The Aeneid (45 page)

                Now Mars, mighty in war, put new spirit and strength into
                the Latins and twisted a sharp goad into their flesh, while
720         sending Flight and black Fear upon the Trojans. Now that their
                chance had come to fight, the Latins gathered from all sides and
                the God of War stormed their hearts. When Pandarus saw his
                brother stretched out in death and knew how his fortunes stood
                and the turn events were taking, he put his broad shoulder to
                the gate with all his force and heaved it shut on its hinges,
                leaving many of his own people cut off outside the walls with a
                hard battle to fight, but taking in those who came running, and
                shutting them in with himself. Fool that he was! He did not see
                
the Rutulian king bursting into the city in the middle of the
730         press. By his own act he penned him in like a great tiger among
                helpless cattle. In that instant a new light shone from the eyes
                of Turnus. He clashed his armour with a fearsome noise, the
                blood-red crest trembled on his head, his shield flashed lightning.
                Suddenly Aeneas’ men recognized him – the hated face, the huge
                body – and were thrown into confusion. But the giant Pandarus
                leapt forward to confront him, burning with anger at the death
                of his brother: ‘This is not your bridal chamber in the palace of
                Amata!’ he shouted. ‘Turnus is not safe in the middle of Ardea
                behind his father’s walls. This is the camp of your enemies and
740         there is no way out.’ Turnus replied, smiling calmly: ‘If there is
                any courage in you, then come and fight. You will soon be able
                to tell Priam that here too you found an Achilles!’ At these
                words Pandarus took a spear of rough, knotted wood with its
                bark unplaned and hurled it with all his force. As it flew to
                wound Turnus, the winds caught it, Juno deflected it and it
                lodged in the gate. ‘You will not escape this weapon of mine,’
                called out Turnus, ‘which I brandish here in my right hand. This
                sword is wielded by a different arm, and gives a deeper wound.’
                With these words he lifted it above his head, rising with it, and
750         struck Pandarus between the temples. The blade went straight
                through the middle of the forehead and parted the smooth,
                young cheeks. The wound was hideous. He fell with a crash and
                the ground shook with the weight of him. As he lay dying he
                strewed around his nerveless limbs and armour blooded with
                brains, and the two halves of his head hung on his two shoulders.

                The Trojans turned and ran in terror. If at that moment the
                victor had thought of breaking the bolts and letting his comrades
                in through the gates, that would have been the end of the war
760         and the end of the Trojan race, but instead his mad lust for
                blood drove him upon his enemies in an ecstasy of passion. First
                he caught Phaleris and Gyges, slitting his hamstrings. He then
                took their spears, and with Juno lending him strength and spirit,
                he hurled them into the backs of the retreating enemy. Next he
                sent Halys to keep them company and Phegeus, the spear passing
                through his shield; then Alcander, Halius, Noemon and Prytanis,
                who were on the walls in the thick of battle and did not
                
know he was inside. Now Lynceus was coming at him and
                calling on his comrades for help. Turnus from the rampart on
770         his right stopped him short with one flashing stroke of his sword,
                a blow from close range that severed the head and sent it flying
                far from the body, helmet and all. Next he brought down
                Amycus, that mighty hunter and slayer of wild beasts – no man
                better to charge the spear-point with poison or smear the tip of
                the arrow; then Clytius, son of Aeolus, and Cretheus, that dear
                companion of the Muses, Cretheus, a great lover of song and of
                the lyre, a great setter of poems to the strings, always singing
                of horses and armour and the battles of heroes.

                At last the Trojan leaders, Mnestheus and the bold Serestus,
                hearing of the slaughter of their men, came on the scene to find
780         their allies scattering and the enemy within the walls. ‘Where
                are you running to now, citizens?’ cried Mnestheus. ‘Where is
                there to go? What other walls have you? What other defences
                when you leave these? Can one man, and one man hemmed in
                on every side by your ramparts, cause all this slaughter and send
                so many of your best fighting men to their deaths all over your
                city, and still live? Have you no spirit? Have you no shame? No
                thought for your fatherland in its anguish, for your ancient gods
                or for great Aeneas?’ These words fired them. They rallied and
                held fast in close formation while Turnus gradually began to
790         disengage, making for the river and the part of the camp in the
                bend of the river. Seeing this the Trojans laid on all the harder,
                shouting at the top of their voices and crowding him like a pack
                of huntsmen with levelled spears pressing hard on a savage lion;
                the lion is afraid and gives ground, but he is still dangerous, still
                glaring at his attackers; his anger and his courage forbid him to
                turn tail, and though he would dearly love to, he cannot charge
                through the wall of steel and the press of men – just so did
                Turnus give ground, uncertain but unhurried, and his mind was
800         boiling with rage. Twice he even hurled himself into the middle
                of his enemies, breaking their ranks and sending them flying
                along the walls, but a whole army came together in a rush
                against him from the camp, and Juno, daughter of Saturn, did
                not dare to renew his strength to withstand them, for Jupiter
                sent Iris down from the sky bearing stern commands through
                
the air for his sister Juno if Turnus did not withdraw from the
                high walls of the Trojans. So sword-arm and shield were of no
                avail. The warrior could no longer stand his ground in the hail
                of weapons that overwhelmed him from every side. The helmet
                rang and rang again on his hollow temples and the solid bronze
810         was cracked by rocks. The plumes were torn from his head and
                the boss of his shield gave way under the blows. The Trojans
                doubled their barrage and the spear of Mnestheus was like the
                lightning. Sweat poured off the whole body of Turnus like a
                river of pitch and he was given no breathing space. His lungs
                were heaving. He was shaking and sick with weariness. Then,
                and only then, he dived head first into the river in full armour.
                The Tiber took him when he came into his yellow tide, bore him
                up in his soft waves, washing away the blood of slaughter, and
                gave him back in high heart to his comrades.

                Meanwhile the house of All-powerful Olympus was thrown
                open and the Father of Gods and King of Men summoned a
                council to his palace among the stars, from whose steep heights
                he looked down upon all the lands of the earth, upon the Trojan
                camp and the peoples of Latium. The gods sat in their chamber
                open east and west to the light, and Jupiter began to speak: ‘O
                great dwellers in the sky, why have you gone back on your
                word? Why do you contend with such bitterness of heart? I had
                forbidden Italy to clash with the Trojans. Why is there discord
10           against my express command? What has made them afraid and
                induced them to take up arms and make each other draw the
                sword? The time will come for war – there is no need to hasten
                it – when barbarous Carthage will let destruction loose upon
                the citadels of Rome, opening up the Alps and sending them
                against Italy. That will be the time for pillaging, and for hate to
                vie with hate. But now let it be. A treaty has been decided upon.
                Accept it, and be content.’

                These were the few words spoken by Jupiter, but when golden
                Venus replied, her words were not few: ‘O father, imperishable
                power over men and over all the world – how could there be
20           any other to whom we might address our prayers? – you see the
                Rutulians rampant and Turnus riding in glory in the midst of
                them, swollen with the success of his arms. A closed ring of
                fortifications no longer offers protection to the Trojans. They
                now have to fight hand to hand inside their gates, even on the
                ramparts of their walls, and their ditches are swimming with
                blood. Aeneas is far away and knows nothing of this. Will you
                never allow them to be free of besiegers? Even as Troy is being
                
reborn, a new enemy is threatening its walls with a new army
                behind him, and from Arpi the Aetolian Diomede is once more
                rising against the Trojans. I suppose I shall soon be wounded
30           again – after all, mortals are at war and your daughter stands in
                their way!

                ‘If the Trojans have come to Italy without your approval, in
                defiance of your heavenly will, they must be punished for their
                sins and you must not raise a finger to help them. But if they
                have obeyed all the commands they have received from the gods
                above and the shades below, how can anyone overturn what
                you have ordered or fashion a new destiny? You have seen their
                ships burned on the shores of my own son Eryx. You have seen
                the king of the storms and his raging winds roused out of their
                Aeolian island. You have seen Iris driven down from the clouds.
                And now she even turns to the one remaining part of the world
40           and stirs up the powers below – Allecto has suddenly been let
                loose upon the earth and has run wild through all the cities in
                the middle of Italy! I no longer give a thought to empire. That
                was our hope, as you well know, while our fortunes remained.
                But those who must prevail are those you wish to prevail. If
                there is no region on earth that your cruel queen could concede
                to the Trojans, I beg of you, father, by the smoking ruins of the
                sacked city of Troy, allow me to take Ascanius safely out of the
                war. Allow my grandson to live. As for Aeneas, let him be tossed
                by storms in unknown waters and go the road that Fortune
50           gives him, but grant me the power to protect Ascanius and take
                him out of this fearful battle. I have Amathus. I have lofty
                Paphos, and Cythera, and my palace at Idalium. Let him lay
                down his arms and there live out his life in obscurity, while you
                give the order for Italy to be crushed beneath the mighty empire
                of Carthage. The cities of Tyre will have nothing to fear from
                Ascanius. What good has it done him to escape the plague of
                war and come safe through the middle of all the fires of the
                Greeks, to have drained the cup of danger over all the vast earth
                and sea while the Trojans have been searching for Latium and
                a new Pergamum? Would it not have been better for them to
60           settle on the dead ashes of their native land, on the soil that was
                once Troy? Take pity on them, I beg you, and if the wretched
                
Trojans must live again the fall of Troy, give them back their
                Xanthus and their Simois.’

                At this Juno, Queen of Heaven, burst out, wild with rage:
                ‘Why do you force me to break my deep silence? The scars have
                formed over my wounds. Why do you make me speak and
                reopen them? Neither man nor god compelled Aeneas to choose
                the ways of war and confront king Latinus as an enemy. We are
                told he has the authority of the Fates for coming to Italy. The
                Fates, indeed! He was goaded into it by the ravings of Cassandra!
                And did we urge him to abandon his camp or put his life at
70           the mercy of the winds? Did we advise him to entrust his
                fortifications and the whole management of the war to a boy?
                To disturb the loyalty of the Etruscans and stir up a peaceful
                people? Was it a god that drove him to dishonesty? Was it some
                cruel power of mine? Where is Juno in all this? Where is Iris
                sent down from the clouds? It is wrong, we hear, for Italians to
                ring Troy with fire at the moment of its birth, and for Turnus
                to take his stand in the land of his fathers, Turnus, whose
                grandfather was Pilumnus and whose mother was the goddess
                Venilia. Why then is it right for Trojans to raise the blacksmoking
                torches of war against Latins, to put other men’s lands
                under their yoke, to carry off plunder, to pick and choose who
                are to be their fathers-in-law, to tear brides from their mothers’
80           laps and to hold out the olive branch of peace with their weapons
                fixed on the high sterns of their ships? You can steal Aeneas
                away from the hands of the Greeks, and where there was a man
                you can spread a cloud with empty winds. You can change ships
                into sea nymphs. Is it an impiety if we in our turn have given
                some help to the Rutulians? Aeneas, you tell us, is far away and
                knows nothing of all this. Keep him in ignorance and let him
                stay away! You have Paphos and Idalium. You have the heights
                of Cythera. Why do you concern yourself with those roughhearted
                Italians and their city teeming with war? You claim
                we are trying to overturn from the foundations the tottering
                fortunes of these Phrygians from Troy. No! Who was it who
90           put your wretched Trojans at the mercy of the Greeks? What
                caused Europe and Asia to rise in arms and betray the sacred
                ties of friendship? Was I in the lead when the Trojan adulterer
                
stormed the walls of Sparta? Did I hand him his weapons? Was
                it I who kindled the fires of war with lust? That was when you
                should have feared for your people. Now, when it is too late,
                you get to your feet with these complaints and lies, and hurl this
                empty abuse.’