Virgil’s Aeneid
At the end of Virgil’s Aeneid, the hero of the epic famously executes Turnus, even as the latter has admitted defeat and is seeking mercy. Given the many parallels Virgil makes between Aeneas and Augustus throughout the poem, it is not surprising that scholars have generally assumed that the killing of Turnus should be read as a key piece of Virgil’s commentary on Augustus. Some readers consider the execution to be consistent with a thoroughly positive portrayal of Augustus in the poem. Others take the scene as an expression of pessimism about the Augustan regime. Yet others read ambivalence and/or uncertainty in this closing episode of the Aeneid.
Given what you have read in books 1, 6, and 8 of the Aeneid, which reading of the closing scene of book 12 do you find most consistent with the way Virgil has portrayed Augustus up to that point in the poem?
Citation: The conventional abbreviation for Virgil’s Aeneid is ‘Verg., Aen.’ followed by the book and line numbers. So the passage at book 12, lines 1094 to 1113 is cited thus: Verg., Aen. 12.1094–1113.
This paper is due during session 6.
