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The Romans’ view of the supernatural reflected in the will of the Fates, the intervention
of the Gods and supernatural appearances from three episodes in Aeneid II.
1.
The episode of the wooden horse
Virgil gives many indications that the Greeks received supernatural assistance with the
idea and use of the wooden horse.
ll. 15-16
. . . equum divina Palladis arte/aedificant
They build a horse with the divine skill of Pallas (= Minerva, goddess of wisdom and
craftsmanship). The Greeks would have known her as Artemis, but Virgil uses the
Roman name for his Roman readers to recognise. The Romans were used to the
concept of sacrifices or gifts being made to win a god’s favour, so when the Greek agent
Sinon tells the Trojans that the Greeks built the horse for Minerva and that if it were to be
damaged by Trojan hand, there would be terrible destruction for Priam’s empire and the
Trojans,
ll. 189-191
nam si vestra manus violasset dona Minervae,
tum magnum exitium . . . Priami imperio Phrygibusque futurum;
they would find it credible that the Trojans believed him. Aeneas himself acknowledged
this belief in l. 31. . . innuptae donum . . . Minervae – a gift for the unwed Minerva; it was
only with hindsight after the use of the horse that Aeneas knew that it was exitiale –
deadly.
When Trojan Thymoetes urges the Trojans to bring the horse into the city,
Aeneas speculates that perhaps at that stage Troy’s fate was set,
l. 34
. . . seu iam Troiae sic fata ferebant.
Romans inclined to believe that the Fates set out predestined events for one’s life would
have picked up on this. The concepts of predestination and free will could co-exist, if
certain events were predestined, but free will operated in the procedural happenings
between them. So Laocoon could choose to try to unmask the horse as a trick by
throwing his spear into its side and speaking out against it. However unfortunately for
him supernatural intervention came in the form of twin sea serpents, who with their coils
crushed him and his two small sons when he tried to rescue them.
ll. 203-05
ecce autem gemini a Tenedo tranquilla per alta
(horresco referens) immensis orbibus angues
incumbunt pelago pariterque ad litora tendunt;
But behold, (I shudder in telling this) twin snakes with huge coils
through the calm waters from Tenedos press upon the sea, and side by side
make their way towards the shores.
Aeneas once again suggests to his audience of Dido and her Carthaginians that the
destined will of heaven was set against the Trojans or perhaps, Trojan reason was
faulty. Otherwise Troy would still be standing.
Student 1 Low Excellence: page 2
When the Greek Sinon gets the chance to tell his lies to the Trojans, he makes use of
supernatural aspects to help the Trojans swallow his story. He says that fortune has
made him wretched,
ll. 79-80
miserum fortuna Sinonem/ finxit
and suggests that the Greeks several times unsuccessfully tried to sail away from Troy
and so consulted the oracle of Apollo for advice. Roman readers knew about the
concept of asking for divine advice from an oracle. So, convinced by Sinon’s stories and
by the terrible fate that befell Laocoon, the Trojans called for the horse to be pulled into
Troy, and for prayers of entreaty to be offered to the goddess’s divine will,
ll. 231-2
orandaque divae / numina conclamant
Supernatural events had assisted the Greeks to get their machine of war,
the wooden horse, into Troy, enabling the second stage of the fall of Troy, the fighting for
the city, to begin.
2.
The fight for the city of Troy
During the course of the fighting, various supernatural events and interventions
contributed to Aeneas’ eventual decision to abandon Troy and seek a new home for the
Trojans.
First, the dead Hector appears to Aeneas in a dream and tells him to leave Troy.
ll. 289-90
‘heu fuge, nate dea, teque his ’ait ‘eripe flammis.
hostes habet muros; ruit alto a culmine Troia.’
Alas, flee, son of a goddess, and snatch yourself from these flames,’ he
says, ‘the enemy hold the walls; Troy is crashing down from its highest
reach.’
Roman readers would have been familiar with Hector from study of the Iliad at school
and also with the concept of a ghost conveying information to the living.
Aeneas does not take this advice yet, for when he wakes he hears the sounds of battle
and instinctively girds on his weapons and rushes out to fight. Out amongst the fighting
he meets Panthus, priest of Apollo, who also tells him that Troy has finished l. 325 . . .
fuit Ilium . . . and that fierce Jupiter has handed over everything to the Greeks.
ll. 326-7
. . . ferus omnia Iuppiter Argos /transtulit;
(Virgil continues to use Roman names for gods for rapid recognition by Roman readers.)
Aeneas still does not accept the advice to leave, even although that advice comes from
the priest of the god of prophecy and the decision is said to be the will of the king of the
gods, Jupiter. A little further on, Aeneas states what became obvious to him after the
event, but was not so at the time,
Student 1 Low Excellence: page 3
l. 402
heu nihil invitis fas quemquam fidere divis!
Alas, if the gods are unwilling, it is not right for anyone to place trust in them!
He says this on recalling that the Trojan princess, Cassandra, who had foresight granted
by the gods and was cursed to predict the future accurately, but never to be believed,
was dragged from Minerva’s temple to be Greek booty. Once again, the Romans were
familiar with this story of the woman with a supernatural gift and a supernatural
punishment.
The last site where Aeneas was poised to engage in the bitter fighting with the Greeks
was at Priam’s palace. Here a divine appearance to him of his mother, the goddess
Venus, fortunately prevented his murdering Helen the Spartan, which would have
brought him no glory in Roman eyes.
l. 591-3
alma parens,
. . . dextraque prehensum
continuit roseoque haec insuper addidit ore:
And my kindly mother caught me by my right hand and held me back,
and with rosy mouth added these words besides to me, . . .
l. 619
eripe, nate, fugam finemque impone labori.
Snatch your escape my son, and put an end to your struggle.
At last Aeneas takes the collective advice from Hector, Panthus and Venus to take his
family away from Troy.
3.
The procedure leading to the departure
Aeneas came up against a huge impediment when he went home to gather up his family
ready to leave Troy. His father Anchises, feeling old and frail, refused to leave. Aeneas
in desperation and frustration called upon his mother, Venus,
l. 664-5
hoc erat, alma parens, quod me per tela, per ignes/eripis? . . .
Is it for this, kindly mother, that you snatch me from among weapons, among
fires?
After this outburst he started to pick up his weapons ready to return to the fighting again.
When Creusa held his feet to stop him, then insisted on accompanying him,
a miraculous event occurred. A harmless flame licked around the soft hair
and temples of their young son, Iulus. This supernatural event prompted Anchises to call
in Jupiter for confirmation, which came immediately with a thunderclap, followed by a
shooting star. The Romans would have recognised the thunderclap as a sign from
Jupiter, and the halo of fire on the child’s head as an augurium oblativum, an augury
sent without human request, whereas the thunder and shooting star they would know as
an augurium impetrativum because Anchises had asked for a sign. Such concepts were
aspects of the practices and beliefs in Roman religion.
It is tempting to imagine that since Aeneas had called on his mother in his desperation,
she may have applied some persuasion therefore to her own father, Jupiter, to take
dramatic action to get Anchises to get a move on, so that the family can escape.
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There is a final drama before they all make it to safety. Creusa disappears as they dash
down back streets to avoid meeting any enemy soldiers. Aeneas later speculates about
what had happened, blaming ‘an unhappy fate’:
l. 738-40
heu misero coniunx fatone erepta Creusa
substitit, erravitne via seu lassa resedit,/ incertum;
Alas my wife Creusa, snatched away by some unhappy fate, came to a
halt, whether she wandered from the path or whether she sank down
exhausted is not clear.
After Aeneas realises that she has gone missing and does some frantic searching back
in the city, she appears to him as a ghost and tells him that what has happened to her is
not without the divine will of the gods.
l. 777-8
. . . non haec sine numine divum/ eveniunt.
Virgil’s use of the supernatural in these episodes recognises that Roman readers were
familiar with and could identify with supernatural concepts such as talking ghosts,
dreams, prayers and portents. In telling the story of the fall of Troy, which ultimately led
to the foundation of Rome, Virgil makes it clear that these great events in human lives
were steered by divine action, satisfying the Roman desire to see their race and its
power blessed by the gods.