639. 'sunt' understood as often.

'Wrought coverlets there are, and of proud purple: massive silver on the boards, and carved in gold the brave deeds of their sires, a long line of noble exploits, from the ancient rise of the race through many a hero'.

[643-656. Aeneas sends for Ascanius and bids him bring gifts.] 643. consistere, 'to rest'.

644 rapidum, poetic adj. for adv. as so often: here it is even more convenient, as the adv. is wanted for Achates not for Aeneas, and rapide would be ambiguous.

645. ferat, oblique jussive, depending on praemittit, lit. 'sends him, let him tell', i. e. sends him forward bidding him tell.

646. in Ascanio stat, 'cleaves to Ascanius'. Stat implies 'firmly

rooted'.

648. palla, a long dress worn by women reaching to the feet. 650. Argivae...Mycenis. Mycenae and Argos were two towns some miles off one another, but in the poets both are spoken of as the home of Agamemnon, and Menelaus the husband of Helen. Homer, Agamemnon is king of Mycenae and Menelaus of Sparta. In Aeschylus they are joint kings of Argos.

651. Pergama, Troy.

In

The 'forbidden marriage' is meant for Paris who carried her off from Greece to Troy, and so caused the Trojan war. (peterēt old quantity.)

652. Leda was the mother (by Iuppiter) of Helen and Clytaem

nestra.

655. bacatum, 'beaded'.

duplicem gemmis auroque coronam: 'double circlet of gold and jewels' is what he means: but the construction is 'circlet double with gold and jewels', a Vergilian variation, like virgulta sonantia lauro.

duplicem must mean that there are two rings of gold fastened together.

[657-694. Venus plans to send Cupid instead of Ascanius, and entreats her son to carry out the plan, and so to inflame Dido with love for Aeneas. Ascanius shall be hidden far away, in sleep: Cupid agrees.] 658. Cupido, the son of Venus.

faciem mutatus et ora, either middle 'changing his form and feature' or passive 'his form and feature changed' (see 228): the latter is more probable, as Venus does it for him, not he for himself.

659. furentem, the result of the verb (proleptic): 'kindle to madness'.

661. Surely she fears the treacherous house, the double-tongued Tyrians'. The 'faithlessness' of the Carthaginians was a common slander among the Roman writers: Livy accuses Hannibal of 'perfidia plusquam Punica'. So Vergil makes the brother Pygmalion a base traitor (346): and Venus attributes Dido's welcome to craft (670).

The thought in bilingues (as in the English 'double-tongued') is probably the old superstition that the snake had two tongues. (Cf. the old song, 'ye spotted snakes with double tongue'.)

662. urit atrox Iuno, 'Iuno's wrath vexes her', i. e., the thought of it. 665. Typhoia. Typhoeus was a monster with 100 heads produced by the Earth to revenge the death of the Titans whom Jove slew. But Typhoeus himself was slain by another thunderbolt. So 'tela Typhoia' means 'bolts such as slew Typhoeus', rather a stretch of meaning. The sense is of course the supreme power of Love.

667. ut, 'how'.

668. iactetur: so ingreditur G. III. 76, obruimūr A. II. 211, datūr v. 284: [but it does not appear that this is one of the archaisms of Vergil].

669. nota, poet. variation for the common notum. In Greek it is common ἀδύνατα, γνωτά, δεινά, πότερα.

671. 'I fear whither may end this welcome of Iuno's'.

vertant, deliberative, lit. 'whither it is to end' like nescio quo eam, 'I don't know whither to go': it might be simple indirect question 'whither is turning', but the other is more natural.

Iunonia, Venus instead of saying, 'Dido's welcome' says naturally 'Iuno's'. Iuno was her foe: she was planning all this delay at Carthage it is of Iuno she is thinking here, as cessabit shews.

672. She will not be idle at such a turning-point of fortune'. cardo (the socket in which the gate-post turns), often used thus figuratively, like English 'to turn on', 'turning-point'.

674. that no power may change her': another hint at Iuno.

675. mecum teneatur, 'bound to me', variation of phrase, literally 'kept with me'.

The other int. of mecum, 'like me' (pariter atque ego), is hardly possible. A mother's love could not be compared by Vergil to the love of man and woman. Venus wants to keep Dido in her party and prevent her going over to the enemy: hence the siege-metaphor of 673. 676. qua, 'how' adv. as 682.

678. mea maxima cura: hence she takes care that no harm shall happen to him, 680.

679. pelago et flammis, either dat. after restantia ‘surviving', like the dat. with superstes, superesse: or perhaps more likely abl. 'saved from '.

680-1. Cythera, 257. Idalium a town and hill in Cyprus, 415. 682. medius for adv. as often: 'or come between'.

683. non amplius, often used idiomatically thus, without changing the case of the subst. So non plus quingentos, non amplius quattuor millia passuum, non amplius unum.

686. laticem Lyaeum, 'the flow of wine', Lyaeus (here used adj.) a name of Bacchus.

688. fallasque veneno, ‘and poison unawares', fallere regularly used of acting unseen.

692-4. Notice the soft and liquid rhythm and sound, to describe the lulling of the divine slumber.

dea after Venus, the action of bearing him of and lulling him with sleep being an act of divine power, see note on 256.

694. Cradles him in flowers, and wraps him in the breath or its sweet shade'.

[695-722. Cupid finds the queen seated, the guests coming, the servants ordering the feast. He clasps his father, then embraces and is cherished by Dido, and begins his wiles.]

696. duce laetus Achate, ‘glad in the guidance of Achates', the abl. of attendant circumstances (the same thing practically as the abl. abs.) here in close connexion with laetus.

697. aulaeis superbis, the same abl. again, ‘amid proud hangings'. 698. aurea, two syllables as often, ea having been slurred into one (synizesis). So aureis, 726.

mediam, 'in the midst' of the hall and the guests.

701. manibus, ‘upon their hands', the guests'.

702. expediunt, here 'serve': for the phraseology see 177.

tonsis villis, ‘close-clipped nap', [villis connected with vellus, oûλos, Féplov, and our wool]. The clothes are rich and soft.

703. quibus ordine longam cura penum struere, 'whose task it is duly to pile a long store of food', i. e. a store to last a long while: a strange use of longa, but confirmed by a later poet (Auson. III. 27) who (thinking very likely of this passage) says cui non longa penus, huic quoque prompta fames.

[The MSS. all but Pal. read ordine longo, a common and easy phrase: but we find longam also known as early as Gellius, 150 a. D.]

704. adolere, a strange word with various senses. Originally 'to increase' (cf. adolescens, alere, &c.) used (like macto) for 'to honour' gods.

Vergil uses it for to honour here: to offer ad. honores III. 547: to burn verbenas ad. Ecl. vIII. 65: to fire altaria VII. 71.

706. qui with subj. final, to load'.

708. pictis, embroidered', as often: 'to embroider' is properly pingere acu, so 711.

710. A fine effective line: 'the god's flaming glances and feigned words', dei comes in well after he has called him Iulum.

712. pesti, 'bane', 'ill', 'ruin'.

713. expleri mentem, quasi-middle, see above, 215; 'cannot sate her soul'.

715. complexu colloque abstract and concrete mixed. both abl. being local 'in the clasp and on the neck', i. e. clasped on the neck. 716. 'filled to the full his false father's love'.

720. matris Acidaliae, Venus, so called from a spring in Boeotia named Acidalian, where the Graces and Venus bathed.

720-2. Slowly to blot out Sychaeus, and with a living love to surprise a soul long slumbering and a heart unused'.

[723-756. Dido calls for a cup and pledges the strangers, the other princes follow. The minstrel sings of the heavenly bodies. Dido asks of all the events of Troy, and finally begs Aeneas to tell the whole story.]

724. vina coronant, Vergil clearly means 'put flowers round the cups', which the Romans did at feasts: so cratera corona induit, III. 525 but he intends no doubt also to translate the common Homeric phrase, κοῦροι δὲ κρητῆρας ἐπαστέψαντο ποτοῖο, which however simply means 'filled' not 'crowned'.

726. lychni, lamps', Greek word. V. is perhaps thinking of a feast in the halls of some court noble, where the lamps are costly works of art. Or he may merely wish to glorify a familiar thing, cf. 177.

aureis, 698.

730. a Belo, 'from Belus' race': the preposition like 'at mi genus a Iove'.

731. loquuntur, a poetic use with acc. inf. like dicunt, or ferunt. So Ecl. v. 28, ingemuisse leones...loquuntur.

734. bona, 'kindly'.

735. celebrate faventes, 'honour with good-will'.

736. laticum honorem, 'the offering of the flowing wine' (LL.), a Vergilian expression for the libation.

737. libato, abl. abs. ‘after libation'. So composito, cognito, permisso, auspicato, exposito: commoner in late Latin with no subst.

tenus implies that she did no more, 'just touched with her lips'. 738. Bitias is a courtier apparently.

increpitans, 'urging him', i. e. bidding him drink with speed.

739. pleno se proluit auro, ‘dipped deep into the brimming gold', Vergil's ornate-emphatic style.

740. Iopas is the bard who wore long hair like his patron Apollo (qui rore puro Castaliae lavit crines solutos Hor.), and sings at the banquet as in the Odyssey the bards do.

Atlas, according to the common tale was a conquered Titan, compelled to bear heaven on his shoulder. Even in Homer we find him.

The stories which represent him a wise philosopher and astronomer (as V. does here), and identify him with the African mountain, are later.

742. labores is used with lunae, G. 11. 478, for 'sufferings' meaning 'eclipse': and that may be the meaning here: but with errantem lunam it seems to be less restricted here, and mean 'the travails' of the sun including his regular courses.

744. Hyadas (vades the rainy stars'), a constellation whose morning rising in May announced the rainy season of spring.

Triones, trio, orig. ter-io ‘a plough-ox': the 'seven oxen' septemtriones was the name given to the constellation of the Great Bear: hence a new word was formed Septemtrio for the Great Bear or the 'north'. The last stage was to call the two Bears (Great and Little) gemini Triones.

745. i. e. why days are short and nights long in winter. These two lines are from G. II. 481-2.

747. ingeminant, intrans. with ablative, for variety. So G. 1. 333, Aen. IX. 811.

748. trahebat, 'lengthened out'.

751.

Aurorae filius, 'son of the dawn', Memnon, 489.

752. In Homer (II. XXIII. 400) Diomedes wins a chariot-race with horses of Aeneas. The comm. object to Dido asking about these horses as indelicate, and suppose some others are meant; for Diomedes won several in battle, but Vergil is probably thinking of the chariot

race.

756. The book ends skilfully with expectation of an interesting tale.