“The crescent waters of a tranquil bay
break through the curving line of cliff on either hand. The spot is of Nature's
giving: one single beach lies between sea and hill, ending towards the land in
overhanging rocks . . . Here would the nimble choir [the Nereides] of Phorcus
wish to bathe, and Cymodoce with dripping tresses and sea-green Galatea." Why Phorcys? In Greek it would be Nereus. I also found “the flood maiden Panopea heard him, with all Phorcus' choir of
Nereids, and lord Portunus with his own mighty hand pushed him on his way.”(Statius, Silvae 2. 2. 14 ff
“Achates, the companion of his breast, Goes
grieving by his side, with equal cares oppress'd.” “In the Aeneid, Achates (good,
faithful Achates, as he was called) was a close friend of Aeneas; his name
became a by-word for an intimate companion.”(Wikipedia). Therapon?
“Two doves, descending from their
airy flight, Secure upon the grassy plain alight.” Aeneid 6
“For,
when the fatal horse, descending down, Pregnant with arms, o'erwhelm'd th'
unhappy town” Virgil is maintaining the Greek pun of “animal litter” and “ambush” “The
horse that was the instrument of Fate, heavy with the brood of armed men in its
belly.” (Penguin translation.)
Dark night had risen in her chariot to
command the vault of heaven, when suddenly there appeared the form of his
father..." but now farewell. The dewy night is turning her chariot
in mis-course. The cruel sun is beginning to rise in the east and I have
felt the brreath of his panting horses." The ghost of
Anchises departing from his dreaming son Aeneas.
“(At the entrance to the Isle of the Blest)
Aeneas leapt on the threshold sprinkled
his body with fresh water and fixed the (golden) bough full in the doorway.” I have an image in my mind’s-eye, from Book 5
when Sleep “the god, shaking
over his (Palinarus’) temples a bough
dripping with Lethe’s dew and steeped in drowsy might of Styx.”,It also reminded
me of the Vedic-god Indira who
promised the demon Namuci not to kill him by day or by night, not with
what was wet nor what was dry. But he wretched off his head in the
morning twilight by sprinkling over him the foam of the sea. (Bhagavatam 8:11)
At
Aeneid 6:630 when the Sibyl and Aeneas enter the land of the Blest,
I recognized the landscape of every movie about Heaven or a Golden Age I
have ever seen. Is this the prototype of the Western concept of Heaven?
In these words
the Cumaean Sibyl chants from the shrine her dread enigmas and booms from the
cavern, wrapping truth in darkness.” [6.98]
Hecate,
supreme both in Heaven and in Hell. Aeneid
6
“Scarce had he said
these words when under his very eyes twin doves, as it chanced, came flying
from the sky and lit on the green grass.” Aeneid 6
Aeneid sacrifices “Proserpine,
a barren heifer.” In many traditions Prosepine and Hades never had
children.
“Hither rushed
all the throng, streaming to the banks; mothers and men and bodies of
high-souled heroes, their life now done, boys and unwedded girls, and sons
placed on the pyre before their fathers’ eyes; thick as the leaves of the
forest that at autumn’s first frost drop and fall,” (Aeneid 6) Once more mankind compared to leaves. “thick as the birds that from the seething
deep flock shoreward, when the chill of the year drives them overseas and sends
them into sunny lands.” A hint of better things to come for the souls
of the dead as Anchises will explain.
Oh, it is such a greater world that waits them! After Aeneas sees the mystic poetic Orpheus
and his heroic ancestors,
"Others he sees, to right and left, feasting
on the grassy field, and chanting in chorus a joyous hymn within a fragrant
laurel grove, from where the full flood of the River Eridanus rolls upward
through the forest. Here is the band of
those who suffered wounds, fighting for their country; those who in lifetime
were priests and pure, good bards, whose songs were meet for Phoebus; or they
who ennobled life by arts discovered and they who by service have won
remembrance among men – the brows of all bound with headbands white as snow.”
Virgil is
pointing out that people besides “heroes” make it into the Isle of Blessed,
Elysium, Paradise, the Isle of Leuce, whatever you call it. These are people were poets, priests, artists
and people whose good works are still remembered.
What the poet is not saying is the significance of the
reference to Orpheus. Orpheus represents
the Orphic Mysteries. In the same way
that Christians know they will be resurrected; because Christ was, so the
Romans and Greeks knew they could escape Hades because Orpheus did. (Remember?
He was there and back trying to rescue his wife, but made the mistake of
looking back instead of concentrating on gazing ahead at their bright new
future.) Likewise Persephone returned so
those who attended the Eleusian Mysteries knew they could return.
The truth that the “little guy”, the ordinary person,
women and children will make it to a better world is hidden in most ancient
poetry. The Nordic Sagas sing the
praises of the fallen Viking warriors partying it up in Valhalla anxiously
awaiting the day when they and the gods take on the forces of evil and
chaos. But when the Universe Tree
collapses in flames and sea boils over a new world arises; it is the estate of
the god of all good things in Norse Mythology; Balder. He and his family have lived hidden away all
this time in a beautiful corner of Hel’s kingdom. And when this new world arises there hidden
in his forest are the “good people”
