Aeneid scholars

Grandsen (fate)

The theme of fate dominates the epic

Grandsen (pietas)

The killing of Turnus can be seen as pious act as he is honouring the dead and securing peace for his people

Grandsen (war)

War is madness and it spares no one

Grebe (fate)

Virgil uses fate to reinforce Augustus’s divine prestige

Grebe (war)

In Virgil's view violence, destruction and death are necessary for the establishment of something new

Griffin (Augustus)

It would be absurd to assume that Virgil sole purpose was to flatter Augustus

Mackie (fate)

Willingness to facilitate fate is the cornerstone of Aeneas's pietas

Hardie (women)

Images of dangerous women would have reminded the roman audience of cleopatra

Fratantuano (women)

Dido is likened to Cleopatra through their suicides

Reilly (women 1)

Unlike in the Odyssey there is not a single idealised woman

Reilly (women 2)

Moral ambiguities: Camilla - chastity/furor as a warrior and Dido - leadership/succumbing to lust

Oliensis (women)

Lavinia and Creusa prove their virtuosness by remaining submissive

Morgan (women)

Women in the Aeneid act as obstacles in Aeneas' journey

Jenkyns (heroism)

Aeneas is a new kind of hero, he is attuned to his duty

Quinn (heroism 1)

Aeneas surrenders to an impulse that disgraces his humanity (killing Turnus)

Quinn (heroism 2)

Certain events suggest that the heroic ideal is not necessarily the nobler ideal

Sowerby (heroism)

Turnus acts as a foil to Aeneas, representing an older, individual form of heroism

Sowerby (pietas)

Carrying his son and father out of Troy is the ultimate symbol of pietas

Rutherford (heroism)

Turnus is a Homeric hero; dashing, unthinking, and violent who must give way to a new style of proto-roman heroes

O’Sullivan (family)

the formula "before the face of one's parents" occurs six times in the epic e.g Polites in front of Hecuba and Priam

Ross (gods)

The gods are everywhere in the epic

Williams (juno)

Juno is striking, formidable and relentless

Williams (war)

Virgil's sympathies for the defeated is often so strong that it seemed to conflict with the patriotic tone

Williams (furor)

by killing Turnus, Aeneas looses to furor

Harrison (gods)

Virgil’s gods are Homeric gods

Brunel (war)

Roman moral tradition may have admired severity to a degree, was against harsh deeds done in sheer revenge

McLeish (nations)

We shouldn't sympathise with the 'oriental' Carthage, they are morally corrupt, as denoted by Dido's turn to furor

Farron (nations)

Romans would have felt guilty over Carthage's recent extermination, Virgil plays upon these feelings in order to to sculpt Dido's Carthage as a tragic nation

Cowan (furor)

furor is the most pervasive, destructive force in the Aeneid