Fable VIII
Julius Cæsar is assassinated in the Senate-house, and by the intercession of Venus, his ancestor, he is changed into a star. The Poet concludes his work with a compliment to Augustus, and a promise of immortality to himself.
And still, he came a stranger to our temples; Cæsar is a Deity in his own city; whom, alike distinguished both in war and peace, wars ending with triumphs, his government at home, and the rapid glory of his exploits, did not more tend to change into a new planet, and a star with brilliant train, than did his own progeny. For of all the acts of Cæsar, there is not one more ennobling than that he was the father of this our Cæsar. Was it, forsooth, a greater thing to have conquered the Britons surrounded by the ocean, and to have steered his victorious ships along the seven-mouthed streams of the Nile that bears the papyrus, and to have added to the people of Quirinus the rebellious Numidians83 and the Cinyphian Juba, and Pontus84 proud of the fame of Mithridates, and to have deserved many a triumph, and to have enjoyed some, than it was to have been the father of a personage so great, under whose tutelage over the world, you, ye Gods above, have shewn excessive care for the human race? That he then might not be sprung from mortal seed, ’twas fit that Julius should be made a Divinity. When the resplendent mother of xv. 762-798. Æneas was sensible of this; and when she saw that a sad death was in preparation for the Pontiff, and that the arms of the conspirators were brandished; she turned pale, and said to each of the Deities, as she met them:—
“Behold, on how vast a scale treason is plotted against me, and with how great perfidy that life is sought, which alone remains for me from the Dardanian Iülus. Shall I alone be everlastingly harassed by justified anxieties? I, whom one while the Calydonian lance of the son of Tydeus is wounding, and at another time the walls of Troy, defended in vain, are grieving? I, who have seen my son driven about in protracted wanderings, tossed on the ocean, entering the abodes of the departed, and waging war with Turnus; or, if we confess the truth, with Juno rather? But, why am I now calling to mind the ancient misfortunes of my own offspring? Present apprehensions do not allow me to remember things of former days. Against me, you behold how the impious swords are now being whetted. Avert them, I entreat; hinder this crime, and do not, by the murder of the priest, extinguish the flames of Vesta.”
Such expressions as these did Venus, full of anxiety, vainly let fall throughout the heavens, and she moved the Gods above. Although they were not able to frustrate the iron decrees of the aged sisters, yet they afforded no unerring tokens of approaching woe. They say, that arms resounding amid the black clouds, and dreadful blasts of the trumpet, and clarions heard through the heavens, forewarned men of the crime. The sad face too of the sun gave a livid light to the alarmed earth. Often did torches seem to be burning in the midst of the stars; often did drops of blood fall in the showers. The azure-coloured Lucifer had his light tinted with a dark iron colour; the chariot of the moon was besprinkled with blood. The Stygian owl gave omens of ill in a thousand places; in a thousand places did the ivory statues shed tears; dirges, too, are said to have been heard, and threatening expressions in the sacred groves. No victim gave an omen of good; the entrails, too, showed that great tumults were imminent; and the extremity of the liver was found cut off among the entrails. They say, too, that in the Forum, and around the houses and the temples of the Gods, the dogs were howling by night; and that the ghosts of the departed were walking, and that the City was xv. 798-826. shaken by earthquakes. But still the warnings of the Gods could not avert treachery and the approach of Fate, and drawn swords were carried into a temple; and no other place in the whole City than the Senate-house pleased them for this crime and this atrocious murder.
But then did Cytherea beat her breast with both her hands, and attempt to hide the descendant of Æneas in a cloud, in which, long since, Paris was conveyed from the hostile son of Atreus,85 and Æneas had escaped from the sword of Diomedes. In such words as these did her father Jove address her: “Dost thou, my daughter, unaided, attempt to change the insuperable decrees of Fate? Thou, thyself, mayst enter the abode of the three sisters, and there thou wilt behold the register of future events, wrought with vast labour, of brass and of solid iron; these, safe and destined for eternity, fear neither the thundering shock of the heavens, nor the rage of the lightnings, nor any source of destruction. There wilt thou find the destinies of thy descendants engraved in everlasting adamant. I myself have read them, and I have marked them in my mind; I will repeat them, that thou mayst not still be ignorant of the future. He (on whose account, Cytherea, thou art thus anxious), has completed his time, those years being ended which he owed to the earth. Thou, with his son, who, as the heir to his glory, will bear the burden of government devolving on him, wilt cause him, as a Deity, to reach the heavens, and to be worshipped in temples; and he, as a most valiant avenger of his murdered parent, will have us to aid him in his battles. The conquered walls of Mutina,86 besieged under his auspices, shall sue for peace; Pharsalia shall be sensible of him, and Philippi,87 again drenched with Emathian gore; and the name of one renowned as Great, shall be subdued in the Sicilian waves; the Egyptian dame too, the wife88 of the Roman xv. 826-858. general, shall fall, vainly trusting in that alliance; and in vain shall she threaten, that our own Capitol shall be obedient to her Canopus.89 Why should I recount to thee the regions of barbarism, and nations situate in either ocean? Whatever the habitable world contains, shall be his; the sea, too, shall be subject to him. Peace being granted to the earth, he will turn his attention to civil rights, and, as a most upright legislator, he will enact laws. After his own example, too, will he regulate manners; and, looking forward to the days of future time, and of his coming posterity, he will order the offspring born of his hallowed wife90 to assume both his own name and his cares. Nor shall he, until as an aged man he shall have equalled his glories with like years,91 arrive at the abodes of heaven and his kindred stars. Meanwhile, change this soul, snatched from the murdered body, into a beam of light, that eternally the Deified Julius may look down from his lofty abode upon our Capitol and Forum.”
Hardly had he uttered these words, when the genial Venus, perceived by none, stood in the very midst of the Senate-house, and snatched the soul, just liberated from the body, away from the limbs of her own Cæsar, and, not suffering it to dissolve in air, she bore it amid the stars of heaven. And as she bore it, she perceived it assume a train of light and become inflamed; and she dropped it from her bosom. Above the moon it takes its flight, and, as a star, it glitters, carrying a flaming train with a lengthened track; and, as he beholds the illustrious deeds of his son, he confesses that they are superior to his own, and rejoices that he is surpassed by him. Although Augustus forbids his own actions to be lauded before those of his father, still Fame, in her freedom and subject to no commands, prefers him against his will; and, in this one point, she disobeys him. Thus does Atreus yield to the glories of the great Agamemnon; thus does Theseus excel Ægeus, and thus Achilles Peleus. In fine, that I may use examples that equal themselves, thus too, is Saturn inferior to xv. 858-879. Jove. Jupiter rules the abodes of heaven and the realms of the threefold world:92 the earth is under Augustus: each of them is a father and a ruler. Ye Gods, the companions of Æneas,93 for whom both the sword and the flames made a way; and you, ye native Deities, and thou, Quirinus, the father of the City, and thou, Gradivus, the son of the invincible Quirinus, and thou, Vesta, held sacred among the Penates of Cæsar; and, with the Vesta of Cæsar, thou, Phœbus, enshrined in thy abode, and thou, Jupiter, who aloft dost possess the Tarpeian heights, and whatever other Deities it is lawful and righteous for a Poet to invoke; late, I pray, may be that day, and protracted beyond my life, on which the person of Augustus, leaving that world which he rules, shall approach the heavens: and when gone, may he propitiously listen to those who invoke him.
And now I have completed a work, which neither the anger of Jove, nor fire, nor steel, nor consuming time will be able to destroy! Let that day, which has no power but over this body of mine, put an end to the term of my uncertain life, when it will. Yet, in my better part, I shall be raised immortal above the lofty stars, and indelible shall be my name. And wherever the Roman power is extended throughout the vanquished earth, I shall be read by the lips of nations, and (if the presages of Poets have aught of truth) throughout all ages shall I survive in fame.
Explanation
The Poet having fulfilled his promise, and having brought down his work from the beginning of the world to his own times, concludes it with the apotheosis of Julius Cæsar. He here takes an opportunity of complimenting Augustus, as being more worthy of divine honours than even his predecessor, while he promises him a long and glorious reign. Augustus, however, had not to wait for death to receive divine honours, as he enjoyed the glory of seeing himself worshipped as a Deity and adored at altars erected to him, even in his lifetime. According to Appian, he was but twenty-eight years of age when he was ranked among the tutelar Divinities by all the cities of the empire.
The Romans, who deduced their origin from Æneas, were flattered at the idea of Venus interesting herself in behalf of her posterity, and securing the honours of an apotheosis for Julius Cæsar. The historical circumstances which Ovid here refers to were the following:—After Julius Cæsar had been murdered in the Senate house, Augustus ordered public games to be instituted in his honour. We learn from Suetonius, that during their celebration a new star, or rather a comet, made its appearance, on which it was promulgated that the soul of the deified Julius had taken its place among the stars, and that Venus had procured him that honour. It was then remembered, that the light of the Sun had been unusually pallid the whole year following the death of Cæsar; this which is generally supposed to have been caused by some spots which then appeared on the disk of the sun, was ascribed to the grief of Apollo. Various persons were found to assert various prodigies. Some said that it had rained blood, others that the moon and stars had been obscured; while others, still more imaginative, asserted that beasts had uttered words, and that the dead had risen from their graves.
The sorrow of the Gods and of nature at the untimely death of Julius being thus manifested, Augustus proceeded to found a temple in his honour, established priests for his service, and erected a statue of him with a star on its forehead. He was afterwards represented in the attitude of ascending to the heavens, and wielding a sceptre in his hand. While flatterers complimented Augustus upon the care which he had taken to enrol his predecessor among the Deities, there were some, the poet Manilius being of the number, who considered that heaven was almost over-peopled by him. Augustus, however, was not the sole author of the story of the apotheosis of Julius Cæsar. The people had previously attempted to deify him, though opposed by Cicero and Dolabella. In the funeral oration which was delivered over Julius Cæsar by Antony, he spoke of him as a God, and the populace, moved by his eloquence, and struck at his blood-stained garments and his body covered with wounds, were filled with indignation against the conspirators, and were about to take the corpse to the Capitol, there to be buried; but the priests would not permit it, and had it brought back to the Forum, where it was burnt. Dio Cassius says, that the Roman people raised an altar on the spot where the body had been burnt, and endeavoured to make libations and to offer sacrifices there, as to a Divinity, but that the Consuls overthrew the altar. Suetonius says, that a pillar was also erected to him, of about twenty feet in height, with the inscription, ‘parenti patriæ,’ ‘To the father of his country,’ and that for some time persons resorted to that spot to offer sacrifices and to make vows. He adds, that he was made a Divinity by a public decree, but he does not say at what time.
1. Lacinian shores.]—Ver. 13. Lacinium was a promontory of Italy, not far from Crotona.
2. Distant Æsar.]—Ver. 23. The Æsar was a little stream of Calabria, which flowed into the sea, near the city of Crotona.
3. Son of Amphitryon.]—Ver. 49. Hercules was the putative son of Amphitryon, king of Thebes, who was the husband of his mother Alcmena.
4. Tarentum.]—Ver. 50. Tarentum was a famous city of Calabria, said to have been founded by Taras, the son of Neptune. It was afterwards enlarged by Phalanthus, a Lacedæmonian, whence its present epithet.
5. Neæthus.]—Ver. 51. This was a river of the Salentine territory, near Crotona.
6. Thurium.]—Ver. 52. Thurium was a city of Calabria, which received its name from a fountain in its vicinity. It was also called Thuria and Thurion.
7. Fields of Iapyx.]—Ver. 52. Iapygia was a name which Calabria received from Iapyx, the son of Dædalus. There was also a city of Calabria, named Iapygia, and a promontory, called Iapygium.
8. And its rulers.]—Ver. 61. Pythagoras is said to have fled from the tyranny of Polycrates, the king of Samos.
9. No good adviser.]—Ver. 103. Clarke translates ‘Non utilis auctor,’ ‘Some good-for-nothing introducer.’
10. The goat is led.]—Ver 114. See the Fasti, Book I. l. 361.
11. Was Euphorbus.]—Ver. 161. Diogenes Laërtius, in the life of Pythagoras, says that Pythagoras affirmed, that he was, first, Æthalides; secondly, Euphorbus, which he proved by recognizing his shield hung up among the spoil in the temple of Juno, at Argos; next, Hermotimus; then, Pyrrhus and fifthly, Pythagoras.
12. Flowing onward.]—Ver. 178. ‘Cuncta fluunt’ is translated by Clarke, ‘All things are in a flux.’
13. Milo.]—Ver. 229. Milo, of Crotona, was an athlete of such stren[gth] that he was said to be able to kill a bull with a blow of his fist, and [then] to carry it with ease on his shoulders, and afterwards to devour it. [His] hands being caught within the portions of the trunk of a tree, which he was trying to cleave asunder, he became a prey to wild beasts.B
14. Lycus.]—Ver. 273. There were several rivers of this name. The one here referred to was also called by the name of Marsyas, and flowed past the city of Laodicea, in Lydia.
15. Erasinus.]—Ver. 276. This was a river of Arcadia, which running out of the Stymphalian marsh, under the name of Stymphalus, disappeared in the earth, and rose again in the Argive territory, under the name of Erasinus.
16. Amenanus.]—Ver. 279. This was a little river of Sicily, rising in Mount Ætna, and falling into the sea near the city of Catania.
17. Anigros.]—Ver. 282. The Anigros, flowing from the mountain of Lapitha, in Arcadia, had waters of a fetid smell, in which no fish could exist. Pausanias thinks that this smell proceeded from the soil, and not the water. He adds, that some said that Chiron, others that Polenor, when wounded by the arrow of Hercules, washed the wound in the water of this river, which became impure from its contact with the venom of the Hydra.
18. Hypanis.]—Ver. 285. Now the Bog. It falls into the Black Sea.
19. Antissa.]—Ver. 287. This island, in the Ægean Sea, was said to have been formerly united to Lesbos.
20. Pharos.]—Ver. 287. According to Herodotus, this island was once a whole day’s sail from the main land of Egypt. In later times, having been increased by the mud discharged by the Nile, it was united to the shore by a bridge.
21. Tyre.]—Ver. 288. Tyre once stood on an island, separated from the shore by a strait, seven hundred paces in width. Alexander the Great, when besieging it, united it to the main land by a causeway. This, however, does not aid the argument of Pythagoras, who intends to recount the changes wrought by nature, and not by the hand of man. Besides, it is not easy to see how Pythagoras could refer to a fact which took place several hundred years after his death.
22. Leucas.]—Ver. 289. The island of Leucas was formerly a peninsula, on the coast of Acarnania.
23. Zancle.]—Ver. 290. Under this name he means the whole of the isle of Sicily, which was supposed to have once joined the shores of Italy.
24. Helice and Buris.]—Ver. 293. We learn from Pliny the Elder and Orosius, that Helice and Buris, cities of Achaia at the mouth of the Corinthian gulf, were swallowed up by an earthquake, and that their remains could be seen in the sea. A similar fate attended Port Royal, in the island of Jamaica, in the year 1692. Its houses are said to be still visible beneath the waves.
25. The raging power.]—Ver. 299. Pausanias tells us, that in the time of Antigonus, king of Macedonia, warm waters burst from the earth, through the action of subterranean fires, near the city of Trœzen. Perhaps the ‘tumulus’ here mentioned sprang up at the same time.
26. Or the hide.]—Ver. 305. He alludes to the goat-skins, which formed the ‘utres,’ or leathern bottles, for wine and oil.
27. Horned Ammon.]—Ver. 309. The lake of Ammon, in Libya, which is here referred to, is thus described by Quintius Curtius (Book IV. c. 7)— ‘There is also another grove at Ammon; in the middle it contains a fountain, which they call ‘the water of the Sun.’ At daybreak it is tepid; at mid-day, when the heat is intense, it is ice cold. As the evening approaches, it grows warmer; at midnight, it boils and bubbles; and as the morning approaches, its midnight heat goes off.’ Jupiter was worshipped in its vicinity, under the form of a ram.
28. Athamanis.]—Ver. 311. This wonderful fountain was said to be in Dodona, the grove sacred to Jupiter.
29. Have a river.]—Ver. 313. Possibly the Hebrus is here meant. The petrifying qualities of some streams is a fact well known to naturalists.
30. The Crathis.]—Ver. 315. Crathis and Sybaris were streams of Calabria, flowing into the sea, near Crotona. Euripides and Strabo tell the same story of the river Crathis. Pliny the Elder, in his thirty-second Book, says— ‘Theophrastus tells us that Crathis, a river of the Thurians, produces whiteness, whereas the Sybaris causes blackness, in sheep and cattle. Men, too, are sensible of this difference; for those who drink of the Sybaris, become more swarthy and hardy, with the hair curling; while those who drink of the Crathis become fairer, and more effeminate with the hair straight.’
31. Salmacis.]—Ver. 319. See Book IV. l. 285.
32. Lake of Æthiopia.]—Ver. 320. Possibly these may be the waters of trial, mentioned by Porphyry, as being used among the Indians. He says, that, according to their influence on the person accused, when drunk of by him, he was acquitted or condemned.
33. Clitorian spring.]—Ver. 322. Clitorium was a town of Arcadia. Pliny the Elder, quoting from Varro, mentions the quality here referred to.
34. Son of Amithaon.]—Ver. 325. Melampus, the physician, the son of Amithaon, cured Mera, Euryale, Lysippe, and Iphianassa, the daughters of Prœtus, king of Argos, of madness, which Venus was said to have inflicted on them for boasting of their superior beauty. Their derangement consisted in the fancy that they were changed into cows. Melampus afterwards married Iphianassa. He was said to have employed the herb hellebore in the cure, which thence obtained the name of ‘melampodium.’
35. Lyncestis.]—Ver. 329. The Lyncesti were the people of the town of Lyncus, in Epirus. This stream flowed past that place.
36. Pheneos.]—Ver. 332. Pheneos was the name of a town of Arcadia, afterwards called ‘Nonacris.’ In its neighbourhood, according to Pausanias, was a rock, from which water oozed drop by drop, which the Greeks called ‘the water of Styx.’ At certain periods it was said to be fatal to men and cattle, to break vessels with which it came in contact, and to melt all metals. Ovid is the only author that mentions the difference in its qualities by day and by night.
37. Ortygia.]—Ver. 337. Ortygia, or Deloe, was said to have floated till it was made fast by Jupiter as a resting-place for Latona, when pregnant with Apollo and Diana. The Symplegades, or Cyanean Islands, were also said to have formerly floated.
38. Far Northern Pallene.]—Ver. 356. Pallene was the name of a mountain and a city of Thrace. Tritonis was a lake in the neighbourhood. Vibius Sequester says, ‘When a person has nine times bathed himself in the Tritonian lake, in Thrace, he is changed into a bird.’ The continuous fall of fleecy snow in that neighbourhood is supposed by some to have given rise to the story.
39. Give any credit.]—Ver. 361. This was a very common notion among the ancients. See the story of Aristæus and the recovery of his bees, in the Fourth Book of Virgil’s Georgics, I. 281-314. It is also told by Ovid in the Fasti, Book I. l. 377.
40. The warlike steed.]—Ver. 368. Pliny the Elder, Nicander, and Varro state that bees and hornets are produced from the carcase of the horse. Pliny also says, that beetles are generated by the putrefying carcase of the ass.
41. Deadly moth.]—Ver. 374. Pliny, in the twenty-eighth Book of his History, says, ‘The moth, too, that flies at the flame of the lamp, is numbered among the bad potions,’ evidently alluding to their being used in philtres or incantations. There is a kind called the death’s head moth; but it is so called simply from the figure of a skull, which appears very exactly represented on its body, and not on account of any noxious qualities known to be inherent in it.
42. Deprived of feet.]—Ver. 376. He alludes to frogs when in the tadpole state.
43. Not a cub.]—Ver. 379. This was long the common belief. Pliny says, speaking of the cub of the bear, ‘These are white and shapeless lumps of flesh, a little bigger than mice, without eyes, and without hair; the claws, however, are prominent. These the dams by degrees reduce to shape.’
44. Into a serpent.]—Ver. 390. Pliny tells the same story; and Antigonus (on Miracles, ch. 96) goes still further, and says, that the persons to whom this happens, after death, are able to smell the snakes while they are yet alive. The fiction, very probably, was invented with the praiseworthy object of securing freedom from molestation for the bones of the dead.
45. Changes its sex.]—Ver. 408. Pliny mentions it as a vulgar belief that the hyæna is male and female in alternate years. Aristotle took the pains to confute this silly notion.
46. Which feeds upon.]—Ver. 411. The idea that the chameleon subsists on wind and air, arose from the circumstance of its sitting with its mouth continually open, that it may catch flies and small insects, its prey. That it changes colour according to the hue of the surrounding objects, is a fact well known. It receives its name from the Greek χάμαι λέων, ‘The lion on the ground.’
47. Changed into stone.]—Ver. 415. Pliny says, that this becomes hard, and turns into gems, like the carbuncle, being of a fiery tint, and that the stone has the name of ‘lyncurium.’ Beckmann (Hist. Inventions) thinks that this was probably the jacinth, or hyacinth, while others suppose it to have been the tourmaline, or transparent amber.
48. A soft plant.]—Ver. 417. Modern improvement in knowledge has shown that coral is not a plant, but an animal substance.
49. Sparta was famed.]—Ver. 426-30. These lines are looked upon by many Commentators as spurious, as they are omitted in most MSS. Besides, all these cities were flourishing in the time of Pythagoras. If they are genuine, Ovid is here guilty of a series of anachronisms.
50. But one born.]—Ver. 447. This was Octavius, the adopted son of Julius Cæsar. According to Suetonius, he traced his descent, through his mother, from Ascanius or Iülus.
51. Ought not to fill.]—Ver. 462. Clarke’s quaint translation is, ‘And let us not cram our g—ts with Thyestian victuals.’
52. Feather foils.]—Ver. 475. He alludes to the ‘formido;’ which was made of coloured feathers, and was used to scare the deer into the toils.
53. Voluntarily invited.]—Ver. 481. He was living at the Sabine town of Cures, when the throne was pressed upon him by the desire of both the Roman and the Sabine nations.
54. City of Pittheus.]—Ver. 506. Pittheus was the son of Pelops, and the father of Æthra, the mother of Theseus; consequently he was the great-grandfather of Hippolytus.
55. Phlegethon.]—Ver. 532. This was said to be one of the rivers of the Infernal Regions, and to be flowing with fire and brimstone.
56. Pæonian aid.]—Ver. 536. Pæon was a skilful physician, mentioned by Homer, in the Fifth Book of the Iliad. Eustathius thinks that Apollo is meant under that name.
57. Virbius.]—Ver. 544. This name is formed from the words ‘vir’ and ‘bis,’ twice a man.
58. Am I devoted.]—Ver. 546. In the same relation to her as Adonis was to Venus, Ericthonius to Minerva, and Atys to Cybele.
59. Son of the Amazon.]—Ver. 552. Hippolytus was the son either of the Amazon Hippolyta, or Antiope.
60. Slender pine.]—Ver. 603-4. The words ‘succinctis pinetis’ are rendered by Clarke, ‘the neat pine-groves.’
61. The tripod.]—Ver. 635. The tripod on which the priestess of Apollo or ‘Pythia,’ sat when inspired, was called ‘Cortina,’ from the skin, ‘corium,’ of the serpent Python, which, when it had been killed by Apollo was used to cover it.
62. Epidaurus.]—Ver. 643. There were several towns of this name. The one here mentioned was in the state of Argolis.
63. Polished steps.]—Ver. 685. Clarke translates ‘Gradibus nitidis,’ ‘the neat steps.’
64. Is conspicuous aloft.]—Ver. 697. ‘Deus eminet alte.’ This is rendered by Clarke, ‘The God rears up to a good height.’
65. Scylacean.]—Ver. 702. Scylace was a town on the Calabrian coast; it was said to have been founded by an Athenian colony.
66. Amphissian.]—Ver. 703. Amphissia was the name of a city of Locris; but that cannot be the place here alluded to on the coast of Italy. It is most probably a corrupt reading.
67. Caulon.]—Ver. 705. Caulon was a colony of the Achæa on the coast of Calabria. Narycia, or Naritium, or Naricia, was also a town on the Calabrian coast. The localities of Ceraunia and Romechium are not known.
68. Leucosia.]—Ver. 708. Leucosia was a little island off the town of Pæstum, which was in Lucania; it was famous for its mild climate, and the beauty of its roses, which are celebrated by Virgil.
69. Capreæ.]—Ver. 709. Capreæ was an island near the coast of Naples.
70. Surrentine.]—Ver. 710. Surrentum was a city of Campania, famed for its wines.
71. City of Hercules.]—Ver. 711. This was Herculaneum, at the foot of Vesuvius; the place which shared so disastrous a fate from the eruption of that mountain.
72. Stabiæ.]—Ver. 711. This was a town of Campania, which was destroyed by Sylla in the Social war. It was afterwards rebuilt.
73. The warm springs.]—Ver. 711. He alludes to the city of Baiæ, famed for its warm springs and baths.
74. Linternum.]—Ver. 714. This place was in Campania. It was famous as the place of retirement of the elder Scipio; he was buried there.
75. Vulturnus.]—Ver. 715. This was a river of Campania, which flowed past the city of Capua.
76. Snow-white snakes.]—Ver. 715. Sinuessa was a town of Campania; Heinsius very properly suggests ‘columbis,’ ‘doves;’ for ‘colubris,’ ‘snakes.’ We are told by Pliny the Elder, that Campania was famed for its doves.
77. Minturnæ.]—Ver. 716. This was a town of Latium; the marshes in its neighbourhood produced pestilential exhalations.
78. She for whom.]—Ver. 716. This was Caieta, who, being buried there by her foster-child Æneas, gave her name to the spot.
79. Abode of Antiphates.]—Ver. 717. Formiæ.
80. Trachas.]—Ver. 717. This place was also called ‘Anxur.’ Its present name is Terracina. Livy mentions it as lying in the marshes.
81. Antium.]—Ver. 718. This was the capital of the ancient Volscians.
82. Castrum.]—Ver. 727. This was ‘Castrum Inui,’ or ‘the tents of Pan;’ an old town of the Rutulians.
83. Numidians.]—Ver. 754. The Numidians under Syphax, together with Juba, King of Mauritania, aided Cato, Scipio, and Petreius, who had been partizans of Pompey, against Julius Cæsar, and were conquered by him.
84. Pontus.]—Ver. 756. Cæsar conquered Pharnaces, the son of Mithridates, king of Pontus, in one battle. It was on this occasion, according to Suetonius, that his despatch was in the words, ‘Veni, Vidi, Vici,’ ‘I came, I saw, I conquered.’
85. Son of Atreus.]—Ver. 805. This was Menelaüs, from whom Paris was saved by Venus. See the Iliad, book III.
86. Mutina.]—Ver. 823. This was a place in Cisalpine Gaul, where Augustus defeated Antony, and took his camp.
87. Philippi.]—Ver. 824. Pharsalia was in Thessaly, and Philippi was in Thrace. He uses a poet’s license, in treating them as being the same battle-field, as they both formed part of the former kingdom of Macedonia. Pompey was defeated by Julius Cæsar at Pharsalia, while Brutus and Cassius were defeated by Augustus and Antony at Philippi. The fleet of the younger Pompey was totally destroyed off the Sicilian coast.
88. The wife.]—Ver. 826. Mark Antony was so infatuated as to divorce his wife, Octavia, that he might be enabled to marry Cleopatra.
89. Canopus.]—Ver. 828. This was a city of Egypt, situate on the Western mouth of the river Nile.
90. His hallowed wife.]—Ver. 836. Augustus took Livia Drusilla, while pregnant, from her husband, Tiberius Nero, and married her. He adopted her son Tiberius, and constituted him his successor.
91. With like years.]—Ver. 838. Julius Cæsar was slain when he was fifty-six years old. Augustus died in his seventy-sixth year.
92. Threefold world.]—Ver. 859. This is explained as meaning the realms of the heavens, the æther and the air; but it is difficult to guess exactly what is the Poet’s meaning here.
93. Companions of Æneas.]—Ver. 861. He probably refers to the Penates which Æneas brought into Latium. Dionysius of Halicarnassus says that he had seen them in a temple at Rome, and that they bore the figures of two youths seated and holding spears.