aeneid similes

1. Neptune calming the storm

'As when disorder arises among the people of a great city and the common mob runs riot, wild passion finds weapons for men's hands and torches and rocks start flying, at such a time if people chance to see a man who has some weight among them for his goodness and service to the state, they fall silence, standing and listening with all their attention while his words command their passings and soothe their hearts - so did the crashing of the sea fall silent'

1. Carthaginians

'like bees at the beginning of summer … The hive seethes with activity'

1. Dido

'like Diana leading the dance on the banks of Eurotas'

'like Diana, she bore herself joyfully among her people'

1. Aeneas' beauty

'it was as though skilled hands had added embellishments to ivory or applied gilding to silver or Parian marble'

2. Laocoon crying out to his death

'like the bellowing of a wounded bull shaking the ineffectual axe out of his neck as it flees from the altar'

2. Aeneas listening to the destruction of Troy

'my ears pricked like a shepherd when a furious wind is carrying fire into a field'

2. Aeneas and the Trojans running towards the enemy

'like wolves foraging blindly on a misty night'

2. Androgeos recoiling in terror at Aeneas and the Trojans

'like a man … who steps on a snake … and starts back in sudden panic as it raises its wrath'

2. The Greeks and Trojans fighting over Cassandra

'as though a whirlwind had burst and opposing winds were clashing'

2. Neoptolemus

'like a snake which has fed on poisonous herbs and hidden all winter in the cold earth … Glistening with youth, it coils its slithering back'

2. Troy falling

'like an ancient ash tree high in the mountains which farmers have hacked … at last it succumbs to its wounds and breaks with a dying groan, spreading ruin along the ridge.'

4. Dido in love

'wandered all over the city … like a wounded doe which a shepherd hunting in the woods of Crete have caught off guard, striking her from long range with steel-tipped shaft; the arrow flies and is left in her body without his knowing it; she runs over all the wooded slopes of Mount Dicte, and sticking in her side is the arrow that will bring her death'

4. Aeneas leading his men to meet Dido for the hunt

'like Apollo leaving his winter home in Lucia and the waters of the river acanthus to visit his mother at Delos'

4. Mercury flying to Carthage

'like a bird skimming the seas as it flies along the shore'

4. Dido hearing that the Trojans were leaving

'she raged and raved round the whole city like a Bacchant stirred by the shaking of the sacred emblems and roused to frenzy when she hears the name of Bacchus at the biennial orgy'

4. Trojans leaving the city to prepare the fleet

'like ants plundering a huge heap of wheat … their little black column advances over the plains'

4. Dido looking for Tyrians in her city

'like Pentheus in his frenzy when he was seeing columns of Furies … or like Orestes, son of Agamemnon, driven in flight across the stage'

6. The golden bough

'just as the mistletoe .. puts on fresh foliage in the woods in the cold of winter and twins it's yellow fruit round slender tree trunks, so shone the golden foliage'

6. The throng of the dead rushing to the bank

'as many as the leaves that fall in the forest at the first chill of autumn, as many as the birds that flock to land from deep ocean'

6. Aeneas recognising Dido

'like a man who sees or thinks he has seen the new moon rising through the clouds'

6. Men around the River Lethe

'like bees in a meadow on a clear summer day'

7. Amata in a frenzy around the city

'like a spinning top flying under the plaited whip when boys are engrossed i their play'

7. Turnus in a rage

'as though a heap of brushwood were crackling and burning under the sides of a bronze vessel making the water seethe and leap up'

7. The fighting breaks out

'like the sea whitening at the first breath of wind and slowly stirring itself raising its waves higher and higher'

7. Latinus during the outbreak of the war

'stood unmoved like a rock in the ocean … standing fast with the waves howling round it'

7. Messapus' men marching

'like white swans flying back from their feeding grounds … pouring out the measured music from their long necks'

8. Aeneas thoughts

'darting in every possible direction … like light flickering from water in bronze vessels as it is reflected from the sun'

8. Vulcan waking up and going to his forge

'when the ashes are first stirred to rouse the slumbering fire by a woman'

8. Pallas

'like the morning Star, which Venus loves above all other starry fires … and lifts up his holy face into the sky to scatter the darkness'

9. The army marching across the plain

'like the Ganges fed by the steady flow of its seven rivers and silently rising … or like the fertile waters of the Nile'

9. Turnus prowling the walls of the Trojan encampment

'like a wolf in the dead of night, lying in wait in all the wind and rain by a pen full of sheep … while the lambs keep up their bleating, safe beneath their mothers; besides himself with anger he storms and cannot reach them'

9. Nisus killing Rutulians

'like a lion drive mad with hunger and ravening through pens full of sheep, dumb with fear, while he growls from jaws dripping with blood as he mails and champs their soft flesh'

9. Euryalus dying

'the head dropped on his shoulders, like a scarlet flower languishing and dying when its stem has been cut by the plough, or like poppies bowing their heads when the rain burdens them and their necks grow heavy'

9. Helenor

'like a wild beast trapped in a dense ring of hunters'

9. Turnus

'like the eagle, the armour-bearer of Jupiter, seizing in his hooked talons a hare or the white body of a swan'

9. Shields and helmets ranging

'like a great shower from the west drumming on the earth in the rainy season'

9. Pandarus and Bitias

'like a pair of tall oaks by a flowing river'

9. Bitias

'like the fall of a stone pile by the shore of the Euboean Baiae; men first build it to its massive height and then they let it down into the sea'

9. Pandarus trapping Turnus in the city

'like a great tiger among the helpless cattle'

9. Trojans cornering Turnus

'like a pack of huntsmen with levelled spears pressing hard on a savage lion; the lion is afraid and gives ground, but he is still dangerous'

10. The noise of the gods agreeing or disagreeing

'like the murmuring of a storm'

10. Ascanius

'like a gem sparkling in its gold setting, an adornment for a head or neck, or like glowing ivory skilfully inlaid'

10. Trojans hurling their spears

'like cranes … giving out their signals under the black cloud'

10. Aeneas' head on fire

'like the gloomy, blood red glow of a comet on a clear night or the dismal blaze of Sirius'

10. Pallas

'Just as a shepherd fires a wood at different points'

10. The Trojans and Latins fight

'like opposing winds fighting their wars in the great reaches of the sky'

10. Turnus reached for combat

'flying at him like a lion which had seen from some high vantage point a bull practising for combat far away on the plain'

10. Aeneas raging victorious over the battle

'was like a Aegaeon who they say had a hundred arms and a hundred hands, with fire flaming from fifty breaded and mouths'

10. Mezentius

'like a rock jutting out into the ocean … exposed to the threats and fury of wind and wave and bearing all the violence of sea and sky unmoved'

10. Mezentius pursuing Acron / Orodes

'as a ravening lion scouring the deep lairs of wild beasts'

10. Mezentius surrounded by Etruscans

'like the wild boar who has long kept his citadel among the pines of Mount Versulus … is driven down from the mountains with the dogs snapping at him and is caught between the nets'

10. Aeneas overwhelmed by missiles

'as when the clouds descend in a sudden storm of hail and all the ploughmen and all the works in the fields scatter across the open ground'

11. Pallas' corpse

'he lay like a flower cut by the thumbnail of a young girl, a soft violent or drooping lily, still with its sheen and its shape, though Mother Earth no longer feeds it and gives it strength'

11. The loudness of the Latins

'as when rocks resist a river in spite and the trapped waters eddy and growl'

11. The Latins arguing

'a great clamour of dissenting voices rose to the winds like the sound of flocks of birds settling in groves of tall trees or swans.

11. Turnus running down to battle

'like a stallion that has broken his tether and burst from the stall'

11. The Struscans turning and then driving the Rutulians to the city walls

'as the sea advances wave by wave, now rushing to the land, throwing foam over the rocks'

11. Camilla and her girls

'like the Amazons of Thrace .. when they fight round Hippolyte in their brightly coloured armour or when Penthesilea… rides home in her chariot and her army of women in their crescent shields exult in a great howling tumult'

11. Camilla killing her enemies

'as easily as the sacred falcon flies from his crag to pursue a dove high in the clouds, catches it, holds it and rips out its entrails'

11. Tarchon and Venulus fighting

'Just as when a tawny eagle has seized a snake .., the wounded serpent writhes in sinuous coils'

11. Arruns running away

'as when a wolf has killed a shepherd or a great ox and goes at once to hide high in the trackless hills'

12. The passion in Turnus rising up

'as a lion in the fields round Carthage, who does not move into battle till he has received a great wound in his chest from the hunters'

12. Lavinia blushing

'as when Indian ivory has been stained with blood-red due, or when white lilies are crowded by roses and take on their red, such were the colours on the maidens face'

12. Turnus raging

'like a bull coming into his first battle, bellowing fearfully and gathering his anger'

12. Turnus on his chariot chasing Aeneas

'Just as Mars spattered with blood, charges along the banks of the icy river Hebrus … giving full rein to his furious horses as he stirs up war'

12. Turnus causing the enemy to flee

'as when the breath of Thracian Boreas sounds upon the deep Aegean ad he pursues the waves to the shore'

12. Aeneas driving his army forward

'as when a cloud blots out the sun and begins to move from mid-ocean towards the land'

12. Juturna riding through the enemy

'like a black swallow flying through the great house of some wealthy man and collecting tiny scraps of food'

12. Aeneas and Turnus rushed into the battle

'like fires started in different places in a dry wood or in thickets of crackling laurel; or like foaming rivers roaring as they run down in spate from the high mountains to the sea'

12. The Latins protecting their city

'just as when a shepherd tracks some bees to their home … the bees alarmed for their safety rush in all directions through their wax-filled camp'

12. Turnus crashing through the ranks of the Trojans

'as a boulder comes crashing down from the top of a mountain … an evil mountain of rock and bounds over the plain'

12. Aeneas and Turnus fighting

'as two enemy bulls … charge into battle; the herdsmen stand back in terror, the herd stands silent and afraid, and the heifers … quietly together waiting to see who is to rule the grove'

12. Aeneas chasing Turnus

'like a hunting dog that happens to trap a stag in the bend of a river or in a ring of red feathers … the stag is terrified by the ambush he is caught in … he runs and runs back a thousand way'

12. One of the Dirae going down to Juturna

'like an arrow going through a cloud .. and it whirrs as it flies, unseen through the swift darkness'

12. Turnus unable to fight back or run away

'Just as when we are asleep … we dream we are trying desperately to run further and not succeed till we fall exhausted in the middle of our efforts; the tongue is useless; the strength we know we have fails our body; we have no voice, no words to obey a will'

12. Aeneas' spear

'like a dark whirlwind it flew carrying death and destruction with it'