Vergil, Aeneid, Book 1, lines 1-49

read in the restored pronunciation of classical Latin

by Robert P. Sonkowsky, University of Minnesota.

(Text followed by translation)

Listen to the recording: Aeneid

I sing of arms, and of the man who, being driven from
his country by the decrees of Fate, first came from the
coasts of Troy to Italy, even to the Lavinian shore, much
harassed both on sea and land by the violence of heaven,
because of the unforgotten grudge of relentless Juno;
suffering much in war too, while he strove to found a city,
and to establish his gods in Latium; from him sprang the
Latin race, the Alban fathers, and the walls of lofty Rome.
Rehearse to me, O Muse, the causes, - for what insult to
her divinity, or by what act aggrieved, did the queen of
heaven force a man noted for his goodness to pass through
so many trials, to undergo so many hardships. Is it possible
that such resentment can exist in the minds of deities?
There was in olden times a city, Carthage by name,
occupied by settlers from Tyre, facing Italy and the mouth
of the Tiber, though far away, rich in its resources, and
devoted to the stern pursuits of war; a city which Juno is
said to have regarded with special favour more than all other
lands, Samos even being second to it.
Here were her arms; here was her chariot; it, even at
that early day, she purposes to be the capital of the earth,
and she cherishes it with that intent, if by any means
the Fates permit. But she had heard that a race is being
derived from Trojan blood which shall one day overturn the
Tyrian towers: that a people of extended sway, and formidable
in war, should spring from it, to the ruin of Africa; that
this the wheel of Fate is bringing round. This the daughter
of Saturn dreaded, and well remembered the long protracted
war which she, with special bitterness, had carried
on at Troy in behalf of her beloved Argos; for not even
yet had the causes of her anger and her keen pangs of
resentment faded from her recollection; the judgement of
Paris dwells deeply lodged in her mind, the affront offered
to her slighted beauty, and the detested race, and the
honours conferred on Ganymede, to heaven borne.
Enraged to fury because of these things, she chased over
the whole ocean those of the Trojans whom the Greeks and
the merciless Achilles spared, and kept them far from
Latium; and thus, hounded by the fates, for many years they
roamed round every sea. So hard it was to found the
Roman State.
Scarcely were the Trojans, clearing Sicily, fairly out to
sea, and with their prows were joyously driving before them
the briny foam, when Juno, nursing in her heart her
never-dying wound, thus muttered to herself: To think of
me abandoning my purpose as one baffled, and that I
should not be able to divert from Italy this Prince of
Troy! I am forbidden by the fates, forsooth! Was not
Pallas Minerva able to burn the Grecian ships, and drown
their crews in ocean, for the crime of one, and the mad
passion of Ajax, Oïleus’s son? She, in person, hurling
from the clouds Jove’s swift lightning, both scattered their
ships and upturned the sea with the winds: him, too,
breathing flames from his pierced breast, she caught in a
whirling eddy, and impaled him on a pointed rock. But I,
who walk in my majesty as the queen of the gods, - I, both
the sister and the wife of Jupiter, am still carrying on war
for so many years with a single nation; and after that, can
men worship Juno’s deity any longer, and lay offerings on
her altar?

                                                               trans. A. Bryce

 
This selection is an excerpt from the recording “Selections from Vergil,” Audio Forum, Madison, CT 06443, with the kind permission of the publisher. For further information, click here audioforum.com.

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