succedimus urbi;  
Worn out, we make for him and come up under a small town;

**277** ancora de prora iacitur, stant litore puppes.  
the anchor is thrown from the prow, the sterns stand along the shore.

**278** Ergo insperata tandem tellure potiti,  
So at last, with land in hand that we had not hoped for,

**279** lustramurque Iovi votisque incendimus aras,  
we purify ourselves to Jove and set the altars burning with our vows,

**280** Actiaque Iliacis celebramus litora ludis.  
and we keep the Actian shore with the games of Ilium.

**281** Exercent patrias oleo labente palaestras  
Stripped and slick with oil, my comrades work at the wrestling

**282** nudati socii; iuvat evasisse tot urbes  
of their fathers; it is good to have slipped past so many

**283** Argolicas, mediosque fugam tenuisse per hostis.  
Argive cities, and to have held a course of flight through the middle of enemies.

**284** Interea magnum sol circumvolvitur annum,  
Meanwhile the sun rolls round the great circuit of the year,

**285** et glacialis hiemps aquilonibus asperat undas.  
and icy winter roughens the water with north winds.

**286** Aere cavo clipeum. magni gestamen Abantis,  
A shield of hollow bronze, the gear great Abas carried,

**287** postibus adversis figo, et rem carmine signo:  
I fix on the facing doorposts, and mark the thing with a line of verse:

**288** AENEAS HAEC DE DANAIS VICTORIBVS ARMA.  
AENEAS THESE ARMS FROM THE DANAANS WHO WON.

**289** Linquere tum portus iubeo et considere transtris:  
Then I order them to leave harbor and take their seats at the thwarts:

**290** certatim socii feriunt mare et aequora verrunt.  
my comrades strike the sea in rivalry and sweep the level water.

**291** Protinus aërias Phaeacum abscondimus arces,  
Straight off we sink the airy towers of the Phaeacians out of sight,
> The ship as the hiding agent: abscondere means to hide something away. Vergil makes the sailors, subject of abscondimus, the ones who hide arces, 'the heights', by sailing far enough that the mountain sinks below the horizon.

**292** litoraque Epiri legimus portuque subimus  
and coast the shores of Epirus, and put in at the Chaonian

**293** Chaonio, et celsam Buthroti accedimus urbem.  
harbor, and come up to the high city of Buthrotum.

**294** Hic incredibilis rerum fama occupat auris,  
Here a report of things past belief takes hold of our ears:

**295** Priamiden Helenum Graias regnare per urbes,  
that Helenus, Priam's son, is king over Greek cities,

**296** coniugio Aeacidae Pyrrhi sceptrisque potitum,  
having come into the marriage and the scepter of Pyrrhus, Aeacus' heir,

**297** et patrio Andromachen iterum cessisse marito.  
and that Andromache has passed once more to a husband of her own people.

**298** Obstipui, miroque incensum pectus amore,  
I was struck dumb, and my heart took fire with a strange longing

**299** compellare virum et casus cognoscere tantos.  
to speak to the man and learn such turns as these.

**300** Progredior portu, classis et litora linquens,  
I go up from the harbor, leaving the fleet and the shore behind,

**301** sollemnis cum forte dapes et tristia dona  
just when, as it happened, Andromache was pouring the solemn feast

**302** ante urbem in luco falsi Simoentis ad undam  
and the mourning gifts to the ashes, in a grove before the city
> Falsus here means a copy: falsus usually means false or deceptive, but here it marks an imitation: a local stream given the name of the river at Troy, Simois. Buthrotum is a small copy of Troy, complete with its own Simois.

**303** libabat cineri Andromache, Manisque vocabat  
beside the water of a false Simois, and calling the Shades

**304** Hectoreum ad tumulum, viridi quem caespite inanem  
to Hector's mound, an empty one, which she had hallowed with green turf

**305** et geminas, causam lacrimis, sacraverat aras.  
and with two altars, a reason for tears.

**306** Ut me conspexit venientem et Troïa circum  
When she caught sight of me coming, and out of her mind saw Trojan

**307** arma amens vidit, magnis exterrita monstris  
arms around me, terrified by great portents

**308** deriguit visu in medio, calor ossa reliquit;  
she stiffened in the middle of the sight, the warmth left her bones;

**309** labitur, et longo vix tandem tempore fatur:  
she gives way, and a long time later, barely, speaks:

**310** “Verane te facies, verus mihi nuntius adfers,  
“Is the shape of you true, do you come to me a true messenger,

**311** nate dea? Vivisne, aut, si lux alma recessit,  
goddess-born? Are you alive? Or, if the kindly light has gone,
> The standing address for Aeneas: nate dea, 'born of a goddess', is the fixed way characters address Aeneas through Book 3, always naming his mother Venus. Andromache uses it here to ask whether he is alive or a ghost.

**312** Hector ubi est? Dixit, lacrimasque effudit et omnem  
where is Hector?” She spoke, and poured out tears, and filled

**313** implevit clamore locum. Vix pauca furenti  
the whole place with her crying. Barely a few words to her frenzy

**314** subicio, et raris turbatus vocibus hisco:  
do I get in, and shaken, I gape out broken sounds:

**315** Vivo equidem, vitamque extrema per omnia duco;  
“I am alive, and I drag my life on through every extremity;

**316** ne dubita, nam vera vides.  
have no doubt of it, what you see is true.

**317** Heu, quis te casus deiectam coniuge tanto  
Ah, what has happened to you, thrown down from so great a husband,

**318** excipit, aut quae digna satis fortuna revisit  
or what fortune good enough has come back round to

**319** Hectoris Andromachen? Pyrrhin’ conubia servas?”  
Hector's Andromache? Are you still keeping the marriage of Pyrrhus?”
> Andromache named by her husband: Aeneas asks after Andromache in the third person, naming her Hectoris Andromachen, 'Hector's Andromache', by her first husband, then in the same breath asks whether she still belongs to Pyrrhus, the son of Hector's killer.

**320** Deiecit vultum et demissa voce locuta est:  
She cast her face down and spoke with her voice let fall:

**321** “O felix una ante alias Priameïa virgo,  
“O happy beyond all others, that girl of Priam's,

**322** hostilem ad tumulum Troiae sub moenibus altis  
ordered to die at an enemy's mound under the high walls

**323** iussa mori, quae sortitus non pertulit ullos,  
of Troy, she went through no drawing of lots,

**324** nec victoris eri tetigit captiva cubile!  
and never touched, a captive, the bed of a master who had won her!

**325** nos, patria incensa, diversa per aequora vectae,  
We, our country burned, carried over scattered seas,

**326** stirpis Achilleae fastus iuvenemque superbum,  
have borne the contempt of Achilles' stock and a young man's pride,

**327** servitio enixae, tulimus: qui deinde, secutus  
and have given birth in slavery. He then went after

**328** Ledaeam Hermionen Lacedaemoniosque hymenaeos,  
Hermione, Leda's granddaughter, and a Spartan wedding,

**329** me famulo famulamque Heleno transmisit habendam.  
and handed me on, a slave woman to a slave, to Helenus, to keep.
> Male and female slave paired: famulo and famulam are the masculine and feminine forms of the same noun, 'slave', naming Helenus and Andromache side by side. transmisit, 'handed over', is the ordinary verb for transferring property, which is the vocabulary Andromache uses for her own transfer.

**330** Ast illum, ereptae magno inflammatus amore  
But Orestes, on fire with a great love for the bride

**331** coniugis et scelerum Furiis agitatus, Orestes  
torn from him, and driven on by the Furies of his crimes,

**332** excipit incautum patriasque obtruncat ad aras.  
catches him off guard and cuts him down at his ancestral altars.

**333** Morte Neoptolemi regnorum reddita cessit  
By the death of Neoptolemus a share of the kingdoms was handed back

**334** pars Heleno, qui Chaonios cognomine campos  
and passed to Helenus, who called the plains Chaonian

**335** Chaoniamque omnem Troiano a Chaone dixit,  
and the whole country Chaonia, after Chaon of Troy,

**336** Pergamaque Iliacamque iugis hanc addidit arcem.  
and set a Pergamum and this citadel of Ilium on the ridges.

**337** Sed tibi qui cursum venti, quae fata dedere?  
But what winds gave you your course, what fates?

**338** Aut quisnam ignarum nostris deus adpulit oris?  
Or what god drove you, not knowing us, onto our shores?

**339** Quid puer Ascanius? superatne et vescitur aura,  
What of the boy Ascanius? Does he live, and feed on air,

**340** quem tibi iam Troia—  
whom, to you, Troy already …
> One of the broken-off lines: This is one of the roughly fifty-five verses Vergil left unfinished at his death; the hexameter stops mid-sentence. Andromache begins to say what Troy already meant to the boy and does not finish. We leave the line broken rather than complete it.

**341** Ecqua tamen puero est amissae cura parentis?  
Has the boy any care at all for the mother he lost?

**342** Ecquid in antiquam virtutem animosque virilis  
Is he stirred at all toward the old courage and a man's spirit

**343** et pater Aeneas et avunculus excitat Hector?”  
by his father Aeneas and by his uncle Hector?”

**344** Talia fundebat lacrimans longosque ciebat  
Such things she poured out weeping, and she stirred up long

**345** incassum fletus, cum sese a moenibus heros  
wailing for nothing, when the hero Helenus, Priam's son,

**346** Priamides multis Helenus comitantibus adfert,  
brings himself down from the walls with many in attendance,

**347** adgnoscitque suos, laetusque ad limina ducit,  
and knows his own people, and gladly leads them to his door,

**348** et multum lacrimas verba inter singula fundit.  
and pours out many tears between every word.

**349** Procedo, et parvam Troiam simulataque magnis  
I walk on, and a small Troy, and a Pergamum copied after the great one,

**350** Pergama, et arentem Xanthi cognomine rivum  
and a dried-up stream that goes by the name of Xanthus,

**351** adgnosco, Scaeaeque amplector limina portae.  
I know again; and I put my arms round the threshold of a Scaean Gate.

**352** Nec non et Teucri socia simul urbe fruuntur:  
Nor do the Teucrians fail to enjoy the allied city along with me:

**353** illos porticibus rex accipiebat in amplis;  
the king was receiving them in his wide colonnades;

**354** aulaï medio libabant pocula Bacchi,  
in the middle of the hall they were pouring cups of Bacchus,
> An archaic genitive in -ai: aulaï is a genitive singular ending in -ai, an older form than the classical -ae, giving three syllables where aulae would give one. Ennius and other early poets used this ending; Vergil revives it here, in the hall Helenus and Andromache built at Buthrotum.

**355** impositis auro dapibus, paterasque tenebant.  
the feast set out on gold, and they held their bowls.

**356** Iamque dies alterque dies processit, et aurae  
And now a day and another day went by, and the breezes

**357** vela vocant tumidoque inflatur carbasus austro.  
call the sails, and the canvas fills with a swelling south wind.

**358** His vatem adgredior dictis ac talia quaeso:  
With these words I go up to the seer, and this is what I ask:

**359** “Troiugena, interpres divom, qui numina Phoebi,  
“Troy-born, interpreter of the gods, you who feel the will of Phoebus,

**360** qui tripodas, Clarii laurus, qui sidera sentis,  
the tripods, the laurel of Claros, the stars,

**361** et volucrum linguas et praepetis omina pennae,  
the tongues of birds and the omens of a wing in swift flight,

**362** fare age—namque omnem cursum mihi prospera dixit  
speak now, for the whole of my course has been called favorable

**363** religio, et cuncti suaserunt numine divi  
by every rite, and all the gods in their divine will have urged me

**364** Italiam petere et terras temptare repostas:  
to make for Italy and try after lands set far away:

**365** sola novum dictuque nefas Harpyia Celaeno  
only Celaeno the Harpy sings a portent new and unspeakable,

**366** prodigium canit, et tristis denuntiat iras,  
and gives notice of grim anger

**367** obscenamque famem—quae prima pericula vito?  
and a foul hunger: what dangers am I to keep clear of first?

**368** Quidve sequens tantos possim superare labores?”  
Or by following what could I get over labors so great?”

**369** Hic Helenus, caesis primum de more iuvencis,  
Here Helenus, killing bullocks first as the custom is,

**370** exorat pacem divom, vittasque resolvit  
prays the gods' peace down, and unbinds the fillets

**371** sacrati capitis, meque ad tua limina, Phoebe,  
from his hallowed head; and to your threshold, Phoebus, he leads me

**372** ipse manu multo suspensum numine ducit,  
himself, by the hand, held in suspense by all that presence,

**373** atque haec deinde canit divino ex ore sacerdos:  
and then the priest sings this out of a god-filled mouth:

**374** “Nate dea,—nam te maioribus ire per altum  
“Goddess-born, for it is plain past doubt that you cross the deep

**375** auspiciis manifesta fides: sic fata deum rex  
under greater auspices: so the king of the gods draws the lots

**376** sortitur, volvitque vices; is vertitur ordo—  
of the fates and turns the changes about; this is the order that revolves.
> Jupiter draws the fates by lot: sortitur, 'draws by lot', is the verb a Roman magistrate used for assigning provinces by chance. Jupiter does not decide the fates outright; he sortitur, 'draws', and volvit, 'rolls', the turns of the changes, vices.

**377** pauca tibi e multis, quo tutior hospita lustres  
a few things out of many I will set out for you in words, so that you may

**378** aequora et Ausonio possis considere portu,  
travel strange waters more safely and come to rest in an Ausonian harbor;

**379** expediam dictis; prohibent nam cetera Parcae  
for the Fates keep the rest from Helenus' knowledge,

**380** scire Helenum farique vetat Saturnia Iuno.  
and Saturn's daughter Juno forbids him to speak.

**381** Principio Italiam, quam tu iam rere propinquam  
To begin with: Italy, which you already suppose is near,

**382** vicinosque, ignare, paras invadere portus,  
whose harbors, knowing nothing, you are preparing to run into,

**383** longa procul longis via dividit invia terris.  
a long road, and no road, divides it off far away by long lands.
> Word order stretches out the line: longa and longis, two forms of longus, 'long', open and anchor the line. via, 'road', and invia, 'roadless', sit side by side in the middle, with the verb dividit wedged between them. No two words of the same phrase touch anywhere in the line.

**384** Ante et Trinacria lentandus remus in unda,  
The oar must first be bent in Sicilian water,

**385** et salis Ausonii lustrandum navibus aequor,  
and the level of Ausonian salt must be traveled over by ship,

**386** infernique lacus, Aeaeaeque insula Circae,  
and the lakes below, and the island of Aeaean Circe,

**387** quam tuta possis urbem componere terra:  
before you can set a city on safe ground.

**388** signa tibi dicam, tu condita mente teneto:  
I will name you the signs; keep them stored in your mind:
> The future imperative form: teneto is a future imperative, a second command form used for a standing rule rather than an immediate one: not 'hold this now' but 'you are to hold this from here on'. Latin uses this form for laws and religious instructions.

**389** cum tibi sollicito secreti ad fluminis undam  
when in your anxiety, by the water of a river out of the way,

**390** litoreis ingens inventa sub ilicibus sus  
a huge sow shall be found lying under the holm-oaks of the shore,

**391** triginta capitum fetus enixa iacebit.  
having brought forth a litter of thirty head,

**392** alba, solo recubans, albi circum ubera nati,  
white, stretched on the ground, her white young about her teats,

**393** is locus urbis erit, requies ea certa laborum.  
that will be the site of your city, that the sure rest from your labors.

**394** Nec tu mensarum morsus horresce futuros:  
And do not shudder at the biting of tables to come:

**395** fata viam invenient, aderitque vocatus Apollo.  
the fates find a road, and Apollo will be there when he is called.
> The fates will find a road: fata viam invenient, 'the fates will find a way', is a phrase Vergil repeats in Book 10, in Jupiter's own mouth. Helenus offers it here as an answer to the curse of starvation.

**396** Has autem terras, Italique hanc litoris oram,  
But these lands, and this rim of the Italian coast

**397** proxuma quae nostri perfunditur aequoris aestu,  
that is washed nearest by the tide of our own sea,

**398** effuge; cuncta malis habitantur moenia Grais.  
get clear of them; every town in them is lived in by Greeks who wish you ill.

**399** Hic et Narycii posuerunt moenia Locri,  
Here the Locrians of Naryx have set walls up,

**400** et Sallentinos obsedit milite campos  
and Idomeneus of Lyctus has filled the Sallentine plains

**401** Lyctius Idomeneus; hic illa ducis Meliboei  
with his soldiers; here is that small Petelia of the Meliboean

**402** parva Philoctetae subnixa Petelia muro.  
captain, Philoctetes, propped on its own wall.

**403** Quin, ubi transmissae steterint trans aequora classes,  
More: when your fleets have crossed and are standing beyond the water,

**404** et positis aris iam vota in litore solves,  
and you are paying your vows on the shore at altars set up,

**405** purpureo velare comas adopertus amictu,  
veil your hair, covered over with a purple cloak,

**406** ne qua inter sanctos ignis in honore deorum  
so that among the holy fires, in the worship of the gods,

**407** hostilis facies occurrat et omina turbet.  
no enemy face may cross you and unsettle the omens.

**408** Hunc socii morem sacrorum, hunc ipse teneto:  
Hold to this form of the rites, you and your comrades; hold to it yourself:

**409** hac casti maneant in religione nepotes.  
let your descendants stay clean in this observance.

**410** Ast ubi digressum Siculae te admoverit orae  
But when the wind has taken you off and brought you up to the Sicilian

**411** ventus, et angusti rarescent claustra Pelori,  
coast, and the barriers of narrow Pelorus start to open,

**412** laeva tibi tellus et longo laeva petantur  
make for the land on your left, and for the water on the left,

**413** aequora circuitu: dextrum fuge litus et undas.  
by a long way round: run from the shore and the waves on the right.

**414** Haec loca vi quondam et vasta convolsa ruina—  
These places, once wrenched apart by force and by a vast collapse,

**415** tantum aevi longinqua valet mutare vetustas—  
(so much can the long reach of age do to alter things)
> A parenthetical remark about time: The sentence breaks off to state a general fact, tantum valet mutare vetustas, 'so much can long age change', before returning to the story. It explains why Sicily, once joined to Italy, is now an island.

**416** dissiluisse ferunt, cum protinus utraque tellus  
sprang open, they say, when the two countries were still one

**417** una foret; venit medio vi pontus et undis  
unbroken land; the sea came in between them by force, and with its water

**418** Hesperium Siculo latus abscidit, arvaque et urbes  
cut the Italian flank off from the Sicilian, and now with a narrow tide

**419** litore diductas angusto interluit aestu.  
runs between fields and cities drawn apart along a coast.

**420** Dextrum Scylla latus, laevum implacata Charybdis  
Scylla holds the right side, and unappeasable Charybdis the left;

**421** obsidet, atque imo barathri ter gurgite vastos  
and three times, in the lowest swirl of her pit, she sucks

**422** sorbet in abruptum fluctus, rursusque sub auras  
huge waves down sheer, and three times throws them back in turn

**423** erigit alternos et sidera verberat unda.  
up into the air, and lashes the stars with water.

**424** At Scyllam caecis cohibet spelunca latebris,  
But a cave shuts Scylla in behind blind recesses,

**425** ora exsertantem et navis in saxa trahentem.  
where she thrusts her mouths out and drags ships onto the rocks.

**426** Prima hominis facies et pulchro pectore virgo  
In front the look of a human being, and a girl lovely to the breast

**427** pube tenus, postrema immani corpore pristis,  
and down to the waist; behind, a sea-beast of monstrous body,

**428** delphinum caudas utero commissa luporum.  
dolphins' tails joined onto the belly of wolves.

**429** Praestat Trinacrii metas lustrare Pachyni  
Better to take the long way about the turning-post of Sicilian Pachynus,
> A headland named a turning post: meta is the marker a chariot rounds at the far end of a racecourse. Vergil applies the word to Pachynus, a Sicilian headland, naming the long detour Helenus recommends sailing around it.

**430** cessantem, longos et circumflectere cursus,  
losing time, and to bend your course wide,

**431** quam semel informem vasto vidisse sub antro  
than to have laid eyes once on misshapen Scylla in her enormous cave,

**432** Scyllam, et caeruleis canibus resonantia saxa.  
and on the rocks that ring with her sea-blue dogs.

**433** Praeterea, si qua est Heleno prudentia, vati  
Besides, if Helenus has any foresight, if a seer deserves

**434** si qua fides, animum si veris implet Apollo,  
any trust, if Apollo fills his mind with what is true,

**435** unum illud tibi, nate dea, proque omnibus unum  
one thing, goddess-born, one thing that stands in for all the rest,

**436** praedicam, et repetens iterumque iterumque monebo:  
I will tell you first, and I will come back and warn you of it again and again:

**437** Iunonis magnae primum prece numen adora;  
worship the power of great Juno first of all, in prayer;

**438** Iunoni cane vota libens, dominamque potentem  
chant your vows to Juno willingly, and get the better of that

**439** supplicibus supera donis: sic denique victor  
strong mistress with a suppliant's gifts: so at last you will be sent,

**440** Trinacria finis Italos mittere relicta.  
a winner, to the boundaries of Italy, with Sicily left behind.

**441** Huc ubi delatus Cumaeam accesseris urbem,  
When you have been carried in here and reached the city of Cumae,

**442** divinosque lacus, et Averna sonantia silvis,  
and the god-haunted lakes, and Avernus loud with its woods,

**443** insanam vatem aspicies, quae rupe sub ima  
you will see a prophetess out of her senses, who under the deep rock

**444** fata canit, foliisque notas et nomina mandat.  
sings the fates, and trusts marks and names to leaves.

**445** Quaecumque in foliis descripsit carmina virgo,  
Whatever verses the maiden has written down on the leaves,

**446** digerit in numerum, atque antro seclusa relinquit.  
she sorts into an order, and leaves them shut away in her cave.

**447** Illa manent immota locis, neque ab ordine cedunt;  
They stay unmoved where they lie, and do not slip out of their sequence;

**448** verum eadem, verso tenuis cum cardine ventus  
but let the hinge turn and a thin draft strike them,

**449** impulit et teneras turbavit ianua frondes,  
let the door flurry the soft foliage, and after that

**450** numquam deinde cavo volitantia prendere saxo,  
she never troubles to catch them as they fly about the hollow rock,

**451** nec revocare situs aut iungere carmina curat:  
nor to put them back in place, nor to join the verses again:

**452** inconsulti abeunt, sedemque odere Sibyllae.  
men go away with nothing answered, and they hate the Sibyl's seat.
> Inconsultus means unanswered and unadvised: inconsulti, from inconsultus, means both 'without having consulted' and 'unadvised'. Men come to the Sibyl for counsel and leave, abeunt, without getting it. Helenus tells Aeneas to have her speak the answer aloud rather than trust a written one.

**453** Hic tibi ne qua morae fuerint dispendia tanti,—  
Here let no expense of delay count so much with you,

**454** quamvis increpitent socii, et vi cursus in altum  
though your comrades scold, and the run to open sea calls your canvas

**455** vela vocet, possisque sinus implere secundos,—  
hard, and you could fill its folds with a following wind,

**456** quin adeas vatem precibusque oracula poscas  
that you fail to go to the prophetess, and ask by prayer that the oracles

**457** ipsa canat, vocemque volens atque ora resolvat.  
be sung by her own mouth, and that she willingly let voice and lips go.

**458** Illa tibi Italiae populos venturaque bella,  
She will lay out for you the peoples of Italy and the wars to come,

**459** et quo quemque modo fugiasque ferasque laborem  
and in what way you are to escape or to carry each labor,

**460** expediet, cursusque dabit venerata secundos.  
and, given her due reverence, will grant you a prospering course.

**461** Haec sunt, quae nostra liceat te voce moneri.  
These are the things I am allowed to warn you of with my own voice.

**462** Vade age, et ingentem factis fer ad aethera Troiam.”  
Go now, and by your deeds carry Troy up huge into the sky.”
> Adjective and noun frame the line: ingentem, 'huge', opens the line and Troiam, the noun it describes, closes it, with factis, 'by your deeds', and aethera, 'sky', placed between them. The word order carries the city across the verse from one end to the other.

**463** Quae postquam vates sic ore effatus amico est,  
After the seer had spoken so, out of a friendly mouth,

**464** dona dehinc auro gravia sectoque elephanto  
he then orders gifts heavy with gold and with carved ivory

**465** imperat ad navis ferri, stipatque carinis  
to be carried down to the ships, and he packs into the hulls

**466** ingens argentum, Dodonaeosque lebetas,  
a great weight of silver, and cauldrons out of Dodona,

**467** loricam consertam hamis auroque trilicem,  
a breastplate linked with hooks and triple-woven with gold,

**468** et conum insignis galeae cristasque comantis,  
and the cone of a splendid helmet with its crest of hair,

**469** arma Neoptolemi; sunt et sua dona parenti.  
the armor of Neoptolemus; and there are gifts of his own for my father.

**470** Addit equos, additque duces;  
He adds horses, and adds guides;

**471** remigium supplet; socios simul instruit armis.  
he fills out the rowing benches, and arms my comrades as well.

**472** Interea classem velis aptare iubebat  
Meanwhile Anchises was ordering the fleet to be fitted with sails,

**473** Anchises, fieret vento mora ne qua ferenti.  
so that no delay should be made for a wind that would carry us.

**474** Quem Phoebi interpres multo compellat honore:  
Phoebus' interpreter speaks to him with great respect:

**475** “Coniugio, Anchise, Veneris dignate superbo,  
“Anchises, judged worthy of a proud marriage with Venus,

**476** cura deum, bis Pergameis erepte ruinis,  
cared for by the gods, twice snatched out of Pergamum's ruin,

**477** ecce tibi Ausoniae tellus; hanc arripe velis.  
look, the land of Ausonia is yours; catch at it with your sails.

**478** Et tamen hanc pelago praeterlabare necesse est;  
And even so, you must slip past this part of it by sea;

**479** Ausoniae pars illa procul, quam pandit Apollo.  
that stretch of Ausonia which Apollo opens lies far away.

**480** Vade” ait “O felix nati pietate. Quid ultra  
Go,” he says, “blessed in the duty of your son. Why do I sail on
> Pietas praised from the receiving end: pietate is the ablative of pietas, the duty that elsewhere names Aeneas's own defining virtue. Here Helenus calls Anchises felix, 'blessed', in his son's pietas, describing the same quality from the side of the person it benefits.

**481** provehor, et fando surgentis demoror austros?”  
further, and hold up the rising south winds with talk?”

**482** Nec minus Andromache digressu maesta supremo  
No less does Andromache, grieving at this last parting,

**483** fert picturatas auri subtemine vestes  
bring out robes figured with a woof of gold,

**484** et Phrygiam Ascanio chlamydem (nec cedit honore),  
and a Phrygian cloak for Ascanius (she yields nothing in honor),

**485** textilibusque onerat donis, ac talia fatur:  
and she loads him with woven gifts, and speaks like this:

**486** “Accipe et haec, manuum tibi quae monumenta mearum  
“Take these as well, to be keepsakes of my hands for you,

**487** sint, puer, et longum Andromachae testentur amorem,  
boy, and to bear witness to the long love of Andromache,

**488** coniugis Hectoreae. Cape dona extrema tuorum,  
the wife of Hector. Take the last gifts of your own people,

**489** O mihi sola mei super Astyanactis imago:  
you who are all that is left me of the likeness of my Astyanax:

**490** sic oculos, sic ille manus, sic ora ferebat;  
so he carried his eyes, so his hands, so his face;

**491** et nunc aequali tecum pubesceret aevo.”  
and he would be coming to manhood now at the same age as you.”

**492** Hos ego digrediens lacrimis adfabar obortis:  
These I spoke to as I went, with the tears starting up:

**493** “Vivite felices, quibus est fortuna peracta  
“Live happy, you whose fortune has already been

**494** iam sua; nos alia ex aliis in fata vocamur.  
played out; we are called from one fate into another.

**495** Vobis parta quies; nullum maris aequor arandum,  
Your quiet is won; you have no level of sea to plow,
> Gerundive names an avoided task: arandum, a gerundive from arare, 'to plow', agrees with aequor, 'the level sea', and carries the sense of 'to be plowed'. To plow the sea is an old figure for wasted labor; Aeneas says his hosts have none of it left to do.

**496** arva neque Ausoniae semper cedentia retro  
no fields of Ausonia forever drawing back away from you

**497** quaerenda. Effigiem Xanthi Troiamque videtis  
to look for. You are looking at a copy of Xanthus, and a Troy

**498** quam vestrae fecere manus, melioribus, opto,  
your own hands made, under better auspices, I hope,

**499** auspiciis, et quae fuerit minus obvia Graiis.  
and one that will stand less in the way of Greeks.

**500** Si quando Thybrim vicinaque Thybridis arva  
If ever I enter the Tiber and the fields the Tiber neighbors,

**501** intraro, gentique meae data moenia cernam,  
and see the walls that are granted to my people,

**502** cognatas urbes olim populosque propinquos,  
then one day, out of kindred cities and neighboring nations,

**503** Epiro, Hesperia, quibus idem Dardanus auctor  
Epirus and Hesperia, which have the same Dardanus for founder

**504** atque idem casus, unam faciemus utramque  
and the same disaster, we shall make of the two one

**505** Troiam animis; maneat nostros ea cura nepotes.”  
Troy in spirit; let that charge stay with our descendants.”

**506** Provehimur pelago vicina Ceraunia iuxta,  
We put out to sea past the Ceraunian range close by,

**507** unde iter Italiam cursusque brevissimus undis.  
from where the road to Italy and the run over water is shortest.

**508** Sol ruit interea et montes umbrantur opaci;  
The sun goes down meanwhile, and the mountains darken into shadow;

**509** sternimur optatae gremio telluris ad undam,  
we stretch out at the water's edge, in the lap of the land we wanted,

**510** sortiti remos, passimque in litore sicco  
having drawn lots for the oars; and here and there on the dry shore

**511** corpora curamus; fessos sopor inrigat artus.  
we look after our bodies; sleep waters our tired limbs.
> Sleep pictured as irrigation: inrigat, from inrigare, is the verb for channeling water onto a field. Vergil uses it of sopor, 'sleep', reaching the men's tired limbs, artus, after a day spent at the oars.

**512** Necdum orbem medium Nox horis acta subibat:  
Night, driven on by the hours, had not yet come to the middle of her round:

**513** haud segnis strato surgit Palinurus et omnis  
Palinurus, no sluggard, rises from his bedding and tries

**514** explorat ventos, atque auribus aera captat;  
every wind, and catches at the air with his ears;

**515** sidera cuncta notat tacito labentia caelo,  
he marks all the stars gliding in a silent sky,

**516** Arcturum pluviasque Hyadas geminosque Triones,  
Arcturus, the rainy Hyades, and the twin Wains,

**517** armatumque auro circumspicit Oriona.  
and looks round for Orion armed in gold.

**518** Postquam cuncta videt caelo constare sereno,  
When he sees that everything holds steady in a clear sky,

**519** dat clarum e puppi signum; nos castra movemus,  
he gives a bright signal from the stern; we strike camp,
> Camp language for a beach: castra movere, 'to move camp', is the standard Latin phrase for an army breaking camp to march. Vergil uses it here for men getting up off a beach to board ships, applying military vocabulary to the whole voyage.

**520** temptamusque viam et velorum pandimus alas.  
and try the road, and spread the wings of our sails.

**521** Iamque rubescebat stellis Aurora fugatis,  
And now Dawn was reddening, the stars put to flight,

**522** cum procul obscuros collis humilemque videmus  
when far off we make out dim hills and a low-lying

**523** Italiam. “Italiam” primus conclamat Achates,  
Italy. “Italy!” Achates is the first to call out,

**524** “Italiam” laeto socii clamore salutant.  
“Italy!” my comrades salute it with a glad shout.

**525** Tum pater Anchises magnum cratera corona  
Then father Anchises put a garland on a great mixing-bowl

**526** induit, implevitque mero, divosque vocavit  
and filled it with unmixed wine, and called on the gods,

**527** stans celsa in puppi:  
standing high on the stern:

**528** “Di maris et terrae tempestatumque potentes,  
“Gods with power over the sea and the land and the storms,

**529** ferte viam vento facilem et spirate secundi.”  
make our road easy with a wind, and breathe on us kindly.”

**530** Crebrescunt optatae aurae portusque patescit  
The breezes we wanted freshen, and a harbor opens,

**531** iam propior, templumque adparet in arce Minervae.  
nearer now, and a temple of Minerva shows on the height.

**532** Vela legunt socii et proras ad litora torquent.  
My comrades take in sail and swing the prows toward the shore.

**533** Portus ab Euroo fluctu curvatus in arcum,  
The harbor is bent into a bow by the swell out of the east,

**534** obiectae salsa spumant aspargine cautes;  
and the rocks thrown out before it foam with salt spray;

**535** ipse latet; gemino demittunt bracchia muro  
the harbor itself lies hidden; towered crags let their arms down

**536** turriti scopuli, refugitque ab litore templum.  
in a double wall, and the temple draws back from the shore.

**537** Quattuor hic, primum omen, equos in gramine vidi  
Here, the first omen, I saw four horses on the grass,

**538** tondentis campum late, candore nivali.  
cropping the plain far and wide, snow-white.

**539** Et pater Anchises: “Bellum, O terra hospita, portas  
And father Anchises: “War, land of our welcome, is what you carry;

**540** bello armantur equi, bellum haec armenta minantur.  
horses are armed for war, war is what these herds threaten.

**541** Sed tamen idem olim curru succedere sueti  
But then the same beasts have been broken before now to go under a car

**542** quadrupedes, et frena iugo concordia ferre;  
and to carry the bit in a yoke, in agreement;

**543** spes et pacis” ait. Tum numina sancta precamur  
there is hope of peace as well,” he says. Then we pray to the holy power

**544** Palladis armisonae, quae prima accepit ovantis,  
of Pallas who rings with weapons, first to receive us cheering,

**545** et capita ante aras Phrygio velamur amictu;  
and before the altars we cover our heads with a Phrygian cloak;

**546** praeceptisque Heleni, dederat quae maxima, rite  
and following the instructions of Helenus, the greatest he had given,

**547** Iunoni Argivae iussos adolemus honores.  
we duly burn to Argive Juno the offerings we were ordered to make.

**548** Haud mora, continuo perfectis ordine votis,  
No delay: the vows finished in order, at once

**549** cornua velatarum obvertimus antemarum,  
we swing the horns of our sail-hung yards about,

**550** Graiugenumque domos suspectaque linquimus arva.  
and leave the homes of the Greek-born and the fields we do not trust.

**551** Hinc sinus Herculei (si vera est fama) Tarenti  
From here the bay of Tarentum (Hercules' town, if the story is true)

**552** cernitur; attollit se diva Lacinia contra,  
comes into sight; the goddess of Lacinium lifts herself opposite,

**553** Caulonisque arces et navifragum Scylaceum.  
and the towers of Caulon, and Scylaceum, breaker of ships.
> A coined word for ship-breaking: navifragum, 'ship-breaking', is a compound Vergil appears to have coined, built on the model of naufragus, 'shipwrecked', but reversed so the coast, not the ship, is the active party. Scylaceum is the place the word describes.

**554** Tum procul e fluctu Trinacria cernitur Aetna,  
Then far out of the water Sicilian Etna is sighted,

**555** et gemitum ingentem pelagi pulsataque saxa  
and we hear from a long way off a huge groaning of the sea, and rocks

**556** audimus longe fractasque ad litora voces,  
struck, and voices broken up against the shores,

**557** exsultantque vada, atque aestu miscentur harenae.  
and the shallows leap, and the sand is churned through the surge.

**558** Et pater Anchises: “Nimirum haec illa Charybdis:  
And father Anchises: “No doubt of it, this is that Charybdis:

**559** hos Helenus scopulos, haec saxa horrenda canebat.  
these are the cliffs, these the dreadful rocks Helenus sang of.

**560** Eripite, O socii, pariterque insurgite remis!”  
Pull us clear, comrades, and rise to the oars together!”

**561** Haud minus ac iussi faciunt, primusque rudentem  
They do exactly as they are told, and Palinurus first

**562** contorsit laevas proram Palinurus ad undas.  
wrenched the groaning prow round toward the water on the left.

**563** laevam cuncta cohors remis ventisque petivit.  
The whole company made for the left with oars and with wind.

**564** Tollimur in caelum curvato gurgite, et idem  
We are lifted skyward on an arching swell, and the same wave,

**565** subducta ad Manis imos desedimus unda.  
dropping from under us, sets us down among the lowest Shades.
> The underworld measures a wave's depth: Manis imos, 'the lowest Shades', names the deepest part of the underworld. desedimus, 'we sank down', places the ship there, in the same line as being lifted to the sky on the wave before.

**566** Ter scopuli clamorem inter cava saxa dedere:  
Three times the crags gave out a shout among the hollow rocks:

**567** ter spumam elisam et rorantia vidimus astra.  
three times we saw the foam squeezed up, and the stars dripping.
> Ter repeated to open two lines: ter, 'three times', opens this line and the one before it, marking the wave's rise and fall three times over. This second line ends on rorantia astra, 'dripping stars'.

**568** Interea fessos ventus cum sole reliquit,  
Meanwhile the wind left us worn out, and the sunlight with it,

**569** ignarique viae Cyclopum adlabimur oris.  
and, not knowing the way, we glide in to the coast of the Cyclopes.

**570** Portus ab accessu ventorum immotus et ingens  
The harbor itself is huge, and unmoved by any coming of winds;

**571** ipse; sed horrificis iuxta tonat Aetna ruinis;  
but close beside it Etna thunders with horrible collapses,

**572** interdumque atram prorumpit ad aethera nubem,  
and now and then hurls a black cloud out toward the sky,

**573** turbine fumantem piceo et candente favilla,  
smoking in a pitch-dark whirl, with white-hot ash,

**574** attollitque globos flammarum et sidera lambit;  
and heaves up balls of flame and licks at the stars;

**575** interdum scopulos avolsaque viscera montis  
now and then it belches crags upright, and the torn-out

**576** erigit eructans, liquefactaque saxa sub auras  
guts of the mountain, and rolls molten rock together
> Viscera names the mountain's insides: viscera means the soft internal organs of a body, not rock or ash. Vergil applies it to montis, 'the mountain', in erigit eructans viscera montis, 'raises up, belching out, the mountain's guts'.

**577** cum gemitu glomerat, fundoque exaestuat imo.  
under the air with a groan, and boils from its lowest floor.

**578** Fama est Enceladi semustum fulmine corpus  
The story is that the body of Enceladus, half burned by a thunderbolt,

**579** urgueri mole hac, ingentemque insuper Aetnam  
is held down by this mass, and that Etna, laid over him,

**580** impositam ruptis flammam exspirare caminis;  
breathes out flame from her broken furnaces;

**581** et fessum quotiens mutet latus, intremere omnem  
and that as often as he shifts his tired side, all Sicily

**582** murmure Trinacriam, et caelum subtexere fumo.  
trembles with the rumbling, and the sky is woven over with smoke.

**583** Noctem illam tecti silvis immania monstra  
That night we get through under cover of the woods, bearing

**584** perferimus, nec quae sonitum det causa videmus.  
monstrous things, and we do not see what gives the noise its cause.

**585** Nam neque erant astrorum ignes, nec lucidus aethra  
For there were no fires of stars, no bright pole

**586** siderea polus, obscuro sed nubila caelo,  
in a starry upper air, but clouds in a darkened sky,

**587** et lunam in nimbo nox intempesta tenebat.  
and the dead of night was holding the moon in a rain-cloud.
> A Roman name for deep night: nox intempesta is an old Roman term for the stretch of night outside ordinary time, when nothing proper is done: literally 'untimely night'. It marks the hour just before dawn brings a stranger to the shore.

**588** Postera iamque dies primo surgebat Eoo,  
And now the next day was rising with the first light out of the east,

**589** umentemque Aurora polo dimoverat umbram:  
and Dawn had pushed the damp shadow from the sky:

**590** cum subito e silvis, macie confecta suprema,  
when suddenly out of the woods, worn down to the last stage of hunger,

**591** ignoti nova forma viri miserandaque cultu  
the strange shape of an unknown man comes forward, pitiable in his state,

**592** procedit, supplexque manus ad litora tendit.  
and stretches suppliant hands toward the shore.

**593** Respicimus: dira inluvies inmissaque barba,  
We look: a horrible filthiness, a beard let go,

**594** consertum tegumen spinis; at cetera Graius,  
a covering pinned together with thorns; but for the rest a Greek,

**595** et quondam patriis ad Troiam missus in armis.  
and once sent against Troy in the arms of his fathers.

**596** Isque ubi Dardanios habitus et Troia vidit  
And when he saw Dardanian dress and Trojan

**597** arma procul, paulum aspectu conterritus haesit,  
arms at a distance, he checked a moment, terrified at the sight,

**598** continuitque gradum; mox sese ad litora praeceps  
and held his step; then he threw himself headlong toward the shore

**599** cum fletu precibusque tulit: “Per sidera testor,  
with weeping and with prayers: “By the stars I call to witness,

**600** per superos atque hoc caeli spirabile lumen,  
by the gods above and this light of the sky that can be breathed,
> A rare word for breathable air: spirabile, 'breathable', is a rare adjective describing lumen, 'light', here standing for the open air. Achaemenides swears by daylight as something taken into the lungs, per superos atque hoc caeli spirabile lumen.

**601** tollite me, Teucri; quascumque abducite terras;  
take me up, Teucrians; carry me off to any lands you like;

**602** hoc sat erit. Scio me Danais e classibus unum,  
that will be enough. I know I am one man out of the Danaan fleets,

**603** et bello Iliacos fateor petiisse Penatis;  
and I admit I made war on the household gods of Ilium;

**604** pro quo, si sceleris tanta est iniuria nostri,  
for which, if the wrong of my crime is as great as that,

**605** spargite me in fluctus, vastoque inmergite ponto.  
scatter me over the waves, sink me in the vast sea.

**606** Si pereo, hominum manibus periisse iuvabit.”  
If I am to die, it will be a comfort to have died at the hands of men.”
> Death by human hands preferred: manibus, ablative plural of manus, 'hand', names the agent: hominum manibus, 'at the hands of men'. Achaemenides asks to be killed by people rather than eaten, and iuvabit, 'it will be a comfort', names dying that way as the better outcome.

**607** Dixerat, et genua amplexus genibusque volutans  
He had spoken, and clasping our knees, rolling at our knees,

**608** haerebat. Qui sit, fari, quo sanguine cretus,  
he clung there. We urge him to say who he is, of what blood

**609** hortamur; quae deinde agitet fortuna, fateri.  
he is sprung, and then to own what fortune drives him.

**610** Ipse pater dextram Anchises, haud multa moratus,  
Father Anchises himself, without much delay,

**611** dat iuveni, atque animum praesenti pignore firmat.  
gives the young man his right hand, and steadies his spirit with that pledge in front of him.

**612** Ille haec, deposita tandem formidine, fatur:  
He, his terror laid down at last, says this:

**613** “Sum patria ex Ithaca, comes infelicis Ulixi,  
“My country is Ithaca; I was a companion of unlucky Ulysses,
> Ulysses called unlucky here: infelicis, 'unlucky', describes Ulixi, genitive of Ulixes. Achaemenides calls the same man unlucky whom Aeneas earlier called saevus, 'savage', and Vergil keeps both descriptions in the book without choosing between them.

**614** nomine Achaemenides, Troiam genitore Adamasto  
Achaemenides by name, and I set out for Troy with a father, Adamastus,

**615** paupere—mansissetque utinam fortuna!—profectus.  
who was poor (how I wish that fortune had stayed!)

**616** Hic me, dum trepidi crudelia limina linquunt,  
Here, while they were leaving that cruel doorway in a panic,

**617** inmemores socii vasto Cyclopis in antro  
my comrades forgot me, and in the Cyclops' huge cave

**618** deseruere. Domus sanie dapibusque cruentis,  
they abandoned me. The house is one of filth and bloody meals,

**619** intus opaca, ingens; ipse arduus, altaque pulsat  
dark inside, and enormous; he himself is towering, and strikes

**620** sidera—Di, talem terris avertite pestem!—  
the high stars (gods, turn such a plague away from the earth!)

**621** nec visu facilis nec dictu adfabilis ulli.  
easy for nobody to look at, and no one to speak with.

**622** Visceribus miserorum et sanguine vescitur atro.  
He feeds on the innards of wretched men and on black blood.

**623** Vidi egomet, duo de numero cum corpora nostro  
I saw it myself, when he took two bodies of our number

**624** prensa manu magna, medio resupinus in antro,  
in his great hand and, lying back in the middle of the cave,

**625** frangeret ad saxum, sanieque aspersa natarent  
broke them on the rock, and the doorway swam, splashed

**626** limina; vidi atro cum membra fluentia tabo  
with gore; I saw when he chewed limbs running

**627** manderet, et tepidi tremerent sub dentibus artus.  
with black rot, and the warm joints shuddered under his teeth.

**628** Haud impune quidem; nec talia passus Ulixes,  
Not unpunished, though; Ulysses did not put up with that,

**629** oblitusve sui est Ithacus discrimine tanto.  
nor did the man of Ithaca forget himself in so great a strait.
> Ulysses named by his island: Ithacus, 'the man from Ithaca', names Ulysses by his home instead of his own name. Vergil does the same with Achilles, Pyrrhus, and Venus elsewhere in this book.

**630** Nam simul expletus dapibus vinoque sepultus  
For as soon as he was filled with his meal and buried in wine

**631** cervicem inflexam posuit, iacuitque per antrum  
and had laid his bent neck down, and lay stretched through the cave,

**632** immensus, saniem eructans et frusta cruento  
measureless, belching gore and gobbets soaked in bloody

**633** per somnum commixta mero, nos magna precati  
wine as he slept, we prayed to the great powers,

**634** numina sortitique vices, una undique circum  
drew lots for our turns, and all together, from every side,

**635** fundimur, et telo lumen terebramus acuto,—  
we pour around him and bore out the eye with a sharpened stake,

**636** ingens, quod torva solum sub fronte latebat,  
the huge one eye that lay hidden alone under his grim brow,

**637** Argolici clipei aut Phoebeae lampadis instar,—  
the size of an Argive shield, or of the lamp of Phoebus,
> Two measures of size, one line: instar, 'the size or likeness of', takes two genitives, clipei, 'a shield', and lampadis, 'a lamp', offered as equal measures of the Cyclops's eye. lampadis names the sun as a torch, so the comparison is to a light.

**638** et tandem laeti sociorum ulciscimur umbras.  
and at last, glad of it, we avenge the shades of our comrades.

**639** Sed fugite, O miseri, fugite, atque ab litore funem  
But run, you poor men, run, and from the shore

**640** rumpite.  
cut the cable.

**641** Nam qualis quantusque cavo Polyphemus in antro  
For as Polyphemus is, and as big, who in his hollow cave

**642** lanigeras claudit pecudes atque ubera pressat,  
shuts up his wool-bearing flocks and squeezes their udders,

**643** centum alii curva haec habitant ad litora volgo  
a hundred others live all along these curving shores,

**644** infandi Cyclopes, et altis montibus errant.  
Cyclopes not to be spoken of, and they wander the high mountains.

**645** Tertia iam lunae se cornua lumine complent,  
The horns of the moon are filling with light for the third time now,

**646** cum vitam in silvis inter deserta ferarum  
while I drag my life out in the woods, among the deserted

**647** lustra domosque traho, vastosque ab rupe Cyclopas  
lairs and dens of wild beasts, and watch the huge Cyclopes

**648** prospicio, sonitumque pedum vocemque tremesco.  
from a rock, and shake at the sound of their feet and their voices.

**649** Victum infelicem, bacas lapidosaque corna,  
A wretched food, berries, and the stony fruit of the cornel,

**650** dant rami et volsis pascunt radicibus herbae.  
the branches give me, and grass feeds me with roots pulled up.

**651** Omnia conlustrans, hanc primum ad litora classem  
Scanning everything, I caught sight of this fleet, the first,

**652** conspexi venientem. Huic me, quaecumque fuisset,  
coming toward the shore. To it, whatever it might turn out to be,

**653** addixi: satis est gentem effugisse nefandam.  
I made myself over: it is enough to have got clear of an unspeakable race.
> Addicere from the slave market: addixi, from addicere, is a legal verb: a magistrate addicit a debtor over to a creditor. Achaemenides uses it of himself, handing himself over to the first ship he finds before knowing whose it is.

**654** Vos animam hanc potius quocumque absumite leto.”  
Do you rather use up this life of mine by whatever death you please.”

**655** Vix ea fatus erat, summo cum monte videmus  
He had barely said it when on the mountaintop we see

**656** ipsum inter pecudes vasta se mole moventem  
the man himself moving among his flocks with his vast bulk,

**657** pastorem Polyphemum et litora nota petentem,  
the shepherd Polyphemus, making for the shore he knows,

**658** monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum.  
a monster horrible, shapeless, huge, whose light has been taken away.
> A description with no main verb: horrendum, informe, and ingens are three adjectives set side by side with no conjunction, followed by a relative clause, cui lumen ademptum, that itself omits its verb. The whole line describes the Cyclops without ever supplying a finite verb.

**659** Trunca manu pinus regit et vestigia firmat;  
A lopped pine in his hand steers him and steadies his steps;

**660** lanigerae comitantur oves—ea sola voluptas  
his wool-bearing sheep go along with him, his one pleasure,

**661** solamenque mali.  
and comfort in his trouble.

**662** Postquam altos tetigit fluctus et ad aequora venit,  
When he reached the deep water and came out to the sea,

**663** luminis effossi fluidum lavit inde cruorem,  
he washed off the running blood of his dug-out eye,

**664** dentibus infrendens gemitu, graditurque per aequor  
grinding his teeth and groaning, and he walks through the sea

**665** iam medium, necdum fluctus latera ardua tinxit.  
already at its middle, and the wave has not yet wet his steep flanks.

**666** Nos procul inde fugam trepidi celerare, recepto  
We, far off from there, hurried our flight in fear, having taken on board

**667** supplice sic merito, tacitique incidere funem;  
a suppliant who had so deserved it, and cut the cable without a sound;

**668** vertimus et proni certantibus aequora remis.  
we swung about, and leaning to it, swept the water with racing oars.

**669** Sensit, et ad sonitum vocis vestigia torsit;  
He noticed, and turned his steps toward the sound of the voices;

**670** verum ubi nulla datur dextra adfectare potestas,  
but when no power is given him to get at us with his hand,

**671** nec potis Ionios fluctus aequare sequendo,  
and he cannot match the Ionian waves by following,

**672** clamorem immensum tollit, quo pontus et omnes  
he raises an enormous shout, at which the sea and all

**673** contremuere undae, penitusque exterrita tellus  
its water shook, and the land of Italy was frightened

**674** Italiae, curvisque immugiit Aetna cavernis.  
to its depths, and Etna bellowed in her curving caverns.

**675** At genus e silvis Cyclopum et montibus altis  
But the race of the Cyclopes, roused out of the woods

**676** excitum ruit ad portus et litora complent.  
and the high mountains, rushes to the harbor, and they fill the shores.

**677** Cernimus adstantis nequiquam lumine torvo  
We see the brothers of Etna standing there for nothing,

**678** Aetnaeos fratres, caelo capita alta ferentis,  
each with his grim eye, carrying their high heads into the sky,

**679** concilium horrendum: quales cum vertice celso  
a dreadful assembly: as when oaks in the upper air have taken

**680** aeriae quercus, aut coniferae cyparissi  
their stand with lofty crowns, or cone-bearing cypresses,

**681** constiterunt, silva alta Iovis, lucusve Dianae.  
the high wood of Jove, or a grove of Diana.

**682** Praecipites metus acer agit quocumque rudentis  
Sharp fear drives us headlong to shake the sheets loose

**683** excutere, et ventis intendere vela secundis.  
for anywhere at all, and to set sail to whatever winds will serve.

**684** Contra iussa monent Heleni Scyllam atque Charybdin  
Against that, the orders of Helenus warn them not to hold a course

**685** inter, utramque viam leti discrimine parvo,  
between Scylla and Charybdis, either way a road of death

**686** ni teneant cursus; certum est dare lintea retro.  
by a narrow margin. We resolve to give the canvas back.

**687** Ecce autem Boreas angusta ab sede Pelori  
But look, the North Wind, sent out from the narrow seat of Pelorus,

**688** missus adest. Vivo praetervehor ostia saxo  
is here. I am carried past the mouths of the Pantagia,

**689** Pantagiae Megarosque sinus Thapsumque iacentem.  
with their living rock, and the bay of Megara, and Thapsus low on the water.

**690** Talia monstrabat relegens errata retrorsus  
Achaemenides was pointing these out, retracing backward

**691** litora Achaemenides; comes infelicis Ulixi.  
the shores he had wandered; a companion of unlucky Ulysses.

**692** Sicanio praetenta sinu iacet insula contra  
Stretched across a Sicanian bay an island lies opposite

**693** Plemyrium undosum; nomen dixere priores  
wave-beaten Plemyrium; the men before us gave it the name

**694** Ortygiam. Alpheum fama est huc Elidis amnem  
Ortygia. The story is that Alpheus, the river of Elis,

**695** occultas egisse vias subter mare; qui nunc  
drove hidden roads here beneath the sea, and now

**696** ore, Arethusa, tuo Siculis confunditur undis.  
through your mouth, Arethusa, is mingled with Sicilian water.

**697** Iussi numina magna loci veneramur; et inde  
As ordered, we worship the great powers of the place; and from there

**698** exsupero praepingue solum stagnantis Helori.  
I pass the very rich soil of marshy Helorus.

**699** Hinc altas cautes proiectaque saxa Pachyni  
Then we shave past the high crags and jutting rocks of Pachynus,

**700** radimus, et fatis numquam concessa moveri  
and Camerina, which the fates never allowed to be moved,

**701** adparet Camerina procul campique Geloi,  
shows far off, and the plains of Gela,

**702** immanisque Gela fluvii cognomine dicta.  
and monstrous Gela, called after the name of its river.

**703** Arduus inde Acragas ostentat maxuma longe  
Then steep Acragas displays its enormous walls a long way off,

**704** moenia, magnanimum quondam generator equorum;  
in its day a breeder of great-spirited horses;

**705** teque datis linquo ventis, palmosa Selinus,  
and with the winds granted me I leave you behind, palmy Selinus,

**706** et vada dura lego saxis Lilybeia caecis.  
and I thread the hard shallows of Lilybaeum with their unseen rocks.

**707** Hinc Drepani me portus et inlaetabilis ora  
From here the harbor of Drepanum and its joyless shore

**708** accipit. Hic, pelagi tot tempestatibus actis,  
takes me in. Here, after so many storms of the sea come through,

**709** heu genitorem, omnis curae casusque levamen,  
here, ah, my father, the easing of every care and every turn,

**710** amitto Anchisen: hic me, pater optume, fessum  
Anchises, I lose: here you leave me worn out, best of fathers,
> A plain verb for a death: amitto, 'I lose', is the ordinary word for losing something, and it is the main verb reporting the death of Aeneas's father. No omen or rite is described here; the sentence simply states the loss and turns to address Anchises directly.

**711** deseris, heu, tantis nequiquam erepte periclis!  
ah, you who were snatched out of such great dangers for nothing!

**712** Nec vates Helenus, cum multa horrenda moneret,  
Neither Helenus the seer, though he warned of many dreadful things,

**713** hos mihi praedixit luctus, non dira Celaeno.  
foretold me this grief, nor did dreadful Celaeno.

**714** Hic labor extremus, longarum haec meta viarum.  
This was the last labor, this the turning-post of the long roads.
> The turning post used again: meta names the post a chariot rounds at the end of a course, the same word Helenus used at line 429 for a Sicilian headland. Aeneas applies it here to his father's grave, a point to turn at rather than a finish.

**715** Hinc me digressum vestris deus adpulit oris.  
From here, once I had gone, a god drove me to your shores.”

**716** Sic pater Aeneas intentis omnibus unus  
So father Aeneas, alone, with every one of them intent on him,

**717** fata renarrabat divom, cursusque docebat.  
was retelling the fates the gods had set, and teaching them his voyages.

**718** Conticuit tandem, factoque hic fine quievit.  
At last he fell silent, and having made an end here, was still.
> The verb that opened Book 2: conticuit, 'fell silent', is the same verb Book 2 used of the whole hall falling silent for Aeneas to begin speaking. Here it describes Aeneas himself falling silent, closing two books of his narration on one repeated word.

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Source text: public domain (Vergil, Aeneid, ed. J. B. Greenough, Boston: Ginn and Company, 1900), as encoded in the Perseus Digital Library canonical-latinLit TEI, CC BY-SA 4.0. English translation and notes: © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC, line for line. Narration: read by Malone (LibriVox, 2012), public domain.