The Aeneid (41 page)

                But Caesar was riding into Rome in triple triumph, paying
                undying vows to the gods of Italy and consecrating three hundred
                great shrines throughout the city. The streets resounded
                with joy and festivities and applause. There was a chorus of
                matrons at every temple, at every temple there were altars and
                the ground before the altars was strewn with the bodies of
720         slaughtered bullocks. He himself was seated at the white marble
                threshold of gleaming white Apollo, inspecting the gifts brought
                before him by the peoples of the earth and hanging them high
                on the posts of the doors of the temple, while the defeated
                nations walked in long procession in all their different costumes
                and in all their different armour, speaking all the tongues of the
                earth. Here Mulciber, the God of Fire, had moulded the Nomads
                and the Africans with their streaming robes; here, too, the
                Lelegeians and Carians of Asia and the Gelonians from Scythia
                with their arrows. The Euphrates was now moving with a
                
chastened current, and here were the Gaulish Morini from the
                ends of the earth, the two-horned Rhine, the undefeated Dahae
                from beyond the Caspian and the river Araxes chafing at his
                bridge.

                Such were the scenes spread over the shield that Vulcan made
730         and Venus gave to her son. Marvelling at it, and rejoicing at the
                things pictured on it without knowing what they were, Aeneas
                lifted on to his shoulder the fame and the fate of his descendants.
¹

                While this was happening far away in Etruria, Juno, daughter
                of Saturn, sent Iris down from the sky to bold Turnus, who
                chanced at that moment to be sitting in a grove sacred to his
                ancestor Pilumnus. These were the words that came to him from
                the rosy lips of Iris, daughter of Thaumas: ‘There, Turnus, time
                in its ever-rolling course has brought you unasked what none
                of the gods would have dared to promise you if you had prayed
                for it – Aeneas has left his city, his allies and his fleet, and gone
10           to visit the royal seat of Evander on the Palatine. And as though
                that were not enough, he has travelled as far as the remotest
                cities of Corythus and is arming a band of Lydians, some country
                people he has collected. What are you waiting for? This is the
                moment to call for your horses and chariots. Do not allow any
                delay. Make a surprise attack on their camp and seize it.’ At
                these words she soared into the sky on poised wings, cutting in
                her flight a great rainbow under the clouds. The warrior knew
                her, and raising his hands palms upward to the stars, he called
                out to her as she flew: ‘Iris, glory of the sky, who has sent you
                here to me, riding the clouds down to the earth? Why this
20           sudden brightness in the air? I see the heights of heaven parting
                and stars wandering through the vault of the sky. I follow this
                great sign, whoever you are that call me to arms.’ When he had
                spoken these words, he walked to the river’s edge and scooped
                up in his hands the water from its surface as he offered up prayer
                upon prayer to the gods and burdened heaven with his vows.

                The whole army was soon moving across the open plain, rich
                in its horses, rich in embroidered apparel, rich in gold. The
                vanguard was controlled by Messapus, the rear by the sons of
                
Tyrrhus, while Turnus, the chief commander, was in the middle
30           of the column. It was like the Ganges fed by the steady flow of
                its seven rivers and silently rising, or like the fertile waters of the
                Nile when it withdraws from the plains and settles back at last
                into its own channel. The Trojans saw this distant cloud of
                black dust suddenly gathering and the darkness rising on the
                plain. Caicus was on the rampart on that side and he was the
                first to raise the alarm: ‘What is that ball of dark dust rolling
                along the plain? Fetch your weapons, fellow-citizens, and fetch
                them now! Give out missiles! Mount the walls! The enemy is
                upon us. To your posts!’ With a great clamour the Trojans
40           streamed in by all the gates to man the walls, for these were the
                orders they had received from Aeneas, the greatest of warriors,
                as he left them: if anything should happen in his absence, they
                were not to dare take up position for a pitched battle or trust
                themselves to the plain, but only to stay on the ramparts and
                defend the camp and the walls. So, though shame and anger
                urged them to join battle, they nevertheless obeyed orders and
                closed the gates against the enemy, waiting for them in full
                armour inside their towers.

                By this time Turnus had taken wing and gone on ahead of the
                 slow-moving column. With twenty picked horsemen he arrived
50           at the city before he was expected, riding a piebald Thracian
                charger and wearing his gold helmet shaded by red plumes. ‘Is
                there any man among you, my friends, will come with me and
                be first upon the enemy? There!’ he cried, and sent his javelin
                spinning into the air as a signal for battle, then, rising in the
                saddle he charged across the plain. His comrades took up the
                cry and followed him with blood-curdling shouts. They were
                amazed at the faint-heartedness of the Trojans. Why did they
                not commit themselves to a fair fight on the level plain? They
                were men. Why did they huddle in their camp and not meet
                arms with arms? Turnus in a fury prowled round the walls this
                way and that, searching for an approach where there was none,
60           like a wolf in the dead of night, lying in wait in all the wind and
                rain by a pen full of sheep, and growling at the gaps in the
                fence, while the lambs keep up their bleating, safe beneath their
                mothers; beside himself with anger he storms and rages but
                
cannot reach them; he is worn out by the ravening hunger he
                has been so long in gathering and many a day has passed since
                blood wet his throat – so did the Rutulian blaze with anger as
                he surveyed the walls of the Trojan camp and the pain burned
                him to the bone. How could he try to come at them? What
70           device could shake out the Trojans shut up there behind their
                rampart and spill them on to the plain? Ah! The fleet! There it
                was moored in a sheltered position along the side of the camp,
                protected by the water of the river, and to the landward by
                ramparts. There he made his attack. Burning with fury himself
                he demanded fire from his exultant comrades and took up a
                great blazing pine torch in his hand. At this they all bent to the
                task, with Turnus there to urge them on. They plundered what
                fires they could find, and their reeking torches smouldered with
                a pitchy light as Vulcan whirled to the stars dense clouds of
                smoke shot through with sparks.

                Tell me, Muses, what god turned these fierce flames away
                from the Trojans and drove such fire from their ships. The tale
                was told in times long past but the fame of it will live for ever.
80           When Aeneas was first building his fleet on Mount Ida in Phrygia
                and preparing to take to the high seas, Berecyntian Cybele
                herself, the Mother of the Gods, is said to have addressed these
                words to great Jupiter: ‘O my son, grant my prayer. Now that
                Olympus is subdued, grant what your dear mother asks of you.
                On top of my citadel I had a wood of pine trees which I had
                loved for many years, a dark grove of black pine and maple
                where men would bring their offerings. These trees I gladly gave
                to the Trojan warrior when he needed a fleet, but now my heart
90           is seized by anxiety and dread. Put all my fears at rest and
                answer your mother’s prayer. Grant that my ships should not
                be wrecked on any of their voyages or overwhelmed by any
                squall of wind. Let it stand to their favour that they were born
                on our mountains.’ Her son, who turns the stars of heaven in
                their courses, made this reply to his mother: ‘What is this you
                are calling on the Fates to do? What do these words of yours
                mean? Are ships made by mortal hands to have immortal rights?
                Is Aeneas to face all his doubts and dangers and never know
                uncertainty? Is there any god to whom such a privilege has been
                
granted? No. But when the ships have done their duty, when in
                due course they reach the end of their voyaging and are safe in
                harbour in Ausonia, each one to survive the sea and reach the
100         Laurentine fields with the Trojan leader will lose its mortal
                shape. I shall order all of them to become goddesses of the great
                ocean, like Galatea and Doto, daughters of Nereus, whose
                breasts cleave the foam of the waves of the sea.’ Jupiter had
                spoken, ratifying his words by the waters of the Styx, his
                brother’s river, by the banks and dark whirlpools of that pitch-black
                torrent, and at his nod the whole of Olympus shook.

                And so the promised day had come and the Fates had completed
                the allotted time, when the violent attack of Turnus
                warned the Mother Goddess to defend her sacred ships from
110         these burning brands. A strange light now shone before men’s
                eyes and a great cloud seemed to cross the sky from the east,
                bearing with it votaries of the goddess from Mount Ida. A
                fearsome voice then fell from the air and filled the ears of Trojans
                and Rutulians in their armed ranks: ‘Do not trouble, Trojans,
                to defend my ships. Do not take your weapons in your hands.
                Turnus will burn the sea dry before he can burn these sacred
                pine trees. Go then! You are freed. Go, you goddesses of the
                sea! The Mother of the Gods commands.’ In an instant every
120         ship burst the ropes that moored it to the bank, and they plunged
                like dolphins, beak first to the bottom. When they returned to
                the surface, they were miraculously changed, each one a nymph
                swimming in the sea.

                The Rutulians were astonished. Messapus himself was afraid
                and his horses reared. Even Tiber checked his flow with a harsh
                roaring of his waters as he called back his current from the sea.
                But the boldness and confidence of Turnus never wavered.
                Without hesitation he set about haranguing his men and whipping
                up their spirits: ‘These portents strike at the Trojans: they
                mean that Jupiter has taken from them the help they have
130         become accustomed to. The ships did not wait to taste Rutulian
                fire and sword! So now the seas are barred to the Trojans and
                they have no hope of escape. By this they have lost one half of
                the world, and the land is already in our hands, so many thousands
                of men are marching under arms from all the races of
                
Italy. This Phrygian talk of destiny and the oracles of the gods
                does not dismay me. Destiny and Venus were satisfied the
                moment Trojans set foot on the fertile fields of Italy. I too have
                a destiny, of a different sort – to cut down with the sword this
                vicious people that has robbed me of my bride. The sons of
                Atreus are not the only ones who have suffered, and the people
                of Mycenae are not the only men who can take up arms. Let
140         them not imagine it is enough to have been destroyed once! It
                should have been enough for them to sin once. They had no
                need to show loathing and contempt for every woman in the
                world. Look at them now, all courage and confidence because
                of this rampart that keeps us from them and these ditches they
                have dug to hold us back. This is no sort of barrier to stand
                between them and death. Did they not see the walls of Troy
                settling into the flames? And those were fashioned by the hands
                of Neptune. You are my chosen few. Which one of you is ready
                to cut through their rampart with the sword and rush into that
                camp of cowards? To fight Trojans I do not need the armour
                Vulcan made for Achilles. I do not need a thousand ships, not
150         if every man in Etruria went and joined them as allies this
                instant. Nor do they need to be frightened of the dark. We shall
                not be creeping up on them like cowards to kill the guards all
                over their citadel and steal their Palladium. We shall not be
                hiding in the blind belly of a horse. Our plan is to come in
                daylight in full view and gird their walls with fire. I shall soon
                make sure they realize it is not Greeks they have to deal with or
                the army of Pelasgians Hector held off into a tenth year. But the
                best part of the day is already spent. For what remains of it you
                can now rest yourselves. You have done well. Be of good cheer,
                in high hopes that we can bring them to battle.’ Meanwhile
160         Messapus was given the task of blockading the gates with a
                night guard and ringing the walls with watch-fires. Fourteen
                Rutulians were chosen to keep watch on the walls, each commanding
                a hundred men with purple crests on their helmets and
                gleaming with gold. They dispersed, some going to their various
                duties, others lying out on the grass, enjoying their wine and
                tipping up the bronze mixing bowls. The watch-fires burned
                and the guards kept awake by gaming the night away.