Caroline Lee schrieb: > In Book VI, Aeneaus descends to the underworld. At the end of Book VI, we > are told that there are two gates through which dreams and ghosts ascend to > the world above: true ones pass through the gates of horn, false ones > through the gates of ivory. After his visit to the realm of the dead, we > are told, Aeneas and the Sibyl return to the world above through the gates > of ivory. I am stumped by the implications for what Aeneas has just > witnessed and the future of his epic.
Sehr gut beobachtet! a real problem. Eduard Norden: "P.Vergilius Maro, Aeneis Buch VI" (Teubner, Leipzig/Stuttgart 1927/1995) page 348 f about verse 893 ff: "... Die richtige Deutung gab W.Everett, Class. review XIV (1900) 153 f. Es war ein weit verbreiteter Glaube, da� die falschen Tr�ume vor und die wahren nach Mitternacht k�men (...), eine von Vergil selbst bei den von ihm erz�hlten Traumerscheinungen befolgte Vorstellung (z.B. 8,26.67). Wenn Aeneas also durch das Tor der falschen Tr�ume entlassen wird, so liegt darin nichts weiter als die Zeitbestimmung 'vor Mitternacht'. Die katabasis begann bei Morgengrauen (255); 535 ff ist es Nachmittag geworden und die Sibylle dr�ngt, das datum tempus auszunutzen; vor Mitternacht, d.h. der Stunde, zu der die Toten die Oberwelt besuchen d�rfen (vgl. 5,719-39), mu� die anabasis des Lebenden vollzogen sein." in my bad English (please excuse my mistakes, maybe your German is better): "... W.Everett, Class. review XIV (1900) 153 f gave the right interpretation. It was a common belief that false dreams would come before midnight and true dreams after midnight (...); Vergil himself follows this idea in those dream-tales, which are told by himself, (for example 8,26.67). That Aeneas leaves through the portal for false dreams means nothing else than: the point of time is situated "before midnight". His katabasis began in the early dawn (255); 535 ff it has become afternoon and Sibylla forces him to take the chance of the "datum tempus"; before midnight - that means before the hour in which the dead are allowed to visit their living relatives in the upper world (compare 5,719-39) - the anabasis has to be done by the living person (by living Aeneas)." grusz, hansz ----------------------------------------------------------------------- To leave the Mantovano mailing list at any time, do NOT hit reply. Instead, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message "unsubscribe mantovano" in the body (omitting the quotation marks). You can also unsubscribe at http://virgil.org/mantovano/mantovano.htm#unsub
