Actium - the Battle of Actium marked the fall of Antony and Cleopatra and the beginning of the rein of Augustus. The shield Vulcan crafts for Aeneas depicts the Battle of Actium at its center (book 8).

Aeneas - the protagonist of the Aeneid.

Allecto - one of the furies. Juno sends her to Latium to turn Queen Amata and the Latins against the Trojans. Allecto poisons Amata with a metaphorical snake. She also inflames Turnus with anger at the threat Aeneas poses to his relationship with Lavinia (book 7).

Amata - Lavinia’s mother, Latinus’ wife, queen of Latium. Poisoned by Allecto to hate Aeneas, kills herself when she realizes their defeat.

Anchises - father of Aeneas. he dies in book 3 and later speaks with Aeneas in the underworld in book 6.

Anna - Dido’s sister. She encourages her sister to let herself fall for Aeneas; unknowingly leading her sister to her death. She collects Dido’s last breath.

Ascanius - Aeneas’ son. AKA Iulus.

Cacus - the cyclops killed by Hercules for his sheep.

Caelano - the leader of the harpies who prophesied Aeneas and his men would reach Italy, where they would be forced to eat their tables (book 3). Later comes true when they use crusty bread as tables before eating it.

Camilla - the warrior who fights in place of Turnus in book 11. Killed by Arruns and avenged by Diana.

Carthage - Dido’s city in North Africa. Fated to fall to Trojans, the reason Juno fights so hard to prevent Aeneas from settling Rome.

Crete - the island to which the Trojans sail when Anchises misinterprets a prophecy. Aeneas founds Pergamum. They are struck by a year-long plague, killing humans and crops, before they return to Delos.

Creusa - Aeneas’ first wife. She is killed somehow in the sack of Troy on their way to the shore. Encourages Aeneas to leave Troy.

Cupid - the son of Venus. In book 1 he disguises himself as Ascanius so as to trick Dido into falling in love with Aeneas.

Diana - the goddess of the hunt and the moon. She protects and avenges Camilla in book 11.

Dido - the Queen of Carthage. She is tricked by Cupid to fall in love with Aeneas and kills herself when he leaves Carthage.

Euryalus - the young, beautiful Trojan soldier who is killed by Rutulians in book 9 when he is detected by the moonlight on a stolen helmet. He was the companion/lover of Nisus. They were trying to tell Aeneas about Turnus’ attack on the Trojans (Aeneas was in Pallanteum).

Evander - the king of Pallanteum. He welcomes Aeneas and offers his help against the Latins. He entrusts Aeneas with his son Pallas.

Fama - the embodiment of Rumor. she is described as "a swift, birdlike monster with as many eyes, lips, tongues, and ears as feathers, traveling on the ground but with her head in the clouds” who grows in size as she goes. Seen in book 4 as the news of Dido and Aeneas’ union travels through North Africa.

Hector - A son of Troy's King Priam and Queen Hecuba, and the first husband of Andromachë. Hector's ghost appears to Aeneas in Book II on the night Troy is invaded by the Greeks and warns the Trojan prince to flee the stricken city.

Hecuba - Priam’s wife, queen of Troy

Helen - the “cause” of the Trojan war. married to Menelaus before she went to Troy with Paris. Aeneas sees her in book 2 hiding from the wrath of the Trojans and her abandoned husband.

Hercules - the greek/roman hero who killed Cacus by tearing a hole into a mountain

Juno - the queen of the gods, sister-wife of Jupiter. She helps the Greeks in the Trojan war and continues to thwart the Trojans as they seek new land. She hates the Trojans because Paris judged Venus to be more beautiful than her, and the Roman ancestors of the Trojans will destroy Carthage, her beloved city.

Jupiter - the king of the gods. He remains mostly unbiased in the conflict and maintains Aeneas’ course to his fate.

Juturna - the sister of Turnus, and a river nymph. She appears in book 12 when Juno compels her to provoke the Latins to battle after a peace agreement is made.

Laocoon - the Trojan priest who warns the Trojans of the danger lying with the giant gift horse (book 2). Minerva sends two sea serpents to kill Laocoon and his two sons.

Latinus - the king of Latium. He welcomes Aeneas and is open to his marriage with Lavinia.

Lausus - Mezentius's son, killed by Aeneas in Book 10.

Lavinia - the daughter of Amata and Latinus. The subject of conflict between Aeneas and Turnus.

Mars - the god of war, lover of Venus.

Mercury - the messenger of the gods. In Book IV, Jupiter sends him to Aeneas in Carthage, to command the Trojan prince to abandon Dido and continue his voyage.

Mezentius - former Etruscan king. He aids Turnus in book 10. When his Aeneas kills his son, he rides to Aeneas to fight. He is killed by Aeneas.

Minerva - A daughter of Jupiter and the goddess of wisdom, during the Trojan War, she generally favors the Greek cause. In Book II, she lures the Trojans into bringing the wooden horse, which they are told is a Greek offering to her, within Troy's protective walls.

Nisus - in Book 9, he is slain by the Rutulians while attempting to inform Aeneas of Turnus's attack on the Trojan camp.

Palinurus - Aeneas's steadfast and loyal ship's pilot, whose life Neptune exacts as the price of the Trojans's safe crossing from Sicily to Italy in Book V. Murdered by savages as he swims ashore after Somnus, the god of sleep, induces him to fall overboard, Palinurus, more than any other character in the epic poem, dies as the result of a god's mere caprice.

Pallas - the son of Evander. His death at the hands of Turnus in Book X is avenged when Aeneas kills Turnus, who brazenly wears his swordbelt slung unceremoniously over his shoulder.

Paris - A Trojan prince, son of Priam and Hecuba, and brother of Hector. Venus promises him Helen as his wife in exchange for his judgment, so he selects Venus. This selection inspires the permanent wrath of Juno against the Trojans. Stealing Helen from her Greek husband, Menelaus, he provokes the Trojan War.

Priam - the king of Troy. He is slain by Pyrrhus in book 2.

Pygmalion - Dido’s evil brother, who killed her husband Sychaeus to usurp the Tyrian throne.

Pyrrhus - the son of Achilles. He is seen in book 2 killing Priam and one of his sons.

Sibyl - (Deiphobë) A prophetess and priestess of the god Apollo, she predicts the future for Aeneas and accompanies him on his visit to the underworld in Book 6.

Sicily - the setting of the funeral games in book 5. Where Iris encourages women to burn the Trojan ships.

Sinon - The Greek warrior who cleverly persuades the Trojans to bring the wooden horse inside Troy's protective walls.

Sychaeus - Dido’s first husband, killed by Pygmalion. He is seen in book 6 comforting Dido in the land of those killed by love.

Tiber - a river in Italy. Tiberinus the river god appears to Aeneas in a dream to tell him that he is on the right path, turning him to Evander.

Troy - Aeneas’ home city. Sacked by the Greeks in book 2.

Turnus - A prince of the Rutulian tribe and the leader of the Latin forces who oppose the settlement of the Trojans in Latium. Motivated by intense pride and a desire for personal fame, as well as Allecto’s influence against Aeneas’ marriage to Lavinia.

Ulysses/Odysseus - The hero of Homer’s Odyssey, and one of the captains of the Greek army that takes Troy.

Venus - The mother of Aeneas by her mortal lover Anchises, she acts on Aeneas's behalf in opposition to Juno, although she allies herself with the rival goddess in Book 4 in an attempt to get her son to settle safely in Carthage as Dido's husband.