Chapter Themes of The Aeneid - Study Guide by Virgil

at persuasion and slurs upon his character are brilliantly captured by the poet. In addition, the fact that it is told from her, rather than his, point of view means that we are not explicitly aware of what Aeneas is feeling, with the result that, at the same time as sympathising with Dido, we do not know where to lay the blame for her suffering. Is it due to Aeneas' hard-heartedness, the decree of fate or the gods, or her own misreading of the situation? As is usual with Virgil, there is no clear answer. We are left to decide for ourselves, and thus the episode has provided much substance for debate and disagreement. One cannot read it without forming an opinion.

This lack of clarity over blame was familiar to the ancients, as it is a fundamental component of Greek tragedy and it is Greek tragedy that the episode most closely resembles. Time and again, we are prompted by Virgil to think in these terms. When she sees the Trojans preparing to depart, Dido is described as raging around the city like a Bacchant (4.300-303), recalling Euripides' play the Bacchae. She sees herself in her dreams as being like Pentheus, the tragic hero from the same play, or like Orestes escaping from the ghost of his mother Clytemnestra and from the Furies, as in Aeschylus' Eumenides (4.469- 473). Interestingly, the latter comparisons are explicitly to these characters on the stage, and not simply to the characters in the legends and thus Virgil emphasises the comparison to tragedy as a literary form, rather than simply to its mythical content. Finally, at the end of the book, just prior to her death, Dido asks herself why she did not tear Aeneas limb from limb and scatter the pieces into the sea or else kill Ascanius and serve his flesh as food at his father's table (4.600-602). Both proposed acts are lifted from Greek mythology (Medea's murder of her brother, and Atreus' punishment of his brother Thyestes, respectively). The latter was the subject of no extant Greek tragedy, but of three Roman tragedies - Ennius' Thyestes, Accius' Atreus and Varius' Thyestes. The former points up the similarity between Dido and Medea, the great mythological and tragic paradigm for a woman sent mad by the betrayal of her love. Indeed, the links between Dido and Medea are apparent throughout Book 4, for example in her description and use of magic (4.474-499).

The structure of Book 4 also causes us to recall Greek tragedy. We find the verbal contests between two characters ('agones'), as well as the reversal of fortune ('peripeteia') and recognition ('anagnorisis') that Aristotle demanded in all good tragedy. The latter two are represented by the departure of Aeneas and Dido's realisation of the position that she has sunk to as a result of her obsession. Her suicide is caused not so much by (in her eyes) Aeneas' betrayal as by her own awareness of how easily she neglected the oath she had made to Sychaeus, of how she has made herself look foolish in front of her people and her enemies, and of how untenable her position as leader of the Carthaginians now is. When we first meet her she is a proud, powerful, glorious queen, likened to Diana (1.498-504). By the time of her death, she has been humbled, a victim of both cosmic and human forces, a broken women, yet still proud and noble enough to see that she can no longer continue living without her former honour intact. In truth, a genuine tragic heroine.

If we pity Dido, what then are we to make of Aeneas' actions? We cannot fault him for leaving, since he is ordered to do so by Jupiter and any refusal on his part would undercut his specifically Roman heroic quality - his 'pietas' - and present him as little more than a self- interested charlatan. However, we must ask whether his treatment of Dido after his visit from Mercury is that of a man struggling with his own emotions and deciding that explaining exactly how he feels is counter-productive both to himself and the queen, or whether he makes a cowardly decision to avoid an awkward encounter. It is a question that has divided critics for centuries. The fact that Book 4 is written from Dido's point of view means that there is no clear insight into Aeneas' state of mind. Virgil does not make it evident whether Aeneas felt any love for her. Yet there are some signs to suggest that he did, a conclusion which would present him in a more heroic light since he would be subjugating feelings similar to those of Dido to the necessity to follow the will of fate and the gods. His love for her seems to be demonstrated in several places. Firstly, at 4.281, his desire to escape Carthage is expressed, but the lands are described as 'dulcis'("pleasant"). Given the highly subjective style of Book 4, which tends, even in the narrative, to take one into the mind of the person described, the 'terras' can only be 'dulcis' to Aeneas because of Dido. Secondly, at 4.331- 2, Aeneas' reaction to Dido's first attack and appeal is described as follows, 'obnixus curam sub corde premebat' (he struggled to hold down the pain in his heart). The use of the word 'curam' is notable because