*WARM UP

*Make a list of how many Greek gods you can name (from memory).

*How many Roman gods can you name (from memory?

*Just jot them down in two columns on a sheet of paper

*Intro to The Aeneid

*The History of Virgil

*Around the 8th century, Homer wrote The Odyssey and The Iliad. The Odyssey was considered an epic poem. It contains dactylic hexameter.

*The story takes places during the Trojan War and follows King Agamemnon’s exploits and later, Odysseus.

*Virgil was born centuries later when the Roman Empire had taken over the Greek reign. He was born in 70 BC. Even though he was born to farmers, he was thoroughly educated in Greek and Roman literature, including Homer’s works.

*The Politics of Rome

*For the first 38 years of Virgil’s life, Rome was in the middle of civil strife. Virgil was deeply patriotic and the conflict concerned him.

*After Augustus (also known as Julius Caesar’s nephew) proved himself as the victorious rule of Rome, the nation experienced a time of peace.

*Augustus wanted to establish a time of “rebirth” for Rome.

*The Aeneid

*Virgil decided to model an epic poem after Homer’s works in order to portray an ideal Rome and arouse patriotic morale.

*He selects the character of Aeneas from The Iliad, who was the last of the defeated Trojans and who later establishes Rome. It took Virgil 11 years to write and he died before completing it.

*Aeneas was the second cousin of Priam and third cousin to Hector. He is favored by the god, Apollo, and supposedly a son of Aphrodite.

*The poem won Virgil the admiration of Augustus and made him instantly famous in Rome.

*Why read this?

*Virgil used his poem as a vehicle for “profound meditations on the human condition, on character and moral judgment, on war and peace, on conflict of duties, on the states, and on history.”

*Some helpful keys

*The gods: Virgil constantly refers to various Roman gods who are suspiciously like the Greek gods. The Romans took on many aspects of Greek culture when they overtook the Greek empire.

*Just like our familiar tale Beowulf, The Aeneid has “flashbacks” or media res.