< Re shield discussion. Does the shield serve as a reminder of the sequence in Book VI where Aeneas is told of his and his successors future? Yet another reminder of the destiny of the Roman race that he will see established - he has always seemed in the previous books to need a lot of reminders of his "destiny"!
ah, destiny- well, if you look at it, Aeneas faces "his" destiny through all 12 books, but is told of it in several specific places- the Shield and the Underworld are the two most obvious, where he actually sees the future.
However, in book 2, Venus removes the cloud from his eyes so he can see it is the gods who destroy Troy, while Creusa tells him to mourn her, but to move on to the land he is destined for.
In book 4, Aeneas is once again told of his destiny when he must leave Dido and carthage- it is not his fate to stay there.
Both of these involve Aeneas' destiny, but the Shield is the first real tangible object which Aeneas has- the rest are either words or shades- remember, he WAS in the underworld in book 6, so I don't think we should picture human figures.
I'm sure there are others people can bring up, but it does appear the image of the shield (even though aeneas does not know exactly what it means) is very much a defining moment in the book.
Is there a better way to keep his destiny before him and his enemies, than the engraved shield?
Short answer- NO!!!!
Cf too the shield allegedly taken by Alexander when he visited the "tomb of Achilles" and took away what was reputed to be the hero's shield. Virgil surely had that in mind at some point.
Conections with Alexander seem most apt- Augustus certainly had great admiration for the Macedonian prince- and emulation of his conquests can be seen in the poetry of the period, certainly.
Cheers, Jim
______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 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
